私人市场通常随着公开市场的涨跌而起伏。就风投对企业级软件公司的估值而言，情况似乎也是如此。

    我们不妨看看过去几年上市的几家获得风投支持的企业级软件公司近期的股价表现：WorkDay公司在过去三个月股价下跌了13.88％。Talbeau软件公司股价缩水了15.48％。而Splunk公司更是跌去了20.18％。总之，公开市场投资者的关注点从成长更多地转向了价值。

    目前获得风投对企业级软件领域的估值数据还为时过早，但多位投资人向我表示，他们已经看到公开市场下行的影响。不出所料，首当其冲的是上市前融资回合，同时，市场下行的影响正在逆企业生命周期蔓延至企业初期的风投估值。

    对此，Emergence Capital Partners公司合伙人戈登•里特解释称：“企业级软件估值方面一直存在‘传递’心态。所以，当公开市场的估值缩水，企业和风投公司自然得适应变化。”Emergence Capital Partners曾投资过Salesforce.com和Veeva Systems等公司。

    Veeva公司的股价在过去一个季度的下跌幅度超过了30％。

    里特还表示，他知道好几位企业家为了加快达成交易，接受了比今年早些时候较低的估值。

    Merus Capital公司的肖恩•登普西表示，他在首轮投资领域尚未看到估值有大的变化，但他承认，估值下降可能只是时间问题。登普西说道：“大家可以看到，涌入后期投资领域的对冲基金和其他公司太多了，这肯定不会有什么好结果。我们从事首轮投资，因此最后才会波及到我们。但如果大型后期交易出现问题，我们也无法独善其身。”

    不过，值得注意的是，里特、登普西以及其它接受采访的风投家似乎都不担心企业级软件行业会长期处于寒冬。不仅是因为他们对宏观经济持续复苏有信心，还因为云技术等的估值使大企业愿意投资于类似的新技术，即便增长有所放缓（再说，增长放缓之前也不是没有出现过）。(财富中文网)

    译者：项航

    The private markets typically follow the public markets on the way up, and also follow them on the way down. And that seems to be what we're seeing when it comes to venture capital deals for enterprise software companies.

    Take a look at the recent stock performance of some of VC-backed enterprise software companies that have gone public within the past several years: WorkDay (WDAY) is down 13.88% over the past three months. Talbeau Software (DATA) is off 15.48%. And Splunk (SPLK) is down 20.18%. In short, public market investors are moving a bit from growth to value.

    It's far too early for us to have VC valuation data for the sector, but several investors tell me that they've already seen an impact of this downward shift. Not surprisingly, it's a cascade that first hit pre-IPO rounds, and is working its way through the venture lifecycle to earlier stages.

    "There has been a real 'pay-it-forward' mentality when it's come to enterprise software valuations," explains Gordon Ritter, a partner with Emergence Capital Partners whose track record includes investments in Salesforce.com and Veeva Systems (VEEV). "So it's pretty natural that as public market valuations pull back, entrepreneurs and VCs have had to adjust."

    Veeva stock, for what its worth, is down more than 30% over the past quarter.

    Ritter adds that he knows of several situations in which entrepreneurs have accepted lower valuations than they might have earlier this year, just so that they can get their deals done faster.

    Sean Dempsey of Merus Capital says that he has not yet seen much valuation change at the Series A level, but acknowledges that it's probably just a matter of time. "You've seen so many hedge funds and other firms like that get into the later-stage space, and you just know that it's not going to end well," he says. "We invest in Series A so we're at the end of the lag, but when some of these larger late-stage deals go bad we'll feel some repercussions."

    It's also worth noting, however, that neither Ritter, Dempsey nor other VCs I spoke with seem concerned that the enterprise software sector could experience a long-term freeze. Not only because of confidence in continued macro economic recovery, but also because the value proposition of things like cloud make it unlikely that big corporations would resist spend on such new technologies, even if things slowed down (as they have done in the past).