Weekly corporate venturing deal net: 11-15 May 2015
Each Friday the Global Corporate Venturing Deal Net rounds up the week’s smaller deals and tracks the emerging companies accessing corporate funds.
Fundraising
Corporates help MPM close $400m fund
MPM Capital has closed an oversubscribed $400m life sciences venture fund that counts Novartis and Astellas among its limited partners.
Square raises cash for small business funding
The payment services company plans to advance hundreds of millions of dollars to small businesses in return for a percentage of their future card sales.
Corporates join Mission for $25m fund
Novozymes and Sobrato Organisation were among the backers for life sciences-based venture firm Mission Bay Capital’s oversubscribed second fund.
Telkom to connect with South African startups
The telecommunications company has launched an $8m funding initiative for small businesses in its home country and formed a partnership with incubator Bandwidth Barn.
Intel embraces Singaporean Spring for internet of things
Intel and Singaporean government agency Spring are collaborating on an initiative that will help develop the country’s internet of things ecosystem.
Exits
Galapagos enters US markets with $275m IPO
Johnson & Johnson and AbbVie bought a combined $55m of stock as the biopharmaceutical company, already listed in Europe, went public on Nasdaq.
The seed technology developer went public after raising more than $100m in funding from investors including BASF.
LoopPay pocketed $250m in acquisition
Samsung acquired the mobile wallet developer LoopPay in February this year, providing exits to corporate backers Visa and Synchrony Financial.
Pet medicine developer Jaguar Animal Health, backed by Napo Pharmaceuticals, raised $20m after receiving $2.2m of venture funding.
HTG Molecular profiles $50m IPO
Novo, GlaxoSmithKline and Merck-backed molecular profiling platform HTG offered almost 3.6 million shares priced at $14 each.
Bank of Ireland seed fund begins divestment programme
Bank of Ireland Seed and Early Stage Fund plans to divest 25% of its portfolio in the next year, beginning with medical device developer NeoSurgical.
Twitter gives clue to Niche acquisition price
Twitter revealed in its earnings report that it spent a combined $86.6m to acquire William Morris Endeavor-backed Niche and Periscope earlier this year.
Corporates consider investing $55m in Galapagos IPO
Galapagos has increased the target for its upcoming IPO on Nasdaq to $230m, while $55m of the stock could be bought by AbbVie and Johnson & Johnson.
IT
Mitsui studies $7m round for Geekie
Mitsui participated in a $7m series B round for Geekie that will support the education technology company’s expansion as well as product development.
The developer of business communications platform Alcatraz has attracted $28m in new funding from investors including Credit Suisse.
Percolate filters $40m into funding pot
The WPP-backed marketing platform developer will use the cash to expand in California, and into new international markets.
Unigen was the only disclosed investor in a $4.5m series B round for the cloud data recovery software company.
Foxconn reveals involvment in Cyanogen series C
The contract manufacturer invested in Cyanogen alongside Tencent, Twitter, Qualcomm, Access Industries and Telefónica among others.
Jumpshot scores $22m from Avast
Security software provider Avast has invested $22m in Jumpshot, which it acquired two years ago when the marketing analytics company focused on online security.
Investors put $17m into Bit Stew
The industrial internet technology company raised $17.2m in a series B round backed by General Electric and Cisco’s corporate venturing units.
Blue Danube flows to $16m series B
AT&T has made a strategic investment in the mobile wireless access technology company’s latest funding round, which brought its total equity to almost $24m.
DocuSign alerts investors for $233m series F
The e-signature company, backed by Comcast, Samsung, BBVA, NTT, Recruit, Mitsui, Google, Telstra and Salesforce, has now raised $440m in total.
Govini procures $20m from series C round
Salesforce Ventures has contributed to a round that will fund an expansion of the big data analytics company’s team and the development of its technology.
General Electric and Autodesk both contributed to a round that Lucid will use to enhance its building management software.
Chartbeat tunes in to $15.5m series C
O’Reilly Media-backed advertising analytics company Chartbeat has secured new funding from investors including internet company Digital Garage.
Health
Eli Lilly inks $360m agreement with BioNTech
The partnership, formed to develop immuno-oncology drugs, will include a $30m equity investment in BioNTech subsidiary Cell & Gene Therapies.
GlaxoSmithKline seeds HIV treatment joint venture
Qura Therapeutics will develop HIV treatments in partnership with University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, a venture in which it is investing $20m.
AM-Pharma clocks $87.5m Pfizer investment
Pfizer also picked up the right to acquire AbbVie-backed AM-Pharma, the developer of a treatment for acute kidney disease, in a deal that could eventually total $600m.
Juventas regenerates series B with $7.5m
Green Cross and Posco Capital co-led a $7.5m series B-2 round for the Takeda-backed regenerative medicine developer, which has now raised almost $40m in total.
SoftBank moves back into Talkspace for series A
Existing investor SoftBank returned to back a $9.5m funding round for the on-demand therapist service, which has now raised $13m in the past year.
Zesty books European travel with $7.2m
The consumer healthcare company has raised a series A round from investors including Qualcomm Ventures to expand across Europe.
Amgen and Baxter target Precision
Genome editing technology developer Precision BioSciences has raised $25.6m in funding from backers including Amgen and Baxter’s corporate venturing units.
Autonomic avoids funding headache with $38m
Novartis and Cleveland Clinic returned to fund the medical device maker’s series D round, which increased its overall funding to $95m.
Media
Tencent spends $60m on Pocket Gems
Tencent reportedly paid about $60m for a 20% stake in the mobile gaming company, which is planning to expand in China.
Salesforce helps send series D funding to Kapost
The marketing platform raised $10.25m in its latest funding round, boosting its total funding to nearly $19m.
Pinterest closes series G at $553m
The Rakuten-backed social network raised the round’s $367m first tranche in March and has now secured more than $1.3bn in total funding.
Consumer
KJS has provided fresh funding for the e-commerce company, also backed by Astro All Asia, to scale up its logistics and delivery capabilities.
Investors grant Wish series D funding
Filings indicate Legend-backed mobile shopping app provider Wish could have secured up to $545m in series D funding.
Financial
Vouch credits IDG for $6m series A
Vouch, a startup that uses social networks to evaluate a user’s credit, has now raised almost $10m in total after securing cash in an IDG Ventures-backed round.
Paidy cashes in $8.3m series A
The cardless payment and instant credit subsidiary of Exchange Corporation has closed a round featuring SIG Asia, CyberAgent and Recruit.
Sapphire trades funding for minority stake in IEX
SAP-affiliated venture firm Sapphire has invested an undisclosed amount in equity trading platform IEX, which had raised $100m in funding as of September.
Wave breaks $10m mark in series C
The personal accounting service’s latest round, backed by an unnamed strategic in the fintech sector, boosted the company’s total funding to $34.5m.
Transport
Alibaba ships investment to Shanghai YTO Express
E-commerce company Alibaba is set to purchase a minority stake in YTO, one of its 14 logistics partners, for an undisclosed sum.
Corporates dock in $6.9m Flexport seed round
Google and Bloomberg are among the lengthy list of backers in the online freight logistics services provider’s seed round.
Acommerce prepares for series B with $5m
Acommerce has secured $5m from existing investors including Sinar Mas, as it gears up for a series B round that could raise more than $30m.
Uber targets $2bn for series F
The taxi hailing service, which counts Google, Baidu and Times Internet among its backers, is reportedly set to raise new funding at a $50bn valuation.