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Startup funding news 💸

• Mallorca-based biotech startup Sanifit Therapeutics raised €55.2 million from Caixa Capital Risc, Columbus Venture Partners, Alta Life Sciences and the company’s prior investors. Sanifit develops cardiovascular pharma solutions
• Barcelona-based electric vehicle charging manufacturer Wallbox Chargers completed a €15 million financing round led by energy supplier Iberdrola
• Madrid-based Bipi, which offers a car subscription service to consumers, raised €6.5 million from Israeli fund Maniv Mobility and Kibo Ventures, IDC Ventures, TA Ventures
• Gas-to-liquid startup BiCat raised €355,000 from Beable Capital
• Health and wellness startup Bodyla raised €100,000 from various business angels
• BBK Venture Philanthropy and Ship2B invested a combined €100,000 in four startups: Kuvu, Gaptain, Wats and Life Kontainer

Investor & accelerator news 🚀

• Martin Varsavsky, Bankinter and Kanoar Ventures (managing firm of Spanish VC firm K Fund) announced MVB Fund, a €200 million Fund of Funds to invest in US-based venture capital firms
• La Informacion looked at the current VC landscape in Spain, with several firms raising funds at the same time
• Nuclio Venture Builder and The SaaS Institute announced the first master in Spain around the topic of B2B sales

Startup news 💡

• eDreams Odigeo posted an EBITDA of €116 million in its latest fiscal year (April 2018-March 2019), 20% more than in the previous year, and a profit of €9 million
• Madrid-based Jobin, which operates a marketplace for professional services, said that last year it had a GMV of €2 million and that it’s growing at a 20% month-on-month rate
• Data management company Tinybird launched their beta program. The company aims to help developers and engineers develop data intensive solutions without all the hassle and to get insights from data in seconds, not in days
• BStartup and SeedRocket chose Barcelona-based AllRead as the best startup in its ‘venture on the road 2019’ program
• Indoor positioning startup Situm announced a pilot program with Spanish giant Ferrovial
• Sunglasses brand Hawkers to open its 60th retail store in London, which aims to be focused on the luxury market
• How data vizualisation startup Zeus is helping hospitality companies analyse their data in a better and deeper way
• CheKin, a company offering a solution to make the short term rental checkin process easier, is expanding internationally by going to Italy and Portugal first
• Startup profiles: Panapop, TeknTrash, Plyzer Technologies, Ecertic

Big company news 🏦

• Cinco Dias interviewed Jose Cerdan, head of Telefonica Empresas. The division has the goal of replacing Indra and IBM as the main provider of IT products and services to large Spanish corporations
• Telefonica posted financial results for the first half of 2019. Profit increased by +2% YoY to €1.7 billion, but revenues slightly decreased (-0.8%)
• Xataka interviewed Pedro Garcia, Spain’s country manager of Amazon Alexa

Tech and policy 💂🏼

• I’ve lost count of the trials and suits that Glovo and Deliveroo are facing in Spain. This time, a Valencia judge said that 97 riders of Deliveroo should be considered employees instead of contractors or freelancers. The sentence can be appealed
• Glovo is fighting in court to be able to once again sell meds on its platform. For now, the ban will continue

Interesting reads 🤓

• Media publication El Confidencial reached revenues of €18 million last year and a profit of €3.3 million. I also found it interesting that the company said that it has invested as much as €1 million in various startups
• Spain is the only country among Europe’s largest economies which saw a decrease in R&D spending in the 2009 to 2016 period
• Daniel Muñoz (product at El Confidencial): ’Good bye to the click dictatorship: how media companies will need to shift the way they measure audiences in 2020’

Podcasts of the week 🎧

• Itnig interviewed … me! (Jaime Novoa)
• MasQueStartups talked to Carlos Hernandez of Quaderno in the ‘Enseñame tu SaaS’ series
• K Fund interviewed Javier Rodriguez Zapatero (former director of Google Spain) and Angel Cano (former CEO of BBVA)
• En.Digital interviewed Lucia Uria of Aire de Fiesta
• Startup Grind BCN interviewed Lina Chong of VC firm Target Global