Your 2019–2021 vintage has a buyer problem, not a markup problem.
ChronoCurve ranks a healthcare venture portfolio by realizable value and by route — strategic sale, direct-share secondary, recapitalization, down-round listing, or wind-down — and reports what the preference stack actually leaves the fund at each outcome. The math is computed deterministically, and every input traces to its source.
What the 2026 market is telling you
Four conditions that turn a hold decision into arithmetic
Every figure below is published third-party research, cited to its source. None of it is a ChronoProof claim about ChronoProof.
The queue is longer than the funds holding it
Active unicorns reached 945 in Q2 2026, holding $5.3 trillion.The Venture Monitor describes a “backlog of trapped value” and notes that “aging unicorns have not looked to go public.” At 2025’s 49 venture-backed IPOs, the NVCA yearbook puts the theoretical queue at 17.5 years — longer than the life of the fund holding the position.
The cash has not come back
Across 2,775 funds and about $119.3 billion of commitments, fewer than 20% of 2017 and 2018 vintage funds have reached 1× DPI, and median DPI for the 2019 and 2020 vintages is “still barely over zero,” with less than half of those funds having returned any capital at all. A 2018 fund is eight years into a ten-year life.
Headline exit value is not your exit value
Venture exit value reached $2.19 trillion through 30 June 2026 —of which a single listing accounted for $1.7 trillion. The Venture Monitor is explicit that “lockup periods mean GPs cannot sell into those listings right away” and “cash will not reach LPs until lockups expire and shares are sold.” In 2025, 67% of unicorn IPOs priced below their last private valuation.
The continuation-vehicle escape valve is not yours
GP-led secondary volume hit $65 billion in the first half of 2026, up 35% year over year, and high-quality buyout interests cleared around 90% of NAV. Butprivate equity was 65% of that GP-led volume and venture was 3%.. The structure that relieved the buyout backlog has not been built for venture positions.
What ChronoCurve computes
Six outputs per position, each one traceable
ChronoCurve is built for the question underneath a venture hold decision: is there a real buyer for this company, at what price, and what does the fund actually receive once the preference stack is satisfied?
Valuation triangulation
Discounted cash flow, precedent transactions, and comparable-company benchmarking blended through a DerSimonian–Laird random-effects model, so dispersion across the comparable set is carried into the range rather than averaged away. The last round price becomes one input, not the answer.
Exit path simulation
Gaussian path simulation returning P10 / P50 / P90 outcomes with conditional value at risk on the downside tail — the shape of the distribution rather than a single point estimate a partner meeting can argue with.
Preference-stack waterfall
What the fund receives at each exit value once liquidation preferences are satisfied. Under 1× non-participating preferred, the holder elects either the preference or pro-rata participation as converted common — not both. Structured terms change that arithmetic materially, and headline valuations do not reflect it.
Route recommendation per position
Sale, direct-share secondary, recapitalization, listing, or wind-down — ranked across the portfolio rather than argued one company at a time, with gross and net labelled on every multiple and the comparator stated alongside it.
Reserves and cost of delay
What another year of hold costs on a specific position, and which reserves are still allocated to companies with no realistic next round. A reserve held against an unfundable company is a distribution the fund has chosen not to make.
Committee-ready and LP-ready memo
Each figure rendered with its denominator, its scenario label, and its source tier, so the output survives the reading it will actually get — a partner meeting, a valuation committee, or the DPI question in a re-up conversation.
The AI explains the reasoning. It never invents the math.
Numbers come from a deterministic calculation package with source-tier provenance gating on every input; the language model is restricted to explaining the result. Regulatory conclusions carry human-in-the-loop review. The Venture Monitor reports LPs asking more about DPI and receiving “little cash back from existing commitments” — which means the relevant test for any analysis is not whether the model sounds convincing, but whether the output holds up in front of an LP. That is what the calculation trail is for.
Five routes, priced
A venture position has fewer exits than a buyout asset
A sponsor can run a sale process on a cash-generating platform. A minority preferred position in a pre-profit company has a narrower set of real options, and each one has different arithmetic behind it.
Two engagements
Scoped so one partner can sign
Both are deliberately narrow, delivered from existing product capability, and structured so the fee is credited against a later platform agreement.
Portfolio Liquidity Triage
Take ten to twenty-five positions from your 2019–2021 vintages and rank them by realizable value and route.
