Thursday, October 31, 2019
VC Deals Only: Video news startup Brut raises $40M, officially la...
VC Deals Only: Video news startup Brut raises $40M, officially la...: Digital media startup Brut is announcing that it has raised $40 million in Series B funding. The money will be used, in part, to finance...
Video news startup Brut raises $40M, officially launches in the US
Digital media startup Brut
is announcing that it has raised $40 million in Series B funding. The
money will be used, in part, to finance its launch in the United States.
CEO
Guillaume Lacroix said that he and his co-founders all come from the
French TV industry, where they were all “frustrated not to be able to
follow up the conversation” on social media. So they created Brut
as a way to deliver video news that felt conversational and authentic,
hoping to spark viewer conversation, then take advantage of that
commentary to find future stories.
“We always say to journalists,
‘Forget the audience, think about your two best friends,’ ” Lacroix told
me. “Would you be excited to have this conversation tonight with your
friends? If yes, let’s do it.”
The publisher focuses on topics like social good and social impact — for example, it published the first viral video
featuring climate change activist Greta Thunberg. Lacroix argued that
Brut’s audience is looking for solutions, not just problems, in contrast
to the “negative news cycle” that they see on traditional media.
“People
are not waiting anymore — they don’t wait for institutions to do it,
they don’t wait for the collectivity to do it,” he said. “It’s very
inspiring to see someone who takes even a small action.”
At the
same time, he doesn’t want Brut’s journalists to veer too heavily into
advocacy or activism themselves: “We don’t do a call to action, we’re
not activists, we don’t point a finger. We just shine a light on people
who are trying to do something to change the world.”
In many ways, Brut seems to check off the same boxes (it aims to
reach a millennial/Gen Z audience with short videos on Facebook,
Instagram and Snapchat) that many U.S. digital media startups did before
they started to struggle and consolidate over the past few years.
But
Lacroix said the startup’s approach is working — not just in terms of
reaching an audience, but also building a real business. Brut is already
profitable in France, and it plans to be profitable in the U.S. within
three years.
Asked whether he’s worried about relying on social
platforms to reach his audience, Lacroix argued that even if you focus
on publishing on your own website, you’re reliant on Google for traffic.
continued below
______________________________________________________________
Sponsor
myCareBase™ is a platform for seniors and their families to find, evaluate, hire and manage home support services, to improve the seniors’ ability to remain living safely in their current home for as long as possible. The caregiver marketplace currently offers candidates in Greater Toronto and Greater Vancouver.
To compliment this platform the company also offers an innovative care management app that centralizes communication and task management among family members and the caregiver, along with a Care Concierge service to help family members with administrative, navigational or organizational tasks.
To compliment this platform the company also offers an innovative care management app that centralizes communication and task management among family members and the caregiver, along with a Care Concierge service to help family members with administrative, navigational or organizational tasks.
________________________________________
“For
me, it’s not a problem of distribution, if you’re diversified enough,”
he said. “It’s a problem of: What’s your business model? Why did Spotify
explode from day one? They have a global DNA. It’s exactly the same for
us.”
For example, Lacroix said that Brut’s audience is concerned
about many of the same issues no matter what country they’re in. And the
company is able to produce content for them in a relatively low-cost
way, because it can shoot a video in French or English, then add
subtitles in a variety of languages — most audiences won’t even notice
because they’re watching on their phones, with the sound off.
To
be clear, Brut hasn’t exactly been ignoring the U.S. market before this.
The company said it has an audience of 30 million daily active viewers
across the globe, including in the United States, and it opened an
office in New York City a couple of years ago. By “launching” here, Brut
means it’s hiring an advertising sales force to start monetizing that
audience.
The company previously raised €10 million (approximately $11.1 million) from Kima Ventures, according to Crunchbase. The new funding was led by Red River West and blisce, with participation from Aryeh Bourkoff, Eric Zinterhofer and others.
“When
deciding where to invest, we look for mission-driven companies whose
values are aligned with our own,” said blisce founder and CEO Alexandre
Mars in a statement. “Like blisce’s previous investments in Spotify,
Pinterest and Bird, we believe that Brut’s unique global approach
represents a special competitive advantage, as well as an understanding
that business success and positive social impact are inextricably
linked.”
Source. TechCrunch, Anthony Ha, October 30, 2019
***
This post was brought to you by Woewoda Communications, your partner in the venture capital, private equity and startup markets; offering strategic communications, public relations & investor relation services to Canadian VCs, PEs, Angels, Endowments/Trusts, Family Offices, and Canadian startups involved in ICT, IoT, blockchain, life sciences, healthcare, agribusiness, clean energy, fintech, AI and robotics.
Are you a Canadian GP/LP/CI or a Canadian startup that needs to grow or scale? Give us a call! One of our representatives would love to explain how we vertically design, and then systematically layer each of our communication platforms to effectively reach niche target audiences for our clients. WC offers a unique synergistic approach to effectively communicate our client's message to their target audience.
Serving Vancouver, Montreal, Toronto, Waterloo, Ottawa and Halifax.
Wednesday, October 30, 2019
VC Deals Only: Oliver Space Raises $6.8M in Seed Funding
VC Deals Only: Oliver Space Raises $6.8M in Seed Funding: Oliver Space , a San Francisco, CA-based startup furnishing homes with monthly subscription, raised $6.8M in seed funding. The roun...
Oliver Space Raises $6.8M in Seed Funding
Oliver Space, a San Francisco, CA-based startup furnishing homes with monthly subscription, raised $6.8M in seed funding.
The round was led by Mayfield Fund, with participation from Abstract
Ventures. Additional notable angel investors include Jana Messerschmidt
and April Underwood (Hashtag Angels); Julia & Kevin Hartz
(Co-founders and CEO at Eventbrite); Michael Ovitz (Founder of Creative
Artists Agency); Eric Wu (CEO of Opendoor) and various Uber executives.
The company intends to use the funds to accelerate multi-city
expansion after that the service has officially launched in the San
Francisco Bay Area.
Founded in 2019 by Chan Park and Christian Talmage, Oliver Space
provides customers with personalized, concierge-like experience in the
home furnishing design process. The company offers everything from
furniture to rugs to plants and pillows.
