This year's venture capital total as of the third quarter shows that money raised by biopharmaceutical companies is on a rollercoaster ride in 2019, according to the latest Venture Monitor report from Pitchbook and the National Venture Capital Association (NVCA).
Finance Watch: 3Q Biopharma Venture Capital Financings Fell From 2Q Spike
VC deals totaled $8.3bn in the first half of 2019, but the year's total rose to just $11.5bn at the end of September, reflecting only a $3.2bn third quarter gain. Among recent financings, Cygnal emerged from stealth mode with $65m invested to date.

More from Financing
Public Company Edition: Stock valuations are falling due to political, economic and regulatory uncertainty, resulting in fewer large public offerings, more alternative financings and cost cuts. Carisma, Tenaya, BioAtla, Arbutus, Nkarta, Alector and Adaptimmune announced layoffs.
CEO Kris Elverum told Scrip about the start-up’s platform for editing RNA to correct genetic variants that cause harm and to reproduce healthy variants as a means of treating disease.
The four-year-old firm said it plans to advance programs toward the clinic from the funding round, which comes just over a year after signing two major pharma partnerships.
Private Company Edition: The latest group of drug developers to announce venture capital financings is remarkable for its geographic diversity, from Character Biosciences’ $93m series B round in the US to Augustine’s $85m series B in Belgium to a $29.2m series C for Aculys in Japan.
More from Business
The German firm’s chairman, Hubertus von Baumbach, is adopting a ‘wait-and-see’ approach to the threat of pharma tariffs.
Trump announced a 26% reciprocal tariff on India but a country-agnostic exemption of pharmaceuticals implies that the interests of Indian firms and the US consumer are protected for now. What is Indian pharma’s business exposure and what is domestic industry saying?
Industry lobbied for pharmaceuticals to be exempt from Trump’s sweeping US tariffs and the effort appears to have paid off. J&J, Lilly and Merck & Co. even got shout outs.