Startups
Auto Added by WPeMatico
Google alum startup Cartken and REEF Technology launch Miami’s first delivery robots
Self-driving and robotics startup Cartken has partnered with REEF Technology, a startup that operates parking lots and neighborhood hubs, to bring self-driving delivery robots to the streets of downtown Miami.
With this announcement, Cartken officially comes out of stealth mode. The company, founded by ex-Google engineers and colleagues behind the unrequited Bookbot, was formed to develop market-ready tech in self-driving, AI-powered robotics and delivery operations in 2019, but the team has kept operations under wraps until now. This is Cartken’s first large deployment of self-driving robots on sidewalks.
After a few test months, the REEF-branded electric-powered robots are now delivering dinner orders from REEF’s network of delivery-only kitchens to people located within a 3/4-mile radius in downtown Miami. The robots, which are insulated and thus can preserve the heat of a plate of spaghetti or other hot food, are pre-stationed at designated logistics hubs and dispatched with orders for delivery as the food is prepared.
“We want to show how future-forward Miami can be,” Matt Lindenberger, REEF’s chief technology officer, told TechCrunch. “This is a great chance to show off the capabilities of the tech. The combination of us having a big presence in Miami, the fact that there are a lot of challenges around congestion as COVID subsides, still shows a really good environment where we can show how this tech can work.”
Lindenberg said Miami is a great place to start, but it’s just the beginning, with potential for the Cartken robots to be used for REEF’s other last-mile delivery businesses. Currently, only two restaurant delivery robots are operating in Miami, but Lindenberger said the company is planning to expand further into the city and outward into Fort Lauderdale, as well as other large metros the company operates in, such as Dallas, Atlanta, Los Angeles and eventually New York.
Lindenberger is hoping the presence of robots in the streets can act as a “force multiplier,” allowing them to scale while maintaining quality of service in a cost-effective way.
“We’re seeing an explosion in deliveries right now in a post-pandemic world and we foresee that to continue, so these types of no-contact, zero-emission automation techniques are really critical,” he said.
Cartken’s robots are powered by a combination of machine learning and rules-based programming to react to every situation that could occur, even if that just means safely stopping and asking for help, Christian Bersch, CEO of Cartken, told TechCrunch. REEF would have supervisors on site to remotely control the robot if needed, a caveat that was included in the 2017 legislation that allowed for the operation of self-driving delivery robots in Florida.
“The technology at the end of the day is very similar to that of a self-driving car,” said Bersch. “The robot is seeing the environment, planning around obstacles like pedestrians or lampposts. If there’s an unknown situation, someone can help the robot out safely because it can stop on a dime. But it’s important to also have that level of autonomy on the robot because it can react in a split second, faster than anybody remotely could, if something happens like someone jumps in front of it.”
REEF marks specific operating areas on the map for the robots and Cartken tweaks the configuration for the city, accounting for specific situations a robot might need to deal with, so that when the robots are given a delivery address, they can make moves and operate like any other delivery driver. Only this driver has an LTE connection and is constantly updating its location so REEF can integrate it into its fleet management capabilities.
Image Credits: REEF/Cartken
Eventually, Lindenberger said, they’re hoping to be able to offer the option for customers to choose robot delivery on the major food delivery platforms REEF works with like Postmates, UberEats, DoorDash or GrubHub. Customers would receive a text when the robot arrives so they could go outside and meet it. However, the tech is not quite there yet.
Currently the robots only make it street-level, and then the food is passed off to a human who delivers it directly to the door, which is a service that most customers prefer. Navigating into an apartment complex and to a customer’s unit is difficult for a robot to manage just yet, and many customers aren’t quite ready to interact directly with a robot.
“It’s an interim step, but this was a path for us to move forward quickly with the technology without having any other boundaries,” said Lindenberger. “Like with any new tech, you want to take it in steps. So a super important step which we’ve now taken and works very well is the ability to dispatch robots within a certain radius and know that they’re going to arrive there. That in and of itself is a huge step and it allows us to learn what kind of challenges you have in terms of that very last step. Then we can begin to work with Cartken to solve that last piece. It’s a big step just being able to do this automation.”
Powered by WPeMatico
Is Substack really worth $650M?
Substack didn’t invent the paid newsletter, but the startup’s early success with the model is enticing previous backers to more than double down on the media startup.
The Exchange explores startups, markets and money. Read it every morning on Extra Crunch, or get The Exchange newsletter every Saturday.
