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Facebook confirms PlayGiga’s acquisition. Glovo raises $166m and reaches unicorn status.

December 23, 2019 • Issue #196

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Startup funding news 💸

  • Barcelona-based Glovo announced a $166 million Series E round led by Abu Dhabi state investment company, Mubadala
  • Madrid-based autonomous transportation startup Goggo Network raised $44 million in funding from SoftBank and Axel Springer Digital Ventures
  • Valencia-based IoT startup Witrac raised €3 million from Mundi Ventures and Goldacre Ventures
  • Madrid-based fintech startup Arbor closed a €3 million investment from FinRebel, The Tifin Group and Apex Capital Partners
  • Seville-based logistics platform Mox closed a €3 million round led by VAS Ventures
  • Madrid-based fintech startup Twinco raised €2.5 million
  • Barcelona-based neobank Bcn10 raised €1 million from various investors
  • Navarra-based startup TedCast raised €300,000 from various business angels
  • Madrid-based The Beemine Lab raised €280,000 via Startupxplore
  • Pre-seed investment platform tQuity raised €250,000 from PADEInvest and other investors
  • Madrid-based HR startup Nailted raised €170,000 from Big Sur Ventures and other investors
  • Wedding platform Zankyou raised an undisclosed round of funding
  • Barcelona-based Iomob received investment and partnered with B4Motion

M&A activity 🎊

  • Facebook confirmed the acquisition of Madrid-based cloud gaming startup PlayGiga. The size of the transaction was not officially disclosed. La Informacion wrote about the company's history
  • Investment banking firm Alantra announced the acquisition of three Spanish genetics companies to form a group with more than €25 million in annual revenues: Imegen, Genycell Biotech and Health in Code
  • Galician tech consulting firm Altia acquired Portuguese counterpart Noesis for €14 million
  • Galician biotech startup Mestrelab sold a majority stake to US-based Bruker. Mestrelab had revenues of more than €5 million last year

Investor & accelerator news 🚀

  • Bewater Funds announced an investment in real estate business Cink Coworking
  • ENISA completed 500 deals in 2019, combining for more than €80 million in loans

Startup news 💡

  • EU-Startups published a list of '10 Madrid-based startups to watch out for in 2020 and beyond'
  • An association called Startup Galicia put together a map of all of Galicia-based technology startups
  • According to La Informacion, BlaBlaCar's revenues in Spain have decreased to less than €1 million, its 2015 levels
  • According to El Confidencial, Circ and other e-scooter companies are having a hard time in the Spanish market, due to high levels of competition and local regulation
  • La Vanguardia says that Scytl has debt of more than €55 million and is looking for alternative financial sources or debt renegotiation to continue operating
  • Marc Caballe, CEO of Hubtype, published 'Building the contact center of the future'
  • Roboadvisor Indexa Capital increased its assets under management by 2.3 this year, up to €312 million
  • El Pais published a profile of Amuda Goueli, CEO and co-founder of travel startup Destinia
  • Public examination platform Opositatest claims to have increased its user base by 250% in 2019
  • Software development firm Marsbased published its 2019 review as well as its financials
  • Startup profiles: HessTec, Acqustic, Yuka

Big company news 🏦

  • Inditex reported a 12% jump in net profit to €2.7 billion in the first 9 months of the year, helped by a rollout of stock-tracking technology and flagship store openings
  • Telefonica announced the directors of its recently created division Telefonica Tech
  • MasMovil gained more clients than other Spanish telcos in 2019, with 1.4 million more clients

Tech and policy 💂🏼‍♂️

  • Euskadi's government wants to impose a 30 minute wait for VTC operators

Interesting reads 🤓

  • Xataka interviewed Jonathan Chacón, a blind programmer, about his work
  • Jesus Monleon of SeedRocket published 'Fiscal planning before an exit or dividends'
  • Caroline Lagergren (Expand to Spain) wrote 'The Spanish tech startup ecosystem, frequently asked questions'

Podcasts 🎧

  • El Economista published an interview with Alex Barredo of mixx.io
  • K Fund interviewed Andrea Barber of RatedPower
  • Marketing4Ecommerce interviewed Alfonso Tomas, CEO of PcComponentes
  • Itnig interviewed David Riudor of Goin

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