Arboretum breaks own state record with new $250 million venture-capital fundArboretum Ventures LLC plans to announce Monday that it has finished raising a fund of $250 million, the largest venture-capital fund in state history, eclipsing the $220 million that it raised in 2015. The fundraising was accomplished fairly quickly, thanks to many of its previous investors signing on again, looking to build on the company's track record of successful exits. The Ann Arbor company, which focuses medical devices, diagnostics health care IT and health care service companies, didn't file with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission until Jan. 30 that it was raising a new fund, Arboretum Ventures V LP. [ Crain's ] Why women in tech are being Photoshopped in instead of hiredAn image of a tech event in which two women CEOs were poorly Photoshopped into a group of 15 men reignited a discussion last week about tech companies’ ongoing failures to meaningfully diversify their workforces. Companies like Google and Facebook have overturned industries, changed the way we live, and are shaping the future. Yet somehow they haven’t been able to hire a workforce that even remotely represents their customers. Across the tech industry, the share of black and Latinx people in tech and leadership roles is often well below 5 percent, while women typically make up about a fifth to a quarter of those positions. [ Vox ] Facebook backs social commerce startup Meesho in first India investmentCollective Health, a six-year-old health tech startup with users such as Pinterest and Uber, has raised $205 million in a Series E led by SoftBank. NEA, Google’s GV, Founders Fund, DFJ Growth and PSP Investments also participated in the round, which brings the San Francisco company’s total raised to $434 million, according to its Crunchbase profile. Per itself, Collective Health’s mission is “to make it effortless to navigate, understand, and pay for healthcare” considering that so many employers today still rely on faxes and snail mail. Its software is designed to allow “self-funded employers to administer plans and control costs” from a centralized platform. According to its website, the company has more than 200,000 members across the United States and 45 “enterprise clients.” Besides Pinterest and Uber, it also names Zendesk, Red Bull and Restoration Hardware among its user base. In general, users come from a variety of industries including entertainment, gaming, publishing, retail, ecommerce, and transportation. [ Crunchbase ] Episode 108: Scott Kupor’s Secrets of Sand Hill Road: Venture Capital and How to Get ItScott Kupor’s career at the legendary VC firm, Andreessen Horowitz, has brought him face to face with 1000s of entrepreneurs looking for an investor. In his debut book, Secrets of Sand Hill Road, Scott takes us inside the world of Venture Capital to find out what VCs are looking for and most importantly what you should ask yourself and potential investors. Scott’s ability to distill down a lifetime of experience will open the benefits of venture capital to everyone, coast to coast and everywhere in between. The Most Recent Startup Investments Over $250 Million In 20192018 was the year supergiant VC deals became a nearly everyday occurrence. Equity funding rounds of $100 million or more dominated the global VC market, accounting for a vanishingly small percent of total deal volume, but accounting for 56 percent of the total dollar volume. Here’s the thing about these supergiant VC deals though. The New York Times headline from August 2018 said it simply: $100 million was once big money for a startup. Now, it’s common. In our Q4 and end-of-year analysis of the global VC market, Crunchbase News found that there were over 500 rounds in the “supergiant” size class throughout 2018, worldwide. Although we covered many of them last year, there were just too many to discuss individually. [ Crunchbase ] Why This Venture-Backed Startup Decided to Hold Its Launch Event in Anchorage, AlaskaPlus-size fashion companies are having a moment, scoring funding and inking trendy partnerships at an unprecedented rate. The latest entry in the category is Part & Parcel, a “social commerce community” for plus-size women offering basics from sizes 14 to 36. [ Yahoo ] This tech recruitment startup solves the biggest problem on the way to solving problemsWhen founders talk about the problem they set out to solve, finding the right tech team to help inevitably becomes part of the story. TechDirect set out to cut to the chase in that adventure by solving the problem on the way to problems – hiring tech people. The startup allows companies to directly connect, pitch and negotiate with over 70 verified and reviewed Australian IT contractors for tech projects. It’s Australia’s first specialised marketplace for IT talent, has been used by more than 20 companies and has another 150 IT specialists about to join the platform. [ Startup Daily ] Startup founders need to decide how much salary is enoughStartup founders don’t typically launch a company as a get-rich-quick scheme. Most know that it will be a long, hard slog if they are to succeed. There will be lean years where the money is tight, and where they may personally struggle to pay their bills. They do it because they believe in the mission and they want to build a successful company, where, if all goes well, they could end up with a healthy amount of money. [ Tech Crunch ] 6 of the most impressive startups from the Hunter Valley wine regionThe Hunter Valley, two hours north of Sydney, is best know for wine, horse breeding and coal mining. But it also has a burgeoning startup scene, with more than 50 startups backed up by more than 10 co-working spaces and some R&D heavy