Kuaishou soars, KKR preps a giant SPAC, and Reddit's WallStreetBets founder sells his life story

February 4, 2021
 
Thursday! No column today -- we were too distracted by a debilitating hamstring strain following a midday basketball game with the interns. (They're not towering over us quite yet but they're getting competitive; relatedly, the trash talk seems to be getting more egregious.)
Top News
 
Senator Amy Klobuchar, the incoming head of the Senate antitrust subcommittee, proposed broad changes to U.S. antitrust laws today, including to place greater legal burdens on companies with more than a 50% share of a market. It would also bar acquisitions by companies that dominate their sectors unless they can prove their deals don’t “create an appreciable risk of materially lessening competition," according to a draft. The WSJ has more here.
 
Kuaishou, a Chinese video app that's a fierce rival for Douyin, the Chinese version of TikTok, has just completed a massive IPO in Hong Kong, notes TechCrunch. The app -- which makes money through the sale of virtual goods, ads and online marketing, and e-commerce and games -- saw its shares open today (Friday morning in Hong Kong) at the equivalent of $43.60 each, a 194% jump from its IPO price of $14.80. That catapults its market cap to nearly $180 billion. The company pocketed approximately $5.4 billion from the listing. More here.
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Massive Fundings
 
BigChange, an eight-year-old, Leeds, England-based startup that builds fleet management software for mobile workforces, has closed a round of £75 million ($102 million at today’s rates). U.S. investor Great Hill Partners led the round. TechCrunch has more here.
 
Brightwheel, a six-year-old, San Francisco-based startup that makes program management software for early-childcare providers, has raised $55 million in Series C funding. Addition led the round, joined by Emerson Collective, Next Play Ventures, Julia and Kevin Hartz, Daniel Shapero, and earlier investors GGV Capital, Bessemer Venture Partners, and Eniac Ventures. Pymnts has more here.
 
Mobile Premier League, a 2.5-year-old, Bangalore, India-based esports and gaming platform, has raised $95 million in new funding just five months after raising $90 million. The Series D round was led by Composite Capital and Moore Strategic Ventures and gives the startup a post-money valuation of $945 million. TechCrunch has more here.
 
Pairwise, a 3.5-year-old, Durham, N.C.-based gene editing company that's using CRISPR gene-editing technology to create what it expects will be more nutritious and better-tasting fruits and vegetables, has raised $90 million in Series B funding. Pontifax Global Food and Agriculture Technology Fund and Deerfield Management Company led the round, joined by Temasek. WRAL Tech Wire has more here.
 
Rad Power Bikes, a 13-year-old, Seattle-based direct-to-consumer maker of electric bikes, just raised $150 million from institutional investors, including Morgan Stanley’s Counterpoint Global Fund, Fidelity Management & Research Company, TPG’s global impact investing platform The Rise Fund, and funds and accounts advised by T. Rowe Price Associates. Earlier investors Durable Capital Partners and Vulcan Capital also joined the round. TechCrunch has more here.
 
Svante, a 13-year-old, Burnaby, British Columbia-based CO2 marketplace using second-generation carbon capture technology, has raised $75 million in Series D funding led by Temasek. Other investors in the round included publicly traded Chart Industries  and Carbon Direct and Export Development Canada. DealStreetAsia has more here.
 
Top Hat, an 11-year-old, Toronto-based digital textbook publisher, has raised $130 million in Series E funding from earlier investor Georgian Partners. Relatedly, Mike Silagadze, who co-founded Top Hat, is stepping down as CEO next month after more than a decade in the job; the company's new CEO will be Joe Rohrlich, who previously served as chief revenue officer at the e-commerce analytics company Bazaarvoice. EdSurge has more here.
 
Big-But-Not-Crazy-Big Fundings
 
Cialfo, a 3.5-year-old, Singapore-based international student application management platform, has raised $15 million in Series A funding. SIG and Vulcan Capital co-led the round, joined by January Capital and Bisk Ventures. Entrepreneur has more here.
 
Class, a six-month-old, Washington, D.C.-based startup that integrates exclusively with Zoom to offer a more customized classroom experience and which was launched by Blackboard co-founder Michael Chasen, has raised $30 million in fresh funding, including from Zoom investors Emergence Capital and VC Bill Tai. The company has now raised $46 million altogether. TechCrunch has more here.
 
