Free

This Week in European Tech: Talend goes private in $2.4 billion deal, Apple says it will invest €1 billion in Munich chip lab, and more

Robin Wauters 12 March 2021
This Week in European Tech: Talend goes private in $2.4 billion deal, Apple says it will invest €1 billion in Munich chip lab, and more
Send email Copy link

Happy Friday!

This week, our research team tracked more than 60 tech funding deals worth more than €1.9 billion, and about 17 M&A transactions, IPOs, rumours, and related news stories across Europe, including Russia, Israel, and Turkey.

As always, we are putting all of them together for you in a handy list sent in our round-up newsletter (note: the full list is for paying customers only).

Recently, we also started publishing 'Today in European Tech', a daily round-up of deals and news stories that caught our attention. Keeping you updated on all things EU tech is our priority!

Today, instead of a daily round-up we give you an overview of the 10 biggest European tech news items for the past week (subscribe to our free newsletter to get this round-up in your inbox every Monday morning).

1) France-born data solutions firm Talend sold for $2.4 billion

French data solutions firm Talend will go private in a $2.4 billion all-cash deal with private equity firm Thoma Bravo.

2) Apple investing heavily in Munich chip lab

Apple will make Munich its European Silicon Design Center, adding hundreds of new employees and a new facility focused on connectivity and wireless technologies. Munich is already Apple’s largest engineering hub in Europe, with close to 1,500 engineers. The expansion, together with additional investment in R&D, will exceed €1 billion in the next three years alone.

3) UK fintech Starling Bank becomes a unicorn

The UK has a new darling in Starling. The digital bank has confirmed its Series D round funding totalling a healthy £272 million, their largest ever. Led by Fidelity Management and Research the round was oversubscribed by £72 million, and now gives the company at £1.1 billion pre-money valuation.

4) Sweden's Epidemic Sound scores $450 million in funding

Epidemic Sound, a Sweden-based marketplace for 'background music', has raised $450 million from Blackstone Group and EQT Growth, an equity round that values Epidemic Sound at $1.4 billion.

5) Deliveroo enters final stretch for London IPO

Deliveroo, the Amazon-backed UK food delivery service, has revealed that it recorded a loss of £223.7 million ($309 million) last year in plans to float on the London Stock Exchange that were published Monday. Deliveroo’s losses are substantially less than they were in 2019, when the London-headquartered firm recorded a loss of £317 million.

6) Europe's largest payments group is born

The European Commission has given an unconditional authorization to the €7.8 billion euro merger between Nexi and Nordic rival Nets, the Italian payment group said today. The merger will create the Europe’s largest payments group.

7) Insurtech scale-up Zego scores $150 million round

It’s been a pretty good week for unicorns in the UK. Insurtech company Zego closed a $150 million funding round, the largest ever by a UK-founded insurtech startup, which now places them at a $1.1 billion valuation. The Series C funding round was led by DST Global and included participation from new investor General Catalyst and others.

8) EU struggles to build antitrust case against Amazon

European regulators are struggling to build a case with enough evidence to bring antitrust charges against tech giant Amazon.

9) Google raises ad prices in France and Spain to offset the 'GAFA' tax

In an email to French and Spanish advertisers last week, Google announced a 3% increase in advertising rates on its platform from May, to cover what has been termed the ‘GAFA tax’ in force in both countries.

10) Passion Capital opens up for retail investors

Passion Capital, a UK early-stage tech VC firm, is opening up its latest £45 million fund to investors registered and qualified by the Seedrs crowdfunding platform. Passion Capital will make an allocation available to the public, making it the first time retail investors can be part of a private venture fund that invests in UK tech startups.

Podcast:

tech.eu Podcast #210: Sonya Iovieno of SVB, Spain’s new labour law, and lots of funding

Bonus link(s):

- The European Union wants to produce a fifth of the global output of cutting-edge semiconductors at the end of this decade and make its first quantum computer in five years, as part of efforts to cut its dependence on non-European technologies.

- The software facet of supercomputing, and the promise of RISC-V and open hardware

- Saying no to $30 million in funding – is hyper-growth without external funding possible?

This Week in European Tech: Talend goes private in $2.4 billion deal, Apple says it will invest €1 billion in Munich chip lab, and more
Comments
  1. Would you like to write the first comment?

    Would you like to write the first comment?

    Login to post comments
Follow the developments in the technology world. What would you like us to deliver to you?
Your subscription registration has been successfully created.