This week, the Tech.eu research team tracked more than 75 tech funding deals worth over €2.2 billion, and over 15 exits, M&A transactions, and rumours, and related news stories across Europe.
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, and now also comes in the form of a handy downloadable spreadsheet).
We've also announced a whole bunch of confirmed speakers for our upcoming Tech.eu Summit on 17 May in Brussels. Check out more info here and get your early-bird tickets now!
From the likes of European Commissioner Mariya Gabriel to world-record breaking pilot Zara Rutherford, Belgian Prime Minister Alexander De Croo, (Transfer)Wise co-founder and CEO Kristo Käärmann, unicorn CEOs and builders from Bunq, Veriff, GoStudent, Deliverect, Sorare, Voi, and investors from Index Ventures, Molten, Lakestar, Speedinvest, Localglobe, Blossom Capital, eFounders and many more - we can't wait to meet them and you there in person!
Below, please find an overview of the biggest European tech news items for the past couple of days (subscribe to our free newsletter to get this round-up in your inbox every Monday morning).
What happened this week in European Tech?
>> Notable and big funding rounds
Turkish on-demand delivery kingpin Getir has confirmed reports on its $768 million Series E round at an $11.8 billion valuation. In so much, the investment sees Getir become Europe’s first grocery delivery decacorn.
Paris-based platform for the healthcare industry Doctolib has raised €500 million in equity and debt funding, now giving the company a valuation of €5.8 billion. With this number, Doctolib officially overtakes Back Market as the highest valued French startup.
Consumer lending platform provider, Oakbrook Finance, has raised £142 million of new capital with global financial services firm J.P. Morgan and alternative investment advisory firm Atalaya Capital Management.
Akeneo, a Nantes, France-based provider of product experience management (PXM) and product information management (PIM) solutions, raised $135 million in Series D funding.
Chemnitz-based Staffbase, an employee communications management solutions provider, has raised a $115 million round to enter the unicorn club. The company has now reached a valuation of $1.1 billion.
Nigerian-born, Amsterdam-headquartered Moove has raised $105 million in a Series A2 round. This raise adds on to a $23 million Series A round announced in August of last year, bringing the company’s total funding to date to $173.2 million.
London-based commerce experience platform Amplience has raised $100 million in funding. The Series D equity investment saw the participation of Farview Equity Partners, and growth financing from Sixth Street, and existing investor Octopus Ventures.
Online academic books platform Perlego has raised $50 million in a Series B funding round via Mediahuis Ventures, Raine Ventures, and Evli Growth Partners, officially confirming a rumour we'd reported two weeks prior.
Dutch online marketplace integration platform ChannelEngine has raised $50 million in a Series B funding round. The company's service taps into the growing e-commerce trend of brands selling directly to consumers via marketplaces including Zalando and Amazon and provides them with one centralised location to manage, orchestrate, and automate a vast number of processes.
Berlin-based Payrails officially emerges from stealth as it prepares to launch its financial operations platform, Payrails OS. The company is supported by a $6.4 million seed round that was led by Andreessen Horowitz.
>> Noteworthy acquisitions, mergers, IPOs and SPAC deals
Adding on to the race of startups getting into the second-hand goods marketplace, French second-hand luxury marketplace Vestiaire Collective has now acquired rival Tradesy. The acquisition will accelerate the French group’s expansion in the U.S., which has now become its biggest market.
Within just ten years of its existence, Nottingham-based checkout and payments platform in the gaming industry Tebex has announced its acquisition by Israel-based Overwolf for $29 million.
JP Morgan has agreed to buy Global Shares, an Irish cloud-based provider of share plan management software. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.
>> Interesting moves from investors
Oversubscribed by a robust $75 million, London’s Hoxton Ventures has announced its newest go around at $215 million. The third fund will be used to carry on Hoxton’s mission of supporting European startups that intend on expanding in the U.S. market via pre-see and seed-stage investments.
Private equity secondaries investor Bex Capital has raised $765 million for BEX Fund IV. The French-based investment firm, which is dedicated entirely to private equity fund-of-funds, secondary funds and co-investment funds, said that fundraising was completed in three months.
The Ministry of Economic Affairs and Climate (EZK), which is committed to providing entrepreneurs room to innovate and grow, and Amsterdam-based investment company Invest-NL, announced on Thursday the launch of a new fund christened Deep Tech Fund (DTF). The fund will invest €250 million in total.
There’s a new seed fund in town, but with a familiar name. Galion, a collective of tech entrepreneurs who network and learn from each other, is launching an investment arm called Galion.exe. They have already raised €30 million and aim to reach a total fund size of €60 to €80 million.
As VCs splash the cash in climate tech startups to accelerate the transition to net-zero, sustainable energy, transition technology and social impact businesses have gained significant momentum. Adding on to the hot sector facilitating green solutions, London-based impact investment company Elbow Beach Capital has launched a venture vehicle with an initial £20 million of committed capital.
Investment giant Coatue has established its anticipated foothold into Europe’s startup scene—and it’s tapped veteran venture capital Sarah Cannon to lead the charge. Cannon who until recently worked at venture firm Index Ventures, has joined Coatue as a general partner, the company says, as the first investor to work out of the firm’s new office in London.
>> In other (important) news
Intel has announced its plans to invest up to €80 billion in the European Union over the next decade in semiconductor research and development, manufacturing, and packaging technologies.
British chip designer Arm is planning to cut up to 1,000 jobs, or 15% of its workforce, just weeks after its $40 billion deal with Nvidia collapsed.
French cloud provider OVHcloud has filed an antitrust complaint against Microsoft in Europe. OVHcloud, along with other European tech firms, complained to the European Commission last summer, saying that Microsoft's licenses for cloud-based products such as the Office productivity suite unduly favor Microsoft's own Azure cloud.
German prosecutors have charged former Wirecard chief executive Markus Braun in relation to the collapse of the payments firm last year.
FC Barcelona have agreed to a sponsorship deal with Spotify to have the audio streaming platform become the club's main partner.
Bitcoin proponents snagged a win in Parliament on Monday as MEPs rejected measures designed to phase out blockchain technologies that carry a heavy carbon footprint.
A high court challenge has been brought against the Data Protection Commission’s alleged failure to fully investigate a complaint made about Google and IAB Europe’s procession of personal data.
Following a breach of data privacy European law, Facebook parent company Meta has received a €17 million fine — representing around 0.055 percent of its quarterly revenue.
>> Recommended reads and listens
Investor term sheets can be baffling beasts for early-stage startups, packed as they are with terms and conditions that can sound opaque to the uninitiated. A new report from Mountside Ventures and Landscape VC is aiming to demystify these terms and increase transparency, by scrutinising deal sheets from over 200 European VC funds.
In an exclusive four-part series for Tech.eu, Cambridge University professor and researcher Dr. Johannes Lenhard breaks down and explores the growing field of public purpose technology and the inner workings of its ecosystem.
How European startups are aiding Ukrainian refugees.
In an op-ed piece exclusive to Tech.eu, Senior Programme Officer at Stockholm-based International IDEA Alberto Fernandez Gibaja presents the case that the EU's upcoming Artificial Intelligence Act (AIA) is severely lacking provisions that will protect the democratic process from AI-driven manipulations.
Open banking is powering ahead in Europe, but open financing is still over the horizon.
Venture capital firms and startups in the West are trying to figure out what to do with their Russian investors.
Inside Flat Capital, the little-known investment company founded by Klarna CEO Sebastian Siemiatkowski.
China’s new Europe strategy: Smaller tech and VC investments.
Would you like to write the first comment?
Login to post comments