Stripe Raises $100 Million at $22 Billion Valuation
Payments startup Stripe has raised an additional $100 million from Tiger Global Management, boosting the firm’s valuation to more than $22 billion, according to a person close to the company. The fundraising is a follow-on round to a $245 million round
led by Tiger Global last year, which valued Stripe at $20 billion. The money will be used for growth areas including international expansion, the person said. [ The Information ]
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Knotch raises $25M to help marketers collect data about their content
Knotch announced yesterday that it has raised $25 million in Series B funding. The round was led by New Enterprise Associates, with NEA’s Hilarie Koplow-McAdams
joining the Knotch board of directors. Rob Norman, the former chief digital officer of ad giant GroupM is also joining the board. [ Tech Crunch ]
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Here’s the Uber Investor Letter That Forced Travis Kalanick Out
Dear Travis:
On behalf of Benchmark, First Round Capital, Menlo Ventures, Lowercase Capital, and Fidelity Investments, we are writing to express our profound concerns about Uber’s future, its willingness to fully embrace the changes that are needed to move forward, and your ability to implement them.
We all believe in Uber’s mission. We are deeply grateful for your vision and tireless efforts over the last eight years, which have created a company whose technology and workforce have transformed the world’s idea of transportation. [ Bloomberg ]
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18 charts to illustrate US VC in 2018
Over the past couple of years, the term "record-breaking" has frequently been used to describe the state of venture capital in the US, as the space hits new heights with deal value, mega-rounds and fundraising. In 2018, some of these records reached heights not seen since the dot-com boom.
The 4Q 2018 PitchBook-NVCA Venture Monitor takes a detailed look at these trends, breaking down the data by stage, sector, region and more. The full report includes more than 30 pages of analysis, visuals and interviews, but for a look at the highlights, here's a set of some of our favorite charts from the report. [ PitchBook ]
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Silicon Valley’s favorite charity almost imploded in scandal. Now it’s asking for a second chance.
Most Americans have never heard of the Silicon Valley Community Foundation, a pedestrian-sounding institution that you might think would operate a food bank in San Mateo or a small tutoring program in Palo Alto. But for the past decade, the foundation has amassed tremendous power in the land of the mega-wealthy, collecting $13 billion in assets to become the nation’s most important, gilded, and opaque charity. And it has done so very quietly. Until last spring. [ Recode ]
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How can you prepare for the future of work? The answer is not “learn to code.”
There is plenty of blame to go around for tech’s monoculture of thoughtand ideas: VC firms stacked with Ivy League-educated white male partners; a reluctance by investors to seed businesses outside a few major cities on the U.S. coasts; investors’ obsession with a narrow set of capital structures. [ Tech Crunch ]
Tech startups who hire workers living all over the world tell us their answers to an uncomfortable question: How do you decide on a fair wage?
- An increasing number of tech startups are opting to hire only remote employees, rather than work out of an office — a move that lets these companies hire top workers from anywhere in the world, without having to compete in the Silicon Valley talent wars.
- But this raises a hard question: Should you pay someone in the pricey San Francisco metropolitan region the same as a worker in places with a lower cost of living, like Indonesia or the Philippines?
- We spoke to three all-remote startups about how they try to keep things fair: Zapier pays the same to everyone, wherever they are in the world, while GitLab and Emsisoft try to benchmark against Silicon Valley salaries.
- Meanwhile, Microsoft, Amazon and Google tell us that they pay out different rates based on where a remote worker is based. [ Business Insider ]
Insurance Company Lemonade Tops $57 Million in Revenue in 2018
Artificial intelligence-based online insurer Lemonade Inc. ended 2018 with more than $57 million in sales, the company announced Thursday. The company offers property and casualty insurance policies at a flat monthly rate. In December of 2017, Lemonade insured 100,000 homes, but by December of the following year, the company insured 425,000 homes, equating to $50 billion in total insured value, according to company statements. [ Calcalis Tech ]
Your product is awesome, why are you selling it so cheap?
