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Welcome back. Hope you had a happy 4th of July.:)
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EU lawmakers gave the thumbs up today to landmark rules to rein in tech giants such as Google, Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Microsoft, but enforcement could be hampered by regulators' limited resources, notes Reuters. In addition to the rules known as the Digital Markets Act (DMA), lawmakers also approved the Digital Services Act (DSA), which requires online platforms to do more to police the internet for illegal content.
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| Frederic Court of Felix Capital on Working with -- and Fending Off -- American VCs |
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Last month, at the same time that the London-based venture firm Felix Capital was announcing that it has closed its fourth and newest fund with $600 million in capital commitments, we had a separate chat with Felix's founder, Frederic Court, about how competition in Europe has changed, given that so many U.S. venture firms have opened offices on the continent, including Sequoia Capital, Lightspeed Venture Partners, Bessemer Venture Partners and General Catalyst.
Unsurprisingly, Court said the expanded array of options is great for founders. He also told us that most European investors would prefer to stick with European firms or to start their own shops where they can have more influence. We thought it was an interesting part of a longer discussion; the excerpts below have been edited for length.
A lot of the biggest U.S. firms have set up shop in Europe over the last 18 months or so. How does all this interest impact your work locally?
Many of these firms we know well already. They hire people who are already investors in Europe from other other [venture] platforms. And overall, it's great for the entrepreneurs in Europe [and] a reflection of the evolution of the market.
Over here, we've seen more ambition, more talent, and obviously more capital in the past few years as Europe has begun
to build not only local champions but global champions like Spotify and Adyen and Farfetch, where I was fortunate to be involved from day one as an investor. So yes, there's more competition, but there are more options as well for founders.
You mention these firms hiring from other platforms, though I'd read somewhere they've had some trouble hiring because there aren't enough investors with general partner-level experience in Europe and also because the mindset is different from U.S. VCs who -- until very recently -- were focused on growth, whereas European VCs were more focused on removing risk. Does any of that ring true to you?
I think a lot of this is true. The reality is that we're in an industry where, to measure success, it takes time. I mean, I've been in venture capital for over 20 years. There are not many of us. There's Fred [Destin] who started Stride.VC and [investors at] Accel and Index who've been in this space for 20-years plus and
with a great track record, but it's quite a small community. So there is lots of great emerging talent but with fewer data points of success and, as a result, yes, it's probably been harder for people to hire.
I think there is probably also a sense from many of the investors in Europe [that] they don't necessarily just wait to be hired by American firms. They very much want to build local firms. When we launched Felix [in 2015] we found tremendous support from friends in the U.S. connecting us to [limited partners] because when I started, I had zero LP connections. But we also found a lot of local support from people wanting to nurture local co-investors with whom they could work well. So it's not necessarily obvious for a European investor to suddenly join a team that's new and where decisions will be made, for the most part, in the U.S. [compared with the opportunity they have to] be part of European platforms and have more influence.
It does happen,
though.
More here.
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Electra, a one-year-old startup based in Paris that is building a network of fast EV charging stations in Europe, raised a €160 million round led by Eurazeo, with additional participation from RGREEN Invest, RIVE Private Investment, Serena, Groupe Chopard, SNCF, and RATP Group. The company has raised a total of $34.6 million. IPE Real Assets has more here.
VulcanForms, a seven-year-old 3D printing startup based in Burlington, Ma., raised a $250 million Series C round led by Eclipse Ventures; additional investors included Stata Venture Partners, Fontinalis Partners, D1 Capital Partners, Standard Investments, Atlas Innovate, Boston Seed Capital, Industry Ventures, and the Simkins Family. The company has raised a total of $355 million. The New York Times has more here.
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| Big-But-Not-Crazy-Big Fundings |
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Current Foods, a three-year-old San Francisco startup that is developing plant-based "tuna" and "salmon," raised an $18 million seed round from Electric Feel Ventures, Astanor Ventures, Tenacity, and GreatPoint Ventures. The company has raised a total of $21.2 million. Forbes has more here.
Onomondo, a ten-year-old startup based in Copenhagen that has built a low-power, wireless network for IoT devices operating in over 180 countries that it claims can double device lifetime, halve battery consumption, and lower data consumption by 90%, raised a $21 million Series A led by Verdane; additional investors included Maersk Growth, People Ventures, and The Danish Growth Fund. The company has raised a total of $26.1 million. TechCrunch has more here.
