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Today, the Dow Jones Industrial Average and S&P 500 fell for the third day straight. The Dow shed 68 points, and the S&P 500 slid 0.13%.
Shares of Tencent and Netease fell on Thursday morning after Chinese regulators called them and other gaming companies for an interview, reminding them of restrictions on game time for children. China’s propaganda department, cyberspace regulator and other authorities said they would “seriously deal with” any violations of their rules, reports CNBC.
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| Sequoia's Pat Grady Says It Isn't Clear That Startups "Should Be Accelerating" Right Now |
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Earlier today, we joined Jon Fortt of CNBC in interviewing partner Pat Grady of Sequoia Capital, and it proved a wide-ranging conversation. You can check out the video over on TechCrunch, but we thought there were some highlights worth pulling out for some of you, including as it pertains to the current market, which has never felt frothier.
It's more than anecdotal. According to a recent Wilson Sonsini report, the median pre-money valuation for Series C and later financings hit a record $675 million -- more than double the full year 2020 median of $315 million. Meanwhile, senior liquidation preferences in so-called up rounds dropped from appearing in 35% of related deals in 2017 to 20% in the first quarter -- a trend that suggests that investors are removing terms in order to win deals. In some cases, founders are feeling so
empowered that they are calling out investor behavior that makes them uncomfortable, which is something you didn't see until more recently.
But Grady said not all is what it seems to those of us on the sidelines. Indeed, he said that while Sequoia's advice to founders as recently as March of this year was to hit the gas, things have changed more recently. Specifically, he said, "In the last couple of months, a rollout of the vaccines has kind of kind of tapered, so I would say that fog has descended onto the road [and] it's not so clear the company should be accelerating anymore."
More here.
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Aviatrix Systems, a seven-year-old, Santa Clara, Ca.-based multi-cloud network platform, has raised $200 million in funding led by TCV, with participation from Insight Partners and Tiger Global. The company says it's now valued at $2 billion, up from $700 million just seven months ago, when it closed its previous round of funding. Bloomberg has more here.
Beauty Pie, a five-year-old, London-based beauty and wellness company that sells anti-aging eye serums, face creams and more, has raised $100 million in Series B funding. Index Ventures and Insight Partners led the round. TechCrunch has more here.
Koyo, a three-year-old, London-based fintech startup that says it uses transactional bank data to make better lending decisions to people with poor credit histories, has closed on $50 million in debt and equity funding led by Force Over Mass, with participation from earlier investors Forward Partners, Frontline Ventures and Seedcamp. More here.
SingleStore, a 10-year-old, San Francisco-based company that provides a platform to enterprises to help them integrate, monitor and query their data as a single entity, regardless of whether that data is stored in multiple repositories, has raised $80 million in Series F funding. Insight Partners led the round, joined by Hewlett Packard Enterprise and previous backers Khosla Ventures, Dell Technologies Capital, Rev IV, Glynn Capital and GV. The company has now raised $264 million and its investors have assigned it a post-money valuation of $940 million, says TechCrunch. More here.
Spiber, a 14-year-old, Yamagata, Japan-based developer of plant-based protein polymers, just raised $91 million at a $1.2 billion valuation from The Carlyle Group, Fidelity and Baillie Gifford. The deal is one of a growing number of late-stage investments in Japanese companies, notes Reuters. More here.
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| Big-But-Not-Crazy-Big Fundings |
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Aviva Links, an 11-month-old, Bay Area-based startup working on a secretive “highly integrated circuit solution” that it says will enable low-latency, multi-gigabit data-sharing in connected cars, has raised $26.5 million in funding led by the founders of chipmaker Marvell Technology Group, among others prominent semiconductor industry investors. The company has now raised $33 million altogether. SiliconAngle has more here.
Borneo, a two-year-old, Singapore-based real-time data security and privacy observability platform that was founded by a former Facebook and Uber executive, Prithvi Rai, has raised $15.5 million in Series A funding led by Vulcan Ventures. Other backers in the round include Prosus Ventures, Lytical Ventures and earlier backer Wavemaker Partners. The company has now raised $18 million altogether. Tech in Asia has more
here.
Eventus, a six-year-old, Austin, Tex.-based maker of multi-asset class trade surveillance and market risk software, has closed on $30 million in Series B funding led by Centana Growth Partners. More here.
Headout, a six-year-old, TK-based app that enables tourists to make same-day bookings for tours, events and activities, has raised $12 million led by Glade Brook Capital. Other backers in the round include Espresso Capital, Practical VC and earlier investors Version One Ventures, Nexus Venture Partners, FJ Labs, 500 Startups, Haystack and Ludlow Ventures. TechCrunch has more here.
PetMedix, a four-year-old, Cambridge, England-based development stage veterinary biopharmaceutical company, has raised £27 million in Series B funding from Tencent, Kyoritsu Holdings, Digitalis Ventures, Parkwalk Advisors and Cambridge Innovation Capital. More here.
