Jawbone follows Silicon Valley debt financing trend Jawbone, the maker of Bluetooth headsets and speakers that is now pushing into wearable technology, has become the latest Silicon Valley company to turn to the debt markets to raise capital, rather than to traditional venture backers. The $100m-plus financing for the company takes place as tech giants such as Apple and Samsung are poised to enter the fast-growing market for wearable devices that monitor health and fitness, competing with Jawbone's Up wristband, which launched last year. It also demonstrates the scale of capital required to grow a hardware business at a time when Silicon Valley is seeing a boom in companies that make physical gadgets, rather than software and web services, which are much cheaper to distribute. Jawbone raised $93m in debt financing from Silver Lake, Fortress Investment Group, JPMorgan and Wells Fargo, to give it the working capital required to gear up for holiday sales, according to sources familiar with the deal. The 14-year-old San Francisco company has also raised a further $20m in new equity funding from existing venture backers such as Andreessen Horowitz and Kleiner Perkins Caufield and Byers, which will be tied to a future venture round. Hosain Rahman, Jawbone's chief executive, told Fortune, which broke the story, that demand for Up was "faster than anything we'd had before, and equity is not the most efficient way to scale all that." JPMorgan was also involved in January's $800m financing for Survey Monkey, the biggest example yet of a Silicon Valley company turning to the debt markets for funds rather than tapping the public markets. Increasing numbers of tech start-ups are delaying plans for an initial public offering after the difficult start to public life faced by Facebook, Groupon and Zynga last year. Some entrepreneurs are reluctant to take on the regulatory burdens and quarterly reporting commitments that are required of public companies, prompting them to seek fresh sources of finance to fulfil their long-range visions. The lending deal structured by JPMorgan provides Jawbone with more flexibility than a traditional bond offering and prevents dilution of existing shareholders. In previous interviews, Jawbone executives have said that they believed the new era of wearable computing was just getting started, and the company has made a series of acquisitions in the market, including device maker Body Media and fitness app Massive Health, during the past year. Venture capitalists are stepping up their investments in the sector. In the last month, Fitbit, a rival fitness-device maker, raised $43m and MyFitnessPal, a health app company, $18m. Jawbone has not released sales figures for its Up wristband, which was withdrawn from sale soon after its launch in 2011 after hardware problems. Last week, Jawbone released its latest gadget, the $180 Mini Jambox, a portable Bluetooth speaker. But despite its premium branding and high-quality design, such devices face lower-cost competition from Chinese hardware makers.