The report from the U.S. Department of Commerce finds that most funding for technology development in the phase between invention and innovation comes from individual private-equity “angel” investors, corporations and the federal government-not venture capitalists. This supports the view that markets for allocating risk capital to early-stage technology ventures are not efficient.
Link
http://www.atp.nist.gov/eao/gcr02-841/gcr02-841.pdf