Last evening, Axios reported that Substack is “raising $65 million in new venture capital” at a valuation of “around $650 million.” As you’ve already guessed, Axios goes on to report that Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) will likely lead the investment.
That we’re seeing a16z pour more capital into what we could call the alt-media space is not a surprise. The investing group is ladling even more cash into its in-house media efforts and has put a small archipelago of capital into audio-based social media app Clubhouse. Its internal publishing schedule is in part an attempt to get around traditional media; the Clubhouse universe is an inverted one in which tech investors are celebrities, producers and gatekeepers. And Substack is a place where publications have bled some well-known talent, shifting the center of gravity in media.
You can detect the theme.
Regardless, Substack’s new valuation and investment are eye-catching. This morning, I want to collect all that we can regarding Substack’s historical growth so that we can chew on its new valuation from the best vantage point. Let’s go!
$650 million?
A little history to kick us off. Crunchbase counts Substack’s total funding to date at $17.4 million. PitchBook puts the number at $21.21 million, inclusive of debt. Both sources agree that the company’s most recent round came in July 2019. PitchBook pegs the company’s valuation at $48.65 million at that date.
Raising $17 million in cash around 20 months ago, regardless of debt, is an amount of capital that the company could easily have burned through by now. Raising more funds is therefore not a surprise.
But the size of the new round is notable, as is its constituent valuation. Series A and B rounds have been growing in size in recent years. But a $65 million Series B would stand out, even by 2021 standards. Not shockingly so, but enough that any company raising that sum at its implied level of maturity would demand our attention. That we’re all familiar with Substack only makes the sum more curious.
Powered by WPeMatico
NBA Top Shot maker Dapper Labs is now worth $2.6 billion thanks to half of Hollywood, the NBA and Michael Jordan
From the early success of Crypto Kitties to the explosive growth of NBA Top Shot, Dapper Labs has been at the forefront of the cryptocurrency collectible craze known as NFTs.
Now the company is reaping the benefits of its trailblazing status with a new $305 million financing led by some of the biggest names in Hollywood, sports and investing.
The new round values the company at a whopping $2.6 billion, according to multiple media reports, and comes at a time when NFTs have captured the popular imagination.
Leading the company’s financing was Coatue, the financial services firm that’s behind many of the biggest later-stage tech deals. But heavy hitters from the entertainment world also took their cut — these are folks like NBA legend Michael Jordan as well as current players and funds including Kevin Durant, Andre Iguodala, Kyle Lowry, Spencer Dinwiddie, Andre Drummond, Alex Caruso, Michael Carter-Williams, Josh Hart, Udonis Haslem, JaVale McGee, Khris Middleton, Domantas Sabonis, Klay Thompson, Nikola Vucevic and Thad Young and Richard Seymour’s 93 Ventures.
Entertainment and music heavyweights including Ashton Kutcher and Guy Oseary’s Sound Ventures, Will Smith and Keisuke Honda’s Dreamers VC, Shawn Mendes and Andrew Gertler’s AG Ventures, Shay Mitchell and 2 Chainz also bought in on the action.
And from the venture world comes other strategic investors like Andreessen Horowitz, The Chernin Group, USV, Version One and Venrock.
The company said it would use the funds to continue building out NBA Top Shot and expanding the updated digital trading card platform to other sports and a broader creator community.
Top Shot has already notched over $500 million in sales for its animated trading cards featuring things like LeBron James dunking, and the sky (at least for now) is seemingly the limit for the collectible applications of blockchain.
It’s like the one thing that cryptocurrency can do really well and it’s been embraced far beyond the world of sports collectibles. The recent $69 million sale of a digital piece of art at Christies also marks a watershed moment for the art world.
“NBA Top Shot is successful because it taps into basketball fandom — it’s a new and more exciting way for people to connect with their favorite teams and players,” said Roham Gharegozlou, CEO of Dapper Labs. “We want to bring the same magic to other sports leagues as well as help other entertainment studios and independent creators find their own approaches in exploring open platforms. NFTs unlock a new model for monetization that benefits the fans much more than advertising or sponsorships.”
Powering the Top Shot system and Dapper Labs’ other offerings is a new blockchain protocol called Flow, which purports to handle mainstream consumer applications at scale, and can support mass adoption.