Commsor, a two-year-old, New York-based "community control" startup whose tech connects third-party APIs like Slack, GitHub, Twitter, along with event platforms, then connects the dots to create profiles of a community, has raised $16 million in Series A funding. Felicis Ventures and Alexis Ohanian's new fund, Seven Seven Six, co-led the round. VentureBeat has more here.
 
Flink, a 3.5-year-old, Mexico City, Mexico-based retail brokerage, has raised $12 million in Series a funding led by Accel. Mexico’s ALLVP, Clocktower, former Accel partner Kevin Efrusy, Cornership founder Oskar Hjertonsson and earlier investor Raptor Financial Group participated in the round, too. TechCrunch has more here.
 
Garner Health, a two-year-old, New York-based health benefits program that aims to highlight individual doctor performance so employees can receive better healthcare experiences, has raised $12.5 million in Series A funding. Founders Fund led the round, joined by Maverick Capital and Thrive Capital. Crunchbase News has more here.
 
PeaTos, a nearly five-year-old, L.A.-based pea-based snack brand, raised $12.5 million in Series B funding led by cereal giant Post Holdings. Forbes dove into the company's story in 2019.
 
Tovala, a nearly six-year-old, Chicago-based company behind a smart oven and meal kit service, has raised $30 million in Series C funding, a round that looks to bring the company's funding to close to $70 million altogether per Crunchbase data. Left Lane Capital led the round, joined by earlier backers Finistere Ventures, Comcast Ventures, OurCrowd, Origin Ventures, Pritzker Group Venture Capital, and Morningstar founder Joe Mansueto. TechCrunch has more here.
 
Waitwhile, a 3.5-year-old, San Francisco-based queue management platform that helps businesses turn their physical wait lines into virtual lines, has raised $12 million in Series A funding led by CRV. More here.
 
Smaller Fundings
 
Aflorithmic, a two-year-old, London-based SaaS-based startup that makes hyper-personalized audio experiences using AI voice synthesis and voice cloning, has raised $1.3 million in seed funding. The backer is Crowd Media Holdings, an Australia-based company focused on influencer-based "social commerce" and marketing. TechCrunch has more here.
 
Bold, a two-year-old, San Mateo, Ca.-based wellness platform focused on providing older adults with digital workout routines that are designed increase their strength, flexibility, and balance, has raised $7 million in seed funding from Andreessen Horowitz. TechCrunch has more here.
 
Cajoo, a months-old, Paris, France-based on-demand grocery deliver startup, has raised $7.3 million (€6 million) in seed funding co-led by the seed stage firm Frst and the Franco-German firm XAnge, with participation from individual investors. TechCrunch has more here.
 
Coya Therapeutics, a year-old, Houston, Tex.-based clinical-stage biotech startup that's creating therapeutics to treat neurodegenerative and autoimmune diseases, says it has completed a merger with Nicoya Health and also raised $10 million in Series A funding led by Florida-based Allele Capital Partners. Innovation Map has more here.
 
Dame Products, a 6.5-year-old, Brooklyn, N.Y.-based startup that sells vibrators and other sexual wellness products, has raised $4 million in funding led by Listen, with participation from Chingona Ventures, The Community Fund, Her Capital, HP Reformation Ventures, and IgniteXL Ventures, as well as individual investors. More here.
 
Elucidata, a nearly six-year-old, Cambridge, Ma.-based molecular data startup, has raised $5 million in seed funding led by IvyCap Ventures, which was joined by Hyperplane VC. More here
 
Iteratively, a two-year-old, Seattle-based startup that sells software to data and product teams for customer analytics tracking, has raised $5.4 million in seed funding round led by Gradient Ventures, with participation from Fika Ventures and early Iteratively investor PSL Ventures. GeekWire has more here.
 
Kranus Health, an eight-month-old, Berlin, Germany-based digital therapeutics startup focused on men's health, has raised $1.2 million in seed funding from High-Tech Grunderfonds, A Round Capital, and Venture Basecamp, among others. More here.
 
Latitude, a 15-month-old, Provo, Utah-based startup building games with “infinite storylines” generated by artificial intelligence, has raised $3.3 million in seed funding led by NFX, with participation from Album VC and Griffin Gaming Partners. TechCrunch has more here.
 
