Funding
Paystand, the US-based developer of a blockchain-enabled enterprise payment network, secured $50m on Friday in a series C round featuring telecommunications and internet group SoftBank’s Opportunity Fund. Venture capital firm NewView Capital led the round, which included King River Capital, Industrious Ventures and Transform Capital. Paystand raised $1m in seed capital from Serra Ventures, Cervin Ventures, Central Coast Angels and TiE LaunchPad in 2014; an undisclosed sum from Leap Global Partners in June 2017; $6m from BlueRun Ventures, Cervin Ventures, Serra Ventures, TiE and Capital for Founders in a series A round five months later; and $20m in series B funding from DNX Ventures, Battery Ventures, Epic Ventures, Commerce Ventures, Wildcat Ventures, Leap Global Partners and BlueRun Ventures in February 2020.
Flipkart Ventures, the corporate venturing arm of online marketplace Flipkart has co-led a $36m series A round for G.O.A.T Brand Labs, an India-based provider of brand building and marketing services for digital consumer brands, YourStory reported today. The round was co-led by Tiger Global Management and also featured Mayfield, Nordstar, Better Capital and angel investors Virender Gupta, Sujit Kumar, Ranjan Pai, Suhail Sameer, Neeraj Goenka and Alex Kuruvilla.
Crédit Mutuel Equity, a private equity subsidiary of bank insurer Crédit Mutuel Alliance Fédérale, invested C$30m ($23.9m) in Canada-based payment and commerce software provider Paystone on Friday. The company had previously received $54.2m in financing from financial services firm National Bank of Canada and Canadian Business Growth Fund in January this year.
Urban Remedy, a US-based organic ready meal provider backed by packaged food manufacturer General Mills, has completed an $18m series D round led by investment firm Manna Tree and backed by Builders Fund and Obvious Ventures. General Mills’ 301 vehicle led Urban Remedy’s $17m series B round in 2018, following $1m in a 2012 seed round featuring Science and various individuals and a $5m series A in 2014 led by Venture51. The company has not revealed details of its series C funding but named Builders Fund and Obvious Ventures as existing investors.
Financial services provider B. Riley Financial led a $17m series A round for US-based additive manufacturer technology developer Continuous Composites on Friday through its B. Riley Venture Capital subsidiary. The company secured $175,000 in 2016, $115,000 the following year, $600,000 in 2018 and $1.6m in December 2019 according to securities filings. Additive manufacturing materials provider Arkema invested an undisclosed sum in July 2020 and Continuous Composites added $1.4m from unnamed investors five months later before advanced materials manufacturer Saint-Gobain supplied an undisclosed amount in March this year.
Lucata, a US-based graph analytics software developer backed by electronics producer Samsung, has secured $11.9m in a series B round featuring University of Notre Dame, Middleburg Capital Development, Blu Ventures, Hunt Holdings, Maulick Capital and Varian Capital. The company – then called Emu Technology – secured $2.5m in 2014 and $3.5m two years later before Samsung subsidiary Samsung Ventures led a $5m series A-2 round in 2017 featuring existing backers Blu Ventures and IrishAngels.
Quinn, a US-based natural snack brand backed by chocolate product maker The Hershey Company, has raised $10m in a series B round led by growth equity firm NewRoad Capital Partners that included Boulder Food Group, Echo Capital and private investor Sunil Thakor. Hershey had invested an undisclosed amount in Quinn in October 2020 following $2.6m in equity funding and $905,000 in debt financing between 2014 and 2018.
IT services firm FPT Software supplied an undisclosed amount for US-headquartered IT services provider Intertec International today. The deal will provide Vietnam-headquartered PFT with access to Intertec’s technology delivery centres in Colombia and Costa Rica as it looks to expand in Latin America.
US-based cybersecurity software and advisory startup OwlGaze completed a $1.5m pre-seed round today led by IMS Digital Ventures, the venture building arm of digital transformation agency Integrated Management Systems. The corporate was joined by an unnamed European family office, undisclosed angel investors and OwlGaze’s management team.