It allows customers to collaborate directly with the Customer Experience team to decide on the layout and design of their space. Oliver then delivers and assembles all of the furniture within a matter of days, at convenient times for the customer.
The model gives customers the opportunity to pay a monthly subscription, without having to spend money upfront to furnish their space.
Source. FinSMEs, October 30, 2019
This post was brought to you by Woewoda Communications, your partner in the venture capital, private equity and startup markets; offering strategic communications, public relations & investor relation services to Canadian VCs, PEs, Angels, Endowments/Trusts, Family Offices, and Canadian startups involved in ICT, IoT, blockchain, life sciences, healthcare, agribusiness, clean energy, fintech, AI and robotics.
Are you a Canadian GP/LP/CI or a Canadian startup that needs to grow or scale? Give us a call! One of our representatives would love to explain how we vertically design, and then systematically layer each of our communication platforms to effectively reach niche target audiences for our clients. WC offers a unique synergistic approach to effectively communicate our client's message to their target audience.
***
This post was brought to you by Woewoda Communications, your partner in the venture capital, private equity and startup markets; offering strategic communications, public relations & investor relation services to Canadian VCs, PEs, Angels, Endowments/Trusts, Family Offices, and Canadian startups involved in ICT, IoT, blockchain, life sciences, healthcare, agribusiness, clean energy, fintech, AI and robotics.
Are you a Canadian GP/LP/CI or a Canadian startup that needs to grow or scale? Give us a call! One of our representatives would love to explain how we vertically design, and then systematically layer each of our communication platforms to effectively reach niche target audiences for our clients. WC offers a unique synergistic approach to effectively communicate our client's message to their target audience.
Serving Vancouver, Montreal, Toronto, Waterloo, Ottawa and Halifax.
Tuesday, October 29, 2019
VC Deals Only: PierianDx raises $27M in Series B to ‘democratize’...
VC Deals Only: PierianDx raises $27M in Series B to ‘democratize’...: A startup that aims to provide a software-as-a-service platform to allow genomic sequencing as a standard of care has raised its latest ro...
VC Deals Only: PierianDx raises $27M in Series B to ‘democratize’...
VC Deals Only: PierianDx raises $27M in Series B to ‘democratize’...: A startup that aims to provide a software-as-a-service platform to allow genomic sequencing as a standard of care has raised its latest ro...
PierianDx raises $27M in Series B to ‘democratize’ next-generation sequencing
A startup that aims to provide a software-as-a-service platform to allow
genomic sequencing as a standard of care has raised its latest round of
financing.
St. Louis-based PierianDx said Monday that it had closed a $27 million Series B funding round, led by ATW Partners and SJW Ventures, along with existing investors Health Catalyst Capital, Inova health Systems, RTI International and ARUP Laboratories.
The company closed its Series A round, for $9.3 million, in January 2016.
“PierianDx has grown tremendously over the past 18 months and is continuing to add the clinical expertise and resources necessary to execute on our vision,” PierianDx Executive Chairman Rakesh Nagarajan said in a statement. “Our team is uniquely skilled and dedicated to the adoption of clinical [next-generation sequencing] around the globe.”
The company’s stated goal is “democratization” of NGS, with a focus on making targeted therapies for cancers more accessible to healthcare systems, labs and patients. The company’s software system is called Clinical Genomicist Workspace and is described as providing clinical labs more streamlined and accurate analysis, interpretation and reporting for accelerating personalized medicine programs.
NGS involves genetically sequencing cancers and find proteins that can be targeted with certain drugs in order to increase the chances of efficacy. For some drugs, doing so is crucial, such as those that target biomarkers independent of what tissue a tumor affects, such as Merck & Co.’s Keytruda (pembrolizumab) for microsatellite instability-high and mismatch repair-deficient cancers and the two approved NTRK inhibitors, Bayer’s Vitrakvi (larotrectinib) and Roche’s Rozlytrek (entrectinib).
Nevertheless, implementing NGS can come with some challenges as well. In a paper published earlier this year in the journal Molecular Case Studies, researchers at Legacy Health in Portland, Oregon, wrote that NGS has proven to have tremendous power to detect and characterize a broad spectrum of mutations across many gene targets. However, “This power of NGS also results in significant challenges related to technical expertise, bioinformatics, computing infrastructure, laboratory practices, and integration into clinical decision-making.”
St. Louis-based PierianDx said Monday that it had closed a $27 million Series B funding round, led by ATW Partners and SJW Ventures, along with existing investors Health Catalyst Capital, Inova health Systems, RTI International and ARUP Laboratories.
The company closed its Series A round, for $9.3 million, in January 2016.
“PierianDx has grown tremendously over the past 18 months and is continuing to add the clinical expertise and resources necessary to execute on our vision,” PierianDx Executive Chairman Rakesh Nagarajan said in a statement. “Our team is uniquely skilled and dedicated to the adoption of clinical [next-generation sequencing] around the globe.”
The company’s stated goal is “democratization” of NGS, with a focus on making targeted therapies for cancers more accessible to healthcare systems, labs and patients. The company’s software system is called Clinical Genomicist Workspace and is described as providing clinical labs more streamlined and accurate analysis, interpretation and reporting for accelerating personalized medicine programs.
NGS involves genetically sequencing cancers and find proteins that can be targeted with certain drugs in order to increase the chances of efficacy. For some drugs, doing so is crucial, such as those that target biomarkers independent of what tissue a tumor affects, such as Merck & Co.’s Keytruda (pembrolizumab) for microsatellite instability-high and mismatch repair-deficient cancers and the two approved NTRK inhibitors, Bayer’s Vitrakvi (larotrectinib) and Roche’s Rozlytrek (entrectinib).
Nevertheless, implementing NGS can come with some challenges as well. In a paper published earlier this year in the journal Molecular Case Studies, researchers at Legacy Health in Portland, Oregon, wrote that NGS has proven to have tremendous power to detect and characterize a broad spectrum of mutations across many gene targets. However, “This power of NGS also results in significant challenges related to technical expertise, bioinformatics, computing infrastructure, laboratory practices, and integration into clinical decision-making.”
