GCV Symposium 2015
GCV Symposium 2015: The Tipping Point for Corporate Venturing
Global Corporate Venturing editor Toby Lewis hosted a panel with George Coyle, Bo Ilsoe, Jon Lauckner and Ralf Schnell, discussing the current state of corporate venturing.
GCV Symposium 2015: Collaboration Within the Corporation
Tom Whitehouse discussed innovation at BP with Isaam Dairanieh, managing director of BP Ventures, and group head of technology David Eyton.
GCV Symposium 2015: Globalisation & Venture Capital
Ray Haarstick, chief executive officer of Relevant Equity Systems, hosted a panel discussion with investors from all corners of the globe – Claudia Fan Munce, Matthew Koertge, Charles Searle and Anderson Thees.
GCV Symposium 2015: How Corporates Should Interact With Venture Firms
Dermot Hill led a panel on the increasing importance of corporate venturing units maintaining symbiotic relationships with venture capital firms.
GCV Symposium 2015: Transforming the Standing of Women in Venture and Tech
Tracy Isacke, head of Silicon Valley Bank’s corporate venture relationship group, discussed tackling the lack of women in venture capital with Lisa Lambert and Eileen Tanghal.
GCV Symposium 2015: Compensation
Megan Muir spoke to Jody Thelander about a global study into wages paid to corporate venturers, venture capitalists and private equity investors.
GCV Symposium 2015: Early-Stage Panel
Karma Samdup of law firm MJ Hudson hosted a panel discussion with Zack Weisfeld, Andy Shannon, John Mcintyre and Peter Cowley on the challenges and effectiveness of startup accelerators.
GCV Symposium 2015: Fireside chat with McLaren’s Geoff McGrath
Geoff McGrath gave an insight into the future of McLaren, as the company is aiming to diversify from its traditional focus on motor racing and automotive manufacturing.
GCV Symposium and GUV Fusion 2015: Open Innovation
John Riggs, a partner at PWC, hosted a panel discussion with corporate and university promoters of innovation about open innovation.
GCV Symposium and GUV Fusion 2015: Convergence across Health and IT
Marc Ceulemans from Novartis and Jack Young of Qualcomm spoke about digital health and the formation of Fund of the Year DRX Capital.
GCV Symposium: Fireside chat with Arvind Sodhani
Claudia Fan Munce, managing director of IBM Venture Capital, spoke to Arvind Sodhani, president of Intel Capital about emerging trends and Intel Capital’s iconic status.
GCV Symposium 2015: Emerging Models of Venturing
Scott Bowman of Clareo Partners hosted a panel discussion with investors Phil Giesler, George Ugras, Wal Van Lierop and Roy Williamson about the evolution of CVC investment.
GCV Symposium 2015: A Look at the Entrepreneurial-CVC Partnership
Global Corporate Venturing editor Toby Lewis discussed the relationship between corporate backers and startups with Carsten Bether and Frank Starrmann.
GCV Symposium 2015: Corporate Venturing Best Practices Panel
Andrew Gaule invited questions from the audience for a panel on best practices in corporate venturing.
GUV Fusion and GCV Symposium Keynote by Lita Nelsen
Hailing from Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s tech transfer office, Lita Nelsen gave the final keynote at this year’s Global Corporate Venturing Symposium.
GCV Symposium 2015: The Globalisation of Innovation
Phil Smith made a keynote speech explaining Cisco’s transformation from a traditional company to one that follows a more disruptive model.
GCV Symposium 2015: Fireside Chat – Global Innovation in Financial Services Digital Commerce
Mark Radcliffe, a partner at DLA Piper, chatted to Harshul Sanghi, managing partner at American Express Ventures about the unit and digital commerce.
GCV Symposium 2015: Mixing Corporate Venturing and M&A
Heidi Mason of Bell Mason spoke to Merck’s Bill Taranto and Donato Tramuto of Physician Interactive about their mutual experience of corporate investing.
GCV Awards 2015
Awards toast an industry in growth mode
Every year it is a great privilege to pick the shortlist for our awards to the corporate venturing industry.
Lifetime Achievement Award: Arvind Sodhani, Intel Capital
If you ask people in the venture industry what they know about corporate venturing, it would come as a surprise if they did not mention Intel Capital, which has come to define what many people think corporate venturing can be. The winner of this year’s Lifetime Achievement award, Arvind Sodhani, has led the chipmaker’s corporate venturing unit since 2005, taking it to more than $11bn of venture capital invested and making it probably the biggest venture investor in the world. It regularly tops the list of the most active corporate venturing investors by number of deals in our annual and quarterly rankings.
New Entrant of the Year and Fund of the Year: DRX Capital
The meeting of minds between IT and healthcare is a strategic move that will help accelerate big data convergence in the wider healthcare and life sciences segments. New Entrant of the Year recipient DRX Capital has capitalised on this exciting investment segment with a fellow corporate venturing unit, potentially urging others to co-fund digital health investment opportunities.
