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June 21 · Issue #61 · View online
Steve's In The Know: Thoughts from a European tech insider.
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Just after going into lockdown - and as the severity of the coronavirus pandemic was starting to hit me - I set an 82 day countdown timer on my LaMetric smart clock. The date’s significance was my birthday: if I make it to June 11th, the worst of this will be over, I told myself. As coping strategies go, it was quite a good one, even if I was woefully optimistic. Instead, it seems, the new normal, especially for those like me who are shielding, is here to stay. And what a normal month I’ve had :) Just last week, I broke news of Facebook’s latest acquisition: Mapillary, the crowdsourced database of street-level imagery. Tipped off by one of my many contacts in the Nordics, I got the story out a few hours before anybody else. Amusingly, I’ve managed to scoop all three recent Facebook acquisitions in Europe. Once is unfortunate. Twice is careless. Three times is… killing it! More VC money sloshing around Europe Talking of hat-tricks, last week also saw me cover three new fund launches which would normally be too much VC for any single human-being. But actually it was a great chance to check in with three early-stage funds, including learning more about climate tech with the launch of Sweden’s Pale Blue Dot, which is targeting startups in Europe that are using technology to help solve climate problems. Fintech ups and down rounds More mixed (and that’s putting it mildly) news for Monzo this month, as the challenger bank confirmed £60 million in top-up funding, seeing a 40% haircut to its valuation, which now sits at £1.24 billion pre-money. As I wrote in my piece for TechCrunch, that’s likely a reflection of the current funding climate amidst the coronavirus crisis, with Monzo having to raise a bridge round at quite possibly the worst time. I also understand from sources that a number of Monzo’s later-stage investors played hardball, in a bid to force down the challenger bank’s ticket price, perhaps after investing at the height of the funding market pre-COVID-19. Investigation
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Otis 'Max' Load: In Between Floors
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To celebrate my birthday, I want to give you all a present. My album is now streaming in all the usual places. Have a listen and if you want to help me celebrate:
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Please follow my artist page on Spotify, Apple Music etc.
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Add your favourite tracks to a playlist.
- And get sharing.
That’s all I ask :-)
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Mapillary, the crowdsourced database of street-level imagery, has been acquired by Facebook
SCOOP: Mapillary, the Swedish startup that wants to take on Google and others in mapping the world via a crowdsourced database of street-level imagery, has been acquired by Facebook.
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With three unicorns under its belt, Hoxton Ventures outs ~$100M second fund
VENTURE: Hoxton Ventures, the London-based early-stage VC firm best known for backing British unicorns Babylon Health, Darktrace and Deliveroo, is announcing its second fund, which has closed at a little less than $100 million.
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Fly Ventures raises new €53M fund to back seed-stage enterprise and deep tech startups in Europe
VENTURE: Fly Ventures, the Berlin-based VC that invests in seed-stage European startups within enterprise and deep tech, has raised a new €53 million fund.
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Onna, the ‘knowledge integration platform’ for workplace apps, raises $27M Series B
FUNDING: Onna, the “knowledge integration platform” (KIP) that counts Dropbox and Slack as backers, has raised $27 million in Series B funding. Leading the round is Atomico, with participation from Glynn Capital.
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European VC firm Pale Blue Dot plans to fund 40 ‘planet-positive’ startups
INTERVIEW: Pale Blue Dot, a newly outed European venture capital firm focused on climate tech, announced this week the first closing of its debut fund at €53 million.
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Pale Blue Dot is a new early-stage fund backing ‘climate-focused’ startups in Europe
VENTURE: Pale Blue Dot, a new “climate only” venture capital firm located in Malmö, Sweden, is officially de-cloaking today, with a first close of €53 million. Primarily targeting startups in Europe at pre-seed and seed, the VC plans to back companies that are using technology to help solve climate problems.
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Monzo confirms £60M down round, with a new pre-money valuation of £1.24B
FUNDING: Monzo, the U.K. challenger bank with more than 4 million customers, has confirmed it has closed £60 million in top-up funding. One of fintech’s worst-kept secrets.
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TransferGo raises $10M additional funding, launches in 11 new markets
FINTECH: TransferGo, the London-based international money transfer service, has raised another $10 million in funding, as it discloses that its customer numbers have surpassed two million.
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Peppy raises £1.7M for its employee healthcare benefits platform
FUNDING: Peppy, the U.K. employee healthcare benefits platform focusing on family support, female health and mental well-being, has raised £1.7 million in seed funding.