Source. Medcity News , Alaric Dearment October 28, 2019
***
This post was brought to you by Woewoda Communications, your partner in the venture capital, private equity and startup markets; offering strategic communications, public relations & investor relation services to Canadian VCs, PEs, Angels, Endowments/Trusts, Family Offices, and Canadian startups involved in ICT, IoT, blockchain, life sciences, healthcare, agribusiness, clean energy, fintech, AI and robotics.
Are you a Canadian GP/LP/CI or a Canadian startup that needs to grow or scale? Give us a call! One of our representatives would love to explain how we vertically design, and then systematically layer each of our communication platforms to effectively reach niche target audiences for our clients. WC offers a unique synergistic approach to effectively communicate our client's message to their target audience.
Serving Vancouver, Montreal, Toronto, Waterloo, Ottawa and Halifax.
Monday, October 28, 2019
VC Deals Only: Calgary-based Benevity raises $40 million in Serie...
VC Deals Only: Calgary-based Benevity raises $40 million in Serie...: Benevity, a global leader in corporate social responsibility and one of the largest startups in the Prairies, has raised $40 million in a ...
Calgary-based Benevity raises $40 million in Series C
Benevity, a global leader in corporate social responsibility and one of the largest startups in the Prairies, has raised $40 million in a Series C round of funding.
The new capital comes from previous investors JMI Equity and General Atlantic. JMI has invested in Benevity since its Series A,
when the Baltimore-based growth equity firm put forward the entire $38
million round. General Atlantic, a New-York-based growth equity firm,
first invested in Benevity in January 2018 with an undisclosed
nine-figure amount, buying a majority stake from early investors,
according to The Globe and Mail.
According to The Globe
the latest funding round puts the companies value close to $400 million
USD. The Globe also noted that Benevity generates around $100 million
in annual revenue, which would make it one of Canada’s largest
early-stage tech companies.
The $40 million will be used to help scale the Calgary-based
company’s “corporate goodness” platform, which helps companies engage
with their employees in giving and volunteering initiatives.
Sponsor
continued below
______________________________________________________________
Sponsor
myCareBase™ is a platform for seniors and their families to find, evaluate, hire and manage home support services, to improve the seniors’ ability to remain living safely in their current home for as long as possible. The caregiver marketplace currently offers candidates in Greater Toronto and Greater Vancouver.
To compliment this platform the company also offers an innovative care management app that centralizes communication and task management among family members and the caregiver, along with a Care Concierge service to help family members with administrative, navigational or organizational tasks.
________________________________________
Benevity was founded in 2008 by current CEO Bryan de Lottinville as a
platform that enables companies to engage their employees and customers
around social responsibility and community investment, hoping to create
better business and social impacts. Since its early days, Benevity has
grown to more than 600 employees and built out a customer base of more
than 600 clients spanning large, global enterprises like Microsoft,
Coca-Cola, Google, and Honda.
The Prairies startup has made a lot of moves over the past year.
Outside of its early 2018 funding from General Atlantic, Benevity also
brought in new executive hires with CFO Kelly Schmitt and Eve Stacey as
president. Benevity also acquired two companies. In February, the
company acquired UK-based TrustCSR, a corporate social responsibility
consultancy that helped Benevity increase its reach into international
markets, and less than a month later Benevity announced the acquisition
of US-based Versaic, a grants, donation, and sponsorship management
solution provider to more than 100 of the world’s largest companies.
Benevity also signed on 50 new large enterprises to its client base in
the first half of 2019.
“With so many of our institutions at an impasse over how to address a
multitude of global crises and societal challenges, progressive
companies are stepping in to fill the void, and we are passionately
helping them do that,” said Lottinville. “Benevity isn’t just building
software, we’re building an entirely new category and ecosystem for
purpose-driven businesses.”
Lottinville added that the latest investment will help Benevity scale
into a sizeable company that can meet the growing needs of the market.
Benevity will also use the funding to grow its team over the next year,
with plans to hire 200 employees across technology, sales, client
success, and operational roles.
“As corporate purpose, CSR [corporate social responsibility] and employee engagement increasingly become business imperatives, more and more companies are seeking enterprise-grade solutions that are inclusive, personalized, easy-to-deploy across their global teams and flexible enough to scale with their evolving requirements,” said Alex Crisses, managing director in General Atlantic’s technology sector. “We believe Benevity is well positioned to continue leading the market in this area, and we are a proud partner in this endeavour.”
This post was brought to you by Woewoda Communications, your partner in the venture capital, private equity and startup markets; offering strategic communications, public relations & investor relation services to Canadian VCs, PEs, Angels, Endowments/Trusts, Family Offices, and Canadian startups involved in ICT, IoT, blockchain, life sciences, healthcare, agribusiness, clean energy, fintech, AI and robotics.
Are you a Canadian GP/LP/CI or a Canadian startup that needs to grow or scale? Give us a call! One of our representatives would love to explain how we vertically design, and then systematically layer each of our communication platforms to effectively reach niche target audiences for our clients. WC offers a unique synergistic approach to effectively communicate our client's message to their target audience.
“As corporate purpose, CSR [corporate social responsibility] and employee engagement increasingly become business imperatives, more and more companies are seeking enterprise-grade solutions that are inclusive, personalized, easy-to-deploy across their global teams and flexible enough to scale with their evolving requirements,” said Alex Crisses, managing director in General Atlantic’s technology sector. “We believe Benevity is well positioned to continue leading the market in this area, and we are a proud partner in this endeavour.”
Source. BetaKit, , Megan Simpson October 22, 2019
***
This post was brought to you by Woewoda Communications, your partner in the venture capital, private equity and startup markets; offering strategic communications, public relations & investor relation services to Canadian VCs, PEs, Angels, Endowments/Trusts, Family Offices, and Canadian startups involved in ICT, IoT, blockchain, life sciences, healthcare, agribusiness, clean energy, fintech, AI and robotics.
Are you a Canadian GP/LP/CI or a Canadian startup that needs to grow or scale? Give us a call! One of our representatives would love to explain how we vertically design, and then systematically layer each of our communication platforms to effectively reach niche target audiences for our clients. WC offers a unique synergistic approach to effectively communicate our client's message to their target audience.