- Triangulated valuation range per position, with the comparable set disclosed
- P10 / P50 / P90 outcomes and downside conditional value at risk
- Preference-stack waterfall showing what the fund receives at each exit value
- Route recommendation per position, ranked across the portfolio
- Reserve review: which allocations are held against companies unlikely to raise again
- A memo written for a partner meeting and reusable in an LP update
Diligence Discipline Sprint
The same discipline applied forward, on healthcare opportunities currently in your pipeline.
- Regulatory pathway read: device, software as a medical device, or therapeutic
- Reimbursement and coverage exposure on the revenue model
- Comparable-financing and comparable-outcome benchmarking
- Named risks with the evidence behind each, not a score
Who this is for
Four seats, four different reasons to care
| Seat | The pressure in 2026 | What ChronoCurve gives them |
|---|---|---|
| Managing partner or general partner | A vintage marked near cost, a re-up conversation coming, and no realized track record to point at. | A ranked view of which positions can produce cash and which cannot, with the reasoning attached. |
| Head of platform or portfolio operations | Twenty-plus companies, uneven reporting quality, and reserve decisions made position by position. | One consistent method across the portfolio, so positions are compared rather than advocated for. |
| CFO, controller, or head of investor relations | LPs asking directly about DPI and a credible path to liquidity before committing to the next fund. | An independent triangulation to test marks against, and language that survives an LP reading it closely. |
| Healthcare partner or principal | Regulatory and reimbursement risk that generalist comparables price badly in either direction. | Sector-specific pathway and coverage analysis feeding the valuation rather than sitting beside it. |
Six questions
If three of these are uncomfortable, the triage will pay for itself
How many of your 2019–2021 positions have gone three years without a new outside-led round?
No new outside lead is a pricing signal, whatever the carrying value says.For your five largest marks, do you know what the fund receives at a realistic sale price after preferences?
The waterfall, not the headline valuation, determines the distribution.Which of your unicorn-marked positions clears $300M+ revenue and the rule of 40?
The NVCA yearbook puts about 5% of unicorns over that bar.What is your DPI today, and what is the path to 1× before the next re-up conversation?
Fewer than 20% of 2017 and 2018 vintage funds have got there.If a strategic buyer bid well below the last round tomorrow, could you show the partnership why that is or is not the best available outcome?
Declining a bid is a decision that deserves the same arithmetic as accepting one.How much of your remaining reserve is allocated to companies that will not raise again?
Reserves held against unfundable positions are distributions deferred indefinitely.Reasonable objections
The four we hear most, answered plainly
They are, and that is the problem the data describes: median DPI for the 2019 and 2020 vintages sits barely over zero while carrying values do not. A last round price is a financing event, not a realization. This gives you an independent range to test it against.
An adviser runs a process on a position you have already chosen to sell. This decides which positions are worth taking to one — which matters more in venture, where 3% of GP-led secondary volume in the first half of 2026 was venture and buyer depth cannot be assumed.
Neither do we. The math runs in a deterministic package with source-tier provenance gating on every input, and the language model only writes the explanation. Ask for the calculation trail in the first meeting — it is the point of the product, not an appendix to it.
Then start with the healthcare assets you do hold. Healthcare led all sectors in 2025 buyout value growth, so it is likely a disproportionate share of both your inventory and your uncertainty.
ChronoCurve for venture capital
Move from “we think it holds” to “here is what it returns.”
Start with the three oldest healthcare positions in your 2019–2021 vintages. If the arithmetic agrees with your marks, you have an independent range to show an LP. If it does not, you found out this quarter.
ChronoCurve produces analysis to support investment and valuation judgment. It does not replace a fund’s valuation policy, an independent valuation opinion, or the work of a financial adviser. Descriptions of financing structures on this page are general and are not legal advice. Market figures are drawn from published third-party research, cited below, and are presented as market evidence only — no endorsement, validation, or affiliation is implied.
IPO count, the exit queue, the $300M+ revenue and rule-of-40 threshold, and the share of unicorn IPOs pricing below their last private valuation: NVCA 2026 Yearbook.
DPI and TVPI by vintage, share of funds returning capital, and fund-level IRR percentiles: Peter Walker and Kevin Dowd, VC Fund Performance: Q1 2026, Carta, 4 June 2026 — 2,775 funds, approximately $119.3 billion in commitments, vintages 2017 through Q1 2026.
Secondary-market volume, GP-led and LP-led mix, asset-class shares, and NAV pricing: Evercore, H1 2026 Secondary Market Review.
Liquidation preference and pay-to-play mechanics: Cooley GO · Fenwick. Regulatory terminology: FDA Software as a Medical Device · predetermined change control plan guidance.