News round up 12 November 2018

Corporate venturing deal net: 5-9 November 2018
Each Friday the Global Corporate Venturing Deal Net rounds up the week’s smaller deals and tracks the emerging companies accessing corporate funds.

Fundraising

Health Velocity Capital closes fund at $185m
UPMC and Cigna Ventures were among the contributors to the first fund raised by healthcare services and software VC firm Health Velocity Capital.

Monashees mobilises CreditEase for $150m fund
CreditEase is part of a list of limited partners that provided $150m for Brazil-based venture firm Monashees to close its eighth fund.

National Grid charges up $250m investment arm
Energy technology and software-focused National Grid Partners is headed by Lisa Lambert and has two other Intel Capital alumni in its team.

Portag3 banks on corporates for second fund
Power Corporation’s Portag3 Ventures has achieved a first close of $150m for its second fund thanks to a range of insurance and financial services investors.

Strategic Education devises seed fund
SEI Ventures will invest in seed-stage companies and give startups the opportunity to pilot their technologies across the privately-owned Strayer University and Capella University.

Hypertherm cuts to corporate venturing
The industrial cutting equipment maker has formed a unit called Hypertherm Ventures that will invest in advanced manufacturing and adjacent technologies.

MassMutual Ventures to manage $50m SEA fund
MassMutual Ventures Southeast Asia plans to invest in up to 15 early-stage enterprise software, digital health, fintech and insurtech companies in the next three years.

Exits

OpenText pays $310m for Liaison
Merck & Co, Accenture and UPS are all set to exit application integration and data management platform developer Liaison Technologies through the acquisition.

People

Murphy resurfaces at Amaranthine
Patrick Murphy, who headed Universal Music’s corporate venturing activities for three years, will head Web Summit’s newly formed fund, which is targeting a $50m close.

Singh Dang leaves Intel for U First
After nine years as an investment director at Intel Capital, Sanjit Singh Dang has co-founded corporate VC access service U First Capital as chairman.

GV’s Kraus crosses over to Lime
GV general partner Joe Kraus, who joined the bike rental service’s board when the unit led a $355m round in July, has agreed to become its COO.

IT

AppZen applies itself to $35m series B
Bloomberg and Mastercard-backed expenses automation software provider AppZen has now raised a total of $52m, after closing a Lightspeed-led series B round.

Shape Security locks up $26m
JetBlue Technology Ventures and Singtel Innov8 have become cybersecurity software provider Shape’s latest corporate backers, joining GV and HPE Pathfinder.

Ambiq Micro ambles to $29m
The Arm and Fujitsu-backed low-power chip producer has now raised more than $135m altogether, after securing $29.1m from investors including EDBI.

Ayar Labs lights up $24m series A
GlobalFoundries and Intel both took part in a $24m series A round for Ayar, which will use the money to commercialise its light-based data transmission technology.

Health

Omeicos completes series C operation
Returning investor SMS Group took part in a $19.5m round for Omeicos that will fund the entry of its persistent atrial fibrillation drug candidate into a phase 2 trial.

Oncology Analytics processes $21m series B
McKesson Ventures and returning investor BlueCross BlueShield Venture Partners took part in a round that will support the cancer data provider’s technology capabilities.

Mirum comes to series A with $120m
Novo invested in liver disease drug developer Mirum Pharmaceuticals as part of the round while Shire acquired an equity stake in the startup through a licensing deal.

Media

The Athletic sprints to $40m series C
Comcast Ventures and existing backers The Chernin Group and Bertelsmann Digital Media Investments all took part as the sports media company raised money at a $200m valuation.

Opera shoots for StarMaker with $30m
Opera has injected $30m into entertainment-focused social media company StarMaker and secured an option to acquire a majority stake in 2020.

Dynamic Yield regenerates with $38m series D
Naver has joined Dynamic Yield’s series D round, which now totals $38m, three months after Union Group contributed to its initial close.

Intel Capital joins Overwolf pack in $16m round
In-game services marketplace Overwolf has raised $16m in a round led by Intel, the company with which it formed a $7m fund earlier this year.