Serving Vancouver, Montreal, Toronto, Waterloo, Ottawa and Halifax.
Saturday, October 26, 2019
VC Deals Only: VC Deals Only. Weekend Edition. Starling Bank rais...
VC Deals Only: VC Deals Only. Weekend Edition. Starling Bank rais...: VC Deals Logixboard , a Seattle, WA-based digital partner for freight forwarders, raised $4.2m in seed funding. The company intends to u...
VC Deals Only. Weekend Edition. Starling Bank raises additional £30M as it nears 1 millionth account holder
VC Deals
Logixboard, a Seattle, WA-based digital partner for freight forwarders, raised $4.2m in seed funding. The company intends to use the funds to expand its platform and accelerate product innovation. More
Octave, a national behavioral health practice, raised $11M in Series A funding. The company intends to use the funds to continue to expand nationally, with additional locations planned for California and New York next year. More
French startup MadBox is raising a $16.5 million (€15 million) Series A funding round from Alven. The company is developing mobile games and handles everything from start to finish, from game design to publishing and user acquisition. More
Logixboard, a Seattle, WA-based digital partner for freight forwarders, raised $4.2m in seed funding. The company intends to use the funds to expand its platform and accelerate product innovation. More
Octave, a national behavioral health practice, raised $11M in Series A funding. The company intends to use the funds to continue to expand nationally, with additional locations planned for California and New York next year. More
Fintech startup Athena has closed a $70 million Series C round as it looks to push into mortgage origination. The country’s largest industry fund, AustralianSuper, joined the raise alongside long-term backers Square Peg Capital, AirTree Ventures and Hostplus, as well as Salesforce Ventures and NAB Ventures. More
French startup MadBox is raising a $16.5 million (€15 million) Series A funding round from Alven. The company is developing mobile games and handles everything from start to finish, from game design to publishing and user acquisition. More
Clay Wilkes had already been retired for six years when he launched Galileo Financial Services in 2000. The serial entrepreneur, who had been an early pioneer in telecommunications technologies now runs the backend integrations with financial institutions for some of the biggest names in financial technology and has just raised $77 million in financing from Accel Partners. More
Fabric, the startup that wants to make automated logistics available to retailers of all sizes, announced today it has raised $110 million in Series B funding. The round was led by Corner Ventures, with participation from Aleph, Canada Pension Plan Investment Board (CPPIB), Innovation Endeavors, La Maison, Playground Ventures and Temasek. More
Fabric, the startup that wants to make automated logistics available to retailers of all sizes, announced today it has raised $110 million in Series B funding. The round was led by Corner Ventures, with participation from Aleph, Canada Pension Plan Investment Board (CPPIB), Innovation Endeavors, La Maison, Playground Ventures and Temasek. More
Starling Bank, the U.K.-based challenger bank founded by banking veteran Anne Boden, has raised an additional £30 million in funding. Starling
says the new funding will support increased investment in its consumer
and SME bank accounts, as well as its B2B banking services. The capital
will also be used to accelerate expansion into Europe. More
Sponsor
myCareBase™is a platform for seniors and their families to find, evaluate, hire and manage home support services, to improve the seniors’ ability to remain living safely in their current home for as long as possible. The caregiver marketplace currently offers candidates in Greater Toronto and Greater Vancouver.
myCareBase™is a platform for seniors and their families to find, evaluate, hire and manage home support services, to improve the seniors’ ability to remain living safely in their current home for as long as possible. The caregiver marketplace currently offers candidates in Greater Toronto and Greater Vancouver.
To compliment this platform the company also offers an innovative care management app that centralizes communication and task management among family members and the caregiver, along with a Care Concierge service to help family members with administrative, navigational or organizational tasks.
Partnerships
A new digital health company is being launched by two well-known names in healthcare: the Cleveland Clinic and telemedicine company American Well. The joint venture — called The Clinic and based in Cleveland— will leverage the hospital expertise of Cleveland Clinic providers and the telemedicine platform devised by American Well to deliver virtual care and high-acuity services to patients. More
New Funds
The Australian tech industry has, in the last few years, started to generate a swathe of startups that have broken through internationally. In fact, it’s now gaining a reputation as a serial producer of high-quality tech platforms, the hottest of which right now is Canva, which recently raised an additional $85 million to bring its valuation to $3.2 billion, up from $2.5 billion in May. More
Exits
The Kik messaging platform has been bought by MediaLab, a holding company which operates Whisper and a number of other apps, the company announced Friday. More
Micron Technology said it acquired Fwdnxt, a maker of hardware and software tools for artificial intelligence deep learning applications. When combined with Micron‘s memory chips, Fwdnxt (pronounced “forward next”) will enable Micron to explore deep learning solutions required for data analytics, particularly with internet of things and edge computing. More
Amazon has acquired Health Navigator, a startup that develops APIs for online health services. According to CNBC, which first reported the deal, Health Navigator will become part of Amazon Care, its pilot healthcare service program for employees. More
Sponsor
This post was brought to you by Woewoda Communications, your partner in the venture capital, private equity and startup markets; offering strategic communications, public relations & investor relation services to Canadian VCs, PEs, Angels, Endowments/Trusts, Family Offices, and Canadian startups involved in ICT, IoT, blockchain, life sciences, healthcare, agribusiness, clean energy, fintech, AI and robotics.
Are you a Canadian GP/LP/CI or a Canadian startup that needs to grow or scale? Give us a call! One of our representatives would love to explain how we vertically design, and then systematically layer each of our communication platforms to effectively reach niche target audiences for our clients. WC offers a unique synergistic approach to effectively communicate our client's message to their target audience.
Serving Vancouver, Montreal, Toronto, Waterloo, Ottawa and Halifax.