At Airtree Ventures, I’ve been lucky enough to meet hundreds of companies across many different verticals, business models, and stages. While questions on pricing do come up on occasion, it’s surprising how often it’s overlooked given its direct impact on the success of any business. While a huge amount of effort is poured into product and sales and marketing, there is much less focus on pricing despite the magnitude of difference it can make. [ Startup Daily ]
China Created a New Tech Unicorn Every 3.8 Days Last Year
The pace of billion-dollar startup creation slowed markedly in China in 2018’s final quarter as the country’s largest tech startups shored up their dominance and the economy decelerated.
China spawned 97 unicorns last year with a combined valuation of 1.2 trillion yuan ($178 billion) across sectors from consumer internet to online shopping and electric vehicles, according to a report published by consultancy Hurun. That’s about one unicorn born every 3.8 days. But of those, 11 were created in the December quarter, down from more than 30 in the previous three months. [ Bloomberg ]
Slack now has more than 10 million daily active users
As Slack reportedly readies itself for an entry to the public markets, the high-flying startup is ready to brag a little bit about what it has accomplished in the past year.
In a blog post, the company shared that it now has 10 million daily active users on the platform, up from 8 million DAUs in May. It’s not just tech companies in Silicon Valley using the service either, the company broke down the number a bit, clarifying that more than half of the DAUs are from outside the United States. [ Tech Crunch ]
How Brexit could affect startup funding in the UK
Sony's out, and Panasonic's long gone; it's safe to say that the UK's decision to leave the EU hasn't gone down well with the great and good of the corporate world, with a number of companies, including the two Japanese giants, relocating their European operations in its wake. And as uncertainty lingers on, so do the warnings from boardrooms. Airbus posted a YouTube video of its CEO, Tom Enders, outlining how exactly the company would cut its UK workforce and siphon production from factories over the long term in the result of a "no-deal" exit. Charming stuff. [ Pitch book ]
Marley Spoon secures more than $30m in funds to support meal-kit growth
Meal-kit delivery business Marley Spoon, which is burning through $5 million a month, has secured more than $30 million in debt funding to support growth until it starts to break even in 2020.
Marley Spoon, the second-largest player in the $500 million Australian meal-kit market, said on Tuesday it had raised €10 million ($15.95 million) in bridging loans from two funds affiliated with US-based venture capital firm Union Square Ventures and €2 million from two minority shareholders. [ AFR ]
RigUp Raises $60 Million in Series C Funding Led by Founders Fund
Austin, Texas, January 29, 2019 -- RigUp, the energy industry’s predominant marketplace for on-demand services and labor, has raised a $60 million Series C round led by Founders Fund. Existing investors including Quantum Energy Partners, Global Reserve Group, and Bedrock Capital also participated in the round. [ RigUp ]
Alphabet-backed Medicare Advantage startup Clover Health raises $500M
Despite a number of well-publicized hiccups, venture capitalists are betting another $500 million on health insurance provider Clover Health, TechCrunch has learned.
Existing investor Greenoaks Capital led the round, according to the startup, which confirmed it was closing a new round of capital in the coming weeks. Clover Health has raised a total of $925 million to date, garnering a valuation of $1.2 billion with a $130 million Series D funding in 2017. The company, backed by Alphabet’s venture arm GV, Sequoia Capital, Floodgate, Bracket Capital, First Round Capital and more, declined to disclose its latest valuation. [ Tech Crunch ]
Our 6 Must Reads for Hiring Tactics that Break the Mold
The beginning of every year unleashes a frenetic rush of activity, from wrapping up performance reviews to finalizing budgets to starting on those plans for the quarters to come. Thankfully, the somewhat painful process of wrangling these inputs is worth the effort, as promotions, increased headcount and team building mandates are often just visible on the edge of the horizon. [ Firstround ]
Dropbox buys electronic signature start-up HelloSign for $230 million
Dropbox said Monday that it's acquiring electronic signature start-up HelloSign for $230 million in cash, its largest purchase ever.
The move puts Dropbox in competition with Adobe and DocuSign, and adds functionality that can potentially lure more big businesses to the company's core file sharing and collaboration products, where it contends with Apple, Google and Microsoft. [ CNBC ]
E898: Office Hours w/Jason! Founder challenges: fundraising, biometrics, personal flight, AI video
E898: Office Hours with Jason! Founders present their most pressing startup challenges: strengthening momentum after fundraise, igniting excitement for biometrics, educating angels on personal flight, increasing sales for AI video, targeting the right investors.
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