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Alkemics picks up €21M for its supplier-retailer collaboration platform
FUNDING: Alkemics, the Paris-based platform that lets brands collaborate and launch products with retailers, has picked up €21 million in a Series C funding. It follows €20 million raised in 2016. Backing the round is growth-stage fund Highland Europe.
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MessageBird launches an ‘omni-channel’ Intercom competitor
LAUNCH: Following the launch of Inbox.ai in March — its “Slack for external communications” — Amsterdam-headquartered MessageBird is continuing to place big bets on a messaging-first future.
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Curve begins quietly testing Curve Credit, its planned Klarna competitor
FINTECH: Curve, the “over-the-top” banking platform that lets you consolidate all your bank cards into a single Curve card and app, is quietly testing its planned “Klarna rival.” Dubbed “Curve Credit,” the new feature is being tested with a small number of customers ahead of a full launch later this year.
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Monzo to lay off up to 120 employees as the ‘economic situation’ remains challenging
FINTECH: Monzo, the U.K. challenger bank, continues to be faced with tough decisions linked to the coronavirus crisis and resulting economic downturn. Following the shuttering of its Las Vegas-based customer support office and almost 300 staff being furloughed in U.K., the company has announced internally that up to 120 U.K. staff are being made redundant.
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Endlesss, the iOS music-making app from Tim Exile, takes to Kickstarter for desktop version
MUSIC TECH: In entrepreneurship, timing is everything. Launch too early and the market or underlying tech may not be ready to support your idea. Launch too late and the opportunity may have already been conceded to competitors.
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Former Pollen employees were asked to sign an ‘NDA masked as a severance agreement’
INVESTIGATION: Pollen, the U.K.-headquartered travel and events marketplace, describes its company culture as built on principles of “freedom” and openness, including a well-publicised pay transparency policy. However, that doesn’t appear to always be the case with regards to the treatment of recently departing employees.
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Partners at B2B European VC henQ discuss remote work’s biggest advantages
INTERVIEW: HenQ, an Amsterdam-based VC that invests in European B2B software startups typically at seed and Series A, recently disclosed the first close of its fourth fund at €70 million.
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Existing backers put another £40M into UK challenger bank Starling
FINTECH: Starling Bank, the U.K.-based challenger bank founded by banking veteran Anne Boden, has raised an additional £40 million in funding, TechCrunch has learned. The round is led by existing backers Harry McPike’s JTC and Merian Chrysalis Investment Company Limited, and adds to the £60 million raised in February this year. Now boasting 1.4 million accounts, […]
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Meniga, the digital banking tech provider, raises €8.5M led by French bank Groupe BPCE
FINTECH: Meniga, the London-headquartered fintech that provides digital banking technology to some of the world’s largest banks, has closed €8.5 million in additional funding.
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Voi hires former Bird UK chief to bring e-scooters to British streets
INDUSTRY MOVES: With the U.K. government set to accelerate trials of e-scooter rentals in a bid to reduce crowding on public transport and support social distancing during the coronavirus crisis, Europe’s e-scooter companies are gearing up to be ready.
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ChatableApps launches its hearing assistance app
LAUNCH: ChatableApps is launching its hearing assistance app on iOS today, with a wider Android release to follow shortly. Backed by Mark Cuban, and based on the work of auditory neural signal processing researcher Dr. Andy Simpson, the app removes background noise in near real-time so that one-to-one conversations can be heard more clearly.
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Cloud canteen startup Feedr has been acquired by Compass Group for ~$24M
ACQUISITION: Feedr, the food tech startup that delivers personalised meals to office workers as an alternative to companies setting up their own canteens, has been acquired by Compass Group, the publicly-listed foodservice company.
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As the world is reshaping itself in my own image - i.e. going fully virtual and embracing work from home (see: ITK: 03/05/2020) - I finally got to make my video streaming debut. I’m not a huge fan of video calling, but when an opportunity came up to interview Atomico and Skype founder Niklas Zennström for a second time - on the leadership stage of CogX, no less - I knew I better get my act together. “Getting The Next Ten Years Right: The role of tech & VC” was the topic, providing the perfect platform to pick up where we left off when I wrote my The Zennström manifesto feature back in 2018. Unsurprisingly, the conversation that followed was pretty meaty, and - just that - an actual conversation. In fact, arguably it benefited from the more intimate non-conference hall setting. I hope you enjoy.
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Global Leadership Stage Live at CogX 2020
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Have feedback or something to say? Hit reply. I answer every single ITK email (as long as it isn’t a pitch).
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