Flow also allows for transactions using fiat currency and credit cards, and provides a much needed ease of cryptocurrency, and can keep customers safe from the fraud or theft common in cryptocurrency systems, according to a statement from Dapper Labs.
Flow enables NFT marketplaces and other decentralized applications that need to scale to handle mainstream demand without extremely high transaction costs (“gas fees”) or environmental concerns, the company said.
“NBA Top Shot is one of the best demonstrations we’ve seen of how quickly new technology can change the landscape for media and sports fans,” said Kevin Durant, co-founder of Thirty Five Ventures. “We’re excited to follow the progress with everything happening on Flow blockchain and use our platform with the Boardroom to connect with fans in a new way.”
Already companies like Warner Music Group, Ubisoft, Warner Media and the UFC, as well as thousands of third-party developers, artists and other creators, are using the Flow mainnet to sell collectible cards and develop custodial wallets.
Additional investors in the round include: MLB players like Tim Beckham and Nolan Arenado; NFL players Ken Crawley, Thomas Davis, Stefon Diggs, Dee Ford, Malcom Jenkins, Rodney McLeod, Jordan Matthew, Devin McCourty, Jason McCourty, DK Metcalf, Tyrod Taylor and Trent Williams; team ownership, including Vivek Ranadivé (Kings); and notable sports investors Bolt Ventures.
Powered by WPeMatico
Slice is launching a point-of-sale system for pizzerias
Slice, the online ordering platform for independent pizzerias, announced two new offerings this morning — a point-of-sale system designed specifically for those businesses, as well as a rewards program for diners.
The launch of the new Slice Register builds on last year’s acquisition of point-of-sale company Instore, and the appointment of its CEO Matt Niehaus as Slice’s senior vice president for payments.
Pizzerias might seem to be a narrow focus for a point-of-sale system, particularly given all the other POS products out there, but Niehaus suggested that many of the 15,000 pizzerias in Slice’s network are still relying on cash registers and pen-and-paper: “If you run a pizzeria, you are certainly great at making pizza, but you are typically less comfortable with the accounting side.”
He also said that existing POS systems aren’t really designed for the needs and workflows of a pizzeria. Slice founder and CEO Ilir Sela added that most of them were designed for offline ordering first, with online support added later. And Niehaus suggested that the average local pizzeria is only seeing 19% of their orders coming from online sources (compared to 75% for the average Domino’s location).
“Domino’s is really the competition, not the POS companies,” he said.
Image Credits: Slice
So the Slice Register is a combined software and hardware (including an iPad) solution. Naturally, it integrates with Slice’s online ordering and also includes support for email and mobile marketing, as well as a consolidated view of each customer. Niehaus said that among other things, it’s designed to “grab those customers on one platform and nudge them online.”
Slice Register is available to pizzerias at no initial charge for the hardware or software. The only fee in 2021 will be for payment processing, with additional pricing announced coming next year.
As for the new Slice Rewards program, diners who order pizzas through Slice will get a free large cheese pizza for every eight orders of $15 or more. (Slice, not the restaurant, is paying for the free pizza.) Sela described this as a “very Domino’s-like program,” except that it works across independent pizzerias.
“What we’re learning is the local consumer has up to four local favorites, and they love all of these locations equally,” he said. “What we think is really cool is, you’re going to get rewarded for buying at all four of your local favorites.”
Powered by WPeMatico
Living Security raises $14M for predictive human risk management
Cybersecurity training is one of those things that everyone has to do but not something everyone necessarily looks forward to.
Living Security is an Austin-based startup out to change cybersecurity training something you look forward to, not dread. And the company has just closed on a $14 million Series B to continue its expansion beyond cybersecurity awareness training into human risk management.
Washington, D.C. based-Updata Partners led the financing, which also included participation from existing investors Silverton Partners, Active Capital, Rain Capital and SaaS Venture Partners. The investment comes after its $5 million Series A, led by Austin-based Silverton, raised last April.
Husband and wife Drew and Ashley Rose founded Living Security out of their house in June 2017 with the mission of making cybersecurity training less boring and more effective via gamified learning, with live action immersive storylines, role-based micro modules and reporting.
Living Security launched with its flagship product — Cyber Escape Room. When the pandemic hit, the startup brought its in-person training sessions online through the launch of CyberEscape Online.
With more people working remotely, the need for the type of offering Living Security provides has become even more paramount, considering how many people use personal devices for professional reasons, among other things. Employees are more vulnerable than ever to inadvertently providing entry points into the networks of the enterprises where they work — whether through social engineering, phishing or other methods.