Metalenz, a four-year-old, Boston-based company at work on engineered surfaces that could save precious space and battery life in phones and other devices,  has raised $10 million from 3M Ventures, Applied Ventures, Intel Capital, M Ventures and TDK Ventures, along with Tsingyuan Ventures and Braemar Energy Ventures. TechCrunch has more here.
 
Monkey, a 4.5-year-old, São Paulo, Brazil-based financial marketplace for receivables in Latin America, has raised $6 million in Series A funding co-led by Quona Capital and Kinea Ventures. TechCrunch has much more here.
 
Moka.care, a two-year-old, Paris, France-based mental wellness startup whose offerings are offered to employees as a benefit, has raised $3 million (€2.5 million) in funding from the venture firm Singular. A long list of business angels also participated. TechCrunch has more here.
 
Mountaintop, a months-old, L.A.-based supergroup game development studio founded by veterans from a multitude of other major companies in the industry, has collected $5.5 million in seed funding from friends and family. The company emerged last summer, headed by Oculus co-founder Nate Mitchell. TechCrunch has more here.
 
Storyblok, a 3.5-year-old, Linz, Austria-based “headless” content management system for developers and marketers to deliver content, has raised an $8.5 million Series A funding round led by Mubadala Capital, alongside earlier investors firstminute capital and 3VC. TechCrunch has more here.
 
Vamstar, a months-old, London-based platform that's aiming to connect private and public buyers and suppliers such as pharmaceutical and medical device companies, has raised $1.7 million in seed funding. btov led the round, joined by Antler and Begin Capital. Tech.eu has more here.
New Funds
 
Acrew Capital, the firm led by founding partner Theresia Gouw, is raising a new growth-sage fund that will attempt to open the door to a more diverse universe of limited partners, reports Fortune. Its Diversify Capital Fund will target LPs from underrepresented backgrounds because "I don't think this opportunity generally exists," Gouw tells the outlet. She adds that 25 limited partners have already made capital commitments to the fund, though she declined to disclose its current size or how much it is targeting.
 
North Island Ventures, a year-old, New York-based crypto-focused venture firm, has closed its debut fund with $72 million in capital commitments. The firm was cofounded by Glenn Hutchins, who is best known for cofounding the investment giant Silver Lake; Travis Scher, a former M&A attorney who most recently ran investment at the startup Digital Currency Group; and Hutchins's son James Hutchins, who logged a year and a half as the head of research at Coatue before jumping into investing full time. LPs in the fund include hedge fund billionaire Paul Tudor Jones, longtime VC Geoff Yang, and Twitter CEO Anthony Noto, among others. Yahoo Finance has more here.
 
Qiming Venture Partners, the nearly 15-year-old, Shanghai, China-based venture firm, said today it has raised the equivalent of $441 million for its sixth RMB-denominated fund after a three-month fundraising process that brought its total assets under management to $5.9 billion altogether. DealStreetAsia has more, including about the firm's limited partners, here.
 
Sapphire Ventures, the fund of funds and direct investor in startups, says it recently raised $1.7 billion more in capital across multiple funds. The outfit's limited partners include SAP, which was once its sole LP. Other backers include Major League Baseball, Sinclair Broadcast Group, and the owners of the English Premier League team Manchester City. Two of Sapphire’s portfolio companies, JFrog and Sumo Logic, went public last year, notes Bloomberg. The outfit was also an investor in Segment, which was acquired by Twilio, and Portworx, which was bought by Pure Storage. More here.
 
Top Tier Venture Partners, the nine-year-old fund of funds that spun out of Paul Capital Investments in 2011 and which both invests in venture firms (Andreessen Horowitz, True Ventures, and Mayfield)  as well as makes direct investments in select companies (DraftKings, TalkSpace), has raised $1.2 billion in capital for its ninth fund, it announced today. Worth noting: one of the firm's managing partners, Lisa Edgar, has also stepped back after 17 years with the firm, becoming a partner emeritus. More here.
Exits
 
Mobile apps marketplace and games publisher AppLovin is acquiring Adjust, a Berlin, Germany-based startup that makes tools to measure the performance of apps, in a deal valued at close to $1 billion, reports Bloomberg. AppLovin, last valued at $2 billion in 2018 according to PitchBook, filed confidentially to go public this year, says Bloomberg. The deal marks AppLovin's seventh acquisition. More here.
Going Public
 
Genetics testing and genome research company 23andMe is set to go public via a merger with special purpose acquisition company VG Acquisition Corp., a vehicle set up by Richard Branson and his company Virgin Group. The transaction is expected to result in 23andMe having around $984 million in cash available at close to spend on product development, hires and other growth strategies, and will value the company at around $3.5 billion. 23andMe, founded in 2006 by CEO Anne Wojcicki, Linda Avey and Paul Cusenza, has raised a total of just under $900 million to date. TechCrunch has more here.
 
