Corporate venturing deal net: 7-11 August 2017
Each Friday the Global Corporate Venturing Deal Net rounds up the week’s smaller deals and tracks the emerging companies accessing corporate funds.
Fundraising
Volkswagen invites six teams to its incubator
The carmaker’s Transparent Factory has chosen CarlundCarla, Smart City System, Geospin, Ekoio, Tretbox and LoyalGo for its first lineup.
Morgan Stanley looks to diversify with new accelerator
The investment bank’s Multicultural Innovation Lab will invest in and assist startups founded by women and people of colour.
Ameren Accelerator has chosen the seven energy technology startups startups that will make up its first batch.
The Information gives the lowdown on accelerator
The Information, the operator of a subscriber-based online media offering catering to the tech industry, will invest $25,000 in each team that takes part in its accelerator.
Corporations back Nudge Foundation
Nonprofit incubator operator Nudge Foundation has secured partners including Tata Trusts, Maruti, Cisco, Mphasis, Godrej, Target and Wells Fargo.
Moleskine opens its innovation program
Moleskine’s Open Innovation Program has launched in partnership with Digital Magics and will support mobile smart object technology startups.
Prestellar harnesses corporates to raise $100m
Conglomerates CG Corp Global and NE Group are among the four general partners for a $100m fund raised by venture firm Prestellar Ventures.
People
Pitts leaves Verizon to go Backstage
Christie Pitts has departed from Verizon Ventures, where she was a venture development manager, to be partner and chief-of-staff at seed fund Backstage Capital.
Fernandes tucks into Cleveland Avenue role
Skyler Fernandes has become a managing director of investments at Cleveland Avenue having left Simon Ventures in February.
Ebersol exit Comcast to head for Health IQ
At Comcast Ventures for three years, Christian Ebersol had focused on early-stage investments, including work for the diversity-focused Catalyst Fund.
Mandjek to make Eurazeo role her own
Cynthia Mandjek, an investment analyst Orange Digital Ventures for six months from January 2016, has joined Eurazeo as a late-stage venture capital analyst.
Akimoto joins TransLink as Sompo supplies $40m
Nobuyuki Akimoto’s departure from NTT Docomo Ventures comes as insurance firm Sompo commits up to $80m to TransLink to manage its corporate venture capital fund.
Exits
Clementia cleaves $120m from IPO
UCB Pharma scored an exit after the bone disease therapy developer floated at the top of its range, having secured $92.5m in funding over the past two years.
AltspaceVR alerts public to closure
The social VR platform, which had raised almost $16m from investors including Tencent, Comcast and Alphabet, will close after failing to raise more funding.
Raine and Temasek near majority stake in SoundCloud
Twitter-backed music streaming service SoundCloud is reportedly in advanced talks to sell a majority stake to the two to alleviate financial struggles.
The bankrupt saltwater electrolyte battery developer had raised $190m in financing from investors including Shell, Total and Exelon but was bought for less than $9.2m.
Snapdeal calls off Flipkart sale
The e-commerce platform, backed by investors including SoftBank, Intel and Alibaba, has decided against a $950m sale and elected to instead restructure.
Dermatology product developer and JLabs graduate Sienna Biopharmaceuticals floated at the middle of its range having raised $86m in venture funding.
IT
GuardiCore grows series B to $35m
The cybersecurity software developer has added a $15m extension led by TPG Growth and Greenfield Partners to a $20m first tranche featuring Dell and Cisco.
Namogoo nails series A to raise $8m
The e-commerce advertising security company, which counts Adler-Chomsky among its investors, has now secured a total of $14m since it was founded in 2014.
SmartX marks the spot for series B
The IT infrastructure technology developer has raised almost $14.9m in a Lenovo Capital-backed round that was led by Matrix Partners China.
Haimawan handles series C funding
The $53.6m round, which included Elefirst Science & Technology, will support Haimawan in developing its mobile content cloud computing offering.
Callsign identifies investors for $35m series A
PTB Ventures and Accel have co-led a series A round for Callsign, an authentication platform backed by digital consultancy Reply.
DataRobot develops series C round to reach $67m
The Intel, Recruit and New York Life-backed machine learning technology developer has added capital to a round that now totals $67.2m according to a securities filing.
Big Switch turns to corporates for new funding
Dell Technologies Capital and Intel Capital invested in a $30.7m round that increased the total raised by the data centre networking technology provider to $120m.
Zeus Entertainment led the app developer’s series B round, through which DotC will take control of digital marketing company Avazu, from which it spun out in 2015.
Health
Eloxx stretches series C to $38m
LSP has provided an $8m extension for Eloxx’s series C round, which achieved a first close at $30m with participation from Opko Health a month ago.
MassMutual Ventures re-enters Limelight in $7m series B
Employee benefits platform Limelight Health secured $7m in a MassMutual Ventures-led round that included Axa Strategic Ventures and Wanxiang Healthcare Investments.
Amplyx grows on investors in $67m series C
Lundbeck has taken part in a $67m series C round for Amplyx Pharmaceuticals, which is developing treatments for life-threatening fungal infections.
