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December 18, 2020
Friday! And we are outta here!
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Before we go(!), we leave you with this week's StrictyVC Download, with guest Justin Fishner-Wolfson, the founder of 137 Ventures, a San Francisco-based investment firm that owns stakes in around a dozen companies per fund -- positions that it assembles largely by buying up secondary shares. (Some of its recent exits include Airbnb, Palantir, and Wish.)
Out of Stanford, Fishner-Wolfson got his start at Founders Fund, working with its original team under Peter Thiel and leading numerous deals, including, he says, its early and enormous investment in SpaceX. (We definitely talked about this.) Since spinning out roughly a decade ago, he has mostly kept a low profile, so we appreciated the opportunity to hear, among other things, how he screens deals, why investors are kind of "meh" about Wish's IPO, and where he's shopping now. Hope you enjoy it. (You can also read some excerpts from the interview below.)
Giant thanks to Acquity Reality for sponsoring this episode. And thank you, listeners and readers, for listening and reading, throughout 2020.:)
Wishing each of you very safe and happy holidays, strange as they might be for many of us this year. See you back here January 4th. ❤️
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Top News
The Justice Department’s historic lawsuit against Google is moving along, slowly. In a status hearing today, U.S. District Judge Amit Mehta set a tentative date for the case . . . that's in September 2023. TechCrunch has more here.
Tesla shares roared to a record high on the eve of their inclusion in the S&P 500, punctuating a 2020 rally that has propelled the electric-car maker into the ranks of the most-valuable U.S. companies. More in the WSJ.
Federal prosecutors today charged a China-based executive at Zoom with conspiring to disrupt videoconference commemorations of the crackdown on the 1989 Tiananmen Square democracy protests. U.S. officials said the case points to a pitfall for American internet companies trying to operate in China. The WSJ has more here.
The Trump administration today added Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp.(SMIC); drone maker DJI; and dozens of other Chinese companies and universities on the Entity List, which bans the export of U.S. technology to the entities unless the exporter receives a government license. The Washington Post has more here.
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Wish (and Palantir and Airbnb) Investor Justin Fishner-Wolfson Doesn't Care About First-Day "Pops"
It’s probably no wonder that when Founders Fund was still a very young venture firm 13 years ago, it brought aboard as its first principal Justin Fishner-Wolfson. Having nabbed two computer science degrees from Stanford and spent two years as CEO of an organization that provides asset management services to the school’s student organizations, Fishner-Wolfson wasn’t shy about voicing his opinions at the venture fund. In fact, he says Founders Fund made a much bigger bet on SpaceX than it originally planned because he pushed for it.
He stayed three years before spying what he thought was an even better opportunity, owing to friends who worked at Facebook before the company’s 2012 IPO. They were beginning to look for ways to liquidate their shares, and while they had options, to his mind, they weren’t great. More, Fishner-Wolfson says he foresaw more companies like Facebook staying private longer. He said goodbye to Founders Fund and formed 137 Ventures to acquire secondary shares from founders, investors, and employees.
That was 10 years ago.
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Massive Fundings
Creditas, an eight-year-old, São Paulo, Brazil-based lending business, has raised $255 million in new funding from new and earlier backers. Among its new investors is LGT Lightstone, Tarsadia Capital, Wellington Management, e.ventures and an affiliate of Advent International, Sunley House Capital. Previous investors that joined the round include SoftBank Vision Fund 1, SoftBank Latin America Fund, VEF, Kaszek and Amadeus Capital Partners. TechCrunch has more here.
Neurogene, a 2.5-year-old, New York-based company developing genetic medicines to treat people with inherited neurological diseases like Batten disease, has raised $115 million in Series B funding. EcoR1 Capital led the round, joined by BlackRock, Janus Henderson Investors, Casdin Capital, Avidity Partners, Ascendant BioCapital, Arrowmark Partners, Alexandria Venture Investments and earlier backers Redmile Group, Samsara BioCapital and Cormorant Asset Management. Endpoints News has more here.
Spryker, a six-year-old, Berlin, Germany-based company that makes e-commerce tools for B2B companies, has raised $130 million at a post-money valuation of more than $500 million led by TCV. Earlier backers One Peak and Project A Ventures also joined the round. Reuters has more here.
Verily, the five-year-old, South San Francisco-based life sciences research and engineering organization spun out of Alphabet, has raised $700 million from earlier backers, including Alphabet, Silver Lake, Temasek and the Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan. FierceBiotech has more here.
Big-But-Not-Crazy-Big Fundings
CoachHub, a 2.5-year-old, Berlin, Germany-based online business coaching platform, has raised $30 million in fresh funding led by Draper Esprit. Earlier backers also joined the round, including HV Capital, Partech, Speedinvest, Signals Venture Capital and RTP Global. Tech.eu has more here.
Foresight, a 2.5-year-old, San Francisco-based insurtech startup centered around workers with more hazardous jobs, says it quietly raised $15 million funding earlier this year, including from Blackhorn Ventures and Transverse Insurance Group. Altogether, it has raised $20.5 million from investors, including Brick and Mortar Ventures and Builders VC. TechCrunch has more here.
PostHog, a months-old, San Francisco-based open source product analytics platform, has raised $12 million in Series A funding led by GV, with participation from YC Continuity Fund. VentureBeat has more here.