Partnerships
A new digital health company is being launched by two well-known names in healthcare: the Cleveland Clinic and telemedicine company American Well. The joint venture — called The Clinic and based in Cleveland— will leverage the hospital expertise of Cleveland Clinic providers and the telemedicine platform devised by American Well to deliver virtual care and high-acuity services to patients. More
New Funds
The Australian tech industry has, in the last few years, started to generate a swathe of startups that have broken through internationally. In fact, it’s now gaining a reputation as a serial producer of high-quality tech platforms, the hottest of which right now is Canva, which recently raised an additional $85 million to bring its valuation to $3.2 billion, up from $2.5 billion in May. More
Exits
The Kik messaging platform has been bought by MediaLab, a holding company which operates Whisper and a number of other apps, the company announced Friday. More
Micron Technology said it acquired Fwdnxt, a maker of hardware and software tools for artificial intelligence deep learning applications. When combined with Micron‘s memory chips, Fwdnxt (pronounced “forward next”) will enable Micron to explore deep learning solutions required for data analytics, particularly with internet of things and edge computing. More
Amazon has acquired Health Navigator, a startup that develops APIs for online health services. According to CNBC, which first reported the deal, Health Navigator will become part of Amazon Care, its pilot healthcare service program for employees. More
Sponsor
This post was brought to you by Woewoda Communications, your partner in the venture capital, private equity and startup markets; offering strategic communications, public relations & investor relation services to Canadian VCs, PEs, Angels, Endowments/Trusts, Family Offices, and Canadian startups involved in ICT, IoT, blockchain, life sciences, healthcare, agribusiness, clean energy, fintech, AI and robotics.
Are you a Canadian GP/LP/CI or a Canadian startup that needs to grow or scale? Give us a call! One of our representatives would love to explain how we vertically design, and then systematically layer each of our communication platforms to effectively reach niche target audiences for our clients. WC offers a unique synergistic approach to effectively communicate our client's message to their target audience.
Serving Vancouver, Montreal, Toronto, Waterloo, Ottawa and Halifax.
Friday, October 25, 2019
VC Deals Only: Looking to become the central hub for logistics ma...
VC Deals Only: Looking to become the central hub for logistics ma...: Shipwell , the software platform for managing trucking logistics, has raised $35 million and is expanding its suite of services to beco...
Looking to become the central hub for logistics management, Shipwell raises $35 million
Shipwell,
the software platform for managing trucking logistics, has raised $35
million and is expanding its suite of services to become a full-service
hub for logistics management.
The new round led by Georgian Partners comes as the company has just expanded its suite of tracking and management tools to integrate with FedEx’s
parcel shipping services. The company also is planning an expansion
into ocean shipping in the coming months, according to chief executive
Gregory Price.
The Austin-based company works with multiple service providers — including the logistics services unicorn Flexport
— but operates as a marketplace for shippers to connect with freight
companies and online tools to manage those shipments. In effect, the
company is pitching to any retailer or outlet a version of the
proprietary logistics management toolkit that has made Amazon so
successful.
continued below
______________________________________________________________
Sponsor
myCareBase™ is a platform for seniors and their families to find, evaluate, hire and manage home support services, to improve the seniors’ ability to remain living safely in their current home for as long as possible. The caregiver marketplace currently offers candidates in Greater Toronto and Greater Vancouver.
To compliment this platform the company also offers an innovative care management app that centralizes communication and task management among family members and the caregiver, along with a Care Concierge service to help family members with administrative, navigational or organizational tasks.
________________________________________
Since its last round of funding a year ago, Shipwell
has grown to service more than 4,000 customers per month with supply
chains spanning multiple geographies. The company now operates in
Canada, Mexico and even across Europe.
With the new funding the
company intends to open new offices in Chicago and expand to a second
location in its home base of Austin.
The company has also launched
a new application program interface that allows it to help manage
logistics through other modes than just trucking. Price says the company
has about 20 companies beta-testing the tool, which is set to launch
publicly in November.
This post was brought to you by Woewoda Communications, your partner in the venture capital, private equity and startup markets; offering strategic communications, public relations & investor relation services to Canadian VCs, PEs, Angels, Endowments/Trusts, Family Offices, and Canadian startups involved in ICT, IoT, blockchain, life sciences, healthcare, agribusiness, clean energy, fintech, AI and robotics.
Are you a Canadian GP/LP/CI or a Canadian startup that needs to grow or scale? Give us a call! One of our representatives would love to explain how we vertically design, and then systematically layer each of our communication platforms to effectively reach niche target audiences for our clients. WC offers a unique synergistic approach to effectively communicate our client's message to their target audience.
Source. TechCrunch, Johnathan Schreiber, October 24, 2019
***
This post was brought to you by Woewoda Communications, your partner in the venture capital, private equity and startup markets; offering strategic communications, public relations & investor relation services to Canadian VCs, PEs, Angels, Endowments/Trusts, Family Offices, and Canadian startups involved in ICT, IoT, blockchain, life sciences, healthcare, agribusiness, clean energy, fintech, AI and robotics.
Are you a Canadian GP/LP/CI or a Canadian startup that needs to grow or scale? Give us a call! One of our representatives would love to explain how we vertically design, and then systematically layer each of our communication platforms to effectively reach niche target audiences for our clients. WC offers a unique synergistic approach to effectively communicate our client's message to their target audience.
Serving Vancouver, Montreal, Toronto, Waterloo, Ottawa and Halifax.
Thursday, October 24, 2019
VC Deals Only: Logixboard Raises $4.2M in Seed Funding
VC Deals Only: Logixboard Raises $4.2M in Seed Funding: Logixboard , a Seattle, WA-based digital partner for freight forwarders, raised $4.2m in seed funding. The round was led by Social Leve...
Logixboard Raises $4.2M in Seed Funding
Logixboard, a Seattle, WA-based digital partner for freight forwarders, raised $4.2m in seed funding.
The round was led by Social Leverage, with participation from F-Prime
Capital, Founders’ Co-op, Techstars Venture Fund, Liquid 2 VC, Bragiel
Brothers, and Tom Gonser, the Founder of Docusign. In conjunction with
the funding, Social Leverage Partner, Gary Benitt, has joined
Logixboard’s Board.
The company intends to use the funds to expand its platform and accelerate product innovation.
continued below
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Sponsor
myCareBase™ is a platform for seniors and their families to find, evaluate, hire and manage home support services, to improve the seniors’ ability to remain living safely in their current home for as long as possible. The caregiver marketplace currently offers candidates in Greater Toronto and Greater Vancouver.
