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Hello, precious weekend! We are hella ready to turn off the lights over here, but before we go, we have a great StrictlyVC Download episode for you this week, featuring successful serial founder Bill Smith. The 36-year-old sold his last company to Target for $550 million in 2017; now, his three-year-old startup, Landing, looks to be going head to head with the flexible furnished apartment empire that Adam Neumann is seemingly building. It's a timely offering in a remote-first world; we think you'll enjoy hearing from Smith what he's building. (You can also read excerpts of our chat below.)
Giant thanks to the team at SaaStr for sponsoring this week's episode. Note that SaaStr Annual 2022 is almost here (it takes place September 13th through the 15th), and organizers say to expect 10,000 SaaS founders, execs, and investors at the event this year. StrictlyVC readers can use code STRICTLYVC to save 20% off tickets before they sell out.
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Many of Wall Street’s biggest banks are nearing agreements to pay as much as $200 million each and admit that their employees’ use of personal messaging apps such as WhatsApp violated regulatory requirements, according to the WSJ. As the outlet notes: "Traders and brokers aren’t supposed to use such products to conduct the firm’s business. The practice became more common—and harder to detect—during the early stages of the pandemic, when employees switched to working entirely from home."
The web browser used within the TikTok app can track every keystroke made by its users, according to new research that is surfacing as the Chinese-owned video app grapples with U.S. lawmakers’ concerns over its data practices. The New York Times has more here.
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You may not have noticed, but this $550m+ fintech platform has maintained a 15.3% track record, despite COVID, stock market volatility and the beginning of a recession. How? By cracking the code of a $1.7 trillion asset class that’s outperformed the S&P 500 by more than 2x in the last 25 years. Even more impressive? Through 5 exits, it has delivered an average 28.4% net IRR to investors. Follow this exclusive StrictlyVC referral link to learn more. See important Regulation A disclosures.
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According to earlier reports this week, Adam Neumann, the famed, controversial cofounder of WeWork, is in the process of creating a vast network of residential real estate properties that -- we're guessing -- can be rented on a highly flexible basis to people who don't want to be confined to one location or lease but to live as "global citizens." It was the vision behind an earlier company that Neumann started, WeLive, a short-lived offshoot of his far better-known company, WeWork, and it's an idea that in a post-Covid world where remote-work reigns, makes more sense than ever.
Here's Neumann talking to The Guardian about the idea in 2016: “It’s going to be a new way of living, day to day, week to week, month to month, year to year. You will be a global citizen of the world. If you’re a member of one, you’re a member of all of them.”
The idea is so timely that another serial entrepreneur may be even farther along with his version of it -- even if you haven't heard of him before. He's Bill Smith, the 36-year-old founder of the three-year-old, 600-person, membership-only flexible, furnished rental company Landing.
Smith, who favors button downs to graphic T-shirts, is the anti-Neumann in many ways. While Neumann's real-life drama with his investors became fodder for a television series, Smith has, with little fanfare, made his own backers a lot of money. After raising capital from friends and family for a reloadable Visa card company in his 20s, Smith sold that outfit to the bank-holding company Green Dot for what Forbes says was tens of millions of dollars. His next startup Shipt, a same-day delivery company that Smith founded in 2014, sold to Target in 2017 for $550 million.
Smith -- unlike Neumann, who famously sold too much of WeWork to SoftBank at too unrealistic a price -- has also been conservative when it comes to VC. Shipt raised $65 million from the venture firm Greycroft and others before it was sold, but Smith still owned fully half the company. The outcome, which he now calls a "game changer," gave him enough confidence and capital that he has now sunk at least $15 million of his own money into Landing, of which he owns one-third. (According to Forbes, Landing has raised $237 million in venture funding to date at a $475 million valuation, including from Greycroft. Meanwhile Neumann's Flow, which has yet to launch, just raised $350 million in funding from Andreessen Horowitz at a reported $1 billion valuation.)
More here.
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| Big-But-Not-Crazy-Big Fundings |
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Flossy, a 2.5-year-old Los Angeles-based dental care company that works with a network of dentists who agree to a pay-as-you-go model, where consumers pay for services as they use them without a sign-up or membership fee, has raised $14.7 million in Series A funding. TTV Capital led the round, joined by Slow Ventures, 8VC, Clocktower Technology Ventures, SV Angel, and other angels. Forbes has more here.
Jar, a year-old, Bangalore-based Indian savings app, has raised $22.6 million in funding led by Tiger Global. Bloomberg has more here.
Keen Technologies, a new AI startup founded by John Carmack -- the game developer who co-founded Id Software and served as Oculus’s CTO, is working on a new venture — has secured $20 million in funding from some big names. Among them: GitHub CEO Nat Friedman, Cue founder Daniel Gross, Stripe co-founder and CEO Patrick Collison, Shopify co-founder and CEO Tobi Lutke, and Sequoia Capital. TechCrunch has more here.
Mobot, a four-year-old, New York-based QA-as-a-service platform using real mechanical robots to automate testing on real mobile devices, has raised $12.5 million in Series A funding. Cota Capital, Heavybit, Uncorrelated Ventures, and others invested in the round. TechCrunch has more here.