Today, Living Security works with more than 100 large enterprises to train their global workforces to better protect sensitive data and secure their organizations. The startup’s customer list is impressive, and includes large enterprises such as CVS Health, Mastercard, Verizon, MassMutual, Biogen, AmerisourceBergen, Hewlett Packard, JPMorgan and Target.
So it’s not a big surprise that in 2020, Living Security tripled its revenue and employee headcount and more than doubled its customer count. The company declined to provide hard revenue figures, saying only that ARR grew nearly 200% last year.
“We have seen a significant increase in account growth and expansion in existing accounts…largely in part due to the scalability of our digital solution,” CEO Ashley Rose said.
With the success of its escape rooms and gamified training, Living Security’s team then asked themselves how they could make their efforts “more predictable.”
“We added risk management and scoring so program and security owners could become more targeted and focused on the delivery of their training,” Rose said.
So now Living Security aims to use behavioral data and analytics to measure and manage human risk. It plans to take that data and provide “predictive interventions” to employees.
“We’re focused on ‘How do we turn people from our greatest risk, to our greatest assets in cybersecurity?’ ” Rose said. “That’s our big vision for the company.”
Image Credits: Living Security
With its “Unify” human risk management platform, Living Security wants to provide an even more scalable solution. The company also plans to use its new capital toward expanding its geographic reach and scaling both direct and channel sales efforts.
Currently, Living Security has 55 employees, with the goal of having 90 by year’s end.
Deb Walter, director of information security training and awareness at AmerisourceBergen, said she first engaged with Living Security in 2017 when she requested its CyberSecurity Card game.
“I wanted to gamify how I presented training,” she recalls.
Introducing episodic gamification and its “bingeable” content into her training program was a big hit with employees, according to Walter.
“Their new platform is enabling us to deploy an ‘Information security academy’ to encourage associates and contractors to use several modes of training to earn points and track themselves on a leaderboard,” she said.
Updata General Partner Jon Seeber, who is taking a seat on Living Security’s board with the funding, said his firm saw “breakout potential” in the startup’s platform.
“It comes as close as you can to closing the loop between people and the systems on which they’re operating,” he said.
Plus, he said, it does it in a way that avoids the compliance-focused, “check-the-box” mindset that so often dominates employee-focused cybersecurity solutions.
Powered by WPeMatico
Weather platform ClimaCell is now Tomorrow.io and raises $77M
Weather intelligence platform ClimaCell today announced that it has raised a $77 million Series D funding round led by private equity firm Stonecourt Capital, with participation by Highline Capital. This brings the company’s total funding to about $185 million. In addition to the new funding, ClimaCell announced that it has changed its name to Tomorrow.io, with “The Tomorrow Companies Inc.” as its new legal name.
Today’s announcement comes only a month after the company announced that it would launch a fleet of small radar-equipped weather satellites to improve its weather monitoring and forecasting capabilities. That’s also, at least in part, where the name change comes from.
Image Credits: ClimaCell/Tomorrow.ai
Originally, ClimaCell/Tomorrow.io built out a novel technology to collect weather data using wireless network infrastructure and IoT devices. That’s where the “cell” in ClimaCell came from. But as the company’s CEO and co-founder Shimon Elkabetz told me, while the company isn’t abandoning this approach, its focus today is much broader.
“The mission is really to help countries, businesses, organizations, to better manage their weather-related challenges,” he said. “And the ambition was always to be that largest weather enterprise in the world, the most disruptive, the most industry-defining. And I think this is the perfect timing for us to come up with a new name, not only because of the funding but because we were able to explain to ourselves that really, we’re helping others take control of tomorrow, today.”
That’s something Stonecourt partner Rick Davis agrees with. “While the company’s growth has been tremendous since launch, there is a larger opportunity at play here,” he said. “What Tomorrow.io is building, corroborated by their recent announcement of launching radar-equipped satellites into space, is only further proof that this company represents the future of weather forecasting for the entire planet. The privatization of the weather industry is now, and that type of vision is what compels the team here at Stonecourt Capital.”
As Elkabetz noted, Tomorrow.io isn’t a typical investment for a private investment firm like Stonecourt. Last year, the firm acquired 365 Data Centers, but it is also backing the Denver-based freight rail company Alpenglow Rail, for example.