Unit of the Year: Merck Global Health Innovation Fund
Merck Global Health Innovation Fund, the corporate venturing unit owned by pharmaceutical firm Merck, has quickly become one of the biggest corporate venturing players in the digital health segment and is dedicating a sizeable amount of its $500m fund to larger deals with private equity and other strategic partners. Given the significant impact it has made over a short period of time, there was a significant number of votes from our advisory board to make it unit of the year.
M&A Exit of the Year: Beats – $3bn to Apple – Vivendi/Universal
Vivendi, the parent company of Universal Music, made a $404m return when it sold its 13% stake in US-based headphones production and music streaming company Beats to computing technology company Apple. The deal, closed in August 2014, marked Apple’s largest acquisition to date.
In the last week of September 2014, the financial news wires were white hot as Yahoo and Softbank-backed Alibaba priced its IPO at $68 per share, initially raising $21.8bn, before the China-based e-commerce company reported that it had sold additional shares in the company, making the listing the biggest in history.
Large Investment of the Year – Xiaomi
The claim of creating the world’s largest startup is always an impressive one. Xiaomi, the China smartphone manufacturer backed by media company IDG and wireless technology producer Qualcomm, raised $1.1bn in series E funding in early 2015 at a valuation of $45bn, according to the company’s president Bin Lin.
Sub-$50m Investment of the Year – Instacart
American Express Ventures, the corporate venturing unit of the eponymous financial services company, has tapped into what could be one of the fastest growing consumer IT investment stories in the past year, Instacart. Its move into the convenience grocery delivery segment has helped it win the sub-$50m investment award, highlighting new ways that financial services companies can strategically tap into the disruption of the retail sector.
Legal Firm of the Year – DLA Piper
DLA Piper has a specialised international practice dedicated to emerging growth and venture capital, with 200 lawyers in the US and 400 around the world who specifically serve entrepreneurs, technology companies and venture funds by focusing on private equity and venture capital transactions.
Financial Firm of the Year – Silicon Valley Bank
With a carefully honed offering for corporate venturing units across the globe, Silicon Valley Bank has consistently proven its dedication to the segment. Its foresight into new market trends, and invaluable deal analytics and sector-based services makes it this year’s Financial Firm of the Year.
Software Service Provider of the Year – Salesforce
Few businesses have made as big a wave as enterprise software producer Salesforce.com has over the past few years.
Consultancy Firm of the Year – PwC
Over the past year PwC has been building its corporate venture capital advisory capabilities alongside its private equity and corporate M&A services, two sectors where the firm has extensive experience. The advisory firm’s far reaching know-how across international markets and transactional services is setting it apart in the corporate venturing arena for existing units and those looking to join the segment, making it this year’s Consultancy Firm of the Year.
The Intramezzo Talent Capital Award – Naspers
Founded in Cape Town in 1915, Naspers began as an Afrikaans newspaper publisher but significant expansion, driven by a highly acquisitive business model, has seen the business develop into a multinational group of media and e-commerce platforms with a presence in over 130 countries worldwide and some 19,000 employees.
News
Weekly corporate venturing deal net: 1-5 June 2015
Each Friday the Global Corporate Venturing Deal Net rounds up the week’s smaller deals and tracks the emerging companies accessing corporate funds.
Fund in the News: Comcast Ventures
Dave Zilberman, a managing director at Comcast Ventures, told Global Corporate Venturing about the unit’s enterprise software investments, as well as two of its biggest bets, Zenefits and DocuSign.
Fundraising
Torstar helps Kensington Venture Fund reach $154m close
The fund of funds, which is being raised by Kensington Capital Partners, reached its second close at $154m after securing investment from media company Torstar.
Alibaba to invest $200m in China Business News
Alibaba will take a 30% stake in the Shanghai Media subsidiary, and the two plan to form both a financial data platform and an incubator.
BGF allocates $308m to UK technology fund
The new £200m fund launched by Business Growth Fund, which is backed by five UK banks, will begin operations in September.
CyberAgent puts $50m into Southeast Asian fund
The internet company will invest at seed, series A and series B stage, and plans to particularly focus on Indonesia-based startups.
Airbus takes off with $150m corporate venturing fund
The aerospace company is launching Airbus Group Ventures in conjunction with a technology and innovation centre that will be based in Silicon Valley.
China Digital helps switch on $484m fund
China Digital TV will invest $16m in the fund, which will target digital television technology startups operating in its home country.
Karolinska forms partnership with Johnson & Johnson
Karolinska Institute has signed a collaboration agreement with Johnson & Johnson Innovation and a research agreement with its Janssen Pharmaceuticals subsidiary.
Generali to put $1.37bn into innovation push
The insurance company will partner with venture capital firms such as GGV Capital and Ribbit Capital as it looks to invest big in fintech innovation.
People
Verrilli makes jump from Twitter to Google
Jessica Verrilli, who was instrumental in Twitter’s acquisitions of Vine and Periscope among others, is set to join Google Ventures as a partner.
Exits
The healthcare management software provider, backed by UPMC and The Advisory Board, will raise the money in an upsized initial public offering.
