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| Here's a look at today's VC briefing. - 🇶🇦 Qatar Investment Authority plans to launch a $1B fund-of-funds.
- 📈 Fidelity Investments raised the value of Stripe's shares by 32%.
- 🤝 VC firm The Column Group is set to take NGM Bio private in a $135M buyout deal.
Thank you. Karan
p/karan-chafekar | |
| 1 | | Qatar's sovereign wealth fund, the Qatar Investment Authority (QIA), is launching a $1B fund-of-funds to back international VC funds investing in the nation and the wider Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) region. The firm will primarily focus on VC funds supporting fintech, edtech, and healthcare startups. More: - In addition to investing in other VC funds, the firm will make targeted co-investments with some funds.
- QIA CEO Mansoor Ebrahim Al-Mahmoud said, "There is currently no dedicated pool of capital in Qatar for companies that are past seed funding and are ready for Series A to Series C funding rounds. Building a well-connected startup ecosystem network in Qatar is fundamental to diversifying the country's economic base in the long term."
Zoom out: - Per Global SWF, Gulf sovereign funds, including the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, ADQ, Mubadala, Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund, and QIA, have collectively invested about $73B in various asset classes in 2022.
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| 2 | | Fidelity Investments has raised the value of portfolio payments startup Stripe's shares by 32% compared to its August price, per Pitchbook. 
What the numbers say: Fidelity priced Stripe's shares at $24.59 at the close of 2023. Despite the surge, Stripe's share prices are still far from its peak value of more than $41 per share in 2021. Stripe touched a peak valuation of $95B when it raised a $600M Series H round in 2021. Last year, Stripe raised a $6.5B funding round at a $50B valuation to prevent employees' stock units from expiring. What happened: Fidelity marked up Stripe's valuation in anticipation of a rebound in the IPO market. Stripe and its rival Plaid are gearing up for a public listing as soon as the IPO window opens. Relevance: F-Prime Capital's principal, Abdul Abdirahman, said, "The multiples for payments companies have rebounded over the last year." The share prices of Stripe's closest publicly traded competitor, Adyen, have more than doubled since November 2023. | | | |
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| 3 | | Trifecta Capital is looking to raise $241M for its fourth venture fund, just six months after it raised $213M for its third venture fund. Typical check sizes from the venture debt fund range from $1.2M (100M INR) to $1.8M (150M INR). The company can eventually offer up to $12M (1B INR) in startup capital. More: - Trifecta has already deployed most of the third fund in startups across emerging sectors such as electric vehicles, supply chain management, and agritech.
- The firm deploys just 10% to 15% of its funds in a single sector.
- By early next year, the firm plans to launch its second growth-stage equity fund, Trifecta Leaders Fund 2.
- To date, Trifecta has invested $603M (50B INR) in 150 startups, including 21 unicorns.
- Most notable startups backed include Zepto, BigBasket, PharmEasy, Cars24, Vedantu, and Infra.Market.
- The company writes checks ranging from $12M (1B INR) to $24M (2B INR) from its venture capital funds.
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| 4 | | Shareholders of publicly traded biotech firm NGM Bio have accepted VC firm The Column Group's $135M buyout offer. The Column Group offered $1.55 per share in cash. The offer represents an 80% premium over NGM Bio's closing price from Dec. 29, 2023. More: - The Column Group is the largest shareholder of NGM Bio, owning 27% of its outstanding shares.
- NGM Bio has faced significant headwinds in recent months after the phase 2 failure of its age-related macular degeneration asset.
- After the failure, NGM laid off a third of its workforce, or 75 employees, and reduced operating expenses to fund its solid tumor programs.
- The value of NGM Bio's shares plummeted from $5 per share at the start of 2023 to below the $1 mark.
- Nasdaq threatened to delist the company after its shares dipped below $1.
- The company had about $144.2M in cash and equivalents at the start of 2024.
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| 5 | | COTU Ventures, short for Champions of the Underdog, raised $54M capital for its debut fund. The fund aims to invest in pre-seed to seed-stage startups across the Middle East, writing checks ranging from $500,000 to $1.5M. More: - Over the past two and a half years, the firm has backed 20 early-stage startups, primarily in the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Pakistan.
- Notable startups in its portfolio include mortgage platform Huspy, ResTech platform Supy, warehouse management solution Sirdab, and fintech startup MoneyHash.
- The firm is sector agnostic but is more inclined towards fintech and B2B software.
- Limited partners that backed the fund include Lunate, Mubadala, Dubai Future District Fund, Arab Bank, and Bupa KSA.
- The firm has also received backing from general partners of Foundry Group, Tribe Capital, and Stride.
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| 6 | | Today's Funding: Biotech - Alamar Biosciences, a biotech startup developing precision proteomics to detect diseases at the earliest stages, held the first close of its Series C funding round at $100M. Sands Capital led the round. The firm expects to add another $28M to the Series C round within a month.
Defense tech - French maritime surveillance solutions firm Unseenlabs secured €85M ($92.2M) in fresh funding from lead investors Supernova Invest, ISALT's Strategic Transition Fund, and UNEXO.
Healthcare - AI-powered healthcare technology data and analytics company Reveleer raked in $65M in fresh funding led by Hercules Capital.
- Leavitt Equity Partners led a $40M Series C round into personalized health insights firm b.well Connected Health.
Logistics - Shadowfax, a logistics startup catering to hyperlocal and on-demand delivery businesses in India, raised $100M in Series E funding led by TPG NewQuest. Existing investors Flipkart, Mirae Asset Venture Investments, IFC, Nokia Growth Partners, Qualcomm, Eight Roads Ventures, and Trifecta Capital joined the funding round.
- Unmanned logistics vehicles maker Zelos Technology closed its Series A round at $100M. Meituan led the round, with additional support from Baidu Ventures, Xianting Fund, Seekdource, Blue Lake Capital, and Xiamen C&D Emerging Industry Equity Investment.
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| 7 | | Quick Hits: - Discover the trends shaping 2024 and learn how trust will be the key to business success. Shape your strategy and get ahead with this latest report.*
- Geothermal startup Fervo Energy is in the process of raising a $221M funding round, per SEC filing documents seen by TechCrunch.
- AI-powered humanoid robot maker Figure AI is reportedly raising a $675M funding round at a pre-money valuation of $2B. The Sunnyvale, Calif.-based firm received a commitment of $100M from Jeff Bezos' Explore Investments, with another $95M coming from Microsoft. Nvidia and an Amazon-affiliated fund invested $50M each.
- African vehicle financing startup Moove is in talks with Uber to raise between $75M and $100M at a valuation of $750M.
- Seattle startup studio Pioneer Square Labs partnered with VC firm Mayfield. The duo will provide $1.5M in seed funding to AI startups spinning out from PSL.
- Dutch founder and investor community FounderFund announced its new investment fund, which it will use to invest in 25 to 35 pre-seed and early-seed stage startups.
- Fintech sector-focused VC firm Flourish Ventures promoted Diana Narváez and Harsh Gupta to the principal role.
- Visa and Mastercard have come to a historic $5 billion settlement, marking a pivotal moment for small business owners. If your business accepts Visa/MC, Claim your share today.*
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 | Analyst | | Karan Chafekar is a Management Consultant, Business enthusiast, and Licensed Pilot. | | This newsletter was edited by Vibha Chapparike | |
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