While the overall U.S. venture capital market has drawn headlines for record-breaking total investment levels in 2021, the story has been far different for smaller deals. Data currently suggests a decline in deals under $1 million, and only modest growth for deals under $5 million. The final data may tell a slightly different story,[1] but the level of activity at the smaller end of the spectrum is clearly quite different than what is driving market coverage. Of the $335 billion in angel, seed and venture capital deals PitchBook has identified for 2021, more than 10 percent went to deals of $1 billion or more and almost 60 percent to deals worth at least $100 million.