Mergers and acquisitions activity and US initial public offerings of venture-backed companies are on pace this year to hit their lowest point this decade , according to new data from Dow Jones VentureSource. During the third quarter, venture-backed companies produced just $4.57 billion through IPOs and M&A, down 66% from the $13.4 billion generated in the year-ago period.

The IPO market continues to be shut off for venture-backed companies, as only Rackspace Hosting Inc. (NYSE: RAX) went public in the third quarter, compared with 11 such offerings a year ago. Meanwhile, 66 M&A deals involving venture-backed companies generated $4.4 billion, compared with 116 deals and $12.7 billion a year earlier.

Safety-Kleen (SK) is North America's leading provider of used oil recycling and parts cleaning.

All quotations are from the company’s most recent S-1 filing, with links provided

There have been just 54 initial public offerings so far this year, which is the lowest number through September of any year since at least 1991.  The second lowest was during the dot com hangover of 2001, when there were 66 through September.  After a decent amount of 15 offerings in January, we saw 8 in February, 5 in March, 5 in April, 8 in May, 4 in June, July and August, and just 1 so far in September.

The lack of revenues from IPOs, while probably the least of many financial firms' worries right now, is not helping things for Wall Street.  Below we highlight the monthly IPO totals in the US going back to 2000 and over a longer time period back to 1991.

Just before the worst of the market meltdown, I interviewed tech stalwart Marc Andreessen in front of an audience at Silicon Valley's Churchill Club. We got talking about the situation on Wall Street and how it has affected tech IPOs -- i.e., there are none. That led to an exchange about who he supports for president.

From the interview transcript:

Venture capitalists may not be exposed to toxic mortgage securities, but they, and the startups that they fund, will feel the pain, nonetheless.

A Yale University professor and a think tank analyst said the turmoil on Wall Street will extend the current deep freeze in the initial public offering market, curb merger and acquisition activity, and make it harder to raise money from limited partners.

By Jennifer Kho

If thin-film solar companies such as Nanosolar, Miasole and SoloPower succeed, a new company called SMG Indium Resources Ltd. (ITD) could also benefit.

Italian utility giant Enel is considering spinning off 40 percent of its clean-energy business in a public offering next year, according to research firm New Energy Finance (via Clean Edge).

The news comes a few days after U.S. wind-power company Noble Environmental Power filed to sell 23.4 million shares in an initial public offering – despite an ongoing investigation from New York's attorney general.

iRobot (IRBT) had about $76 million in cash after its IPO in 2005, which was priced at $24.00 per share for approximately 23.4 million shares.

After WowWee's pseudo reverse merger into Optimal Group, Inc. (OPMR), and OPMR’s Optimal Payments subsidiary assets sales, OPMR will likely have significantly more cash than what IRBT had after its IPO, about the same number of shares [with OPMR’s share buyback], and about the same revenue [$142 million revenue for IRBT in 2005 vs. WowWee 2008E revenue of $130 to $140 million].

Sometimes a big juicy IPO is just what the market needs to shake loose from its doldrums. It's hard to tell whether private equity-owned Avago Technologies Ltd.'s upcoming offering will be such a seminal event, but it sure is the biggest deal to consider plying the turbulent public markets in some time.

The former Agilent Technologies Inc. (A) chip unit, which was acquired by Kohlberg Kravis Roberts and Silver Lake Partners for $2.66 billion in 2005, in one of the biggest tech LBOs, filed on Thursday to go public.

This Mission Viejo, CA company operates 54 skilled nursing facilities and 7 assisted living facilities in California, Arizona, Texas, Utah, and Idaho. One thing is for sure about our population: it is aging and it will continue to age as we continue to find drugs that help us live longer and healthier lives. 

Proof that The Ensign Group (ENSG) is doing well early on is its recent growth the past three quarters in EPS, with 20%, 55%, and 19% growth. That, combined with revenue growth the past eight quarters of 20%, 15%, 18%, 17%, 13% 12%, 16%, and 15%, shows that this company is clicking on all cylinders. Future estimates for the company are great with YOY ESP gains of 35% and 20% expected in 2008 and 2009 respectively. 

After filing for an IPO last April in which it hoped to raise $400 million, Web hosting provider (and cloud-computing aspirant) Rackspace finally priced its IPO last night at $12.50 a share. That would have brought in $187.5 million, or half what it was hoping for. But it opened this morning at $10 (ticker: RAX). It’s been been going up since then to about $11.