And while many of Tomorrow.io’s customers saw their business decline during the pandemic (the company counts Uber and Delta among its users, for example), Elkabetz tells me that its team focused on diversifying its customer base and managed to sign up a number of large logistics companies, including major railways in the U.S. and Mexico, but also smaller companies in the drone, autonomous driving and electric vehicle space. In total, the company says, it saw a 200% net revenue retention rate and its annual contract value grew 850% during the past two years.
The company plans to use the new funding to launch more satellites, but also to improve its overall product and accelerate its go-to-market activities.
“We’re an interesting company because we’re a SaaS company that is now going to space,” Elkabetz said. “A lot of the Earth observations companies are now scratching their heads and saying, ‘Oh, we can’t just sell observations, it’s not monetizable or becoming a commodity. We now need to become a software company and build the platform and do the analytics.’ Good luck.”
Powered by WPeMatico
Ecovative sees a fungal future for fashion, food and foam packaging and has a fresh $60M to make it
Eben Bayer has spent the better part of 14 years proving out the power of the humble mushroom as the world’s truly functional food.
As the chief executive and founder of Ecovative Design, Bayer has made replacements for foam packaging, lamps and furniture, leather materials and even meats like bacon from mighty mushroom mycelia (they even grew a tiny home).
Now the company has $60 million in financing to create new applications for its mycelial products and to scale up existing business units.
The core of Ecovative Design’s business is in packaging. That’s where the company has been developing its tech the longest and where its replacements for Styrofoam packaging have had the most commercial traction.
But there’s far more to Ecovative’s mushrooms than that, and the company’s new investors — including Viking Global Investors, with support from Senator Investment Group, AiiM Partners, Trousdale Ventures and other undisclosed backers — want to see just how far the company can go.
Part of the money will be used to build out a discovery platform for new materials and new strains in an effort to make Ecovative the Gingko Bioworks of the mushroom business. Another chunk of change will be used to build out a larger production facility for its mushroom production.
The Gingko analogy may not be that much of a stretch. Using its platform for manufacturing and deep knowledge of fungi, Ecovative has already spun up a food company called Atlast, which raised $7 million to begin building a fake meat empire on the back of a mushroom-made bacon substitute.
A person in a lab coat stands with their back to several trays of Ecovative’s mushroom material growing in trays. Image Credits: Ecovative Design
And the company also has fashion on the brain. A licensing agreement between Ecovative and Bolt Threads helped power that massively funded startup’s push into manufacturing a leather replacement from mushrooms back in 2018.
The deal between the two ended in acrimony and litigation — and now Ecovative is going it alone, looking to be a provider of bulk leather replacements for anything from shoes to belts to buckskin jackets.
“It seems like there’s a need for somebody who could not be a branded supplier, but to be someone who can provide scalable mushroom leather,” said Bayer.
Other companies are working on trying to convince consumers to make the switch to mushrooms or other plant-based leather substitutes. Those are businesses like Mycoworks, which raised $45 million from a slew of celebrities last year to build out its own commercial-scale mycelial manufacturing business. Or Natural Fiber Welding, which is backed by none other than the omnipresent eco-conscious fashion accessory adorning the feet of almost every venture investor — Allbirds (or are Atoms the new thing? I can’t keep up…).
“The demand for new biomaterials in the fashion industry, such as mycelium, far outstrips the current supply. Ecovative is tackling this challenge head-on, committing to building a next-generation platform capable of producing mycelium at scale,” said Katrin Ley, managing director of Fashion for Good, in a statement.
While Ecovative makes small batches of products under brands like Atlast, Bayer wants his company to be more of a white-label material provider than a branded business making shoes, packaging and plant-based meat replacements.
The new financing comes on the heels of Ecovative’s partnership with U.K. packaging licensee Magical Mushroom Company, which recently announced the opening of four more facilities to supply the U.K. and EU markets with green packaging solutions, the company said.
“Mycelium is a unique material that outperforms other sustainable alternatives in industries as diverse as fashion and food,” said Evan Lodes, partner at Senator Investment Group, which first backed Ecovative back in 2019. “Ecovative pioneered the field of mycelium materials, and has invested in the research and development necessary to deliver it at the scale and cost necessary to make a significant impact.”
