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Friday! [Prepares to magically disappear.]
We didn't talk with a guest this week for StrictlyVC Download; instead, Alex and I dived into a handful of news stories that we kind of wanted to understand better ourselves. If you're looking for a weekend listen, this one is half decent and also the perfect length for a walk to the coffee shop and back.:)
Giant thanks to this episode's sponsor, Affinity, the "relationship intelligence platform for dealmakers," which is hosting its second annual Campfire Conference in San Francisco’s historic Presidio on September 28. The event will feature speakers from 8VC, Pear VC, Sands Capital, SOSV, and more; you can check out the full agenda here.
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Sam Bankman-Fried, the former CEO of the now-bankrupt crypto exchange FTX, just saw his bail revoked ahead of his October trial. U.S. District Court Judge Lewis Kaplan announced the decision earlier today, following allegations that Bankman-Fried leaked the diary of Caroline Ellison, the former CEO of FTX’s investment-arm Alameda Research, to the New York Times. “He has gone up to the line over and over again, and I am going to revoke bail,” Judge Kaplan said of Bankman-Fried after reading his ruling from the bench. Reportedly, Bankman-Fried was (or soon will be) whisked off toward the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn, which sounds a lot less pleasant than his parents' house on Stanford's campus, where has been under house arrest. In one report about the facility, in October 2021, inmates were complaining about a lack of access to water, spotty electricity and a lack of hot food. Per this same report, the detention center has also faced staff shortages in the past as correctional facility officers reported overwhelming and dangerous conditions. TechCrunch has more here.
Elon Musk is again insisting his fight with Mark Zuckerberg is in motion, saying it will take place at an "epic location" in Italy and broadcast on both his social media platform, X, and on Meta. (According to Alex Heath of The Verge, this was all news to Zuckerberg, who later posted on Threads that until you hear it from Zuckerberg himself, to "please assume anything [Musk] says has not been agreed on.") We don't care anymore -- we overdosed on this topic a while back. We're still digging the memes, though. (Click below.)
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Verdagy, a two-year-old startup based in Moss Landing, Ca., that makes industrial-sized electrolyzers, raised a $73 million Series B round co-led by Temasek and Shell Ventures, with additional participation from Bidra Innovation Ventures, BlueScope, Galp, Samsung Venture Investment, Toppan Ventures, Tupras Ventures, Yara Growth Ventures, and Zeon Ventures. The company has raised a total of $117 million. Bloomberg has more here.
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| Big-But-Not-Crazy-Big Fundings |
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Boston Micro Fabrication, a seven-year-old Boston startup that enables precise, micro-scale 3D printing for customers in healthcare, the life sciences, electronics, and machining, raised a $24 million Series D round. Guotai Junan Securities was the lead investor. The company has raised a total of $79.3 million. More here.
Kraftblock, a nine-year-old German startup that develops thermal energy storage systems, raised a $21.9 million Series B led by Shell Ventures, with Finindus, Moore Strategic Ventures, A&G Energy Transition Tech Fund, TechEnergy Ventures, and Future Industry Ventures also taking part. EU-Startups has more here.
Persefoni, a three-year-old startup based in Tempe, Az., whose software helps companies track and manage their environmental impact, raised a $50 million Series C1 round led by TPG Rise, with Clearvision Ventures, ENEOS Innovation Partners, NGP Energy Technology Partners, Prelude Ventures, Parkway Ventures, Rice Investment Group, Bain and Co., EDF, and Alumni Ventures also piling on. The company has raised a total of $164.2 million. BuiltIn has more here.
Rootly, a three-year-old San Francisco startup that's developing a platform to help automate companies’ responses to incidents like website outages, raised a $12 million Series A round led by Renegade Partners, with Google Gradient Ventures and XYZ Ventures also contributing The company has raised a total of $15.2 million. TechCrunch has more here.
Tracer, a five-year-old New York startup that helps businesses visualize their data, raised an $18.1 million Series A round co-led by NewRoad Capital Partners, Progress Ventures, and BDMI, with participation from S4S Ventures and Arbour Way Investors. TechCrunch has more here.