Luminovo, a five-year-old business software startup in Munich that says it helps electronics companies bring innovations to market faster and cheaper, has raised €11 million in a seed funding. Chalfen Ventures led the round, joined by Tencent, Verve Ventures, Khadjavi Capital Partners, La Famiglia, and Cherry Ventures. Tech.eu has more here.
Solsten, a 4.5-year-old, Berlin-based customer engagement platform, has raised $21.8 million in Series B funding led by Konvoy. Other backers in the round included Inventure, GFR Fund, Sisu Game Ventures, Bascom Ventures, Galaxy Interactive, Dentsu Ventures, and Warburg Serres. Tech.eu has more here.
Sunstone, a three-year-old, New Delhi, India-based higher education startup that collaborates with academic institutions to help 'upskill' their students for employability, has raised $35 million in Series C funding led by WestBridge Capital, with participation from Alteria Capital. TechCrunch has more here.
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Airgram, a two-year-old, Singapore-based video call transcription service that competes with Otter.ai, has raised $10 million in Series A funding led by GL Ventures, with participation from Linear Capital, CDH Capital, and PKSHA SPARX Algorithm Fund. TechCrunch has more here.
Demoleap, a three-year-old, Tel Aviv-based live demo assistant and sales discovery platform, has raised $4.4 million in seed funding co-led by Bonfire Ventures and Differential Ventures. More here.
Dukkantek, a 1.5-year-old Dubai-based small business management software company, has raised $10 million in funding led by BECO, with participation from Rocketship, Colle Capital, Chaos Ventures and Wamda Capital, among others. Wamda has more here.
dWallet Labs, a five-month-old Tel Aviv-based blockchain cybersecurity startup that's developing projects for the Odsy Network, a new layer 1 blockchain, has raised $5 million in pre-seed funding. Node Capital and Digital Currency Group co-led the round. CoinDesk has more here.
Fudo, an eight-year-old, Buenos Aires-based company whose point-of-sale software and operating system brings together a restaurant’s operations into a centralized hub, has raised $7.5 million in seed funding. Andreessen Horowitz, Atlántico and MAYA Capital co-led the round, joined by Collaborative Fund, Goodwater Capital and Latitud, as well as individual investors. TechCrunch has more here.
Roleshare, a year-old London-based job sharing platform, has raised $1.2 million in seed funding. Plug and Play led the round, joined by Forward VC, Rethink Capital Partners, Techstars VC, and other angels. More here.
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Blackrock grabbed headlines this week when it published its proprietary “Three D’s” strategy for inflation-fighting investments: Diverse, Durable, Defensive. What checks all these boxes? Fine art. Diverse? Yes. Citi reports a near-zero correlation between art and traditional asset classes. Durable? You bet. Fine art outperformed the S&P 500 by 2x in the last 25 years. Defensive? Yup. Art sales grew 25% while stocks had their worst 6-month start in 50 years. With Masterworks, anyone can easily invest in art. Follow this exclusive StrictlyVC
referral link to learn more. See important Regulation A disclosures.
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Fundamentum Partnership, a three-year-old venture firm that invests in startups in India, has closed on $227 million in capital commitments for its second fund, with plans to back four to five startups that have reached the Series B stage and beyond each year. The firm's founders are Nandan Nilekani and Sanjeev Aggarwal. Nilekani co-founded the IT services giant Infosys and has been instrumental in the development of several of India’s digital initiatives; Aggarwal founded the now IBM-owned BPO firm Daksh. TechCrunch has more here.
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Chewy cofounder Ryan Cohen gets paid -- again.
Elon Musk reportedly offered his thoughts on how the Republican Party could widen its appeal at a GOP donor retreat earlier this week. According to Axios, Musk said the party should show more compassion to immigrants and stay "out of people's bedrooms."
Mark Zuckerberg responds to graphics backlash, promises metaverse won't be boring to look at.
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Bay Area employment is nearly back to pre-pandemic levels.
American companies are on pace to reshore, or return to the U.S., nearly 350,000 jobs this year, according to the lobbying group Reshoring Initiative. That would be the highest number on record since the group began tracking the data in 2010.
Wayfair, the online home goods retailer, announced today it was laying off close to 900 employees. The move follows a hiring freeze that the company instituted in May. The layoffs represent close to 5% of the company’s global workforce and 10% of its corporate team.
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Elon Musk has approached brain chip implant developer Synchron about a potential investment as his own company Neuralink plays catch-up in the race to connect the human brain directly to machines, according to Reuters sources. Musk reportedly reached out to Synchron' founder and CEO Thomas Oxley in recent weeks to discuss a potential deal, though it's unclear whether a transaction would involve a tie-up or collaboration between Synchron and Neuralink,
notes the outlet. adding that Synchron, based in Brooklyn, is ahead of Neuralink in the process to win regulatory clearance for its devices.
According to the Financial Times, Tiger Global, with a newfound focus on "not losing money," per an FT source familiar with the firm, has moved away from high-risk tech groups while maintaining its focus on more stable companies, including software companies Microsoft, Atlassian and Sevicenow, as well as cyber security firm CrowdStrike, Brazilian fintech Nubank, the Chinese e-commerce group JD.com, and Sea, the Singapore tech conglomerate. More here.
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