Happy Friday!
This week, we tracked 66 tech funding deals worth more than €816 million, as well as 10 M&A transactions across Europe, including Russia, Israel, and Turkey.
We listed every single deal in our weekly newsletter (note: the full newsletter is now available to paying subscribers only). Here’s an extra overview of the 10 biggest European tech news items for this week:
1) European authorities fined Google a record $5.1 billion on Wednesday for abusing its power in the mobile phone market and ordered the company to alter its practices, in one of the most aggressive regulatory actions against American technology giants and one that may force lasting changes to smartphones.
The European Union’s antitrust fine of 4.34 billion euros was almost double the bloc’s fine against Google last year over the company’s unfair favouring of its own services in internet search results. Unsurprisingly, Google said it would appeal the decision.
2) Publicly-listed Scout24 is to acquire FINANZCHECK.de, a German online comparison portal for consumer loans, for 285 million in cash.
3) Barcelona-based delivery startup Glovo has raised €115 million in a Series C funding round from Idinvest and AmRest. The startup is now valued at over €300 million. Glovo's app allows customers to order any item, which is then purchased and delivered by couriers in an hour or less.
4) Ultimate Software plans to acquire Paris-based PeopleDoc, with a price tag of approximately $300 million. US-based Ultimate Software is a provider of human capital management solutions, and PeopleDoc is also a provider of HR services, with more than 1,000 customers with users in 180 countries.
5) American sales and marketing software company Salesforce said on Monday it signed an agreement to acquire Datorama, an Israeli cloud-based artificial intelligence marketing platform; local media says the deal was worth more than $800 million.
6) Airbnb has been found in breach of EU law and given until the end of the summer to ditch a range of practices, including that of belatedly applying additional fees to the prices it promotes online.
7) UK-based spaceflight startup Orbex has secured £30 million in public and private funding from the VC funds Sunstone Capital and the High-Tech Gründerfonds, as well as strategic investor Elecnor Deimos Space, private investors, the UK Space Agency (UKSA), the European Space Agency (ESA), and the European Commission Horizon 2020 programme.
8) The European Union reached a deal on Tuesday allowing businesses to seamlessly transfer personal data between the bloc and Japan, deepening economic links as the two sides also agree a free-trade pact.
9) Major European telecom operator Orange has acquired Basefarm Holding, a Norwegian-founded cloud infrastructure and critical application services company, for €350 million. The deal has been made by Orange Business Services, the telco's enterprise subsidiary.
10) German fashion e-commerce startup About You has raised €300 million, reaching unicorn status to boot.
Bonus link: Where is the money going? These are the European tech sectors that received the most funding in H1 2018
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