To compliment this platform the company also offers an innovative care management app that centralizes communication and task management among family members and the caregiver, along with a Care Concierge service to help family members with administrative, navigational or organizational tasks.
________________________________________________________________
Led by Julian Alvarez, CEO, Logixboard provides a web-based
end-to-end customer engagement platform for freight forwarders to give
real-time visibility to their customers. Existing customers, like
Transborder SAS, have processed millions of dollars in shipments using
Logixboard.
With the new financing, the company will accelerate its vision of
becoming the digital system of engagement for the global freight
forwarding industry, automating quote and booking processes, deriving
data insights, and building data integrations to other critical systems
across the industry.
Logixboard, a recent graduate of Techstars, has offices in Bogota, Colombia.
Source. FinSMEs, October 22, 2019
***
This post was brought to you by Woewoda Communications, your partner in the venture capital, private equity and startup markets; offering strategic communications, public relations & investor relation services to Canadian VCs, PEs, Angels, Endowments/Trusts, Family Offices, and Canadian startups involved in ICT, IoT, blockchain, life sciences, healthcare, agribusiness, clean energy, fintech, AI and robotics.
Are you a Canadian GP/LP/CI or a Canadian startup that needs to grow or scale? Give us a call! One of our representatives would love to explain how we vertically design, and then systematically layer each of our communication platforms to effectively reach niche target audiences for our clients. WC offers a unique synergistic approach to effectively communicate our client's message to their target audience.
Serving Vancouver, Montreal, Toronto, Waterloo, Ottawa and Halifax.
Wednesday, October 23, 2019
VC Deals Only: Octave Raises $11M in Series A Funding
VC Deals Only: Octave Raises $11M in Series A Funding: Octave , a national behavioral health practice, raised $11M in Series A funding. The round was led by Greycroft, with participation from ...
Octave Raises $11M in Series A Funding
Octave, a national behavioral health practice, raised $11M in Series A funding.
The round was led by Greycroft, with participation from Obvious Ventures.
The company intends to use the funds to continue to expand nationally, with additional locations planned for California and New York next year.
Led by founder and CEO, Sandeep Acharya, Octave is a new evidence-based therapy practice and wellness community offering in-person and virtual coaching, group therapy and psychiatry, along with an array of content and assessment tools to support clients between sessions. Since opening its first office in New York in October 2018, the company has launched a number of new services, including group sessions for anxiety, LGBTQ patients, and expecting couples, and has also expanded virtual coaching nationwide, serving patients in multiple states and even internationally.
Sponsor
The company plans to increase staff therapists in the coming months and will also begin offering a variety of free classes for Octave members – from meditation to one-night workshops.
Octave opens its first San Francisco location at 625 Market Street on October 28, with its second New York office opening in the Flatiron Building in December. The company also announced a partnership with Anthem Blue Cross of California to serve patients as an in-network provider.
Acharya is joined by Chief Clinical Officer Dr. Sarah Adler and head of operations Sejal Shah.
This post was brought to you by Woewoda Communications, your partner in the venture capital, private equity and startup markets; offering strategic communications, public relations & investor relation services to Canadian VCs, PEs, Angels, Endowments/Trusts, Family Offices, and Canadian startups involved in ICT, IoT, blockchain, life sciences, healthcare, agribusiness, clean energy, fintech, AI and robotics.
Are you a Canadian GP/LP/CI or a Canadian startup that needs to grow or scale? Give us a call! One of our representatives would love to explain how we vertically design, and then systematically layer each of our communication platforms to effectively reach niche target audiences for our clients. WC offers a unique synergistic approach to effectively communicate our client's message to their target audience.
The round was led by Greycroft, with participation from Obvious Ventures.
The company intends to use the funds to continue to expand nationally, with additional locations planned for California and New York next year.
Led by founder and CEO, Sandeep Acharya, Octave is a new evidence-based therapy practice and wellness community offering in-person and virtual coaching, group therapy and psychiatry, along with an array of content and assessment tools to support clients between sessions. Since opening its first office in New York in October 2018, the company has launched a number of new services, including group sessions for anxiety, LGBTQ patients, and expecting couples, and has also expanded virtual coaching nationwide, serving patients in multiple states and even internationally.
continued below
______________________________________________________________
Sponsor
myCareBase™ is a platform for seniors and their families to find, evaluate, hire and manage home support services, to improve the seniors’ ability to remain living safely in their current home for as long as possible. The caregiver marketplace currently offers candidates in Greater Toronto and Greater Vancouver.
To compliment this platform the company also offers an innovative care management app that centralizes communication and task management among family members and the caregiver, along with a Care Concierge service to help family members with administrative, navigational or organizational tasks.
________________________________________________________________
The company plans to increase staff therapists in the coming months and will also begin offering a variety of free classes for Octave members – from meditation to one-night workshops.
Octave opens its first San Francisco location at 625 Market Street on October 28, with its second New York office opening in the Flatiron Building in December. The company also announced a partnership with Anthem Blue Cross of California to serve patients as an in-network provider.
Acharya is joined by Chief Clinical Officer Dr. Sarah Adler and head of operations Sejal Shah.
Source. FinSMEs, October 22, 2019
***
This post was brought to you by Woewoda Communications, your partner in the venture capital, private equity and startup markets; offering strategic communications, public relations & investor relation services to Canadian VCs, PEs, Angels, Endowments/Trusts, Family Offices, and Canadian startups involved in ICT, IoT, blockchain, life sciences, healthcare, agribusiness, clean energy, fintech, AI and robotics.
Are you a Canadian GP/LP/CI or a Canadian startup that needs to grow or scale? Give us a call! One of our representatives would love to explain how we vertically design, and then systematically layer each of our communication platforms to effectively reach niche target audiences for our clients. WC offers a unique synergistic approach to effectively communicate our client's message to their target audience.
Serving Vancouver, Montreal, Toronto, Waterloo, Ottawa and Halifax.
Tuesday, October 22, 2019
VC Deals Only: Online mortgage lender Athena raises $70 million i...
VC Deals Only: Online mortgage lender Athena raises $70 million i...: Fintech startup Athena has closed a $70 million Series C round as it looks to push into mortgage origination. The country’s largest in...
