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July 8, 2021
Thursday! No column today but more tomorrow when we have time to write.
Please don't let it be a sweep, don't let it be a sweep!
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Top News
Instacart just poached one of the highest-ranking female Facebook executives, Fidji Simo, as its new CEO. She'll move into the role next month, succeeding Instacart founder Apoorva Mehta, who transitions to executive chairman of the board. As has been widely acknowledged today, Simo is a *huge* get for Sequoia-backed Instacart. Still, we can't help but wonder why Mehta would hand over the reins as he's on the cusp of becoming a public company CEO. If you have any insights here -- other than that he knows his limitations and that she's amazing (we all know it's never so simple) -- we're all ears. More here.
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Massive Fundings
Clearco, a six-year-old, Toronto, Canada-based company that provides non-dilutive, revenue-based financing to startups, has raised $215 million in new Series C funding from SoftBank Vision Fund 2. The company has now raised around $680 million altogether, per Crunchbase. TechCrunch has more here.
DealShare, a three-year-old, Bangalore, India-based social commerce site focused on "high-quality, low-priced essentials," has raised $144 million in Series D funding at a $455 million post-money valuation. Earlier backer Tiger Global led the round, joined by WestBridge Capital, Alpha Wave Incubation, Z3Partners, partners of DST Global and Alteria Capital. TechCrunch has more here.
Mirxes, a seven-year-old, Singapore-based diagnostics startup whose first product is a molecular blood test for the early detection of gastric cancer, has raised $77 million in Series C funding at a $500 million valuation. CR-CP Life Sciences led the round, joined by Rock Springs Capital, CCB International and Keytone Ventures. Bloomberg has more here.
Younited Credit, a 12-year-old, Paris-based consumer credit platform, has raised $170 million led by Goldman Sachs, with participation from Eurazeo, Bpifrance and AG2R La Mondiale. TechCrunch has more here.
Big-But-Not-Crazy-Big Fundings
Lula, a five-year-old, Miami, Fl.-based insurance infrastructure startup, has raised $18 million in Series A funding co-led by Founders Fund and Khosla Ventures, with participation from SoftBank, hedge fund manager Bill Ackman, Shrug Capital, Bain Capital co-chairman and Boston Celtics owner Steve Pagliuca, and Tiny Capital’s Andrew Wilkinson. TechCrunch has more here.
Otter, a 10-month-old, New York-based childcare marketplace that connects parents who need childcare with stay-at-home parents, has raised $23 million in Series A funding led by Sequoia Capital. Other investors in the round include Abstract Ventures, Thrive Capital, and earlier backer Andreessen Horowitz, which had led a previously undisclosed $4.8 million seed round last fall. Forbes has more here.
Popshop Live, a three-year-old, L.A.-based livestream shopping community (that's akin to a next-gen QVC), has raised $20 million in Series A funding at a post-money valuation of $100 million, says TechCrunch. Benchmark led the round, with participation from TQ Ventures, Mantis VC, Access Industries and SV Angel, along with previous backers Floodgate, Abstract Ventures and Long Journey Ventures. TechCrunch has more here.
Raylo, a two-year-old, London-based smartphone subscription startup with a tagline so terrible we love it ("Don't own it; Raylo it"), has raised $11.5 million in Series A funding led by Octopus Ventures. TechCrunch has more here.
Techmint, a year-old, India-based live tutoring and teaching platform, has raised $20 million in funding led by Learn Capital, with participation from CM Ventures. TechCrunch has more here.
Smaller Fundings
PowerZ, an 11-month-old, Paris-based startup that makes a video game focused on education, has raised $8.3 million (€7 million) in new funding, including $1.2 million (€1 million) in debt. Bpifrance Digital Venture, RAISE Ventures and Bayard participated in the round, alongside earlier backers Educapital, Hachette Livres, and individual investors. TechCrunch has more here.
Repeat, a three-year-old, L.A.-based product replenishment service that works with more than 60 CPG companies, has raised $6 million in Series A funding led by Battery Ventures, with participation from earlier backers Mucker Capital and Harlem Capital. TechCrunch has more here.
Rootly, a 15-month-old, San Francisco-based startup that's building an incident-response solution inside of Slack, just raised $3.2 million in seed funding. XYZ Venture Capital led the round, joined by 8VC, Y Combinator and several individual tech executives. TechCrunch has more here.
Smile Identity, a five-year-old, Oakland, Ca.-based Africa-focused provider of ID verification and KYC compliance software, has raised $7 million in Series A funding co-led by Costanoa Ventures and the pan-African venture firm CRE Venture Capital. TechCrunch has more here.
WellSaid Labs, a three-year-old, Seattle-based startup whose tools create synthetic speech that could be mistaken for the real thing, has raised $10 million in Series A funding. FUSE led the round, joined by previous investors Voyager, Qualcomm Ventures and GoodFriends. TechCrunch has more here.
Z1, a two-year-old, Sao Paulo, Brazil-based digital bank aimed at Latin American GenZers, has raised $2.5 million in funding led by Homebrew, with participation from Clocktower Ventures, Mantis VC, Goodwater Capital, Gaingels, Soma Capital and Rebel Fund. TechCrunch has more here.
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New Funds
Acrylic, a new, Brooklyn-based venture firm focused on blockchain and crypto enabled protocols, applications and companies, has raised $55 million for its debut fund. The outfit was founded by solo general partner Ash Egan, who spent the last few years as a venture partner with Accomplice VC and, before that, was a principal with Consensys (among other roles). TechCrunch has more here.