hitters, such as the CSIRO’s Energy Centre, the Hunter Medical Research Institute (HMRI), University of Newcastle, aerospace ginats Boeing Defence Australia, and BAE Systems as part of the RAAF’s F-35 Joint Strike Fighter program. [ Startup Daily ] Tech Feels Hot As Q2 Races To A CloseCryptocurrencies are back on the bounce, and tech IPOs are hot. And it’s nearly time to check in on the global venture world. The second quarter is racing to a close. Amazingly, we’ll soon dive into July and the third three-month period of the year. That means earnings seasons (good!), summer (good!), and your partner taking you on hikes (bad!). [ Crunchbase ] The 10 Breakthrough Technologies That Will Define 2019Gone are the days of turning stones into spears. With the advent of new technologies, we’ve learned to develop tools that not only make living faster and easier every day, but also improve the future of humanity as a whole. [ Visual Capitalist ] All nugget, no chicken: Ex-Boeing engineer targets cafeterias with food tech startupFormer Boeing engineer Christie Lagally thinks vegan meat has a problem: the cheap options aren’t tasty, and the tasty options aren’t cheap. She’s on a mission to change that equation with Rebellyous Foods, a Seattle startup that’s targeting cafeteria staples in the form of chicken-free nuggets, patties and strips. [ Geek Wire ] Zava raises $32m in Series A funding roundZava has raised $32m in a Series A funding round ahead of its launch into statutory healthcare systems in Germany, the UK, and France. The funding round was led by growth equity firm HPE Growth, and Zava plans to use the investment to further accelerate its growth. [ uktech ] $400 million? Paul Allen’s Stratolaunch space venture is up for sale, sources saySources say Vulcan Inc. is looking to sell Stratolaunch, the space venture founded by the late Seattle billionaire Paul Allen, and one report says the asking price could be as high as $400 million. [ Geek Wire ] Bumble owner to spend $100 million on dating appsThe owner of dating app Bumble said on Friday it would revamp its holding structure and spend $100 million, as it looks to better compete with Match Group’s Tinder. The company has created Magic Lab, a holding company for its brands that include dating apps Badoo, Chappy and Lumen, said Andrey Andreev, founder and chief executive officer of the group. [ Reuters ] A MATH GENIUS BLOOMS LATE AND CONQUERS HIS FIELDON A WARM morning in early spring, June Huh walked across the campus of Princeton University. His destination was McDonnell Hall, where he was scheduled to teach, and he wasn’t quite sure how to get there. Huh is a member of the rarefied Institute for Advanced Study, which lies adjacent to Princeton’s campus. As a member of IAS, Huh has no obligation to teach, but he’d volunteered to give an advanced undergraduate math course on a topic called commutative algebra. When I asked him why, he replied, “When you teach, you do something useful. When you do research, most days you don’t.” [ Wired ] How much it would cost Uber and Lyft if drivers were employeesA bill passed by the California Assembly seems likely to classify Uber and Lyft drivers as employees, instead of their current status as independent contractors. Under guidelines laid out in the bill, which is now with the state senate, ride-hail drivers would likely fail the contractor test because they don’t perform work “outside the usual course of the hiring entity’s business.” Put another way, drivers drive, and driving is essential to Uber and Lyft. [ QZ ] #7 - Audit to Fintech and Kindness to Venture Capital with Ricky LaiJoin in for a conversation with Ricky Lai, Senior Associate at Portage Ventures. Follow Ricky's journey from an accountant's path to making incremental changes to transition to roles in Peter Thiel's Mithril Fund, a fintech company and finally to his current position at Portage. Ricky's journey to Portage is an example of how a habit of giving can create great opportunities. Former WeWork VP sues the company alleging age discriminationA former WeWork vice president is suing the company over his termination, claiming that he was fired in an act of retaliation after he complained about possible age discrimination. In a lawsuit filed this week in San Francisco Superior Court, Richard Markel, 62, claimed that not long after he was brought in, WeWork hired a man 20 years younger than he with the same job title as him, and that he was given no explanation for the hire. Markel had been hired as the company's vice president of construction for the West Coast in April 2018, after WeWork acquired the firm he worked for, UA Builders Group. [ CNN ] The Pac-12 and private equity could be a perfect matchUnder commissioner Larry Scott, the Pac-10 athletic conference announced it had struck a television rights deal with ESPN and Fox worth roughly $3 billion over the next 12 years. Still new on the job, Scott, coming off a largely successful stint leading the Women's Tennis Association, was hailed as a business whiz for striking the biggest Tier 1 deal in the history of college sports. OFFICE HOURS WITH GUILLAUME CABANE ON JUNE 27Next week, on the 27th of June, Redpoint will host Office Hours with Guillaume Cabane. Guillaume is an exceptional marketer. He built the highly successful growth practices at Segment and Drift. He stands out because of his persistence at the cutting edge. I remember when he told me of how he used the Clearbit Reveal API to change the content of conversations in Drift pop-ups to meaningfully improve conversion. He’s always at the vanguard of using technology to drive awareness and demand for SaaS products. [ TOMASZ TUNGUZ ] Curated by Venture Pulse Team. Find us on : [ Venturepulse.org, CrunchBase, AngelList ] |