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"Mondays" is what we'd title this one if it were up to us (it is not!). Credit: Kai Choyce.
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Top News
China’s government has asked Alibaba Group to dispose of its media assets, as officials grow more concerned about the technology giant’s sway over public opinion in the country, says the WSJ. Alibaba, founded by billionaire Jack Ma, has through the years assembled media assets that span print, broadcast, digital, social media and advertising, including stakes in Twitter -like Weibo and the South China Morning Post.
Tencent, meanwhile, is also now in the sights of regulators who are cracking down on the unchecked expansion of its tech giants, fueling a $62 billion wipe-out today as its shares slid today (Monday) in Hong Kong. Bloomberg posits that one way it might manage to escape China's latest regulatory tightening is by positioning itself less as an online gaming and social media giant and more as China’s best venture capital fund.
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Massive Fundings
Airtable, the nearly nine-year-old, San Francisco-based no-code relational database that has amassed a customer base that spans 250,000 different organizations, just closed on $270 million in Series E funding at a $5.77 billion post-money valuation -- more than double its valuation in September when it raised $185 million in Series D funding. Greenoaks Capital led the new round, joined by WndrCo and earlier investors Caffeinated Capital, CRV, and Thrive. The company has now raised $617 million altogether, according to Crunchbase. TechCrunch has more here.
Bitpanda, a six-year-old, Vienna, Austria-based retail broker that says it makes it easier for anyone to invest not just in bitcoin and other digital assets but also gold and established stocks, has raised $170 million in Series B funding at a post-money valuation of $1.2 billion. Valar Ventures led the round, just six months after leading the company's $52 million Series A round. Unnamed partners from DST Global also joined the round. TechCrunch has more here.
ElevateBio, a 3.5-year-old, Cambridge, Ma.-based biotech company that aims to help corporate partners develop cell and gene therapies, as well to build its own portfolio of disease treatments, has raised a massive $525 million Series C round, just shy of a year after closing its Series B round with $193 million. Earlier backer Matrix Capital Management led the new round, which also included new investors SoftBank and Fidelity Management & Research Company, along with numerous other, earlier backers. TechCrunch has more here.
Graphite Bio, a two-year-old, South San Francisco-based gene editing startup, has raised $150 million in Series B funding. RA Capital Management and Rock Springs Capital co-led the round, joined by Cormorant, Deerfield, Federated Hermes Kaufmann Funds, Fidelity, Janus Henderson, and half a dozen other new and earlier backers, including Versant Ventures. More here.
Insitro, a three-year-old, South San Francisco-based machine learning start-up that's aiming to speed up drug discovery and is run by former Stanford artificial intelligence professor Daphne Koller, has raised $400 million from investors. Canada Pension Plan Investment Board led the round, which also included SoftBank, Temasek, and previous backers Andreessen Horowitz, T Rowe Price and BlackRock. The Financial Times has more here.
Stripe, the nearly 11-year-old, San Francisco-based company whose software is used by businesses to accept payments, has closed on $600 million in new funding at a post-money valuation of $95 billion -- nearly tripling where it was valued less than a year ago. According to a. statement published yesterday by the company, primary investors in the round include the digital investment unit of Allianz Group, Axa SA, Baillie Gifford, Fidelity Management & Research Co., Sequoia Capital and Ireland’s National Treasury Management Agency. More here.
Big-But-Not-Crazy-Big Fundings
DeepSee.ai, a 3.5-year-old, Salt Lake City, Ut.-based startup that helps enterprises use AI to automate line-of-business problems, has raised $22.6 million in Series A funding led by ForgePoint Capital. Earlier investors AllegisCyber Capital and Signal Peak Ventures also participated in this round, which brings the company's funding to $30.7 million. TechCrunch has more here.
Fondeadora, a three-year-old, Mexico City, Mexico-based challenger bank, has added $14 million to a Series A round that first closed last August, bringing the total round to $28 million. Portag3 led the newest tranche, with earlier backer Gradient Ventures also investing more money, along with notable angel investors Gokul Rajaram and Anatol Von Hahn. Earlier investors in the company include Y Combinator, Scott Belsky, Sound Ventures, Fintech Collective and Ignia. TechCrunch has more here.
Genesis, a nearly nine-year-old, New York-based low-code application platform built for financial markets so non-technical employees can more quickly create ways to monitor and manage real-time risk, high-frequency trades and other activities, has raised $45 million in Series B funding led by Accel. Other participants in the round include GV and Salesforce Ventures, as well as earlier backers Citi, Illuminate Financial and Tribeca Venture Partners. TechCrunch has more here.
Smaller Fundings
FocalPoint Positioning, a nearly six-year-old, U.K.-based maker of satellite positioning software, has raised £6 million from Draper Esprit. More here.
Gatsby, a three-year-old, New York-based options trading app, has raised $10 million in Series A funding, including from Techstars, Beta Bridge Capital, and numerous individual investors organized by both ClearList and through a SeedInvest campaign. TechCrunch has more here.
GloveBox, a three-year-old, Denver, Co.-based mobile platform for independent insurance agents, has raised $3 million in seed funding led by Mercato Partners, with participation from Heffernan Insurance Brokers. Crunchbase News has more here.