Genetic disease medicine producer BridgeBio Pharma led the carcinoma therapy developer’s latest round, having provided an undisclosed amount in December 2016.
Novartis goes Homology in series B round
Homology Medicines, a startup developing treatments for rare genetic diseases, has closed $83.5m in series B funding, welcoming Novartis as a new investor.
Novo reaches Milestone for $55m series C
Cardiovascular therapy developer Milestone Pharmaceuticals will use proceeds from the Novo-led round to advance its lead candidate to a phase 3 clinical trial.
Media
M17 cracks series A code with $40m
M17 Entertainment, formed by the merger of corporate-backed startups Paktor and 17 Media, has raised $40m in a series A round featuring Yahoo Japan.
RTL leads series A round at Inception
Immersive content platform developer Inception has raised $15m in a series A round led by broadcasting group RTL.
Wonderbly turns the page with $8.5m series B
Wonderbly has rebranded from Lost my Name and secured new funding in a round led by Ravensburger that included existing investors GV and Chernin Group.
Consumer
Revolution Growth led the item location technology developer’s series B round, which included corporate venturing units Amazon Alexa Fund and Docomo Capital.
Bajaj Finance brings $35m to Mobikwik
Mobikwik has received $35.3m from new strategic partner Bijaj Finance as it looks to expand its mobile payment and wallet platform into lending and insurance.
Meican orders up series D funding
Corporate-focused food ordering platform Meican, which counts Nokia and Meituan-Dianping as investors, has raised cash in a Goldman Sachs-led round.
Shiyunji courts Bertelsmann for series A round
The China-based company, which is using technology to streamline the operation of food courts, has secured an eight-figure sum in a round co-led by Bertelsmann Asia Investments.
Yiguo raises $300m as Tmall partnership proves fruitful
Tmall has invested $300m in Yiguo, a fresh food e-commerce platform that is also backed by Tmall’s parent company, Alibaba.
SoftBank’s Vision Fund considers flinging $2bn to Flipkart
Despite the breakdown Flipkart’s proposed acquisition of SoftBank-backed Snapdeal, Vision Fund is in talks with the online marketplace over an investment of $1.5bn to $2bn.
Financial
Kabbage cashes in with $250m SoftBank investment
Existing investor SoftBank has agreed to invest $250m in the small-business lender, increasing its overall funding to about $490m since 2009.
Singapore’s GIC led the Bohai Leasing-backed online lender’s latest round, which follows a $207m series C co-led by Standard Chartered Bank in 2015.
Personal Capital manages another $40m in funding
IGM Financial has returned to lead a $40m extension to the digital asset manager’s series E round that was raised at a higher valuation than the first two tranches.
Marqeta makes $25m in series D round
Visa led the payment card issuing platform’s latest round, which included two more corporates: CreditEase and existing investor CommerzVentures.
ShopEx’s existing shareholders include Alibaba, Legend, Lenovo and Bertelsmann, though none appear to have returned for its Joy Capital-led series D round.
Energy and Natural Resources
Enbala expands corporate-backed series B round
The distributed energy management platform has closed an ABB, General Electric and National Grid-backed round at $17.5m after adding $5.5m from Zoma Capital.
Impossible Foods cooks up $75m round
Temasek led the Alphabet-backed vegan food developer’s latest round, which took its funding over the past three years to about $260m.
Industrial
Closed Loop rings up GreenMantra funding
Closed Loop Ventures, which manages a $100m social impact fund backed by several retail and consumer goods companies, has invested $3m in GreenMantra.
Transport
MaaS Global amasses extra funding
The mobility app developer increased its latest round, which includes Transdev, Veho, Toyota, Denso, Aioi Nissay Dowa, Swiftcom and Karsan, from $11m to $16.8m.
Volocopter has secured $34.8m in a Daimler-backed round as it prepares to demonstrate its vertical take-off passenger drone technology in Dubai.
Channel 4 gets in step with Carspring
Used vehicle marketplace Carspring has raised $6.6m from backers including Channel 4’s ad-for-equity Commercial Growth Fund and Rocket Internet.
Services
Meituan-Dianping makes progress on $5bn round
Tencent is reportedly in line to invest $1bn in the local services platform’s latest round, which will be between $3bn and $5bn in size and will value it at up to $30bn.
Sawyer gets Advance in $6m round
Advance Publications’ corporate venturing unit has led the children’s education software and marketplace provider’s latest round.
Thrive Capital led a $6.4m round for the employee performance management platform that follows a Slack-backed seed round last year.
ExecOnline mandates $16m series B
Existing investor Kaplan has returned for a NewSpring Growth Capital-led round that increased the leadership course provider’s total funding to more than $23m.
JazzHR makes some noise with $6m
Recruitment software provider JazzHR has now raised $24m in four funding rounds from a consortium including Salesforce Ventures.
Goldman Sachs Investment Partners led a $25m series B round for the budget hotel chain that follows a Qualcomm Ventures-backed round in June 2016.