Coinbase's big day, China's continuing crackdown, and more sand in the SPAC gears

April 13, 2021
Top News
 
Today, Chinese regulators reportedly summoned 34 of the country’s largest companies from Tencent to TikTok owner ByteDance, warning them “the red line of laws cannot be touched.” (They also imposed a record-breaking fine of $2.75 billion on Alibaba for acting like a monopoly.) The implied message to entrepreneur Jack Ma and his peers is that the decade of their unfettered expansion is at an end.
 
Coinbase's direct listing hits tomorrow and investors are on tenterhooks as they wait to see what happens. The Nasdaq said today that Coinbase’s reference price for the listing is $250, which would value the company around $65.3 billion on a fully diluted basis.
 
U.S. health officials are probing a rare blood-clot complication tied to Johnson & Johnson’s Covid-19 vaccine and have halted its use as they determine how best to recognize and manage it. The EU and South Africa have also paused their use of the vaccine. (Relatedly, if we keel over in the next two weeks, you'll know why.)
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Massive Fundings
 
CeQur, a  13-year-old, Marlborough, Ma.-based maker of wearable insulin delivery devices, has raised $115 million in funding co-led by Credit Suisse Entrepreneur Capital and Endeavour Vision. Mass Device has more here.

Clearcover, a five-year-old, Chicago-based auto insurance startup, has raised $200 million in Series D funding. Eldridge, the investment firm helmed by L.A. Dodgers owner Todd Boehly, led the round, joined by American Family Ventures, Cox Enterprises, and OMERS Ventures. Reuters has more here.
 
ConsenSys, a six-year-old, New York-based software development company at the heart of the Ethereum network (which has become central to non-fungible tokens and decentralized finance), has raised $65 million from J.P. Morgan, Mastercard, and UBS. Business Insider has more here.
 
Degreed, a nine-year-old, Pleasanton, Ca.-based company that provides training and career development programs, has raised $153 million in Series D funding co-led by Sapphire Ventures and Riverwood Capital at a post-money valuation of $1.4 billion. Dan Levin, a former COO of Box, is also taking over as CEO while longtime CEO Chris McCarthy steps down to "take care of a chronic back issue," per the company. Bloomberg has more here.
 
Epic Games, the 30-year-old, Cary, N.C.-based game maker behind "Fortnite,"
has raised $1 billion in new funding at a $28.7 billion valuation, including $200 million from Sony. Other backers include Appaloosa, Baillie Gifford, Fidelity, GIC, T. Rowe Price, Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan, BlackRock, Park West, KKR, AllianceBernstein, Altimeter, Franklin Templeton and Luxor Capital. Sky News had reported this deal was in the works roughly three weeks ago, which is why it might sound familiar. TechCrunch has more here.
 
GumGum, a nearly 14-year-old, Santa Monica, Ca.-based contextual advertising firm, has raised $75 million from Goldman Sachs Growth. The round brings the company's total funding to $122 million. The WSJ has the story here.

Hazel Technologies, a six-year-old, Chicago-based agtech company focused on food waste (its sugar-packet-size sachets condition the storage atmosphere to reduce respiration rate and increase resistance to the ripening agent ethylene), has raised $70 million in Series C funding co-led by Pontifax Global Food, Agriculture Technology Fund, and Temasek. The company has now raised $87 million altogether. More here.
 
HomeX, a four-year-old, Chicago-based home services platform that connects homeowners with technicians virtually before sending someone in for repairs, has raised $90 million in funding  led by New Mountain Capital. Built in Chicago has more here.
 
Memic Innovative Surgery, a 7.5-year-old, Israel-based maker of a robotics-assisted surgery platform that features dexterous miniature limbs, has raised $96 million in Series D funding. Peregrine Ventures and Ceros co-led the round, joined by OurCrowd and Accelmed. Times of Israel has more here.
 
Papa, a four-year-old, Miami-based platform that offers care and companionship to seniors, has raised $60 million in Series C funding led by Tiger Global Management. The outfit had closed its Series B round last September with $18 million led by Comcast Ventures. It has now raised $91 million altogether. TechCrunch has more here.

Repertoire Immune Medicines, a year-old, Cambridge, Ma.-based biotech company focused on cancer, immune disorders, and infectious disease, has raised $189 million in Series B funding, including from Flagship Pioneering, Softbank Vision Fund 2, the Public Sector Pension Investment Board (PSP Investments), the Alaska Permanent Fund, and Invus. Flagship created Repertoire by combining two of its portfolio companies, Cogen Immune Medicines and Torque Therapeutics. FierceBiotech has more here.

