Hello!
Here is what happened today in European tech:
Deals
- PrimaryBid, a British fintech platform that connects retail investors with public companies raising capital, has just raised funding of its own, closing a $50 million Series B round. An official partner of the London Stock Exchange, the startup aims to democratise access to public markets and has the potential to “modernise market infrastructure software,” says Vinoth Jayakumar, a partner at Draper Espirit.
- Raylo, a UK company offering a circular leasing model for smartphones, has raised up to £10 million of debt to fuel its next phase of growth. Raylo customers can lease new and refurbished devices for a lower monthly cost; when they want to upgrade to a newer model, the old phone is returned to Raylo for refurbishment and reuse.
- Scientific knowledge discovery platform Eagle Genomics has landed $9 million in funding. As the company tells in a press release, one of its customers, “Unilever has already used the platform successfully to distil credible scientific evidence to support claims about its Zendium toothpaste, which uses natural enzymes to boost the good bacteria in the mouth – the first substantiated microbiome-based claim recorded in a product launch.”
- Austrian-founded Emarsys is acquiring marketing technology company Loyalsys based in Israel. Per a Globes report that cites unnamed sources, the deal is worth “several tens of millions of dollars.” Cloud marketing company Emarsys was itself acquired earlier this month by German software giant SAP, in a deal estimated at about $500 million.
- Swiss digital fundraising platform RaiseNow has now raised €5 million for itself from SIX Fintech Ventures, PostFinance, and others. The platform caters for non-profit organisations and says that it handles all their needs, “from the online donation and payment processing to peer-to-peer fundraising and seamless integrations with existing tools.”
- We also tracked a large number of (other) European tech funding rounds and M&A transactions, all of which we are putting in a handy list for you on Friday afternoon in our weekly roundup newsletter (note: the full list is for paying customers only). Also check out our European tech news section for ongoing coverage.
Worth Knowing
- Uber has been sued by the App Drivers & Couriers Union, which claims that “four drivers in the UK and Portugal were unfairly dismissed by the platform’s algorithm.” Uber claims that the drivers were allegedly involved in fraudulent activities, and that the dismissals were assessed by human employees.
- In a story that was actually published on Friday, The Guardian reveals that Facebook has categorised its contract moderators as “essential workers” and is forcing them to work from the company's Dublin office. At the same time, the company's employees work from home.
- The European chapter of the Google for Startups Accelerator has presented its nine-strong first cohort, originating from Norway, Hungary, Romania, Poland, Israel, and Germany.
- In today's policy news, Bloomberg reports that “ig technology platforms are calling on the European Union to protect them from legal liabilities for removing hate speech and illegal content.”
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