Consumer

Molekule follows investors to $25m series B
Molekule, developer of a molecular-level air purifier, took its total funding to $39m in a Foundry Group-led round that did not include existing investor Foxconn.

Mayvenn fixes $23m series B
African American-focused hair supplier Mayvenn has secured $23m in a series B round led by media holding company Essence Ventures.

Financial

Corporates follow Ethos to $35m series B
GV and existing investor Arrive both contributed as the digital life insurance platform raised money at a valuation of more than $100m.

Admiral leads Compare to $35m
Parent company Admiral supplied $10m of convertible debt financing for car insurance spinoff Compare.com in a round that took its overall funding to $185m.

Bitfury rages to $80m private placement
The Naver-backed Korelya Capital led the blockchain technology provider’s placement, which included Dentsu, Macquarie Capital, Foyer and MACSF.

CFPA Microfinance reaps $140m
Ant Financial was among the participants in a series C round for the rural microfinance and financial trading provider that was led by Rise Fund.

KBank kicks in $50m for Grab’s latest round
Grab has added $50m from Kasikornbank to a round sized at $2.7bn, following a $250m investment by Hyundai and Kia earlier this week.

Lloyds turns on Thought Machine in series A round
Lloyds took a 10% stake as it led a $23.5m series A round for Thought Machine, gaining access to the fintech developer’s cloud-based banking platform.

Energy

Maana wins GCV award for ‘Energy-tech Corporate Venture Capital (CVC) Investment of the Year’
Global Corporate Venturing’s inaugural award for ‘Energy-tech Corporate Venture Capital (CVC) Investment of the Year’ was announced on November 8th during the Venture Houston conference.

Telecoms

Tink Labs aims for $300m result
Hotel smartphone provider Tink Labs already counts Foxconn and TCL as investors but has reportedly approached travel and hospitality companies for funding at a $1.5bn valuation.

Industrial

Dispelix displays 3M-backed series A round
3M Ventures has participated in a $13.7m round for VTT spinout Dispelix, which is working on augmented reality display technology.

SoftBank Vision Fund backs billion-dollar View
SoftBank Vision Fund has invested $1.1bn in dynamic glass producer View, whose investors already include GE and Corning, taking its total funding past $1.8bn.

Airobotics works out $30m series D
Microsoft-backed automated drone provider Airobotics took its total funding past the $100m mark with a round led by Singapore’s Pavilion Capital.

Taranis scans corporates for $20m
Nutrien, Sumitomo Corporation Europe and Wilbur-Ellis unit Cavallo Ventures all came in as new investors for the agricultural monitoring platform’s series B round.

Transport

Transit completes journey to series B funding
Mobility app developer Transit has raised $17.5m in a round led by Alliance Ventures that also featured Jaguar Land Rover’s Inmotion Ventures unit.

Hyundai and Kia hike Grab round to $2.7bn
The carmakers have supplied $250m in connection with an electric vehicle promotion deal, and the round already includes Toyota, Ping An, Microsoft and Citi Ventures. und to $2.7bn

Hellobike hails SoftBank for potential $400m round
Bicycle sharing platform Hellobike has entered discussions with SoftBank for an investment as part of a $400m round that would value it at $2bn.

Services

Deliv gets $40m dispatch
Enterprise Holdings and Google have taken part in a series C round for last-mile delivery service Deliv alongside existing shareholders such as UPS and Macerich.

Yuanfudao studies $350m funding round
Tencent is contributing $250m to a larger funding round reportedly being raised by online education platform Yuanfudao at a valuation of $2.8bn.

Turvo turns Siemens interest to $60m round
Siemens’ Next47 subsidiary has participated in a series B round led by Mubadala Ventures that boosted the collaborative shipping platform’s overall funding to near $100m.

Morgan Stanley sends $30m to Samanage
Salesforce-backed IT service platform developer Samanage has now raised $74m altogether, following a $30m investment by Morgan Stanley Expansion Capital.

RapidSOS raids corporates for $30m
Emergency services data provider RapidSOS took its total funding to $65m in a series B round backed by existing investors CSAA and M12.