Weekly corporate venturing deal net 29 February – 4 March 2016
Each Friday the Global Corporate Venturing Deal Net rounds up the week’s smaller deals and tracks the emerging companies accessing corporate funds.
Interview: Healthcare VC and exits compress as the market speeds up
2015 saw companies raising large VC rounds faster and investors existing quicker, according to Jon Norris of Silicon Valley Bank, and expect M&A to stay steady as IPO market continues to move slowly.
Fundraising
Telecoms firms look to Ignite startups
Investment units owned by Deutsche Telekom, Orange, Singtel and Telefónica have launched Go Ignite to accelerate startups in Asia, Africa, Europe, Latin America and the Middle East.
Growth Builder to help UK startups expand
BP, Pie Mapping and Natwest are among the backers of an initiative that will support UK-based startups.
Telstra has provided $7m for the $80m Southeast Asian fund being raised by Singapore-based Monk’s Hill Ventures, joining LPs already including Cisco and Yahoo Japan.
Camelors lights up KDDI’s Mugen Labo incubator
KDDI’s incubator program Mugen Labo named online arts marketplace Camelors the winner of its ninth startup demo day.
Kensington pushes fund to $228m close
Kensington Capital Partners has achieved a $228m final close for its fund of funds backed by investors including Torstar and OpenText.
JLabs to incubate Texan startups
Johnson & Johnson has opened its fifth JLabs incubator in the US at the Texas Medical Centre, launching with an initial 21 startups.
People
Treitz leaves 3M for Black Pearls
Ewa Treitz, a manager at corporate venturing unit 3M New Ventures since 2012, has taken a venture partner position at Poland-based Black Pearls VC.
Coyle untwists from ConocoPhillips
George Coyle has departed from ConocoPhillips’ corporate venturing unit to form an oil and gas-focused fund that has already raised almost $43m in capital.
Exits
Corporate-backed eJiaJie approved for China flotation
Chinese regulators have approved the home cleaning service’s application to list on domestic stock exchange NEEQ, providing an exit to investors including Tencent and Shanda.
Cliqr grabs Cisco’s attention for $260m acquisition
GV, a backer since cloud computing company Cliqr Technologies’ seed round, will be among the exiting investors in a deal expected to close in Q3.
Rocket Internet-backed Tripda hits the brakes
The Brazil-based carpooling service Tripda will cease operations tomorrow after it reportedly failed to secure series B capital.
Syndax synchronises with public markets
The cancer treatment developer raised $52.8m, floating beneath its $14 to $16 range, as existing backer Fidelity invested $8m.
IT
Power conversion technology developer Arctic Sand Technologies has closed a $19m series B round led by Murata and backed by GE Ventures.
O’Reilly Media-backed cybersecurity company Signal Sciences publicly launched its web app firewall while disclosing $9.7m of series A funding.
Enlighted leads the way to $25m series D
Intel-backed smart building analytics platform Enlighted has now accumulated more than $80m in funding and will spend the money on European expansion.
The mobile communication device maker has raised funding in a series A round featuring Bloomberg Beta and the Verizon-run BBG Ventures.
Corporates chip in $10m for Inpria
Air Liquide, Samsung, Intel and Tokyo Ohka Kogyo have provided $10m for semiconductor photoresist maker Inpria, effectively doubling its total funding.
Haizhi Wangju analyses corporates for $30m
Legend Holdings, Wind Info and IDG Capital Partners have backed a $30m round for Haizhi Wangju that valued the big data company at $250m.
The messaging app company has raised $340m from backers including Alphabet and is seeking a valuation higher than the $2.8bn at which it last secured funding.
Health
Strategic investor UPMC led the series B round, which also featured LabCorp and Envision Healthcare, and which Vivify first began raising in 2014.
Health Catalyst converts interest into $70m
The healthcare data software provider took its overall funding to more than $220m in a round featuring UPMC, MultiCare Health System, OSF Healthcare, Partners HealthCare, Kaiser Permanente and Indiana University Health.