SambaNova Systems, a four-year-old, Palo Alto, Ca.-based startup that makes semiconductors for artificial intelligence related computation work, has raised $676 million in Series D funding. SoftBank Vision Fund 2 led the round, joined by Temasek and GIC. The round brings the company's funding to more than $1 billion and its valuation to more than $5 billion, says Reuters. More here.
 
Scribe Therapeutics, a three-year-old, Alameda, Ca.-based platform designed to help develop and engineer new therapeutics based on CRISPR for addressing specific diseases (it was co-founded by recent Nobel Prize winner Jennifer Doudna, one of the pioneers of CRISPR), has raised $100 million to advance its pipeline of therapies for neurodegenerative diseases. The round follows a $20 million Series A round that Scribe raised last fall led by Andreessen Horowitz. The new round was led by Avoro Ventures, Avoro Capital Advisors, OrbiMed Advisors, and a16z; they were joined by Perceptive Advisors, T. Rowe Price Associates, Wellington Management, RA Capital Management, Menlo Ventures, and an undisclosed global investment firm. Crunchbase News has more here.
 
Tempo, a six-year-old, San Francisco-based smart home fitness system that promises to track users' motion and improve their form, has raised $220 million in Series C funding. SoftBank Vision Fund 2 led the round, joined by STEADFAST Capital Ventures, DCM, General Catalyst, Norwest Venture Partners, and Bling Capital. The financing follows a $60 million Series B round that closed last July. TechCrunch has more here.
 
Theseus Pharmaceuticals, a four-year-old, Boston-based oncology biotech that was incubated by OrbiMed, has raised $100 million in Series B funding led by Foresite Capital. More here.

Vegamour, a five-year-old, L.A.-based hair wellness brand that sells hair, brow, and eyelash serums, has raised $80 million in funding from General Atlantic. More here.
 
Big-But-Not-Crazy-Big Fundings
 
Grover, a six-year-old, Berlin, Germany-based consumer electronics rental service that makes computers, phones, game consoles, and scooters accessible, among other things, raised €15 million in Series B funding and another €45 million in debt. JMS Capital-Everglen led the round, joined by Viola Fintech, Assurant Growth and earlier investors  Augmentum Fintech, Circularity Capital, Seedcamp and Samsung Next. TechCrunch has more here.
 
Hatch, a two-year-old, San Francisco-based digital bank focused on small and mid-size businesses (founder Thomson Nguyen sold his last company to Square), has raised $20 million in funding from investors like Kleiner PerkinsFoundation CapitalSilicon Valley Bank and Plaid founders William Hockey and Zack Perret. TechCrunch has more here.
 
Meroxa, a two-year-old, San Francisco-based startup that says it enables its users to build real time data infrastructure quickly regardless of expertise, has raised $15 million in Series A funding led by Drive Capital, with participation from earlier backers Root, Amplify, and Hustle Fund. TechCrunch has more here.
 
Orbital Sidekick, a five-year-old, San Francisco-based deployer of hyperspectral sensors in space for the purposes of selling monitoring services to the oil and gas industries (among other markets), raised $16 million in Series A funding. Temasek led the round, joined by Energy Innovation Capital, Allied Minds, 11.2 Capital, and Syndicate 708. Space News has more here.
 
Talon Cyber Security, a new, Tel Aviv, Israel-based cyber security that's developing software to secure distributed workforces, has raised $26 million in seed funding, including from Lightspeed Venture Partners, Team8, and entrepreneur Zohar Zisapel. Calcalist has more here.
 
Territory Foods, a 10-year-old, Arlington, Va.-based maker of a meal delivery service with personalized dietary preferences, has raised $22 million. U.S. Venture Partners led the round, joined by Upfront Ventures, Lewis & Clark Ventures, and DF Enterprises. Crunchbase News has more here.
 
Vericred, a seven-year-old, New York-based digital data company focused on insurance and benefits, has raised $23 million in Series B funding. Aquiline Technology Growth led the round, joined by Echo Health Ventures, MassMutual Ventures, Guardian Strategic Ventures and earlier backers Riverside Acceleration Capital, FCA Venture Partners and First Health Capital Partners. MobiHealth News has more here.
 
Smaller Fundings
 
Clim8 Invest, a two-year-old, London-based crowdfunding platform that helps consumers to invest in companies and supply chains that are focused on tackling climate change, has raised $8 million from 7pc Ventures and British Business Bank Future Fund. TechCrunch has more here.
 
