Fresh from making $140 million from the sale of Bebo and a “substantial return” on the sale of MySQL, Balderton Capital is announcing a new $430 million (£285 million) tech and media fund to capitalise on promising business plans thrown up in the downturn - proving that VCs really mean it when they say money is still available for good ideas.

Though private equity is finding it harder to raise money from banks, Balderton - which was Benchmark’s European arm but span out in 2007 - assembled most of its new fund from investors in just two months, general manager Barry Maloney told FT.com: “We are about to enter a very interesting time for new investments, if not for exits. Part of the reason for raising this fund now is to take advantage of the opportunities that this stage of the cycle throws up.” Innovation gets another spurt in times like these, many investors say, explaining that Web 2.0 came off the back of the dot.com crash. VC money isn’t going away - Accel unveiled a $525 million new London fund last month. More at paidContent:UK...

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