Corporates process $35m MedCPU deal
UPMC and Merck have invested $35m in MedCPU as UPMC prepares to acquire a majority stake in the healthcare IT company.
Bone regenerates with OrthoFix-backed round
Medical device maker OrthoFix was part of a $5.75m round that will help fund development of Bone Biologics’ bone graft substitute.
Johnson & Johnson sweetens WellDoc series B
Digital diabetes treatment developer WellDoc has added Johnson & Johnson to a Samsung and Merck & Co-backed series B round now sized at $29.5m.
Investors free up $25m for Unchained Labs
The biopharma tools developer secured $25m in a Novo-led series A round in February last year.
Jianmin, Ping An and InCube Labs all contributed to a round that will fund phase 1 clinical trials for Fe3 Medical’s iron deficiency patch.
Media
Deustche Telekom finds right perspective for Replay investment
Replay Technologies, creator of a 3D video format for sports matches, has added the telecoms company to an investor base already containing Samsung in a $13.5m round.
Blippar taps into $54m series D
Qualcomm-backed augmented technology company Blippar has secured a series D round led by Malaysia’s sovereign wealth fund Khazanah Nasional.
Influitive spreads word to grow series B
The advocate marketing company has boosted an NTT Docomo-backed series B round to $38.7m, securing an extra $8.2m from investors.
Google reports $29m in funding
Google has revealed it has committed the first part of its $168m DNI Innovation Fund to a total of 128 organisations across 23 European countries.
Fidelity sends $175m message to Snapchat
Snapchat, backed by Tencent, Alibaba and Yahoo, boosted its series F round to more than $710m and its overall funding to more than $1.3bn.
Consumer
Naspers returned to reinvest in the Dubai-based online marketplace, which has now raised $425m in total and is reportedly worth more than $1bn.
Philippine Long Distance Telephone Company has co-led a second funding round for consumer loyalty platform AppCard.
Hopscotch marks out $13m investment
Hopscotch, backed by Jabbar Internet Group, has raised additional capital from existing investor Eduardo Saverin, co-founder of social media network Facebook.
BGF pours another $6.8m into TD4 Brands
Business Growth Fund has provided follow-on funding for the drinks chains operator, returning for a second time and boosting its total commitment to more than $12m.
The e-commerce marketplace has become Japan’s first pre-IPO unicorn, raising money in a round that included Mitsui and Sumitomo Mitsui Trust Bank.
Africa Internet Group downloads $326m
The e-commerce holding group has raised funding from MTN, Rocket Internet and Goldman Sachs to add to cash provided by AXA last month.
Logistics service 8dol receives series B+ funding package
Jiangsu Longliqi led a $30.7m round as part of a strategic partnership with the consumer goods delivery service, which is already backed by Fosun and Bosideng.
Global Fashion Group lays out $20m for Jabong
The Rocket Internet-backed e-commerce holding company has provided $20m to help the fashion retailer carry on running for the next year.
Eight beds down with Comcast in $6m seed round
Comcast Ventures was among the participants in the first funding round closed by sleep tracker developer Eight.
Transport
Hertz could ride Luxe in $50m round
On-demand parking service Luxe is in talks for a $50m series B round that would be led by Hertz and which could value it at upwards of $160m post-money.
Investors drop off $28m for Deliv
Logistics company Deliv has added UPS to shareholders that already include General Growth Properties, Macerich, Simon Property, Taubman Centers and Westfield.
Services
Corporates fix up $24m round for YourMechanic
The on-demand auto mechanic service’s latest round included SoftBank, SAIC, Verizon and American Family Insurance.
Cornerjob employs Mediaset for $10m series A
Media company Mediaset’s ad-for-equity unit was among the investors in a round that will boost marketing, product development and recruitment for the jobs platform.