HeraSoft, a two-year-old, Bartlesville, Ok.-based blockchain startup focused on cybersecurity, has raised $5 million in Series A funding led by United Capital Management of Kansas. Crunchbase News has more here.
Sherpa, a nearly nine-year-old, Bilbao, Spain-based artificial intelligence company specializing in predictive conversational digital assistants, has tacked on $8.5 million to a Series A funding that originally closed with $15 million. Backers in the newest tranche include Marcelo Gigliani, a managing partner at Apax Digital; Alex Cruz, the chairman of British Airways; and the Spanish investment firms Mundi Ventures and Ekarpen. TechCrunch has more here.
Not-Saying-How-Much Fundings
Kunlun, the AI semiconductor business of Baidu, has raised an undisclosed amount of money at a $2 billion valuation, according to CNBC. The round was led by CPE, a Chinese asset management and private equity firm, with IDG and Legend Capital participating. The move reportedly comes as the Chinese search giant looks to diversify its revenue streams. More here.
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New Funds
Black Tech Nation, a Pittsburgh, Pa.-based organization that supports Black entrepreneurs with education, content, community and more, is now raising its first venture fund with a $50 million target. The firm's general partners are Kelauni Jasmyn, who is the founder and CEO of Black Tech Nation; Sean Sebastian, who is a partner at the seed-stage investment firm Birchmere Ventures; and David Motley, co-founder of BlueTree Venture Fund and African American Directors Forum. The idea is to write both seed and Series A checks to software startups around the U.S., whether their consumer- or enterprise focused. TechCrunch has more here.
Brunnur Ventures, a six-year-old, Iceland-based early-stage venture firm, has closed its second fund with $65 million in capital commitments, from what it describes as ten of Iceland’s leading pension funds and the Icelandic national bank Landsbankinn. The outfit plans to write checks to roughly 20 companies with the new fund. More here.
Congruent Ventures, a nearly four-year-old, Oakland, Ca.-based early-stage venture firm, has raised more than $152 million in capital commitments for its second fund, shows a new SEC filing that lists a $175 million target. More here.
Dundee Venture Capital, an 11-year-old, Omaha, Nebraska-based seed-stage venture firm that focuses on startups across the Midwest, says it has closed on $25 million in capital commitments for a new fund. It isn't clear if the fund is yet closed. Built in Chicago (Dundee has an office in Chicago) has more here.
TinySeed, a 2.5-year-old, Minneapolis, Mn.-based accelerator program for nascent software startups that are largely bootstrapped, has raised $25 million for its second fund. Axios has more here.
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Exits
Voyage, a 3.5-year-old autonomous vehicle startup that spun out of Udacity, has been acquired by Cruise for undisclosed terms. The majority of Voyage’s 60-person team will move over to Cruise and the company’s co-founder and CEO Oliver Cameron will take on a new role as vice president of product, says TechCrunch, noting that the deal points to continued consolidation within the burgeoning industry. More here.
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Going Public
Trading platform eToro, a rival to Robinhood, plans to go public via a merger with a blank-check firm led by serial deal-maker Betsy Cohen, according to Bloomberg. The deal with FinTech Acquisition Corp. V will value the combined company at about $10 billion and the companies are reportedly raising about $650 million in equity to support the deal, which could be announced as soon as tomorrow.
FirstMark Capital filed to raise $200 million for its second tech SPAC and $400 million for its third. Firm cofounder Amish Jani joined us on StrictlyVC Download back on October about the firm's first SPAC, and he made clear then that there would be more.
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People
After dozens of people caught the coronavirus at his expensive conference, tech mogul Peter Diamandis doubled down, offering fraudulent Covid-19 treatments to them, from injectable peptides to amniotic fluid.
Elon Musk says he is selling this song about NFTs as an NFT, and the reactions are classic. (Musk, who famously loves trolling, also said in a new SEC filing that his title as CEO of Tesla has formally changed to Technoking, and that CFO Zach Kirkhorn's title is now Master of Coin).
Jason Pontin, a former editor of Technology Review and more recently a senior advisor with Flagship Pioneering, has joined DCVC as a partner. More here.
Investor Peter Thiel is "placing the biggest political bet of his career, pumping $10 million into a super PAC that is supporting a former Thiel aide who may run for the U.S. Senate in Ohio," reports Vox, citing a Cincinnati Enquirer story. That former aide is J.D. Vance, the author of the best-selling book Hillbilly Elegy and also a former principal at Mithril Capital, a firm Thiel cofounded that is named after a fictional metal found in J.R.R. Tolkien's writings. Vance himself founded a new venture capital firm in Ohio in 2019 called Narya, named after one of the rings of power in the works of Tolkien. More here.
Tyler Winklevoss reminds his brother of that time they hired Mark Zuckerberg.
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Essential Reads
Hackers have already started stealing NFTs, the blockchain-based art credentials that give a buyer original ownership over a digital piece of art, Motherboard reports.
A look at WeWork's turnaround strategy, including all-access passes, hourly rentals, and weekend availability.
Gumroad, a startup that helps creators sell their work, is raising up to $5 million from anyone willing to hand over $100, via changes to "Reg CF" that went into effect today.
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