Powered by WPeMatico
MessageBird acquires 24sessions to bring video to its ‘omnichannel’ platform
MessageBird, the omnichannel cloud communications platform recently valued at $3 billion, is continuing to ramp up its M&A activity. Following last year’s acquisition of Pusher, a company that provides real-time web technologies, it is announcing that it has acquired “video-first” customer engagement platform 24sessions, and customer data platform Hull.
Terms of the two new deals aren’t being disclosed, although MessageBird founder and CEO Robert Vis tells me the three acquisitions add up to about $100 million in total, and we alreadly know that Pusher’s acquisition price was $35 million. I also understand that the 24sessions and Hull acquisitions saw both companies’ investors exit entirely.
Originally seen as a European or “rest of the world” competitor to U.S.-based Twilio — offering a cloud communications platform that supports voice, video and text capabilities all wrapped up in an API — MessageBird has since repositioned itself as an “Omnichannel Platform-as-a-Service” (OPaaS). The idea is to easily enable enterprises and medium and smaller-sized companies to communicate with customers on any channel of their choosing.
Out of the box, this includes support for WhatsApp, Messenger, WeChat, Twitter, Line, Telegram, SMS, email and voice. Customers can start online and then move their support request or query over to a more convenient channel, such as their favourite mobile messaging app, which, of course, can go with them. It’s all part of MessageBird Vis’ big bet that the future of customer interactions is omni-channel.
To that end, the acquisition of 24sessions adds another channel: video. This, Vis tells me, is a particularly important channel where in-person interactions are being replicated digitally. However, he says it’s not just enough to have a video option — you need one that is compliant and secure. This is especially true for regulated industries such as financial services and healthcare. In addition, 24sessions is web-based, meaning that end-users aren’t required to install an app.
“Bringing a safe, secure and customizable video platform into the MessageBird family is the next step in our strategic journey,” said Vis in a statement. “Our portfolio of owned services already includes SMS, voice, email, OTT, social, live chat and push. The addition of 24sessions’ video platform gives us one of the world’s most comprehensive and powerful omnichannel offerings, and is consistent with our having end-to-end control of the stack in order to create magical experiences for our customers”.
“By joining forces with MessageBird, we’re making a leap forward in our mission to improve personal customer contact and turn it into a smooth digital experience, without losing the human touch,” adds Rutger Teunissen, CEO of 24sessions. “Video has become a more embedded, instant, intelligent, and integrated part of the omnichannel customer experience”.
However, communicating with customers more efficiently doesn’t just mean interacting with them on the channels of their choosing and building backend workflows to support this, it also requires a better understanding of the customer and the context of their query. That’s where the acquisition of Hull, based in France and the U.S., comes into play.
Described as a customer data platform (CDP), Hull’s team and technology will be deployed to create an “in-depth analytics layer” between MessageBird’s omnichannel offering and the workflow solutions it provides to customers.
“We want to empower clients to have easy, frictionless conversations with customers, so it’s crucial that we understand where those customers are and how they like to communicate,” said Vis. “To do that, it’s crucial that our platform is able to collect, unify and enrich product, marketing, and sales data and synchronize it across the workflow.”
In total, 45 staff will join from 24sessions, and 14 will join from Hull. The combined M&A brings MessageBird’s total headcount to almost 500 people across its nine hubs globally.
Powered by WPeMatico
LIVEKINDLY screams its way to the top of new plant brands with the close of a $335 million round
LIVEKINDLY Collective, the shouty parent company behind a family of plant-based food brands, has snagged cash from the global impact investing arm of $103 billion investment firm TPG to close its latest round of funding at $335 million.
The company’s fundraising shows that investors still have high hopes for plant-based food brands and that despite the money that’s flowed to companies like Beyond Meat and Impossible Foods — and the resurgence of older brands in the category like Quorn or Kelloggs’ Morningstar Farms — there’s still a healthy appetite among investors for more brands.
LIVEKINDLY was founded by some heavy hitters from the food industry, including Kees Kruythoff, the former president of Unilever North America; Roger Lienhard, the founder of Blue Horizon; and Jodi Monelle, the chief executive and founder of LIVEKINDLY Media. Food industry veterans like Mick Van Ettinger, a former Unilever employee, and Aldo Uva, a former Nestlé employee, round out the team.
Founded as a rollup for a number of different vegetarian and alternative protein food brands, the LIVEKINDLY Collective is now one of the largest plant-based food companies, by funding.
The company said it would use the money to expand into the U.S. and China and to power additional acquisitions, partnerships and investments in plant-based foods.