Online mortgage lender Athena raises $70 million in Series C
Fintech startup Athena has closed a $70 million Series C round as it looks to push into mortgage origination.
The
country’s largest industry fund, AustralianSuper, joined the raise
alongside long-term backers Square Peg Capital, AirTree Ventures and
Hostplus, as well as Salesforce Ventures and NAB Ventures.
Square Peg’s Paul Bassat joined the Athena board last year when the company raised $15 million
in a Series A. Six months later, in November 2018, it raised $25
million in a Series B. The latest cash injection values the company at
$230 million.
continued below
______________________________________________________________
Sponsor
myCareBase™ is a platform for seniors and their families to find, evaluate, hire and manage home support services, to improve the seniors’ ability to remain living safely in their current home for as long as possible. The caregiver marketplace currently offers candidates in Greater Toronto and Greater Vancouver.
To compliment this platform the company also offers an innovative care management app that centralizes communication and task management among family members and the caregiver, along with a Care Concierge service to help family members with administrative, navigational or organizational tasks.
________________________________________________________________
The cloud-based fintech, founded in 2017 by ex-NAB
bankers Nathan Walsh and Michael Starkey, also counts Macquarie Bank,
Rice Warner, Apex Capital, and RESIMAC Group among its investors and
from the outset targeted super funds as lending partners.
To date,
Athena has written around $500 million in loans since its launch in
February, with a goal of writing $1 billion in business within 12
months, but has focused on refinancing. It was among the first to
respond to recent RBA rate cuts, passing on the full 25 basis points to
offer a 2.84% p.a variable rate for owner-occupiers and 3.24% for
investors.
The cash injection will have the business eyeing off a
market worth around $380 billion annually, with around 80% of that
figure new mortgages.
Source. Startup Daily, Simon Thomsen, October 21, 2019
***
This post was brought to you by Woewoda Communications, your partner in the venture capital, private equity and startup markets; offering strategic communications, public relations & investor relation services to Canadian VCs, PEs, Angels, Endowments/Trusts, Family Offices, and Canadian startups involved in ICT, IoT, blockchain, life sciences, healthcare, agribusiness, clean energy, fintech, AI and robotics.
Are you a Canadian GP/LP/CI or a Canadian startup that needs to grow or scale? Give us a call! One of our representatives would love to explain how we vertically design, and then systematically layer each of our communication platforms to effectively reach niche target audiences for our clients. WC offers a unique synergistic approach to effectively communicate our client's message to their target audience.
Serving Vancouver, Montreal, Toronto, Waterloo, Ottawa and Halifax.
Monday, October 21, 2019
VC Deals Only: Mobile game startup MadBox raises $16.5 million af...
VC Deals Only: Mobile game startup MadBox raises $16.5 million af...: French startup MadBox is raising a $16.5 million (€15 million) Series A funding round from Alven . The company is developing mobile gam...
Mobile game startup MadBox raises $16.5 million after 100 million downloads
French startup MadBox is raising a $16.5 million (€15 million) Series A funding round from Alven.
The company is developing mobile games and handles everything from
start to finish, from game design to publishing and user acquisition.
MadBox
is a young player in the mobile game space. The company is the result
of the merger of two tiny Paris-based game studios in July 2018. After a
couple of months, the startup released its first game, Dash Valley. And the game quickly ended up trending in the top 50 of top free game downloads in the App Store in the U.S.
The
company has released a handful of games since then. At some point,
MadBox had three games in the top 10 charts in the U.S. (once again,
free game downloads) — StickMan Hook, Sausage Flip and Idle Ball Race.
Overall, MadBox has generated 100 million game downloads.
continued below
______________________________________________________________
Sponsor
myCareBase™ is a platform for seniors and their families to find, evaluate, hire and manage home support services, to improve the seniors’ ability to remain living safely in their current home for as long as possible. The caregiver marketplace currently offers candidates in Greater Toronto and Greater Vancouver.
To compliment this platform the company also offers an innovative care management app that centralizes communication and task management among family members and the caregiver, along with a Care Concierge service to help family members with administrative, navigational or organizational tasks.
________________________________________________________________
“The
core method at MadBox is that we internalize everything,” co-founder and
CEO Jean-Nicolas Vernin told me. “We try to automate as many thing as
possible.”
In
addition to reusing assets from one game to another, MadBox also tries
to apply the same method when it comes to user acquisition and
marketing. “People often tell us that we have a data-driven culture that
is disproportionately developed in our company,” Vernin said.
MadBox has a careful approach when it comes to growth. The company hires slowly and doesn’t release dozens of games in a year.
With
30 to 40 employees and a business model mostly based on ads, the
company is currently profitable. MadBox now wants to tackle a wider
range of mobile games, from hyper casual to idle games and less casual
games. The startup is also opening a second office in Barcelona.
“We
are a generation of friends who have worked for well-known casual game
studios. And we all think that big game productions will have to become
simpler so that people can play them like casual games — and vice
versa,” Vernin said. And MadBox wants to be there when these two worlds
collide.
Source. TechCrunch, Romain Dillet , October 18, 2019
***
This post was brought to you by Woewoda Communications, your partner in the venture capital, private equity and startup markets; offering strategic communications, public relations & investor relation services to Canadian VCs, PEs, Angels, Endowments/Trusts, Family Offices, and Canadian startups involved in ICT, IoT, blockchain, life sciences, healthcare, agribusiness, clean energy, fintech, AI and robotics.
Are you a Canadian GP/LP/CI or a Canadian startup that needs to grow or scale? Give us a call! One of our representatives would love to explain how we vertically design, and then systematically layer each of our communication platforms to effectively reach niche target audiences for our clients. WC offers a unique synergistic approach to effectively communicate our client's message to their target audience.
Saturday, October 19, 2019
VC Deals Only: ArsenalBio emerges from stealth with $85 million a...
VC Deals Only: ArsenalBio emerges from stealth with $85 million a...: The story behind ArsenalBio begins with Sean Parker’s Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy . Founded in 2016, the Institute has be...
ArsenalBio emerges from stealth with $85 million and a dream team to fight cancer
The story behind ArsenalBio begins with Sean Parker’s Institute for Cancer Immunotherapy.
