 Big Tech showed an insatiable M&A appetite in 2021 despite mounting antitrust rhetoric from Washington. According to Dealogic data presented by CNBC, Alphabet’s 22 deals, Microsoft’s 56 deals, and Amazon’s 29 deals in 2021 were all 10-year highs. More: - Alphabet and Microsoft’s aggregate deal volumes also hit 10-year highs, at $22B and $25.7B, respectively.
- Amazon’s $15.7B in deal value came in only below its figure for 2017, the year that saw it acquire Whole Foods for $13.7B.
- Erik Gordon, a professor at the University of Michigan Ross School of Business, claims that the companies are trying to get in as many deals as they can before the administration can get one judge to set a new antitrust precedent.
- Once it has one decision in its favor, the White House will have much less trouble bringing more antitrust cases.
- The challenge faced by FTC Chairperson Lina Khan, who is spearheading the effort to rein in Big Tech’s power, is large:
- The companies’ targets are frequently not in their own sectors, meaning that the deals don’t set off traditional antitrust alarms.
- The onus is on Khan to show their actions are harmful both to consumers and markets at large.
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Berlin-based fintech Moss closed on $86M (€75M) Series B to grow its credit card business for SMEs. Tiger Global Management led the round, with A-Star also participating. The company has now raised a total of $150M (€130M). More: - The company's valuation hit a respectable $573M (€500M) with the latest capital injection.
- At its core, the company provides a spend management platform and thus competes with other European players, including Spendesk, Pleo, and Soldo.
- Spendesk recently boosted its arsenal with a $114M (€100M) round and became France's latest unicorn with a $1.14B (€1B) valuation.
- Moss' value proposition of using credit cards as opposed to the more standard debit cards allows it to offer 0.4% cashback on all expenses.
- It can also generate digital cards, allowing companies to better segment their spending activity. Moss also offers a centralized invoices platform.
- It has processed 250,000 transactions and issued 20,000 cards in Germany and the Netherlands. It seeks to expand to the U.K.
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 A message from MODERN TREASURY Why you need to care more about payment operations. If your business moves money, you have payment operations. Payment operations include processes to initiate, approve, track, and reconcile payments. Just like the money they manage, payment operations are critical to a functioning business. In fact, survey data show that 86% of finance leaders view upgrading their payment operations as a priority. To better understand the current state of payment operations, Modern Treasury partnered with the Harris Poll to survey 300 leaders and uncover their top payment operations problems and priorities. In our first-ever report on payment operations, we reveal: - The costliest payment-related challenges companies face
- The 5 upgrades to payment operations leaders believe are most important
- The 7 most common barriers to upgrading payment operations
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Best of Last Week M&A - Microsoft has agreed to buy Activision Blizzard in a deal that would value the game publisher at close to ~$69B.
- Fintech unicorn Plaid will acquire the verification platform provider Cognito for a reported price of $250M. Cognito allowed financial institutions to confirm customer IDs and deal with anti-money laundering requirements.
- Reliance, the Indian conglomerate run by the country's richest man, bought a majority stake in e-commerce logistics robotics provider Addverb Technologies for $132M.
- NFT marketplace OpenSea has acquired DeFi wallet firm Dharma Labs.
- Crypto exchange Gemini has acquired the trading platform Omninex.
IPOs - The Nasdaq has officially hit "correction" territory. It dropped 166.64 points, or 1.1%, to 14340.26. That figure puts it 10.7% below its all-time closing high, or .7% beneath the official metric for an index correction.
- Credo Technology Group, provider of secured, high-speed connectivity solutions, filed for a $345M IPO at a $1.8B valuation. The company will sell 28.8 million shares priced at $10-$12.
- WeTransfer, a cross-border payments platform, will seek to raise $286M in an Amsterdam IPO. The listing is reduced by ~25% compared with its original target.
SPACs - Close to 80% of companies that went public through a SPAC merger are trading below the $10 per share SPAC issue price, The Information reports.
- Investment app Acorns has bailed on its planned merger with SPAC Pioneer Merger Corp at a $2.2B valuation. The company will pay a $17.5M termination free and will seek private capital at a higher valuation.
New Funds
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Workspace management platform OfficeSpace Software raised $150M from Vista Equity Partners. The Atlanta-based company was founded in 2004 and has avoided seeking investment from VC firms despite operating in the VC-heavy SaaS space. More: - OfficeSpace offers a cloud-based platform enabling enterprise customers to simplify how their employees utilize and interact with their workspace, manage desk and room bookings, and navigate social distancing rules.
- The company has pivoted hard to focus on hybrid work environments. To that end, it released a new feature geared toward coordinating the return to physical workplaces.
- The investment came from Vista’s Endeavor Fund, which only places bets in companies with $10M+ in ARR. OfficeSpace’s press release, however, did not reveal its latest figures.
