It's been a tough year all around for IT businesses and IT talent looking for new jobs. But it's not over yet. There has been a sharp decline in venture capital funding to help innovative startups keep going. It's a drop of more than a third--in billions of dollars that is--and that means plenty of good ideas will remain dormant and may never take off.

Where would Google or Adobe be without startup money? How about Facebook and Twitter? Where would so many other ideas critical to IT be without an infusion of capital?

We've had bad years in the past, and the dot-com bust certainly put a damper on new and innovative IT projects a few years ago. But there are critical needs right now. Companies need IT innovation, and the health and future growth of our economy depend on advances in technology.

In 2009, venture capitalists invested $17.7 billion in 2,795 tech start-ups, amounting to 37 percent less cash and 30 percent fewer deals than in 2008. Venture investors expect the slowdown in investing to continue this year.

It may be that the big tech companies like IBM, HP, Accenture and Adobe will have to be the innovators, and the ones spending the money for new ideas.

But large companies are providing only a small share of venture capital dollars. In recent years, corporate venture capital activity has decreased from more than 15 percent of dollars invested during the late 1990s to less than eight percent every year since 2001.

Who knows when the landscape will change, but it certainly will have to for that little idea to become the next great idea, and move our economy forward. - Judi