Weekly corporate venturing deal net 14 – 18 December 2015
Each Friday the Global Corporate Venturing Deal Net rounds up the week’s smaller deals and tracks the emerging companies accessing corporate funds.
CVC comes to television, Hit Big secures corporate term sheet
Production company Hit Big secures $500,000 of its planned fundraising from one undisclosed corporation, as it looks to bring corporate venturing to television next year.
Star Wars’ BB-8 uses the force of corporate accelerators
The overnight transformation of robot ball company Sphero – the maker of the latest Star Wars robot – to a business “printing money” is likely to fuel greater interest in the potential of the Disney accelerator and other corporate accelerators.
Google restructured itself under a holding company called Alphabet, but its corporate venturing units continued to invest heavily in healthcare despite GV pulling the plug on its European fund.
Intel Capital fell short of the $600m target it set in September but will enter 2016 under new leadership with some promising IPO candidates.
SoftBank is winding down corporate venturing vehicle SoftBank Capital in favour of fewer, bigger investments as it looks to replicate its Alibaba investment.
The internet portal invested heavily in food delivery, ride hailing and ticketing as it seeked to build out the services linked to its extremely popular WeChat messaging app.
2015 round up: Salesforce Ventures
Salesforce’s corporate venturing unit invested larger amounts in 2015, building up a stable of enterprise IT unicorns as its strategic VC model began to be widely replicated.
Fundraising
Illumina signs four startups to its accelerator
MetaMixis, NextGen Jane, Skinomics and Vitagene have joined Illumina’s six-month accelerator program, and will secure $20,000 each from the program.
WuXi Healthcare Ventures closes $290m second fund
Wuxi PharmaTech is anchor investor in the fund, which will target early-stage life science and healthcare investments in China and the US.
Infosys discusses 500 Startups funding role
VC firm 500 Startups is currently in the process of raising $200m for its fourth global fund, and could secure IT services provider Infosys as a limited partner.
Walter Group launches $100m private equity firm
The conglomerate is funding the newly formed Walter Capital Partners with $100m of capital from another subsidiary, Walter Financial.
Novartis finds Health for Life a good deal
Two years after its launch, venture firm Seventure has closed its Health for Life Capital fund at $175m after Novartis joined a raft of existing corporate partners.
Corporates connect to $21m Luxembourg ICT fund
Satellite operator SES has inked a partnership with Luxembourg’s government and six other businesses to launch the $21m Digital Lëtzebuerg fund to back the local ICT sector.
Slack to communicate with startups through $80m fund
The messaging platform has provided more than half the funding, with the rest coming from its investors, and aims to build up an ecosystem around its app.
Cisco heightens French connection
Cisco is injecting $55m in funds being raised by Partech Ventures and Idinvest Partners, alongside an undisclosed amount for big data company Intersec.
360 Square to invest in European startups
Groupe Rocher, Thuasne and Maif are among the supporters of a $38m seed fund formed by 360 Capital Partners to target European startups.
People
Bastien fortifies Siemens Venture Capital
Peter Bastien has left Toyota Tsusho USA where he oversaw strategy and business development to become principal at Siemens’ corporate venturing unit.
Exits
SimilarWeb catches Quettra in $10m deal
Alphabet and Sungy Mobile are among the investors that have exited mobile analytics startup Quettra, which had raised $2.9m in seed funding.
Yummly cooks up Orange Chef acquisition
GV and Bertelsmann-backed connected kitchen appliance developer Orange Chef, which shut down last month, has been bought by Yummly.
Trustev joins TransUnion in $44m deal
Shareholders including Telefónica are exiting the cybersecurity technology, which was acquired by TransUnion after raising about $4m.
Weiying and Gewara buy ticket to merge
Tencent and Wanda-backed Weiying Technology and rival Gewara have agreed a merger that will create the second most popular online ticketing platform in China.