Oxbury Bank, a four-year-old startup based in Chester, U.K., that loans money to farmers, raised a £20 million Series C extension; investors included Frontier Agriculture, Hutchinsons Group, Hambro Perks, and Grosvenor Food & AgTech. The company has raised a total of £68 million. AltFi has more here.
Oxford Quantum Circuits, a five-year-old startup based in Oxford, U.K., that is offering quantum computing as a subscription service, raised a $47 million Series A round led by Lansdowne Partners and The University of Tokyo Edge Capital Partners, with British Patient Capital, Oxford Science Enterprises, and Oxford Investment Consultants also chipping in. The company has raised a total of $46 million. TechCrunch has more here.
Quantum Source, a one-year-old startup based in Rehovot, Israel, that intends to enable the scaling of quantum computers to millions of qubits with its proprietary photonic technology, raised $15 million seed round. Grove Ventures, Pitango First, and Eclipse Ventures co-led the transaction. The Quantum Insider has more here.
Rebellions, a two-year-old, South Korean AI chip developer, has raised a $22.8 million in extended Series A financing from a strategic investor, KT, one of the largest telecom companies in South Korea. The outfit has now raised roughly about $102.8 million altogether. TechCrunch has more here.
Tesorio, a nine-year-old San Francisco startup that helps companies manage their accounts receivable by using AI models to look across a customer’s payment history and predict when they will pay, raised a $17 million Series B round led by BAMCAP Ventures, with additional capital supplied by Carao Ventures, Susan and Anne Wojcicki, and previous investors Madrona Venture Group, First Round Capital, Floodgate, FundersClub, Hillsven, Mango Capital, and Xplorer Capital. The company has raised a total of $33.9 million. TechCrunch has more here.
Voyantis, a two-year-old Tel Aviv startup developing tools to estimate a customer’s lifetime value, has emerged from stealth with $19 million in seed funding from Target Global, Square Peg, Schusterman Family Investments, Kaedan Capital and Operator Partners. TechCrunch has more here.
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Konselio, a six-year-old London startup that helps insurance brokers check compliance and manage policy administration, raised a £4.7 million Series A; investors included Committed Capital and ACF Investors. UKTN has more here.
Last Crumb, a year-old, L.A.-based "luxury" cookie brand (yikes), has raised $3 million in seed funding led by Electric Feel Ventures. More here.
Maolac, a four-year-old Israeli food tech startup focused on creating a superfood by extracting proteins from bovine colostrum or plant-based analogs, say it quietly raised $3.2 million in seed funding back in January led by OurCrowd. TechCrunch has more here.
MarketWolf, a five-year-old startup based in Singapore whose app aims to make trading accessible to first-timers with low minimum investment amounts, a risk-management system, and modules for practicing and learning about investing, raised a $10 million Series A round co-led by Jungle Ventures and Dream Capital, with additional capital provided by previous investors 9Unicorns, iSeed, Crescent, and Riverwalk. The company has raised a total of $17.4 million. TechCrunch has more here.
OppZo, a two-year-old startup based in Miami that makes affordable, asset-based working capital loans to small- to medium-size businesses in Opportunity Zones, raised $5 million in equity and $255 million in debt financing. Arcadia Funds was the deal lead. The company has raised a total of $262 million. More here.
Pina Earth, a year-old, Munich-based startup that's building an online platform for European forest owners to get certified to sell carbon credits, has raised $2.5 million in seed funding led by Franco-German VC XAnge, with participation from the London-based venture firm Nordstar, as well as a number of business angels and serial founders. TechCrunch has more here.
Profasee, a year-old, Miami-based dynamic pricing platform for digitally-driven brands on Amazon, has raised $2.3 million in seed funding led by defy.vc. The venture firm had previously backed Profasee founder Chad Rubin in another venture (an e-commerce operations platform called Skubana that was acquired last year). Refresh Miami has more here.
Promoted, a two-year-old, San Francisco-based startup that says it unifies search, feed, ads, and promotions for online marketplaces, has raised $6 million in seed funding, bringing the total amount raised to $8 million. Y Combinator led the round (which you don't see so often), joined by Interlace Ventures, Vela Partners and angel investors, including Y Combinator Managing Director Michael Seibel. More here.
Seatti, a three-year-old Munich startup that is building a platform to maximize the benefits and minimize the complexity of hybrid work for both companies and their employees, raised a $3.1 million seed round. Acton Capital and Partech co-led the deal. The company has raised a total of $3.7 million. EU-Startups has more here.
