After dropping its bid for Grubhub, Uber is now reportedly seeking to acquire food delivery company Postmates.
But Postmates is not making the process straightforward. A blank check company led by investment banker Michael Klein has reportedly made an acquisition offer to the company — and Postmates has very much sought to take matters into its own hands: Though interest in the company had waned pre-pandemic, it is now reportedly reviving plans for an initial public offering in a move that could give Postmates a different benchmark on pricing and put pressure on buyers… if public market investors land on its side.
Postmates was last valued at $2.4 billion in September.
At any rate, consolidation in the food delivery market has been a long time coming, even pre-pandemic. The trend will continue, whether or not Postmates decides to sell.
What now, stimulus? There was a mad dash for the first round of the Paycheck Protection Program aimed at keeping the lights on at small businesses. So who would have expected cash would be left on the table?
Except that’s what happened: Some $130 billion of the program was still waiting for applicants even while it expired yesterday, on June 30. In a surprise move, the U.S. Senate passed on Tuesday an extension to the program, which some small businesses had avoided over the unclear guidance, pushing the expiration to August 8. The House and President Donald Trump will still need to sign off on the law.
That comes as hopes of a V-shaped recovery fade as reopenings are correlating with a surge in Covid-19 cases. For a good read about the economic recovery (that puts it in the alphabetical terms that we’ve used to define the charts), here’s a piece on a K-shaped recovery—which brings to light the socioeconomic and racial divides that are being magnified as a result of a pandemic that has razed storefront businesses but boosted many tech companies.
VENTURES DEALS
- Discord, a San Francisco-based chat app popular among gamers, raised $100 million in funding. Index Ventures led the round.
- Evidation Health, a San Mateo, Calif.-based medical research platform, raised $45 million in Series D funding. B Capital Group led the round and was joined by investors including McKesson Ventures and Section 32 as well as existing investors Revelation Partners, Rethink Impact, and SV Health Investors.
- Kitu Life, the startup behind Super Coffee, raised $25 million in funding that values it at $200 million. Skyview Capital led the round. Read more.
- Elementary Robotics, a Los Angeles-based hardware and software platform for machine learning in manufacturing and logistics industries, raised $12.7 million in Series A funding. Threshold Ventures led the round.
- Protaryx, a Baltimore, Md.-based company developing access to the left atrium for transcatheter cardiac procedures, raised $3.2 million in seed funding and $5.1 million in Series A financing led by Ajax Health and was joined by investors including University of Maryland Ventures.
- Beckley Psytech, which is developing psychedelic drugs for treating psychiatric and neurological disease, raised $3.8 million in seed funding. Investors include Canadian businessman Greg Bailey and British entrepreneur Jim Mellon.
- Neo.tax, a company that helps startups secure R&D research credits from the federal government, raised $3 million in seed funding from Andy McLoughlin at Uncork Capital and Mike Maples at Floodgate, with Michael Ma at Liquid 2 Ventures and Deena Shakir at Lux Capital participating. Read more.
- Intento, a Berkeley, Calif.-based AI integration platform, raised $3 million in seed funding. Flint Capital led the round and was joined by investors including Berkeley SkyDeck and SmartHub.
- Willa, a Los Angeles-based fintech startup for helping freelancers get paid on time, raised $3 million in seed funding. EQT Ventures led the round.
- Pattern89, an Indianapolis-based platform using AI to boost digital ad performance, raised $2 million in funding. Investors include Break Trail Ventures, Elevate Ventures, F&M Investments, High Alpha Capital, and Vitalize.
PRIVATE EQUITY
- Inside Real Estate, backed by Lovell Minnick, acquired dashCMA DRAPER, a pricing tool for real estate agents. Financial terms weren't disclosed
- S4 Capital acquired Lens10, an Australian digital strategy and analytics consultancy, and merged it with MightyHive. Financial terms weren't disclosed.
