The real news here? Most people in the tech world thought that number would be higher.
The Numbers
Here’s what Mattermark had to say in a recent blog post: The Series B, meanwhile, remains the easiest round to land: Series B dollars are up 207 percent since Q3 2015, though VC investment continues to constrict slightly overall.
The Expectations
Interestingly, Mattermark includes a Twitter poll in which 60 percent of the 514 respondents said that they expected the three accelerators to be responsible for more than the roughly 10 percent of Series A rounds that they landed in 2016. It looks like the majority of tech insiders who voted expect to see a wider divide among successful accelerators and lesser known ones. This response aligns with certain popular beliefs in the tech community. Consider the 80/20 rule, also known at the Pareto principle, which states that around 80 percent of one’s benefits often come from 20 percent of one’s causes. Or, even better, take a look at income inequality in the U.S., which is far worse than the average person assumes it is: The top one percent in the U.S. average earnings of $1.3 million a year, over three times as much as they pulled in during the 1980s, while the bottom 50 percent average $16,000, a number that’s stayed the same for three decades. While the top three startup accelerators should definitely be congratulated for their significant chunk of Series A successes, the numbers might just as easily be a vote of confidence in all the other accelerators out there. After all, that remaining 90 percent needs to come from somewhere.
