The drop in investment mirrors global trends, which faced a sixth consecutive quarter of declining investment rates. Photograph: iStockRising interest rates, high inflation and the Russian invasion of Ukraine have driven venture capital investment into Ireland down by more than 15 per cent compared with the second quarter of last year and fintech investment down to just $59 million , two reports by KPMG show.
The quarterly Venture Pulse report shows that in the second quarter of this year Irish companies raised investment of just $172.5 million, a 17 per cent decrease from the $207 million recorded in the same period of 2022. The number of deals in the sector dropped from 44 last year to 33 in 2023 amid concerns of high inflation and rising interest rates.
The drop in investment mirrors the global trends, which faced a sixth consecutive quarter of declining investment rates. The second quarter saw global venture capital investment drop to $77.4 billion in 7,783 deals from the $86.2 billion of investment across 10,121 seen in the first three months of the year.
The biggest deals in the second quarter were a $53.6 million investment into Dublin-based unified payment platform NomuPay and medical technology company Neuromod Devices, which received $32 million in investment.