- Salt Creek Capital acquired IT Assist, a provider of outsourced technology services and IT consulting to companies in the Philadelphia metro area. Financial terms weren't disclosed.
- Carrick Capital Partners acquired Flatiron School, a New York-based technical bootcamp, from Softbank-backed WeWork. Financial terms weren't disclosed.
- Apollo Global Management acquired Tech Data Corporation (Nasdaq: TECD), a Clearwater, Fla.-based technology distributor. Financial terms weren't disclosed.
- Chatterjee’s Haldia Petrochemicals and Rhône Capital acquired Lummus Technology, a Houston-based licensor of gas processing technologies, from McDermott International. The acquisition price was $2.7 billion.
- Mercer Global Advisors, backed by Genstar Capital, acquired Argosy Wealth Management, a Los Angeles-based wealth management company. Financial terms weren't disclosed.
OTHERS
- Suez SA plans to sell its continental Europe waste management businesses. The deal could raise as much as 3 billion euros ($3.4 billion), per Bloomberg. Read more.
- LiveXLive (NASDAQ: LIVX) is acquiring Napster, a player in the B2B music space. LiveXLive has also acquired PodcastOne, an advertiser-supported on-demand digital audio network. Financial terms weren't disclosed.
BREAKUPS, HANGUPS, AND BANKRUPTCIES
- Grupo Aeroméxico SAB, a Mexico City-based airline company, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing. Read more.
- Byron, a UK-based burger chain backed by Three Hills Capital Partners, is headed for bankruptcy proceedings, per Sky News. Read more.
IPOS
- Jamf, a Minneapolis-based Apple device management company, filed to raise up to $100 million in an initial public offering. It posted revenue of $204 million in 2019 and a loss of $32.6 million. Vista Equity backs the firm. It has yet to choose an exchange. Read more.
- GS Acquisition Holdings II, Goldman Sachs’ second blank check company, raised $700 million in an offering of 70 million units priced at $10 apiece. It plans to list on the NYSE as “GSAH.U.” Read more.
- GO Acquisition, a New York-based blank check company founded by the co-founder of GLG Partners (Noam Gottesman) and the founder of Certares (Gregory O’Hara), filed to raise $500 million. It is targeting a company in the travel industry. Read more.
- Montrose Environmental Group, ae Irvine, Calif.-based provider of environmental assessment, filed to raise up to $160 million. It posted revenue of $233.9 million in 2019 and a loss of $23.6 million. Oaktree (17.2% pre-offering), CTEH Holdings (8.7%) and Yukon Environmental (8.4%) back the firm. It plans to list on the NYSE as “MEG.” Read more.
- DoubleDown Interactive, a South Korean developer of mobile and web-based games, plans to raise $86 million in an offering of 5.5 million ADSs priced at $15.60 apiece. It posted revenue of $273.6 million and income of $36.3 million in 2019. It plans to list on the Nasdaq as “DDI.” Read more.
EXITS
- Société Générale is acquiring Shine, a French neobank for young companies. Shine has raised from investors including Kima Ventures and Xange Private Equity. Financial terms weren't disclosed.
- Google acquired North, a Canadian maker of smart glasses. North has raised from Intel Capital and the Amazon Alexa Fund. Financial terms weren't disclosed.
- Cedar Gate Technologies, a portfolio company of GTCR, acquired Citra Health Solution, a healthcare workflow software provider, from Great Point Partners. Financial terms weren't disclosed.
F+FS
- B Capital Group, a venture firm founded by Facebook cofounder Eduardo Saverin, raised $820 million vehicle for its second fund.
- Cendana Capital, a firm that invests in seed stage managers, raised $278 million in capital commitments: $218 million for its fourth flagship fund and $60 million to be managed on behalf of the University of Texas endowment. Read more.
PEOPLE
- Cherry Ventures added Sophia Bendz, Spotify's former global marketing director and Atomico partner, as a partner beginning September 1.