Piston to slot into Cisco machine
Cisco is set to acquire portfolio company Piston Cloud Computing, which also counts Swisscom as a backer, to boost its cloud services offering.
Fitbit gets on track for $448m IPO
SoftBank and Qualcomm will both make partial exits through the offering, after the fitness tracker producer set the range for its IPO.
SoftBank ups its stake in Supercell
SoftBank paid $1.5bn for a 51% stake in the mobile gaming company in 2013 and now owns 73%, after buying additional shares from external investors.
NDN turns up volume with Reverb acquisition
Digital media company Manatt has exited the word-based trend tracking app through an acquisition by News Distribution Network.
Salesforce finds the right Tempo for acquisition
Qualcomm and SingTel both exited the smart calendar app developer, which has been acquired by cloud computing company Salesforce for an undisclosed sum.
IT
16Wifi counts $16m for series A
Baidu and United Electronics provided more than $16m for 16Wifi, which is helping to bring wifi to China’s public transport services.
CounterTack pins down $15m for series C
The cybersecurity company has secured fresh funding in a round led by TenEleven that also featured Mitsui, Siemens and Alcatel-Lucent.
Beabloo sells investors on $11m round
SoftBank provided €8m of the €10m raised by retail technology developer Beabloo in the round, which also included Baozun Commerce.
Cyber threat detector Cyphort secures $30m
Sapphire Ventures led the cybersecurity company’s series C round, taking its overall funding to more than $53m since 2008.
Twenga successfully markets $11m series A
Corporate-backed IdInvest Partners has provided series A funding for the online advertising technology company.
Health
Carena calls up investors for $13.3m series B
McKesson Ventures, Cambria Health Solutions and Catholic Health Initiatives all contributed to a $13.3m series B round for the telemedicine provider.
Cambia shares in $17m LifeImage round
The medical images exchange platform has now raised about $85m in total, after raising money in a round led by Cambia Health Solutions.
The Blue Cross and Blue Shield Association-backed healthcare provider raised the cash in a series C round led by venture capital and private equity fund Oak HC/FT.
Media
Joyus rejoices in $24m series C
Time Warner Investments and Disney-backed Steamboat Ventures both contributed to the video e-commerce company’s latest round, boosting is total funding to nearly $44m.
VisionChina sees Baidu participation for $11.5m series B
Baidu has also formed a strategic partnership with the outdoor advertising and wifi provider, which operates in 18 Chinese cities.
CAA finds Blend in $6.3m series A
Blend, which enables users to nominate others to follow their online trends, has now raised $9m altogether from investors including Creative Artists Agency.
Axel Springer gets on Mic for $17m series B
Axel Springer joined a range of previous investors to provide series B capital for the online media company, taking its total funding to approximately $32m.
FullStory reveals $9.2m series A
Google Ventures has participated in a $9.15m funding round that will enable FullStory to develop a range of new functionalities for its web analytics platform.
Rail advertising company Tianjin Changda raises $16m
Tianjin Changda, backed by investors including Shenzhen Press Group, will use the funding to upgrade its on-board wi-fi offering.
Snapchat raises Alibaba-assisted $537m
The e-commerce company has contributed a possible $200m to what could eventually be a $650m series F round for the instant messaging service.
Consumer
Iwode Tailor measures out $24m
The bespoke tailored clothes seller raised the money from Legend Holdings and IDG Capital, the latter of which invested $10m in the company in 2011.
Coupang puts $1bn of SoftBank funding in its basket
SoftBank reportedly took a 20% stake in Coupang, Korea’s largest mobile commerce company, boosting its overall funding to about $1.5bn.
Sphero has a ball, raising $45m
The connected toy producer has now raised $80m in total, securing series E funding from investors including a subsidiary of The Walt Disney Company.
Flextronics was among the investors in a series B round that will enable Canary to expand the manufacturing line for its home monitoring system.
Movile and Just Eat deliver $50m to iFood
Movile now owns a majority share of iFood, which claims to be Brazil’s largest online food ordering platform, and the money will support a doubling of its restaurant base.
Energy and Natural Resources
Harju Elekter led the ultracapacitor manufacturer’s series B round, which will support an expansion in its workforce and production capabilities.
Industrial
SCD Probiotics-backed Proklean has secured funding from corporate-backed cleantech firm Infuse Ventures.
Transfield Services sells 49% stake to Quess
Thomas Cook India subsidiary Quess has agreed to acquire a minority stake in the infrastructure maintenance company in return for an undisclosed amount.
Prodways finds extra dimension for $27.8m
The 3D printing technology and finance provider secured the cash from its industrial group parent Groupe Gorgé and financial services company Fimalac.
Transport
Alibaba buys ticket for Chelaile series B
The bus tracking app has secured $15m, less than a year after closing a series A round that also reportedly featured Alibaba.
Services
The online education marketplace has now raised $113m in total, after securing $65m in a Norwest Venture Partners-backed series D round.
Lvmama goes on $80m series E trip
Travel booking website Lvmama has received series E capital from tourism company Jinjiang International that increased its total funding to more than $150m.