Trove, an 11-year-old company based in Brisbane, Ca., that helps brands like REI, Patagonia, and Lululemon manage their resale activities, raised a $30 million Series E round co-led by Wellington Management and ArcTern Ventures, with other investors including CVC Fund, G2 Venture Partners, and Prelude Ventures. The company has raised a total of $152.5 million. Retail Dive has more here.
Veza, a three-year-old Palo Alto startup whose platform helps companies to secure identity access across apps, data systems, and cloud infrastructure, raised a $15 million at a $415 million valuation. Capital One Ventures and ServiceNow were the co-leads. The company has raised a total of $125 million. TechCrunch has more here.
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BioFlyte, a three-year-old Albuquerque startup that screens infrastructure and incoming mail for potential biothreats, raised a $5.4 million Series B round co-led by Scout Ventures and Cottonwood Technology Fund, with New Mexico Vintage Fund also chipping in. The company has raised a total of $12.8 million. More here.
SkyCool Systems, a seven-year-old startup based in Mountain View, Ca., that makes panels that passively cool fluids in air conditioning and refrigeration systems, raised a $5 million seed round co-led by Nadel and Gussman Ventures, with D3 Jubilee Partners also investing. The company has raised a total of $9.3 million. More here.
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Modular, a startup whose software aims to loosen Nvidia’s dominance in AI chips, has reportedly been talking with investors about a Series A round that would value it at roughly $600 million. The new capital would come less than two years after two Google and Apple alumni co-founded the startup and only three months after it launched its flagship software product. The Information has the story here.
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Eniac Ventures, the 14-year-old, New York-based seed-stage venture firm, is looking to raise up to $150 million for its sixth fund, per an SEC filing. More here.
Symbol, a two-year old, Tel Aviv-based venture capital fund invests in early-stage startups founded by Israeli entrepreneurs, announced earlier this week that it has closed its debut fund with $50 million. Times of Israel has more here.
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Zillow Group has paid approximately $35 million to acquire a software company. The publicly traded Seattle-based real estate outfit said earlier this week it acquired Aryeo, a four-year-old, Boston-based platform that serves real estate photographers, with plans to bring the startup within Zillow's real estate software suite. According to Crunchbase, Aryeo had raised roughly $7 million from half a dozen investors. NBC Boston has more here.
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Digital mortgage lender Better.com’s proposal to combine with Aurora Acquisition Corp. via a SPAC (special purpose acquisition) has been approved by shareholders, the company confirmed today. According to an SEC filing, Better.com will combine with Aurora, or go public, “on or about August 22, 2023," so right around the corner. It's the newest twist in a series for the now nine-year-old company, which has became "better" known over the last two years for shedding roughly 10,000 employees over a painful series of layoffs. Perhaps retail investors won't ever know or care(?), but we also can't quite forget that CEO Vishal Garg reportedly once called an investor in his company "sewage," and said during a deposition that he was "going to staple" his former partner "against a fucking wall and burn him alive." TechCrunch has more here.
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Shawn Xu has been promoted from chief of staff to partner at Lowercarbon Capital; Harsh Dubey has been promoted from analyst to associate at the firm. More here.
Tesla’s new CFO is known as VT. The rest is a mystery. 🔍
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Sixty Spear Street, an 11-story, 157,436 square foot space on a prime block in downtown San Francisco, just sold to Presidio Bay Ventures for $40.9 million — about 66% less than its most recently assessed property value of $121 million. The San Francisco Chronicle has more here.
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SaaStr Annual 2023, the world's largest SaaS and Cloud event, is almost here! Don't miss this three-day event, Sept. 6-8 in SF that will bring together 12,000 global SaaS founders, executives, and investors for a series of high-quality content sessions and networking opportunities, including Founder and VC matchmaking. The leaders of companies like Asana to Zoom will take the stage to share their actionable insights on scaling. Readers can grab 20% off tickets with code strictlyvc (until tickets sell out.)
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