Angel Capital Education Foundation, Silicon Valley Bank and CB Insights Create Partnership to Produce 'Halo Report'

KANSAS CITY, Mo., SANTA CLARA, Calif. and NEW YORK, Feb. 23, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- The Angel Capital Education Foundation (ACEF), Silicon Valley Bank (SVB) and CB Insights today announced a partnership intended to raise awareness of early stage investment activities.  Together, the three organizations will produce a quarterly research report, titled the Halo Report, which will highlight angel investment activity and trends in the United States and Canada and provide much sought after data that has not been previously available to entrepreneurs or early stage investors.  

By combining CB Insights' extensive database of private company financings, SVB's knowledge and experience in working with startups, and ACEF's expertise in angel investing, this partnership will offer an unprecedented level of visibility into early stage investment.  The Halo Report will include aggregate analysis of quarterly investment activity by angels and angel groups and will highlight trends across topics such as round sizes, location and industry preferences, among others.  The transaction details will also be available in the CB Insights subscription database for users to review and analyze themselves.  

CB Insights specializes in gathering and providing data on high growth private companies.  CB Insights CEO and Co-founder, Anand Sanwal, said "Unlike data on VC investments, comprehensive, rigorously collected data on angel-backed companies and angel investors does not currently exist in any centralized fashion.  We're looking forward to using our technology and capabilities in partnership with ACEF and SVB to bring greater visibility to this extremely important segment of early-stage investing and to ultimately build data-driven tools that help both investors and the startups they support."

According to Gerald Brady, Head of the Entrepreneur Services Group at SVB, "Angel investors are the key spark that ignites the entrepreneurial ecosystem, kick-starting the investment capital that drives innovation and entrepreneurship.  Given SVB's mission to help entrepreneurs succeed, we are thrilled to be part of this partnership. Together, we will provide more transparency into angel investment activity, along with rich data and analysis that will help inform entrepreneurs' decisions, as they produce innovative new products and build the next generation of exciting new companies."

In addition, the Halo Report will provide information that is important for our nation's long term sustainability, according to Allan May, ACEF Chair. "If new companies are the source of job creation and innovation as recent data and reports from the Kauffman Foundation and the Small Business Administration suggest," May said, "then as the primary source of investment capital for entrepreneurs, angel investing needs to be well understood. This partnership provides an important step toward our goal of providing accurate data to help the public understand who angel investors are, how they operate, what their results are, and how angel investment can impact the economic recovery."

The first Halo Report is expected to be available in the second half of 2011.  

Angel groups and individual angel investors interested in including their data in the Halo Report should contact Sarah Dickey, ACEF Research Manager, for details.  She can be reached via 913-894-4700 and [email protected].

The Angel Capital Education Foundation (ACEF) is a charitable organization devoted to education and research in the field of angel investing, a growing driver of our entrepreneurial economy. ACEF was founded by the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation.  The programs of ACEF include educational workshops and seminars, research projects and reports, and information about angel investing for the general public. ACEF is affiliated with the Angel Capital Association, the professional association of angel groups in North America. More information is available at www.angelcapitaleducation.org.

For nearly 30 years, SVB Financial Group (Nasdaq: SIVB) and its subsidiaries, including Silicon Valley Bank, have been dedicated to helping entrepreneurs succeed. SVB Financial Group is a financial holding company that serves companies in the technology, life science, venture capital/private equity and premium wine industries. Offering diversified financial services through Silicon Valley Bank, SVB Analytics, SVB Capital, and SVB Private Client Services, SVB Financial Group provides clients with commercial, investment, international and private banking services. SVB also offers funds management, broker-dealer services and asset management, as well as the added value of its knowledge and networks worldwide. More information on SVB can be found at www.svb.com. 

CB Insights is a technology and information services firm that offers comprehensive information, intelligence and insights about private companies that have received venture capital, private equity, angel or government funding.  Its products include the CB Insights database platform which offers structured, searchable data on companies and investors as well as FundingFlash, a daily email detailing venture capital, growth equity and angel investment deals.  CB Insights is used by leading venture capitalists, private equity professionals, corporate M&A professionals, angel investors, investment bankers, and governments.  For more information, visit www.cbinsights.com.

SOURCE Silicon Valley Bank; CB Insights; Angel Capital Education Foundation