And Rackspace is a solid company financially. But in this market, any IPO is a sign of hope (there were no VC-backed IPOs last quarter). Rackspace backed off from an IPO once before, in 2000. It’s been champing at the bit to go public for a long time. It looks like the shares are trading up. Let’s see where they end the day.

Bruce Lipnick’s latest attempt to unload stock in Asset Alliance Corp, his accident-prone alternative investment manager roll-up, is over.

Tailwind Financial Inc (“Tailwind”) (AMEX: TNF), a blank check development stage company, and Asset Alliance Corporation (“Asset Alliance”), a Delaware corporation, today jointly announced that they have terminated the Agreement and Plan of Merger between Tailwind and Asset Alliance dated January 8, 2008...The decision to terminate was based on the belief that the transaction would not receive shareholder approval due to market conditions in the financial services sector...Asset Alliance will seek other sources of capital to expand its manager acquisition and manager seeding business...

As expected, A123 Systems filed a registration statement for a planned $175 million IPO last Friday. I believe the A123 IPO, together with recent industry reports by Merriman Curhan Ford and Lux Research, will begin to draw attention to the energy storage sector in a whole new way and mark the beginning of a major upward trend in a basic industry that's been undervalued for years. While it seems that nobody really wants to talk about batteries in a wired world, the fact is we couldn't be wired without them. And as we shift to alternative energy and electric vehicles in response to high oil prices, the demand for many energy storage technologies is likely to soar.

Today I'm going to venture a little out of my depth and try to provide a simple primer on energy storage for the electric utility grid. I'm not seeking perfection in this endeavor and will be happy with B- grades from the power professionals and engineers out there. My goal is to try and establish a baseline context for discussion and analysis, show why I believe some unloved companies are likely to be big winners.

Companies itching to IPO are braving the markets again. This morning, Rackspace had its IPO (RAX) and today nanotech battery company A123 Systems filed its IPO registration document [an S-1] with the SEC. The Boston-based company is hoping to raise $175 million in an IPO. (It’s already raised $132 million in venture funding from Sequoia, General Motors, Motorola, Qualcomm, and others).

A123 Systems makes next-gen lithium ion batteries for electric and hybrid vehicles, as well as for smaller portable devices. It is working closely with GM and Black & Decker. The company, which came out of MIT, already employs 1,100 people (150 in R&D alone), and has been manufacturing batteries for two years. The company’s revenues in the first quarter of 2008 was $10.3 million, and its sales for all of 2007 was $41.3 million. It’s also been eating through a lot of cash. Last quarter it had a net loss of $14 million, and last year it lost $31 million.

All quotations are from the company’s most recent S-1 filing, with links provided.

Rackspace, Inc. (RAX) will list shares on the NYSE this week, offering investors a chance to own a small part of this dynamic, growing technology company. The deal is expected to price between $12 and $16 and there are 15 million shares being offered. The number of shares outstanding will be north of 115 million which means that only 13% of the total shares will be in float to start with. Goldman Sachs, Credit Suisse, and Merrill Lynch will be the lead underwriters, with a small handful of other firms also participating.

The company has decided to take a non-traditional approach in offering the shares to the public. The process resembles a Dutch Auction where potential buyers are asked to submit the number of shares they would be willing to buy, and the price they would be willing to pay. Once the bids are collected, the underwriters determine at what price the total block of 15 million shares would be sold and then distributes the shares to successful bidders. All shares are distributed at the same price so if a bidder was willing to buy 20,000 shares at $18.00 and the underwriters determine the offering price to be $15.50, then the bidder would receive his full 20,000 shares at the $15.50 offering price.

I should learn Chinese. Not a week goes by that I don’t regret not being able to read Chinese (and by that I mean Mandarin Chinese — the country’s official dialect), if not speak the language.

It’s a symptom of our international economic age: At least a tenth of the information on companies, industries and investments that I’d like to access only appears in Chinese. That’s a lot of data I can’t find because of a lack of language.

Business/Overview

China Mass Media International Advertising Corp. is a leading independent television advertising company in China. It provides a full range of integrated television advertising services, including:

On June 28, Bill Simpson wrote an analysis of Energy Recovery Devices (ERII). July 2, the initial public offering of 14 million shares priced at $8.50, near the top of the expected price range.

The text of Mr. Simpson's original writeup follows: