Some Venture Funds Hit “Pause” on Big Deals
Over the past year, Marc Andreessen invested in a series of high-profile Web companies, including Facebook Inc., Twitter Inc. and Groupon Inc. Now the Silicon Valley venture capitalist is hitting the pause button on such big-name deals.
Since participating in a $112 million funding of Web darling Airbnb Inc. in July that valued the online room-rental company at more than $1 billion, Mr. Andreessen said his venture-capital firm Andreessen Horowitz has “taken a step back.”
With some deals for private companies “definitely on the expensive side” amid a choppy stock market and concerns over a European debt crisis, Mr. Andreessen said he is looking to invest in fast-growing tech start-ups that aren’t as well known and where “pricing is still under control.”
