Venture capital funding in health IT sector almost doubled to $1.6b

There were 165 deals transacted.

Mercom Capital Group, llc, a global communications and research firm, released its report on funding and mergers and acquisitions (M&A) activity for the Healthcare Information Technology (IT) / Digital Health sector for the first quarter of 2017.

Venture capital (VC) funding, including private equity and corporate venture capital, in the Health IT sector almost doubled quarter-over-quarter (QoQ), coming in at $1.6 billion in 165 deals compared to $845 million in 159 deals in Q4 2016. VC funding in Q1 2017 was also up compared to Q1 2016 when nearly $1.4 billion was raised in 146 deals. The Digital Health sector has now received $20 billion in VC funding since 2010.

Total corporate funding in Health IT companies - including VC, debt and public market financing came to $1.8 billion compared to $1 billion in Q4 2016.

Since 2010, VC funding in the Healthcare IT sector has now crossed $20 billion (2010 - Q1 2017).

“Digital Health funding is off to a fast start this year and there was no visible ‘Trump effect’ on investments in the sector, at least in the first quarter, and publicly-traded Digital Health companies actually fared much better in Q1 than last year,” commented Raj Prabhu, CEO and Co-Founder of Mercom Capital Group.

Healthcare practice-centric companies received 35 percent of the funding in Q1 2017, raising $574 million in 50 deals compared to $261 million in 42 deals in Q4 2016. Consumer-centric companies received 65 percent of the funding this quarter, bringing in $1 billion in 115 deals compared to $584 million in 117 deals in Q4 2016.