Hack The Box, a four-year-old, U.K-based testing platform for hacking skills, has raised $10.6 million in Series A funding. Paladin Capital Group led the round, joined by Osage University PartnersBrighteye Ventures, and Marathon Venture Capital. TechCrunch has more here.
New Funds
 
5Y Capital, the 13-year-old, Shanghai, China-based venture firm formerly known as Morningside Venture Capital, has closed on more than $2 billion in capital commitments for its newest USD and RMB funds. The firm, which says it was the first investor in both Xiaomi and Kuaishou, says in a related press release that demamd "significantly" exceeded the firm's original targets. More here.
 
Maverick Ventures, a 16-year-old, San Francisco-based venture capital firm whose biggest exits include Coupang and OneMedical, has closed its third evergreen fund with over $600 million. Forbes has more here.
Going Public
 
Autodoc, a nearly 13-year-old, Berlin, Germany-based online car-parts dealer, could seek a valuation of as much as 10 billion euros ($11.9 billion) in an IPO in Frankfurt, says Bloomberg. Crunchbase doesn't show outside funding for the outfit (which doesn't mean there isn't any -- we just don't know). 
 
Kakao Entertainment, a South Korean entertainment and digital comic company overseen by Kakao, is reportedly looking into a U.S. IPO next year that could value it at roughly $17.8 billion. Kakao Entertainment CEO Lee Jinsoo tells Bloomberg that while the focus is on a Korean listing, the company is also looking into New York where Coupang’s $4.6 billion float was the biggest U.S. IPO since Uber’s 2019 listing. More here.
People
 
Billionaires like Bill Gates have said that they would be in favor of paying much more money in personal taxes, yet Gates and some of the wealthiest people in the world are staying silent on a series of active proposals that would do just that in their home state of Washington, reports Vox. More here.
 
Chelsey Glasson, who spent roughly five-and-a-half years at Google, where she led user research for a variety of products, says she was discriminated against by the company while pregnant and witnessed others being treated similarly. Now, she's battling Google's army of lawyers.
 
By Coindesk's math, rapper-investor Nasir Jones (Nas) and his investment firm, QueensBridge Venture Partners, stand to net around $100 million when Coinbase rolls out its listing, having participated in the company's Series B round. More here.
 
Stitch Fix shares fell more than 5% this afternoon after the company announced that founder Katrina Lake would step down as CEO. Elizabeth Spaulding, a former Bain & Co consultant who joined Stitch Fix at the beginning last year as its president, will become CEO effective August 1 while Lake becomes the company's executive chairman. The company didn't provide much in the way of an explanation, with Lake writing in a company-wide email: “This moment of transformation in our business and our industry makes it the right time to think about the next generation of leadership at our company." CNBC has more here.
 
Kenneth Lerer, the venture capitalist and former longtime chairman of BuzzFeed, recently sold his newly built Miami mansion in an off-market deal for $25 million, says the WSJ. (Oracle founder Larry Ellison has meanwhile spent $80 million on a Florida property, but insists he is tearing the house down and not moving there.)
 
Peter Yi has been promoted from principal to partner at Icon Ventures in Palo Alto, Ca. Before joining Icon in 2014, Yi was an investor with the since-shuttered firm Worldview Technology Partners. 
 
When Coinbase goes public tomorrow, the list of people eligible to cash in will be longer than expected owing to a recent decision by the company to hand out 100 shares to its approximately 1700 employees around the world as a "thank you" to the company's staff, a Coinbase spokesperson tells Decrypt.
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Essential Reads
 
Per Bloomberg: "U.S. regulators are throwing another wrench into Wall Street’s SPAC machine by cracking down on how accounting rules apply to a key element of blank-check companies. The Securities and Exchange Commission is setting forth new guidance that warrants, which are issued to early investors in the deals, might not be considered equity instruments and may instead be liabilities for accounting purposes. The move, reported earlier by Bloomberg News, threatens to disrupt filings for new special purpose acquisition companies until the issue is resolved."
 
TikTok stats from leaked sales presentations show how it's trying to lure advertisers to the platform, including through a format called Collection Ads, where brands can combine their product catalogs and branded videos to lead people to product landing page. Business Insider has more here.
 
IBM taught a machine to debate policy questions. What can it teach us about the limits of rhetorical persuasion? In the New Yorker.
Detours
 
Not your standard family office, clearly. 
 
Found (on MBS's 439-foot yacht): Leonardo da Vinci’s $450 million “Salvator Mundi.”
 
Prince Philip's life in pictures.
Retail Therapy
 
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