The company raised money previously from S2G Ventures and Rabo Corporate Investments, the investment arm of the giant Dutch financial services firm, Rabobank.
Fundamentally, the founding investors behind LIVEKINDLY believe that the technology has a long way to go before it matures. And it’s likely that this latest round will be LIVEKINDLY’s last before an initial public offering of its own.
“We are building a global pureplay in plant-based alternatives — which we believe is the future of food,” said Roger Lienhard, founder and executive chairman of Blue Horizon and founder of LIVEKINDLY Collective. “In just one year, we have raised a significant amount of capital, which testifies to the urgency of our mission and the enormous investment opportunity it represents. We believe the momentum behind plant-based living will continue to grow in both the private and public markets.”
As a result of its investment, Steve Ellis, co-managing partner of The Rise Fund, has joined the LIVEKINDLY Collective board of directors, effective March 1, 2021.
“We are excited to work with LIVEKINDLY Collective and its ecosystem of innovative companies and world-class leaders to meet the growing global demand for healthy, plant-based, clean-label options,” said Ellis. “The company’s unique, mission-driven model operates across the entire value chain, from seed to fork, to drive worldwide adoption of plant-based alternatives and create a healthier planet for all.”
Powered by WPeMatico
Knock is the latest proptech said to be eyeing the public markets
Another proptech is considering raising capital through the public arena.
Knock confirmed Monday that it is considering going public, although CEO Sean Black did not specify whether the company would do so via a traditional IPO, SPAC merger or direct listing.
“We are considering all of our options,” Black told TechCrunch. “We pioneered the real estate transaction revolution over five years ago and our priority is to build a war chest to dramatically widen the already cavernous gap between us and any unoriginal knock-offs.”
Bloomberg reported earlier today that the company had hired Goldman Sachs to advise on such a bid, which Knock also confirmed.
According to Bloomberg, Knock is potentially seeking to raise $400 million to $500 million through an IPO, according to “people familiar with the matter,” at a valuation of about $2 billion. The company declined to comment on valuation.
Black and Knock COO Jamie Glenn are no strangers to the proptech game, having both been on the founding team of Trulia, which went public in 2012 and was acquired by Zillow for $3.5 billion in 2014. The pair started Knock in 2015, and have since raised over $430 million in venture funding and another $170 million or so in debt.
Knock started out as a real estate brokerage business until last July, when the company announced a major shift in strategy and said it was becoming a lender. At the time, Knock unveiled its Home Swap program, under which Knock serves as the lender to help a homeowner buy a new home before selling their old house. It previously worked with lending partners but has now become a licensed lender itself.
In other words, the company now offers integrated financing — the mortgage and an interest-free bridge loan — with the goal of helping consumers make strong non-contingent offers on a new home before repairing and listing their old home for sale on the open market.
With that move, Knock eliminated its Home Trade-In program, where it helped consumers buy before selling by using its own money to purchase the new home on behalf of the consumer before prepping and listing the consumer’s old house on the open market. Under that trade-in model, the homeowner used the proceeds from selling their old home to buy the new home from Knock and pay the company back for any repairs it did to prep the house for sale.
At that time, Black told me that Knock had decided to move away from its trade-in program in part because it was capital-intensive and required the closing of a house to take place twice.
“It added friction to the experience,” he said. “And now, especially during COVID, it can be inconvenient to try and sell a house at the same time as buying one. This is about making something possible that isn’t possible with any other traditional lender. We’re able to lend some money before an owner’s [old] house is even listed on the market.”
To sum up what Knock does today, Black said the company aims to offer a full service technology platform that includes everything “from pre-funding the homebuyers to make non-contingent offers and win bidding wars, to getting their old home ready for market with our contractor network to selling their old home quickly at the highest price and empowers them to have their own agent working with them in the app through the entire process.”
Demand for the Home Swap, he added, has “exceeded all expectations.”
Knock is headquartered in New York and San Francisco. The company launched the Home Swap in three markets in July 2020, and today it is in 27 markets in nine states, including Texas, California and North Carolina.
“Our original plan was to be in 21 markets by the end of 2021,” Black said. “At our current growth rate, we expect to end the year at 45 markets and be in 100 by 2023.”
Knock began 2021 with 100 employees and now has 150. Its plan is to have at least 400 employees by year’s end.
Other proptech startups that have recently announced plans to go public include Compass and Doma (formerly States Title).
Powered by WPeMatico