PolyAI, a four-year-old, London-based startup that builds and deploys voice assistants for automating customer services, has raised $14 million in fresh funding led by Khosla Ventures, with participation from earlier investors Point72 Ventures, Amadeus Capital, Sands Capital Ventures, Passion Capital and Entrepreneur First. The company has now raised $28 million to date. TechCrunch has more
here.
Printify, a six-year-old, Latvia- and San Francisco-based on-demand custom printing startup, has raised $45 million in Series A funding led by Index Ventures, with participation from a long list of notable individual investors. TechCrunch has more here.
TrueFort, a six-year-old, Weehawken, N.J.-based network security company focusing on protecting enterprise applications, has raised $30 million in Series B funding led by Shasta Ventures, with participation from Canaan, Ericsson Ventures and earlier backers Evolution Equity Partners, Lytical Ventures and Emerald Development Managers. The company has now raised nearly $48 million altogether. TechCrunch has more here.
UnitQ, a 3.5-year-old, Burlingame, Ca.-based product quality monitoring platform, has raised $30 million in Series B funding. Accel led the round, joined by Creandum and Gradient Ventures. TechCrunch has more here.
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Accure, a 16-month-old, Aachen, Germany-based maker of battery safety software, has raised $8 million in Series A funding led by Blue Bear Capital, with participation from Capnamic Ventures and 42CAP. Tech.eu has more here.
Novi, a two-year-old, San Francisco-based B2B marketplace for helping brands make more sustainable products, has raised $10.3 million in Series A funding. Greylock led the
round, joined by Defy Partners, former OpenTable CEO Thomas Layton and former Proctor & Gamble executive Yannis Skoufalos. Forbes has more here.
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SaaStr Annual 2021, the world's largest non-vendor B2B software event, is almost at capacity! Don't miss this year's Annual on Sept 27-29 at the San Mateo County Event Center. The three-day conference will bring together more than 10,000 global SaaS founders, executives, and venture capitalists for a series of high-quality content sessions and networking opportunities. Across five stages more than 300 SaaS leaders will share their hard-earned learnings and actionable insights to help you scale up and grow your company faster. Readers can grab 20% off tickets with code StrictlyVC.
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Flyover Capital Partners, a seven-year-old, Overland Park, Kan.-based venture capital firm focused on funding early-stage startups outside of traditional hubs, says it has closed its second fund with $60 million in capital commitments. More here.
J2 Ventures, a year-old, Boston-based venture capital firm that invests in companies addressing national security problems, launched its second fund and so far has raised $26.3 million, according to an SEC filing. So far, the firm counts seven companies in its portfolio and has two full-time employees. Managing partners Alexander Harstrick and Jon Bronson reportedly met at Columbia University around 2009. Boston Business Journal has more here.
Gaia Capital Partners, a two-year-old, Paris-based growth equity fund, says it has closed its debut fund with €250 million in capital commitments and rebranded itself as Revaia, a nod toward its mission to 'reveal' Europe's next tech leaders. The firm was founded Alice Albizzati, who most recently worked for Verlinvest, and Elina Berrebi, formerly of Eurazeo. Tech.eu has more here.
Promus Ventures, a nine-year-old, Chicago-based venture firm, says it has raised $140 million for a new fund called Orbital Ventures that will invest in early-stage space and geospatial companies around the world. Promus, which is known for investing in deep-tech and other moonshot startups, has made several space investments to date, including publicly traded Rocket Lab and Spire Global, along with satellite maker ICEYE. Orbital Ventures is Promus' fifth venture capital fund, and its first sector-specific fund. Chicago Inno has more here.
Volkswagen AG plans to set up a venture capital fund with an initial volume of 300 million euros ($355 million) to invest in decarbonization projects and start-ups. VW Chief Executive Officer Herbert Diess said in a LinkedIn post that,“More and more industries are recognizing the opportunities, and even sophisticated investors like Bill Gates are financing major sustainability projects. The financial business case is accelerating the change.” Bloomberg has more here.
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India’s most valuable startup, the online education provider Byju’s, is in talks to raise between $400 million to $600 million and then accelerate plans for an initial public offering next year, according to Bloomberg. It reports that the Bangalore-headquartered company could close the pre-IPO fundraising in a few weeks at a valuation of about $21 billion and that fundraising is likely to be split roughly evenly between equity and debt.
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Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong tweeted out his frustration today with the SEC, which is investigating its crypto lending program. He called the agency's behavior "really sketchy,"
saying it has been too vague in its complaints about Coinbase, and that "plenty of other crypto companies continue to offer a lend feature, but Coinbase is somehow not allowed to."
Jenny Fielding is stepping down as a managing director with TechStars, to "build new projects," among other things, she writes on LinkedIn.
Elizabeth Holmes's defense strategy emerges: "Failure is not a crime," her attorney told a jury today. More here.
Andreessen Horowitz, has brought aboard former Winklevoss Capital associate Jane Lippencott to its crypto fund team. She tweeted about the move earlier today.
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