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| Here's a look at today's VC briefing. - 💵 Lightspeed to roll up portfolio stakes worth $1B into a new continuation fund to free up cash for investors
- 📊 VC slump was milder for seed-stage startups
- 💰 Eric Schmidt-founded Innovation Endeavors raised $630M fifth fund
We have also rounded up the top late-stage funding rounds from this week. Thank you. Karan
p/karan-chafekar | |
| 1 | | Prominent VC firm Lightspeed Venture Partners plans to roll up portfolio stakes of 10 companies worth $1B into a new continuation fund. This tactic, typically followed by the private equity industry, will give existing LPs an opportunity to cash out their returns while allowing Lightspeed to hold on to portfolio stakes for a longer duration. More: - Lightspeed, known for making early investments in Snap, Rubrik, and Nest, is facing pressures from investors seeking liquidity as its fund nears the end of the typical 10-year lifespan.
- Chief business officer Michael Romano said, "We think VCs can't just use the excuse that the IPO window is closed. They need to take a page out of the private equity playbook and build more consistent liquidity that LPs can count on."
- The firm has about $25B worth of assets under management.
- Distributing returns is important if the company plans to raise fresh funds in the future, as LPs typically look at the distributed to paid-in capital metric while evaluating where to allocate their capital.
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| 2 | | VCs deployed $717.3M in late-stage and beyond global startups this week between Jan. 20 and Jan. 26, per Crunchbase data. Cybersecurity startups raked in 22% of the funding this week. Travel, battery, and healthcare startups nabbed 14%, 13%, and 12% of the financing, respectively. 
Here are the top five largest rounds announced this week: - Identity protection solutions startup Silverfort raised $116M in Series D funding. Brighton Park Capital led the round, with additional support from Acrew Capital, Citi Ventures, General Motors Ventures, Vintage Investment Partners, Singtel Innov8, and others.
- Business travel management platform TravelPerk extended its previous Series D-1 from January 2022 with an additional $104M investment led by SoftBank Vision Fund 2. Existing investors Kinnevik and Felix Capital participated in the round. The current funding round values the firm at $1.4B.
- Portable battery systems startup Instagrid raised $95M in Series C funding led by Teachers' Venture Growth. Morgan Stanley Investment Management, Energy Impact Partners, SET Ventures, and Hightech Gründerfonds participated in the funding round.
- RNA drug developer Accent Therapeutics bagged a $75M Series C funding round led by Mirae Asset Capital Life Science. Bristol Myers Squibb and Johnson & Johnson's investment arm JJDC backed the funding round.
- LB Pharmaceuticals, a biotech startup developing medicines to treat schizophrenia, closed its Series C funding round at $75M.
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| 3 | | Innovation Endeavors has secured $630M of capital commitments toward its fifth fund. The fund has not made any investment so far out of the new fund but plans to back about 30 to 35 startups at the intersection of science and technology, including climate intelligence software, engineering health, and supply chain. More: - Former Google CEO Eric Schmidt founded the firm along with Dror Berman, Scott Brady, and Rick Scanlon.
- Since its founding in 2010, the firm has backed 115 startups and exited 34 of them.
- Notable portfolio investments include SoFi, Uber, Astra, Slice, and Zymergen.
- It recently backed industrial engineering and manufacturing startup Machina Labs and cancer therapies biotech firm BioLoomics.
- The firm launched the fund in the current climate as it believes it is the right time to invest in quantum computing, robotics, sensing, and AI technologies as they are just beginning to mature.
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| 4 | | While seed-stage funding dropped by 31% in 2023, the slump was milder compared to the overall funding dip seen in the U.S., per Crunchbase. Despite the tough economic conditions, investors are still bullish about U.S. seed startups as "a lot more great talent [is] excited about starting things," says Renegade Partners' co-founder Renata Quintini. More: - Forum Ventures' Michael Cardamone expects the current crop of seed and Series A startups to fuel the next bull market.
- Current seed startups are focusing on executing for longer and de-risking the investment before opting for Series A rounds.
- The median time taken by seed startups to raise subsequent Series A rounds has doubled from 14 months in 2014 to 28 months in 2023.
- However, the top quartile companies were able to raise Series A rounds in just 12 months.
- Seed stage funding defied the VC funding dip in 2022, with a 10% surge in the amount invested compared to the previous year.
- 2023's seed stage funding tally of $11.5B could not match the record high of $16B from last year.
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| 5 | | Asian investment firm InnoVen Capital held the first close of its second venture debt fund at $130M, about halfway to the final target of $250M. InnoVen China Fund II is a dual currency fund that will provide venture debt financing to high-growth and innovative Chinese startups. More: - A joint venture established by Temasek's wholly owned subsidiary Seviora and United Overseas Bank is the anchor investor in the fund.
- Since 2017, InnoVen has allocated over $400M to 100 high-growth startups.
- It has funded nine unicorn startups, six of which eventually became publicly listed entities.
- InnoVen China Fund I backed 20 high-growth startups, including Mininglamp Technology, NextVPU, CBMG, Moodytiger, ANXIN, Casstime, Weiyun, and Autowise.ai.
- Fund I achieved a distributed to paid-in capital return of 13%.
- The second fund will primarily focus on deep tech, enterprise services, consumer, healthcare, and carbon-neutral sectors.
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| 6 | | Today's Funding: AI - Ride-hailing platform Ola's founder Bhavish Agarwal's new AI startup Krutrim has raised $50M in fresh funding led by Matrix Partners India. The startup, founded last year, has already cemented its unicorn status.
Biotech - Spinal tumor implants firm icotec ag secured $30M in growth funding from MVM Partners.
Cybersecurity - Wireless threat intelligence solutions startup Bastille Networks raised a $44M Series C funding round led by Goldman Sachs Asset Management. Bessemer Venture Partners, Comcast, and others participated in the round.
- Authentication solutions startup Clerk announced a Series B funding of $30M. CRV led the round, with additional support from Andreessen Horowitz, Stripe, and Madrona.
Healthcare - Healthcare price transparency startup Turquoise Health raked in $30M in Series B funding led by Adams Street Partners and supported by Andreessen Horowitz and BoxGroup.
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- Cross-Border Impact Ventures (CBIV) closed its debut fund at $90M to invest in medical device, diagnostic, and digital health companies across North America and Europe. The firm will invest in healthcare software companies that have at least $1M to $5M in revenue and one product that is CE Mark or FDA approved.
- Danish VC firm Kost Capital launched a €25M ($27M) fund to invest in European pre-seed and seed startups working on B2B applications in the future of food.
- British investment firm Fasanara acquired a majority stake in Pollen VC. The move will help Fasanara to pursue larger structured deals.
- Longitude Capital-backed biotech startup CG Oncology raised $380M capital from its IPO debut. The company sold 20 million shares priced at $19M each, giving the firm an initial market capitalization of $1.2B.
- Biotech investment firm Third Rock Ventures hired Karuna Therapeutics' co-founder Steve Paul, Beam Therapeutics' former chief business officer Courtney Wallace, and TESARO's co-founder as venture partners. In addition, the firm promoted venture partner Jigar Raythatha to partner and principal Vyas Ramanan to venture partner roles.
- OpenAI chairman Bret Taylor is close to finalizing an $85M funding round led by Sequoia Capital for his enterprise-focused AI startup Sierra. The firm is poised to achieve unicorn status at the round.
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 | Analyst | | Karan Chafekar is a Management Consultant, Business enthusiast, and Licensed Pilot. | | This newsletter was edited by Aaron Crutchfield | |
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