Smaller Fundings
Avenue 8, a months-old, San Francisco-based residential brokerage platform that aims to enable agents to be more entrepreneurial, has raised $4 million in seed funding led by Craft Ventures, which was joined by Zigg Capital and Good Friends (a fund whose investors include the founders of Warby Parker, Harry's and Allbirds). TechCrunch has more here.
MetaCX, a 2.5-year-old, Indianapolis, In.-based platform that helps suppliers and buyers of enterprise software to communicate and collaborate, has raised $7.5 million co-led by Greenspring Associates and BIP Capital. The company has now raised $24.5 million altogether. The Indianapolis Business Journal has more here.
Sorare, a 2.5-year-old, Paris, France-based global fantasy football (soccer) game where players can buy, trade, and play with official digital cards, has raised $3.5 million in seed funding led by the U.S.-based Cassius Family Fund and by Barcelona FC captain Gerard Piqué, who has apparently begun making startup bets. Sifted has more here.
Surrogate.tv, a two-year-old, Espoo, Finland-based online gaming company, has raised $2.5 million in seed funding led by Supernode Global, with participation from PROfounders, Brighteye Ventures and Business Finland. The company had separately raised $2 million in pre-seed funding last year. TechCrunch has more here.
Tap Network, a three-year-old, New York-based startup focused on corporate rewards programs, has raised $4 million in funding from investors, including Revelis Capital, Nima Capital, the Forbes family office, Warner Music Group, Access Industries, and longtime VC Bill Tai. TechCrunch has more here.
Urbeez, a two-month-old, Brussels, Belgium-based company piecing together a fleet of all-electric delivery vehicles (including bikes, vans, and scooters), has raised €2.5 million in funding from unnamed investors said to be "specializing in logistics." Tech.eu has more here.
V7 Labs, a 2.5-year-old, London-based startup behind a computer vision platform that helps organize data, label, train, deploy, and monitor AI in production, has raised $3 million in seed funding. Amadeus Capital Partners led the deal, joined by Partech, Air Street Capital and Miele Venture. TechCrunch has more here.
Walnut, a months-old, New York-based codeless, customizable platform that's aiming to help sales reps to "own their successful sales demo experience," has raised $3.5 million infunding from SV Angel, A.Capital, NFX and numerous individuals, including Joe Montana and former a16z partners. The company has now raised $6 million. TechCrunch has more here.
WorkWhile, a year-old, San Francisco-based labor platform for hourly workers, has raised $3.5 million in seed funding led by by Khosla Ventures, with participation from F7 and numerous individual investors, including Stitch Fix CEO Katrina Lake and longtime VC Jennifer Fonstad. TechCrunch has more here.
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Going Public
908 Devices, an eight-year-old, Boston-based maker of mass spectrometry devices for scientific research that raised $130 million in its IPO after pricing 6.5 million shares at $20 each for a market cap $519 million, began trading today on the Nasdaq and saw its shares soar as much as 164% before closing at $49 a piece, up 145.1%. Barron's has more here.
Bumble, the dating app where women make the first move, has filed confidentially for an IPO, says Bloomberg, whose sources say the offering is planned for February and could come around Valentine's Day. Bumble sold a majority stake in its business last year to Blackstone. More here.
Playtika, a 10-year-old, Israel-based mobile gaming giant, has filed for its long-awaited IPO. VentureBeat has more here.
Poshmark, a nearly 10-year-old, online reseller of second-hand clothing, shoes and accessories, has filed its IPO prospectus, after racking up over $30 million in profit over the past two quarters. The venture firm Mayfield owns a whopping 26.5% of the business; others of its biggest outside shareholders include GGV Capital, Menlo Ventures, and Inventus Capital. CNBC has more here.
A lot of SPACs were just filed, a number of them by venture firms (and one by an institutional investor that backs venture funds, Hamilton Lane). You can find a full rundown here.
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People
Sad news: Devon Dalio, the 42-year-old son of hedge fund founder Ray Dalio, died in a car crash this week, a family spokesperson said today. In a tweet, Ray Dalio, whose Bridgewater Associates is known as the world’s largest hedge fund, said his family was “mourning and processing and would prefer to be incommunicado for the time being.” CNBC has more here.
Matthew Jones has been promoted to managing director at Anthemis, a fintech focused venture firm. Jones, who is based in London, joined the firm 3.5 years ago as a principal after working most recently on customer engagement at Swiss Re. More here.
Qualtrics CEO Ryan Smith officially became a sports owner today after the NBA approved his $1.6 billion purchase of the Utah Jazz. The new ownership group also adds Atlassian co-founder Mike Cannon-Brookes and Ryan Sweeney of the venture capital firm Accel as minority partners. CNBC has more here.
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Essential Reads
Microsoft is working on in-house processor designs for use in server computers that run the company’s cloud services, says Bloomberg. It adds to an industrywide effort to reduce reliance on Intel's chip technology, and caused Intel's share to fall more than 6% today.
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Detours
The New York Times has retracted the core of its hit 2018 podcast series "Caliphate."
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Retail Therapy
Great headphones (if you're still scrambling for gift ideas).
The top books of 2020 (if you're still scrambling for book ideas).
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