Cleantech investments skyrocket in 4Q05

Following up on yesterday's cleantech market growth news comes impressive data from the Cleantech Venture Network today, showing that a half a billion dollars were invested into cleantech startups by VCs in the fourth quarter last year. Matt Marshall's already got the scoop (as well as a link to the press release), and he contrasts these totals with total semiconductor venture investments in the same period.

These results show a huge uptick in VC activity in cleantech sectors, a 60% increase on fourth quarter numbers from 2004, and an 18% increase on 3Q05 figures. The numbers show that cleantech grew to 10% of all venture investments in the quarter. Sure, one can go back and forth on the specific figures (and the Cleantech Venture Network does a terrific job with an inherently impossible task), but the directional answer is clear -- these results simply put some numbers down to back up the clear trend toward more and more VC investments in clean technologies.

Here's the AP newswire story.