Food producer Chobani is considering an IPO later this year, according to the WSJ, which says the Norwich, New York-based maker of greek yogurt, oat milk and other products is seeking an offering that could value it at as much as $10 billion. Food producers have broadly seen a sales boost in the last 12 months as restaurant consumption declines and consumers get more of their meals at home, notes Bloomberg.
 
Blank-check company KKR Acquisition Holdings I Corp., sponsored by KKR & Co. Inc., in partnership with Glenn Murphy, filed plans with the SEC today for an $1 billion offering (which kind of answers this question). Murphy, the blank-check company’s chief executive, is currently chairman of Lululemon Athletica and previously served as chairman and CEO of Gap Inc. The WSJ has more here.
 
Israeli fintech powerhouse Payoneer says it it merging with the blank-check company FTAC Olympus Acquisition Corp (FTOC). Once the reorganization is complete, the combined company will begin trading at an implied estimated enterprise value of approximately $3.3 billion. Calcalist has more here.
 
Sana Biotechnology, a three-year-old, Seattle gene regulation startup led by several co-founders of Juno Therapeutics, raised $588 million in its IPO. The company priced 23.5 million shares at $25, for a fully diluted market value of around $4.9 billion. It's the largest-ever IPO for a preclinical biotech company, says Axios. Meanwhile GeekWire note that even without the IPO, Sana is sitting on a large cash pile. At the close of 2020, the company reported cash, cash equivalents and marketable securities of $412 million. More here.
People
 
Chris Bischoff, an experienced London-based investor, has joined General Catalyst as managing director of its new London office. TechCrunch has more here.
 
Investor and SPAC proponent Chamath Palihapitiya posted a picture of his abs yesterday, and the Twittersphere had things to say about it.
 
ForgePoint Capital, a nearly six-year-old cybersecurity-focused venture firm, announced three promotions, including appointing Wil Lin to the role of managing director, Ernie Bio to principal, and Rohit Gupta to associate. Lin was a member of ForgePoint's founding team who joined from Trident Capital. Bio joined in 2018 as a vice president after serving as a COO of the Defense Innovation Unit, a Department of Defense organization headquartered in Silicon Valley. Gupta moved to ForgePoint last year from Plug and Play Ventures. More here.
 
Jaime Rogozinski, the founder of Reddit’s WallStreetBets, ha sold the rights to his life story to RatPac Entertainment, a production company known for backing hits like “Wonder Woman.” The WSJ has more here.
 
At least 10 former employees of Robinhood have founded their own venture-backed startups, and some are raising capital from Robinhood investors like Ribbit Capital and Index Ventures. Business Insider takes a look here.
Jobs
 
Common Ocean Ventures, a New York-based early-stage venture firm whose core thesis is financial wellness for all, is looking to bring on a venture investor MBA summer associate for a paid internship from May through September. Applications are due February 26th.
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Essential Reads
 
Apple is developing a mixed reality headset that will be equipped with more than a dozen cameras for tracking hand movements and showing video of the real world to people wearing it, along with ultra-high-resolution 8K displays and advanced technology for eye tracking, according to a new report in The Information. It posits the device -- which could cost around $3,000 -- might represent one of the company’s most ambitious efforts to build a new technology platform. More here.
 
Citadel Securities, a major source of revenue for Robinhood, is going to war with the SEC.
 
SoftBank Group  is expected to extend its earnings recovery when it reports third quarter results on Monday as go-go markets drive a rally in the value of its tech investment portfolio and public offerings gain more traction. Reuters has more here.
Detours
 
The doctor will sniff you now.
 
The power brokers of Beverly Hills.
 
Harvard has become a factory for NFL tight ends
 
Twitter trolls tried to come for AOC. Their hashtag was taken over by adorable pet pics.
Retail Therapy
 
Amanera Resort. (At least you can travel to its website; it's nice!)
 
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