Aurora, la aceleradora de Soltec que lucha contra el cambio climático

Aurora, la aceleradora de Soltec que busca impulsar proyectos innovadores que luchen contra el cambio climático a través de las energías renovables, promete revolucionar el panorama emprendedor. La aceleradora busca startups con soluciones tecnológicas validadas o en fase pre-comercial, spin-offs universitarias que busquen un socio industrial, e incluso scale-ups con nuevas soluciones que deseen validar en un entorno real.

Aurora busca proyectos en campos como el hidrógeno verde, el almacenamiento energético, las redes inteligentes o nuevos materiales estructurales de plantas de energía y su reciclaje. Ofrece asesoramiento técnico, entornos para pruebas, acceso al mercado nacional e internacional y financiación a todos aquellos proyectos con potencial para impulsar la transición energética, especialmente en el ámbito de la energía solar.

Soltec pretende ayudar a estas nuevas empresas a través de la financiación de proyectos que mejoren el campo de las energías limpias y el sector fotovoltaico en particular.

Las startups tendrán acceso a infraestructura para la realización de pruebas piloto, asesoramiento en materia de industrialización de procesos, validación comercial de soluciones innovadoras y acompañamiento en la entrada a nuevos mercados y recursos financieros. El objetivo de Aurora es conseguir una relación simbiótica entre las startups y Soltec. Consulta más información aquí.

Startup funding news 💸

• According to Biocat, Catalunya-based biotech startups raised a combined €296M in the first seven months of 2022. That's more than in all off 2021
• Barcelona-based pet food startup Food for Joe raised €1.5M, led by Abac Nest and Lanzame Capital
• Other rounds of funding: Mogu, INROBICS, Abastores, Belong,

Investor & accelerator news 🚀

• Sponsored
  Aurora, Soltec's accelerator for projects that aim to fight against climate change, is looking for startups to join its most recent program. More info here
• ENISA has almost €100M in new funding to loan to Spanish startups
• Profile of 5G Ventures, a Barcelona-based venture builder focused on incubating and developing businesses related to 5G technology. The four companies supported to date are Neutroon, BE-IN-G, BlueGuardian and Gluonise
• Grow Venture Partners did a first closing of €5M of its deep tech fund

Startup news 💡

• José Antonio Pérez Moral, CEO of restaurant reservation service Covermanager, said in a post that the company has reached €10M in ARR and 50% of EBITDA with no external funding. The company did raise a round recently to expand to other verticals and countries
• Automotive ecommerce company Clicars said that it did €193M in gross sales in the first six months of 2022, almost double compared to the prior period
• Remotely, a recruitment startup connecting US companies with developers in Latam, published its July 2022 investor update: "The "uncertainty ahead" update". The company was co-founded by Pau Sabria and Jose de Cabo (Olapic)
• More layoffs in the quick commerce sector. After Gorillas and Getir announced significant reductions of employment in Spain, now it's Gopuff's turn. The company will lay off 188 employees in Spain and also shut down operations
• The private data of thousands of Glovo customers and delivery men are for sale on the Internet, after a new hack. More info here. The hack took place in 2021
• Banktrack, co-founded by Nacho Gonzalez Barros (Mailtrack, infojobs), David Álvarez and Carlos Perez, came out of beta. The company helps users keep track of their finances via daily notifications
• Otovo is a Norwegian marketplace for distributed energy installation. The company is active in Spain and has turned its first profit. Here's an interview with its Spanish country manager, Iñigo Amoribieta, who previously was part of the management team at La Nevera Roja and We Are Knitters, among others
• Business Insider put together a list of the 15 bigger exits in the history of the Spanish tech sector
• Startup profiles:
• Silt: online identity and security
• Capboard: legal tech and cap table management software

Big company news 🏦

• Chiliz, the owner of blockchain-based fan rewards platform Socios.com, has invested $100 million in FC Barcelona's non-fungible tokens (NFTs) and metaverse efforts
• T-Systems, the IT division of Deutsche Telekom, shut down its office in Saint Petersburg (Russia) and relocated 150 engineers to Granada. More info here
• Cinco Dias published an article on the interest of investment companies such as Blackstone, Pimco and others in financing the launch of data centres in Spain

Interesting reads 🤓

• Albert Nieto, co-CEO of Seedtag, wrote a post called "Volver a empezar" about the €235M round they recently raised, his move to NYC and the history and evolution of the company
• Miguel Arias, my colleague at K Fund, wrote a post on "dual scaleups": tech companies that have dual headquarters. Often an engineering/product office in Spain and then most or part of the go-to-market function in the US (Delaware). Is this type of structure a good or bad thing?

Podcasts 🎧

• SeedRocket interviewed Nacho Gonzalez Barros to talk about the unsuccessful startups he's launched to date and lessons learned
• Novicap interviewed Javier Megias of Bankinter
• Product Hackers has been publishing a series of podcasts on the topic of web3 and NFTs