That’s good news, especially given the recent debates about the health of biotech venture and funding for innovation. But it’s interesting to note that if you broaden your view to include not just U.S., but global biotech fundraising, and not just venture-backed deals but all non-partnering money raised by private companies – you see that the $774 million raised in Q1 2012 represents a slight dip from the $845 million raised in Q1 2011 and the $974 million raised in Q4 2011.

What does that mean? My guess is these minor quarter-to-quarter fluctuations don’t mean much. But one interesting point: in 2011 we saw some really big non-venture deals like Pro Bono Bio‘s $600 million from government-owned Rusnano, H3 Biomedicine‘s $200 million round from Eisai Co. Ltd., and Ascletis Inc.’s $100 million mainly from Chinese entrepreneurs. We didn’t see any big deals like that in Q1 2012 – the closest was Supernus Pharmaceuticals Inc.’s $42 million raised through a combination of royalty monetization and venture debt. Most of the private company fundraising so far this year has indeed come from VCs. It will be interesting to see if the non-VC private fundraising component picks up later this year or if the new creative VC partnerships (with folks like Rusnano or big pharma) are the way of the future.

Also interesting to note that public company financing dipped more than private company financing in the first quarter of the year (vs. the same period last year). Biotechs raised $2.5 billion via public offerings and $1.88 billion via public alternatives (PIPEs, registered directs, loans, etc) in Q12012 vs. $3.2 billion and $2.07 billion, respectively, in Q12011.

Annette Grimaldi, managing director at BMO Capital Markets, said there’s no reason to panic about these dips either. She noted that as public offering terms have improved, companies have been less interested in the alternatives, and as a slew of biotechs covered their financing overhangs in late 2011, there’s now less need in 2012. For all the details, check out this week’s BioWorld Insight . . .

Distraction is so rampant in society that it hardly even seems rude any more to multitask in conference sessions. There is so much competition for our attention that we are perpetually too preoccupied to focus on a primary task.

Out of 173 audience members in attendance at a panel discussion at the BIO CEO and Investor Conference in New York in February, I counted 52 who were giving undistracted attention to the goings-on. The rest were either texting, tweeting, web surfing, playing games(!), or actually talking on their phones. Four were dozing, so I assume their batteries had drained!

A recent performance of the New York Symphony at Lincoln Center was stopped by the conductor when a cell phone repeatedly rang during the performance. The owner of the evidently-too-smart-for him device claimed it was a recent purchase and that he did not know how to silence the ring (or turn it off either, evidently).

In a fleeting newscast pan shot this week, I saw four people participating in the 2012 Selma-to-Montgomery March re-enactment who were talking on cellphones as they passed the camera. I couldn’t help but think Martin Luther King Jr. and his fellow marchers were dodging bricks, attack dogs, high-pressure water and epitaphs – but not annoying, intrusive phone conversations.

I was at a comedy show about four years ago and a ticketholder was talking loud on a cell and fingering her smart device throughout the set. When the comedian could take no more, his act abruptly turned into a five-minute personal insult tirade that started out with the offender trying to trade barbs with the professional, but ended with her storming out in tears and the audience giving the comedian a standing ovation. I am not so sure the audience would react the same today. They’d either sympathize with the serial talker or be too involved themselves cleaning out their inboxes, tweeting a recap of the jokes to their followers or capturing the war of words to upload to video.

Biotech is a big and serious business, but courtesy and good manners have been around even longer than the first biologics license application, so let’s not lose our civility. After all, how would you feel if an FDA advisory panel member felt obliged to interrupt the meeting to tweet and take phone calls?

It’s no excuse, but part of the problem that emboldens this impoliteness may be the relaxed setting of the spacious conference rooms. I do not witness such discourtesy in the more intimate milieus for board meetings, staff meetings or one-on-one engagements. I can’t imagine a biotech executive not giving his undivided attention in wooing a VC in a conference tête-à-tête by cleaning out his inbox or cutting off the dialogue with, “I have to take this call – it’s my wife – No dear, spaghetti’s fine – Now, where were we?”

Financing denied!

Upon contemplating the ever-increasing divided attention order-of-things-to-come trend, I’d like to know what does everyone think?

• Do you consider it discourteous to interface with smart devices while speakers are engaged in communication on stage?
• With live webcasts and other high-tech options emerging, is physical attendance even no longer necessary to produce a successful conference?

Well, I’ve exceeded 400 words, which is the new media attention-span article threshold. So, I need to wrap this up before the auto-censoring feature on my tablet termina – - -

You heard that right. According to data from BioWorld Insight and BioWorld Snapshots, Seed and Series A rounds accounted for a healthy 27.5 percent of private biotech funding so far in 2011, up from just 17.7 percent in 2010.

Here’s the catch. The biggest start-up round this year was the $200 million raised by cancer company H3 Biomedicine, and it wasn’t venture money. H3 is a subsidiary of Eisai Co. Ltd., which provided its start-up funding. Similarly, the second biggest round this year ‑ $100 million raised by oncology and infectious disease start-up Ascletis Inc. – wasn’t venture money either. The round was led by Hangzhou Binjiang Investment Holding Co. – a holding firm for Chinese real estate billionaire Jinxing Qi, and additional money came from Ascletis’ CEO and other private entrepreneurs.

What does that say about the changing role of VCs in funding innovation and the new normal for start-up biotechs? Find out at BIO 2011!

Starting Up Biotechs in the New Normal World

10 AM Wednesday, June 29, 2011, Room 149AB

• Lynn Yoffee, Managing Editor, BioWorld Today, will present the latest statistics on funding for biotech start-ups.
• Susan Molineaux, President and CEO, Calithera Biosciences Inc., will discuss how Calithera was able to raise $40 million in Series A funding from VCs in 2010.
• Walter Ogier, President and CEO, Acetylon Pharmaceuticals Inc., will discuss how Acetylon was able to initially raise funding from private investors rather than VCs.
• Arthur M. Pappas, Managing Partner, Pappas Ventures, will provide the VC view on funding for innovation.
• Edward Tenthoff, Analyst, Piper Jaffray & Co., will discuss how biotech exits have changed in recent years and how to survive in the new normal world.