- Existing investor Resurgens Technology Partners will retain a significant stake in the company.
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 Today's Funding 💸 Adtech/Martech - Pixis (Burlingame, Calif.), contextual codeless AI infrastructure for complete marketing optimization: $100M C led by SoftBank Vision Fund 2, participation from General Atlantic, Celesta Capital, Premji Invest, et al.
Biotech/Health - ImmPACT Bio (Camarillo, Calif.), chimeric antigen receptor T-cell therapies for cancer patients: $111M B from venBio Partners, Foresite Capital, Decheng Capital, Surveyor Capital, OrbiMed, Novartis Venture Fund, RM Global Partners, et al.
- ONI (San Diego, Calif.), desktop Nanoimager microscopy platform to observe single molecules in living cells: $75M B led by ARCH Venture Partners, Casdin Capital, participation from Section 32, ARTIS Ventures, Vertical Venture Partners, et al.
- Casana (Rochester, N.Y.), IoT health monitoring toilet: $30M B led by Morningside, participation from Matrix Partners, General Catalyst, Outsiders Fund.
- Desentum (Espoo, Finland), allergy vaccine candidate: $9.06M from Springvest Oyj.
Blockchain - SOMA.finance (Hong Kong), decentralized marketplace for digital assets: $6.5M Seed led by Animoca Brands, participation from Kenetic Capital, Griffin Gaming Partners, GSR, Token Bay Capital, et al.
Consumer - Calii (Mountain View, Calif.), grocery delivery platform: $22.5M led by Dalus Capital, JAM Fund, participation from Forerunner Ventures, Streamlined Ventures, Y Combinator, Base10 Partners.
Cybersecurity - Fleet Device Management (San Francisco, Calif.), open-source device management platform to track an organization's laptops and servers: $5M Seed from CRV, Mike Arpaia, Nico Waisman, Greg Martin, Jack Naglieri, et al.
Data/Analytics - Coalesce (San Francisco, Calif.), data transformation platform: $5.9M Seed led by 11.2 Capital, GreatPoint Ventures.
Enterprise - Nowsta (New York, N.Y.), employee engagement platform for hybrid workforces: $41M B led by GreatPoint Ventures, participation from VMG Catalyst, Rally Ventures, Tribe Capital, Green Visor Capital, et al.
- Prophecy (Palo Alto, Calif.), enterprise low-code data engineering platform: $25M A led by Insight Partners, participation from SignalFire, Berkeley Skydeck, Dig Ventures.
- Swell Commerce (San Francisco, Calif.), headless commerce platform serving fast-growing businesses: $20M A led by VMG Catalyst, Headline, participation from Bonfire Ventures, Willow Growth, Brian Long, et al.
- Zuper (Seattle, Wash.), productivity suite for intelligent field service management and customer engagement: $13M A led by Fuse, participation from Sequoia Capital India, Prime Venture Partners, HubSpot Ventures.
- Whoosh (Mill Valley, Calif.), golf operations software provider: $6M led by Craft Ventures, participation from Bienville Capital, Operator Partners, Human Ventures, Alaris Capital, et al.
Fintech - StockGro (Mumbai, Calif.), social investment platform: $32M from Bitkraft Ventures, General Catalyst, Itai Tsiddon, Roots Ventures, Creed Capital Asia.
Insurtech - Honeycomb (San Francisco, Calif.), digital reinsurance-backed MGA providing multi-family property insurance: $15.4M A led by Ibex Investors, participation from SiriusPoint, et al.
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- Accel-KKR is expected to close its latest $1.25B growth capital fund next month, according to sources. The fund initially targeted $850M.
- Cherry Ventures closed a new fund at $340M (€300M) to invest €1M to €3M in pre-seed and seed-stage rounds for European founders. The Berlin-based firm has a sector-agnostic strategy.
- Viola Ventures closed its sixth fund to invest in early-stage companies with $250M. The firm now has $1.25B in AUM.
- Berlin-based Inflection raised a new $40M crypto-focused fund. Investments will range from $0.5M to $1.5M. LPs in its new Mercury Fund include Accolade Partners, Evanston Capital, Isomer, Hutt Capital, Multiple Capital, and others.
- While GoPuff is preparing to bring its instant-delivery platform to public markets with a $15B IPO, its efforts to expand to Europe have been mixed. Read The Information’s article here about what aspects of the business have not translated well to the Continental context.
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 |  | Inside VC's writer/curator Stephen currently lives in Berlin and is pursuing a Master's degree in philosophy. He otherwise spends his time trying his hand at recipes from India and Southeast Asia, escaping it all at the kickboxing gym, and offending aural sensibilities with his band. |  | | Editor | Aaron Crutchfield is based in the high desert of California. Over the last two decades, he has spent time writing and editing at various local newspapers and defense contractors in California. When he's not working, he can often be found looking at the latest memes with his kids or working on his 1962 Ford. | |
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