WatchTowr, a one-year-old Singapore startup that helps companies prevent cyberattacks, raised an $8 million pre-Series A co-led by Prosus Ventures and Vulcan Capital, with previous investor Wavemaker Partners also pitching in. The company has raised a total of $10.3 million. Crowdfund Insider has more here.
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Bloomberg Beta, a San Francisco- and New York-based outfit that uses Bloomberg LP's money to invest in startups, has secured $150 million from its parent company across two new funds: $75 million for a fourth early-stage fund and $75 million for an opportunity fund. The Information has more here.
Climentum Capital, a year-old, Copenhagen, Denmark-based venture outfit, says it has held a first close of what it expects will be a €150 million ($157 million) fund. The firm's mission is to fund startups that curb CO2 emissions and “accelerate Europe’s green transition,” it says. TechCrunch has more here.
Endeavor, a 16-year-old, U.S.-based investment firm focused on supporting high-growth companies in emerging and under-served markets, has closed its fourth and newest fund with $292 million in capital commitments. DealStreetAsia has more here.
Sequoia Capital’s Chinese affiliate is about to close $9 billion in fresh capital for four new funds, higher than its original target of more than $8 billion, reports The Information.
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Meizu, a once-promising, Alibaba-backed Chinese smartphone maker that was once seen as a competitor to Xiaomi, is being acquired by the founder of Geely, China’s largest private automaker and Volvo’s parent company. TechCrunch has more here.
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Shares in French music-streaming service Deezer fell today in their first day of trading, a fresh sign of the difficult environment facing startups and loss-making companies. The Paris-based competitor to services like Spotify saw its shares fall by more than a quarter; the tumble, down more than 30% at one point, came after the company struck a SPAC deal in April valuing it at roughly $1.1 billion. More in the WSJ.
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Andy Jassy celebrated his one-year anniversary as Amazon CEO today. It's been a rough ride for Jassy and shareholders alike, notes CNBC.
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American-Israeli crypto lender Celsius laid off some 150 employees as it battles a financial crisis that saw it halt customer withdrawals last month, Calcalist reported over the weekend. The firm has about 650 staff members listed on LinkedIn, suggesting that 23% of the company was affected. The layoffs come amid uncertainty for the company as it faces possible insolvency. Coindesk has more here.
Lightricks, a startup that develops video and photo editing apps, has laid off 80 employees, which is 12% of its staff. Business Insider has more here.
Loft, a Brazilian proptech unicorn that says it uses technology to simplify and enable real estate and credit transactions and was valued at $2.9 billion last year, has laid off about 380 employees, or 12% of its workforce, the company announced today. The layoff marks its second round of cuts this year. In April, Bloomberg Linea reported that Loft had cut 159 jobs. That would mean that Loft has let go of nearly 540 workers this year so far. It currently has about 3,200 employees. TechCrunch has more here.
Outschool, a marketplace for kid-friendly, virtual after-school programs, has laid off 31 people or 18% of its workforce, CEO Amir Nathoo confirmed to TechCrunch over text message. The layoff, conducted last month, comes after a period of rapid fundraising for Outschool. The firm raised its Series B, C and D in a 12-month period, most recently growing its valuation to $3 billion after hitting a $1 billion valuation just four months earlier. More here.
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A new Senate bill would help crypto firms access the Federal Reserve's payment system. But financial experts warn the move could destabilize the banking system.
Core Scientific, a top crypto miner, sold 79% of its Bitcoin holdings last month as a steep drop in digital assets squeezes finances for even the leaders of the industry, reports Bloomberg. Crypto miners are struggling to repay debt and complete large purchase orders of expensive mining machines they made during the bull run several months ago, adds the outlet.
Bored Ape Yacht Club’s creators declared war on a vocal critic. Could it backfire?
The Food and Drug Administration said today it would suspend its ban on Juul’s products while the e-cigarette maker appeals the agency’s decision. The FDA initially rejected Juul’s request for a stay, prompting Juul to seek a stay of the ban in court, according to Juul’s court filings.
Bessemer Venture Partners just became the latest in a growing string of venture firms to become a registered investment adviser.
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3D-printed sneakers.
A 1.5-acre Maine island is on the market for $339,000, but its owner is insisting that interested buyers spend a night there alone, in a tiny cottage without water or a septic system that's 20 feet from the water. So you may want to continue your search for a private Maine island.
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