IT
ItsOn dials in $12.5m series D
Verizon contributed to a round that will help the mobile services company, also backed by Cisco, expand in Europe, South America, Africa and the Middle East.
SnapLogic connects series E dots
Big data technology provider SnapLogic has added Microsoft to its shareholders as part of a $37.5m series E round that will support its global expansion efforts.
The advertising platform developer has now raised $65m in total, having closed a Qualcomm Ventures-backed round in 2012.
Digital Guardian opens door to $66m
The data protection company has now secured about $130m in total, adding Siemens and Massachusetts Mutual to investors already including GE Pension Trust.
Kaiser Permanente records Vidyo investment
Kaiser Permanente has invested $10m in the communications platform as part of a $15m round that lifted its total funding to $163m.
Bloomberg helps Textio write $8m script
Intelligent text platform Textio has raised series A funding from investors including seed-stage investor Bloomberg Beta.
Health
Pharmaron finds right result with $280m
Legend Holdings reinvested in life sciences R&D services provider Pharmaron, co-leading a $280m round closed four years after a $40m series C.
Accolade has secured an additional $16m for a McKesson and Independence Health-backed round, boosting it to $38.6m and its overall funding to more than $90m.
Kallyope muses on $44m series A
The Illumina-backed startup has launched with $44m and will develop therapeutics based on how the gut communicates with the brain and other organs.
Norwest Venture Partners led the behavioural therapy provider’s first publicly disclosed funding round, which will support its US expansion.
AltheaDx diagnoses $30m series C
The round, which featured WuXi PharmaTech, follows personalised medicine company AltheaDx’s decision in March to put its $69m initial public offering on hold.
Oration has released its prescription drug management software, at the same time disclosing $11.2m in series A funding from backers including GV.
Sophia diagnoses success in $15m series C
Swisscom-backed medicine analytics platform Sophia Genetics has secured new funding, taking its overall equity capital to more than $31m.
Qihoo 360 shows sense and invests in Profusa
Qihoo 360 has contributed to a $13.2m series B round that will help Profusa commercialise its biosensor technology, which monitors body chemistry.
Media
Media group Tribune Media led viral media company Dose’s series B round, closed as it rebrands from Spartz Media and seeks to enter new content verticals.
Video subscription platform iFlix targets $150m
The Southeast Asian company aims to follow a $30m PLDT-backed round with $150m in growth funding and could target other telecoms investors.
Holtzbrinck Ventures was among the investors in a round closed by the mobile video advertising company as it announced it has reached profitability.
Consumer
ADIF invests in six Malaysian startups
The fund created by Axiata and government-owned fund Mavcap, has already committed a total of $3m and expects to provide follow-on funding.
Ningbo joins Jibo’s series A family
Already backed by a long list of corporates, Jibo has added Ningbo GQY to its shareholders as it extends its series A round to $52.3m.
Google Capital in talks to drive $30m CarDekho round
Google Capital is reportedly in talks with the online automotive marketplace, which has so far raised $65m, to lead a round sized at up to $30m.
SIG China has led a series B round for Yunjiazheng, boosting the home cleaning services provider’s total funding to more than $22m.
Housejoy makes itself at home with $22m
Amazon has led a $22.5m series B round for Housejoy that included Qualcomm, and which followed $4m of series A funding in June.
Financial
AmEx verifies $15m Trulioo series B
American Express is among the backers of a $15m funding round for Trulioo, which has developed technology that checks people’s identity online.
Industrial
Blue River flows towards $17m series B
The agriculture technology producer has added Monsanto and Syngenta to its shareholders as it increases its total funding to more than $30m.
Transport
Flipkart helps BlackBuck haul in $25m
Business-to-business logistics startup BlackBuck previously secured series A funding in a Flipkart-backed series A round in July.
Logistics startup Holisol picks up $10m
Financial services firm CLSA provided fresh funding for DataVision Systems-backed Holisol, which will help the logistics company open additional warehouses.