Founded
in 2016, the Institute has been instrumental in providing a space for
the top researchers into cancer across different fields to collaborate
and communicate on the latest breakthroughs in settings that range from
formal meetings to informal retreats.
It was at one of these
informal retreats that luminaries like Dr. Bradley Bernstein, a
professor of pathology and researcher at the Broad Institute; W.
Nicholas Haining, vice president of discovery oncology at Merck Research
Laboratories; Dr. Alexander Mason, an associate professor of immunology
at the University of California San Francisco; and E. John Wherry, a
professor of systems immunology at the University of Pennsylvania, began
to talk about the current state of the art in cancer diagnostics and
therapies and the technologies powering cell-based therapies to
potentially cure cancer.
Parker suggested that rather than have
each of these researchers spin their technologies out into separate
companies that would develop one discrete innovation that would be
needed to get to a cell-based therapy for solid tumors, the researchers
should combine forces and build an arsenal of tools for the discovery
and development of potential cures.
“I
look at this as a tour de force of a combination of bringing academics
together who typically would start separate companies and get them
working together with a dream team management team,” says Beth
Seidenberg, the founder of Westlake Village BioPartners and an investor
in ArsenalBio.
Indeed, the management team is just as
impressive as the researchers behind the project. Kleiner Perkins
founding partner Brooke Byers recruited Dr. Ken Drazan to serve as a
consultant to the company as it was getting off the ground. Drazan, now
the company’s chief executive, was the former president of the cancer
research and diagnostics startup Grail and has served as an executive
and founder at a number of healthcare startups and large medical
companies.
With Drazan on board, the company quickly recruited the rest of the management team: Jane Grogan, the former principal scientist in charge of adaptive tumor and cell therapy at Genentech; Michael Kalos, the former vice president of immuno-oncology and cell therapies at Janssen Oncology; and Tarjei Mikkelsen, the former vice president of biology at 10x Genomics.
With Drazan on board, the company quickly recruited the rest of the management team: Jane Grogan, the former principal scientist in charge of adaptive tumor and cell therapy at Genentech; Michael Kalos, the former vice president of immuno-oncology and cell therapies at Janssen Oncology; and Tarjei Mikkelsen, the former vice president of biology at 10x Genomics.
ArsenalBio initially formed as a shell company with
seed financing from investors in 2018, basically on the back of its
technical team and nascent executive staff.
Alongside
the powerhouse executive team and scientific founders, ArsenalBio has
now raked in $85 million in financing from investors including Westlake
Village, the PICI, Kleiner Perkins, the University of California San
Francisco Foundation Investment Company, Euclidean Capital and Osage
University Partners.
The idea is to improve the ability of T cell
therapies to fight a broader range of cancers more effectively. T cell
treatments have already shown amazing promise with certain types of
cancer, but have not been able to effectively treat the solid tumors
that represent the deadliest manifestation of the disease.
To
tackle solid tumors like sarcomas, carcinomas and lymphomas, doctors
need to figure out how to deliver the T cells first to the area around
the tumor and then to the right tissues where the tumor is spreading.
That requires a set of biological instructions, which, in many cases
have yet to be discovered.
“We need to get the cells to deal with the tumor microenvironment,” says Seidenberg.
T
cells are the human body’s natural response to fighting off infections
and disease. Cancers essentially turn off that natural immune response
by signaling to the cells that a tumor is actually something they should
ignore rather than attack.
“Our
goal is to program [cells] by delivering additional instructions to
tell the T cell to ignore the instructions from the tumor… to ignore the
signals,” says Drazan.
The company is still developing
its first product strategies now, Drazan says. But ArsenalBio will be
selling two different types of technologies. The first will be the
medicines themselves that will be used to cure certain types of cancer.
The second will be the sequences of genes that can be used to counteract
or override the signals that are coming from different types of tumors
which prohibit T cells from performing their normal functions.
Drazan
compared those sequences to programs on GitHub that other researchers,
clinicians and companies could use to develop their own therapies.
“ArsenalBio
allows us to rewrite vast stretches of code to give T cells dramatic
new functions — that means they can be made to be more effective at
killing cancer and a broad spectrum of other diseases,” said Sean
Parker, founder and chairman of PICI and ArsenalBio director, in a
statement. “It’s also very rewarding to see ArsenalBio born from the
deep collaboration of PICI investigators — who worked together across
research centers, hospitals and universities on the science behind these
technologies. The company’s very existence demonstrates how much faster
and better we can get therapies from bench to bedside when we
collaborate and put patients first.”
Source. TechCrunch, Johnathan Schreiber, October 17, 2019
This post was brought to you by Woewoda Communications, your partner in the venture capital, private equity and startup markets; offering strategic communications, public relations & investor relation services to Canadian VCs, PEs, Angels, Endowments/Trusts, Family Offices, and Canadian startups involved in ICT, IoT, blockchain, life sciences, healthcare, agribusiness, clean energy, fintech, AI and robotics.
Are you a Canadian GP/LP/CI or a Canadian startup that needs to grow or scale? Give us a call! One of our representatives would love to explain how we vertically design, and then systematically layer each of our communication platforms to effectively reach niche target audiences for our clients. WC offers a unique synergistic approach to effectively communicate our client's message to their target audience.
Serving Vancouver, Montreal, Toronto, Waterloo, Ottawa and Halifax.
***
This post was brought to you by Woewoda Communications, your partner in the venture capital, private equity and startup markets; offering strategic communications, public relations & investor relation services to Canadian VCs, PEs, Angels, Endowments/Trusts, Family Offices, and Canadian startups involved in ICT, IoT, blockchain, life sciences, healthcare, agribusiness, clean energy, fintech, AI and robotics.
Are you a Canadian GP/LP/CI or a Canadian startup that needs to grow or scale? Give us a call! One of our representatives would love to explain how we vertically design, and then systematically layer each of our communication platforms to effectively reach niche target audiences for our clients. WC offers a unique synergistic approach to effectively communicate our client's message to their target audience.
Serving Vancouver, Montreal, Toronto, Waterloo, Ottawa and Halifax.
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