After more than a year and a half of capital raising records, April 2022 turned out to be one of the weakest months for Israeli startups in recent years. Is this because of the Passover holiday or have we reached the "investment winter" that investors have been warning us about?

This little amount of fundraising has not been seen in Israel for almost two years

In the past month, 24 Israeli startups reported raising capital totalling $694 million, a relatively low amount, which is reminiscent of the levels raised in August 2020. During that month, Israeli startups reported raising $612 million. However, it is important to remember that these are reported capital raisings, and not necessarily those that have actually closed. Startups and equity funds often prefer to postpone reports until after Pesach and the Sabbath, to gain more media exposure, so some of the fundraisers that closed last month may only be reported in May.

However, when compared to ‘the Passover period’ from previous years, the situation is not looking good. In the same period in 2021, Israeli startups reported raising $2.3 billion - with the startup Trax raising $640 million alone; this is nearly the total amount raised this past month. Also in April 2020, just after the eruption of COVID-19, Israeli startups raised almost a billion dollars - much more than last month. Only in 2019, did we find a month in which the total recruitment from the Passover period was lower than that of last month. So, for comparison, Israeli startups raised $589 million in 2019.

Most of the investments reported this past month were from young startups - in the Seed stages to Series A - with 16 deals reported compared to only 9 deals of growing startups (Series B and up). Of those emerging companies, we saw just one $100 million mega-fundraiser last month - from Viz.ai - which also became the only unicorn that month.

The only unicorn of the month of April: Viz.ai. Photo: Toot Yaeli

Another interesting point about last month: No Israeli company has reported an acquisition or merger (exit), although several Israeli companies have reported acquisitions of foreign companies. This is a particularly uncommon case - which hasn't happened since August 2018. Is this a sign of things to come? Not sure, but it will be interesting to follow.

April 2022’s Reported Fundraising rounds: