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August 13, 2020
Thursday!
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Top News
Uber and Lyft lost their bid to delay a preliminary injunction that will force the two ride-hailing app companies to reclassify drivers as employees. The order currently goes into effect August 20 -- just one week from now -- and a California judge's decision this afternoon to deny a delay sets the stage for a legal fight that will almost certainly see the companies suspend their operations temporarily in California, notes TechCrunch.
A California appeals court today ruled that Amazon is legally liable for defective products sold on its site by third parties.
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Massive Fundings
Allbirds, a six-year-old, San Francisco-based company whose "sustainable" wool sneakers were an early favorite in Silicon Valley circles, is in talks to raise an undisclosed amount from Franklin Templeton that would value the company above its $1.4 billion valuation in 2018, says Bloomberg. More here.
Fanatics, the nine-year-old, Conshohocken, Pa.-based sports retailer, has closed on $350 million in Series E funding at a post-money valuation of $6.2 billion, says the WSJ. Fidelity Management & Research Co. and Thrive Capital led the round, joined by Franklin Templeton Investments and Neuberger Berman Group. Fanatics has raised roughly $1.5 billion over the years, including from SoftBank Group, the National Football League and Major League Baseball. More here.
Impossible Foods, the nine-year-old, Redwood City, Ca.-based company that develops plant-based substitutes for meat products, has raised $200 million in fresh funding at a post-money valuation of $4 billion valuation, according to the data tracker PrimeUnicorn Index. The new round was led by Coatue, which was joined by another hedge fund in the round: XN. The company has now raised $1.5 billion altogether from investors, including Mirae Asset Global Investments and Temasek. TechCrunch has more here.
SiFive, a five-year-old, San Mateo, Ca.-based company working to commercialize an open-source semiconductor technology, has raised $61 million in Series E funding led by SK Hynix, with participation from new investor Prosperity7 Ventures and earlier investors Spark Capital and Sutter Hill Ventures. Reuters has more here.
THREAD, an 11-year-old, Tustin, Ca.-based provider of decentralized clinical research, has raised up to $50 million from Water Street Healthcare Partners and JLL Partners as more patient tests go remote amid the coronavirus pandemic. The WSJ has the story here.
Big-But-Not-Crazy-Big Fundings
Eden Health, a six-year-old, New York-based medical practice, has raised $25 million in Series B funding. Flare Capital Partners led the round, joined by Stone Point Capital, Greycroft, PJC, Max Ventures and Aspect Ventures. Forbes has more here.
High Definition Vehicle Insurance, a three-year-old, Chicago-based commercial auto insurance business, has raised $16 million in Series A funding led by 8VC and Munich Re Ventures, with additional participation from Qualcomm Ventures and Autotech Ventures. Food Logistics has more here.
Hiretual, a five-year-old, Mountain View, Ca.-based recruiting software developer, has raised $13 million in Series B funding led by Oceanpine Capital. The startup has now raised $23 million altogether. Crunchbase News has more here.
Kin Insurance, a four-year-old, Chicago-based property and casualty insurance company, raised $35 million in Series B funding. Commerce Ventures led the round, joined by Hudson Structured Capital Management, Flourish Ventures, QED, Alpha Edison, Allegis NL Capital, Avanta Ventures, August Capital, and the University of Chicago. Chicago Inno has more here.
MOBILion Systems, a five-year-old, Chadds Ford, Pa.-based life science company that's developing an advanced analytical instrument platform to accelerate biologic drug development, has raised $35 million in Series B funding. aMoon led the round, joined by Agilent Technologies, IP Group, Hostplus, and Cultivation Capital. More here.
Natural Fiber Welding, a five-year-old, Peoria, Ill.-based textiles startup company developing plant-based alternatives to leather and plastics, has raised $13 million in funding led by Ralph Lauren Corp. The company has now raised $25 million altogether. Peoria Public Radio has more here.
Omaze, an eight-year-old, Culver City, Ca.-based online fundraising platform for charitable giving, has raised $30 million in Series B funding. FirstMark Capital led the round, joined by Causeway Media Partners, BDMI, Tusk Ventures, Inherent Group, Gaingels, and individual investors, including Guy Oseary. TechCrunch has more here.
Unfold, a newly launched, New York-based vertical farming startup that will focus on seed genetics and was formed by Leaps by Bayer (the impact investment arm of Bayer AG) and by Temasek of Singapore, has raised $30 million in funding from the two entities. The Spoon has more here.
Smaller Fundings
Adaptive Shield, a year-old, Tel Aviv-based security startup that helps businesses protect their SaaS applications by regularly scanning their various setting for security issues, just raised $4 million in seed funding from Vertex Ventures Israel. TechCrunch has more here.
CancerIQ, a seven-year-old, Chicago-based startup that's developing precision health technology, has raised $4.8 million in Series A funding led by HealthX Ventures, a digital health-focused venture firm. MedCity News has more here.
Labster, an eight-year-old, Copenhagen-based startup that helps individuals engage in STEM lab scenarios using virtual reality, raised $9 million in funding. GGV Capital led the round, joined by earlier backers Owl Ventures, Balderton and Northzone. TechCrunch has more here.
Root AI, a three-year-old, Woburn, Ma.-based agricultural robotics startup, has raised $7.2 million in seed funding led by PJC, with added participation from First Round, Accomplice, Launch, AgFunder, and Outsiders Fund also participating. More here.
Stacklet, a six-month-old, Arlington, Va.-based commercial cloud governance platform, has raised $4 million in seed funding from Foundation Capital and Addition. TechCrunch has more here.
Torre, a three-year-old, San Francisco-based professional network for remote job seekers and recruiters, just raised $5 million in seed funding. Investors include Uber's former global head of product operations Mike Shoemaker, Amazon and Apple former vice president Diego Piacentini, Instagram engineering chief Rodrigo Schmidt, and MatterScale Ventures. More here.
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IPOs
Kathleen Smith, Renaissance Capital principal and co-founder, tells Bloomberg the IPO market in on pace to hit the highest levels in more than five years and may hit a record despite the Covid-19 pandemic.
KE Holdings, a China-based real estate broker that's known as Beike Zhaofang and which owns property brokerage brand Lianjia and housing transactions platform Beike, saw its shares jump 75% in their New York debut on today, turning the offering into the largest IPO of a Chinese company since March 2018 when iQiyi, the Netflix-style streaming giant, went public in the U.S. KE's share sale is also the second biggest U.S. IPO of the year, and at a time when the U.S. government is threatening to delist Chinese companies that don't meet U.S. accounting standards, notes Reuters. (iQiyi announced today the SEC has launched a probe into the company following a report that accused iQiyi of fraud and inflating revenue and user numbers.) KE Holdings counts SoftBank Group, Tencent Holdings, Hillhouse Capital and Sequoia Capital among its largest investors. More here.
RedBall Acquisition, a blank check firm led by Oakland A's executive Billy Beane of "Moneyball" fame, is looking to raise $500 million through its IPO. The company, which is the first SPAC dedicated to the sports business, priced 50 million units at $10 each; they began trading today on the NYSE under the ticker symbol "RBAC.U." They rose 1% to close at 10.10 by the market close. Investor's Business Daily has more here.
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People
Lauren Weston has joined Thomvest Ventures as an associate. She previously worked in equity research at Morgan Stanley, where she covered residential and commercial real estate companies. More here.
TikTok's U.S. employees are planning to file a lawsuit, challenging a Trump administration executive order that they say would make it illegal for their employer to pay them. CNet has more here.
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Essential Reads
What a day for Epic Games, make of "Fortnite." After sneaking in an update for both the iPhone and Android versions of the game -- one that allowed users to pay Epic directly for in-app purchases instead of use both platforms' systems -- Apple kicked "Fortnite" out of the App Store, after which Epic sued Apple, after which "Fortnite" was also bounced out of the Google Play Store for Android. The Verge has much more on the story, which is still playing out, here.
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Detours
How to cycle up "Mount Everest."
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