Hello!
Here's what happened today in European Tech:
Deals
- Berlin-based digital freight forwarder sennder has secured $160 million at a $1 billion+ valuation in growth funding to “accelerate digitalization of European trucking” and boost its expansion plans.
- It ain’t exactly a secret that Swedish mobile phone directory and caller ID service Truecaller is keen to become a publicly-listed company at some point in the near future. The Stockholm-based company has announced that it has recruited Odd Bolin as its new CFO. Bolin is tasked with preparing Truecaller for an upcoming IPO as it closed 2020 with around 267 million active users.
- Israeli electronic components 3D printing company Nano Dimension, which raised a total of $657 million in the fourth quarter of 2020, has now priced a $332.5 million offering, which will bring the amount of capital raised in recent months to a cool $1 billion.
- Budbee, a Stockholm, Sweden-based ‘logtech’ startup which offers a sustainably-focused last-mile delivery service, this morning announced that it has raised 525 million Swedish krona (roughly €52 million).
- Medium is acquiring Glose, a digital platform for buying, reading and discussing books. Glose's 20 employees, most of whom are based in Paris, will join Medium. Glose CEO Nicolas Princen will become 'VP of Books' at Medium.
- Shippeo, a French SaaS platform that provides supply chain visibility, has secured $32 million to fuel further growth. The new round is co-led by Battery Ventures and a group of existing investors: NGP Capital, ETF Partners, Partech and Bpifrance Digital Venture.
- Carbyne — an Israeli startup that has built a cloud-based platform aimed at emergency services to help them pinpoint more complete information about the people who are calling in, and to provide additional telemedicine services to start responding faster — has picked up $25 million.
- Berlin-based Moss, a credit card fintech startup formerly known as Vanta, has raised €21 million, boosting the company’s valuation to €100 million just six months after launch. Peter Thiel’s US-based firm Valar Ventures led the round and was joined by existing backers Cherry Ventures and Global Founders Capital.
- Sana Labs, a Swedish startup that’s using machine learning to personalize training courses for professionals, has raised $18 million in a series A round of funding led by EQT Ventures.
- Xentral, a German startup that develops enterprise resource planning software covering a variety of back-office functions for the average online small business, has picked up a Series A round of $20 million. The round was led by Sequoia Capital, its first investment in Europe since officially setting up shop here.
- Swedish startup Minna, creator of an eponymous subscription management app, has raised €15.5 million in a Series B round led by Element Ventures, with support from MiddleGame Ventures, Nineyards Equity and Visa.
- 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 Reading/Knowing
- Germany is modernising its competition law to stand up to digital corporations. In the future, the Cartel Office will be able to act faster and tougher when companies dominate the market.
- France’s top privacy watchdog has told police to stop using drone-mounted cameras to enforce virus lockdowns, monitor protests, stake out drug deals and chase carjackers.
- London tech firms have succeeded in raising $10.5 billion in VC investment in 2020 despite the global COVID-19 pandemic and Brexit. That’s according to research conducted for marketing and promotional agency London & Partners.
- Investment in Berlin startups has slowed because of the coronavirus crisis, but thecity's strengths remain.
- The EU is pledging big investment in a new era of space commercialisation, joining a queue of companies and governments aiming to provide internet service from space.
- Polish government officials have denounced the deactivation of Donald Trump’s social media accounts, and said a draft law being readied in Poland will make it illegal for tech companies to take similar actions there.
- Europe’s most-valuable fintech company, Checkout.com, recorded a pre-tax loss of $9.7 million in 2019, the first time the company has been loss-making since 2013.
- Starling Bank’s CEO, Anne Boden, says it’s still scoping out Europe’s non-bank lending market for potential acquisition targets.
- After a long struggle, Italy has found the secret to getting people to go online.
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