DN Capital, a 21-year-old, London-based venture firm, says it has closed its fifth fund with $350 million in capital commitments. The firm is focused on software, fintech, marketplaces and the consumer internet. Roughly two thirds of its investments have been made in Europe, through its London and Berlin hubs, with the remainder originating in its Silicon Valley office in Menlo Park. More here.
Peter Boyce, who joined venture powerhouse General Catalyst an investor more than eight years ago, has left to launch his own firm, Stellation Capital, and sources tell TechCrunch that he has closed on most of the $40 million in capital commitments the firm is raising for its debut vehicle. More here.
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Exits
Dataminr, the New York-based company specializing in real-time information alerts, says it has acquired WatchKeeper, a data geo-visualization platform in London, for an undisclosed amount. Dataminr, characterizes the move as one of its first to fuel the growth of its private sector business. VentureBeat has more here.
Google is set to buy Japanese mobile payments startup Pring for around $182 million, according to Nikkei. The outlet says that Google is in negotiations to buy the Tokyo-based cashless payment and settlement outfit owned by Mizuho Bank and other investors so that it can offer fintech services, such as payments and transfers, in Japan next year, following launches in the U.S. and India. More here.
View, the Milpitas, Ca.-based company that produces smart glass for buildings based on electrochromism and which went public in March by merging with a blank-check company sponsored by Cantor Fitzgerald & Co, has acquired IoTium, a Santa Clara, Ca.-based maker of secure edge-cloud infrastructure software for smart buildings. IoTium had raised $22 million from its investors; terms of the deal aren't being disclosed. More here.
ZeroFox, a cybersecurity startup that helps companies detect risks found on social media and digital channels, has announced it has acquired dark web threat intelligence company Vigilante. Vigilante — not to be confused with the controversial crime reporting app, notes TechCrunch — scours the dark web to source intelligence that helps to protect organizations from cyberattacks. More here.
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Going Public
Circle, which provides payments infrastructure for digital currencies, said today it will go public in a blank-check merger deal that values it at $4.5 billion. The eight-year-old, Boston-based company will merge with Concord Acquisition Corp, which is backed by former Barclays boss Bob Diamond, and the combined entity will be acquired by a new Irish holding company that will trade on the NYSE. According to Crunchbase, Circle has raised around $710 million over the years from private investors. Its announcement comes at a time when crypto firms are battling increased regulatory scrutiny, notes Reuters.
Equinox Holdings, the luxury gym operator popular among celebrities and financiers, is no longer in talks to go public through a merger with a blank-check company backed by investor Chamath Palihapitiya, according to Bloomberg. Negotiations between Social Capital Hedosophia Holdings Corp. VI and Equinox, which also operates SoulCycle indoor-cycling centers, fell apart due to a disagreement over the combined company’s valuation, says the outlet. More here.
Wise, the international money transfer platform formerly known as Transferwise, is now a publicly traded company in London (LSE: WISE) at a valuation north of $11 billion following a successful direct listing. Founders Kristo Käärmann and Taavet Hinrikus are now billionaires following the fintech firm’s stock market debut. Other big winners in the deal include Peter Thiel’s Valar Ventures and Andreessen Horowitz. CNBC has more here.
Zomato, the 12-year-old, Gurgaon, India-based food delivery company backed by China’s Ant Group and Uber, said today it has boosted its plan to raise $1.3 billion in its initial public offering, which opens on July 14 and closes July 16. The unprofitable startup said it will price its shares in the range of 72 Indian rupees (96 cents) to 76 ($1) and is targeting an upper limit valuation of $8.56 billion. Zomato, which competes with market leader Swiggy, says that following a successful IPO, it will have about $2 billion in the bank. It plans to list on Indian stock exchanges, notes TechCrunch; it has the story here.
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People
Facebook appointed longtime product and engineering executive Tom Alison as the head of its core social networking app, making him the fourth person to hold that role in the last four years, notes Bloomberg. Alison, who’s been at Facebook for 11 years, will take over the job from Fidji Simo, who is leaving the social network to become CEO of Instacart. More here.
Bill Gates can remove Melinda French Gates from the foundation they established together in two years if they can't find a way to work together following their planned divorce. More here.
Jason Warner, who most recently spent four years as the CTO of Github, has joined Redpoint Ventures as the newest partner with the firm's newest ($725 million) growth fund. In a statement about the hire, the firm says it first met Warner when he was VP of Engineering at a former Redpoint portfolio company, Heroku. More here.
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Data
This can't be good: Consumer demand for auto loans and leases, general-purpose credit cards and personal loans was up 39% in April compared with the same period last year, according to credit-reporting firm Equifax. It was also up 11% compared with April 2019, according to Equifax. The WSJ has the story.
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Essential Reads
Mark Zuckerberg and Sheryl Sandberg’s partnership did not survive Trump, according to New York Times reporters Sheera Frenkel and Cecilia Kang, authors of a forthcoming book about Facebook.
Though remote work is sweeping corporate America, Google has been reluctant to let employees do it permanently, an approach Twitter and Reddit have taken and which is backfiring as more employees grow agitated and are speaking up about it.
Square is going to make a hardware wallet for bitcoin in order to make the currency's custody "more mainstream."
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