Data is a critical differentiating element of any business today. A strategy based on data and not assumptions is a great identifier to face challenges in an environment of constant change like the current one. The question is, how do you establish data-driven processes for your business?

At zenital, we specialize in preparing businesses for growth. We optimize data systems to maintain quality at scale.

With over 7 years of experience being the key ally for large companies in Spain, the United Kingdom, Switzerland, and the United States, we have been helping them grow and give real meaning to their data through innovation.

If you're ready to tackle your company's data challenges, contact us today to discuss how we can help you.

Startup funding news 💸

• US and Spanish startup Erudit raised $10m. The round was led by an investor group formed by Conexo Ventures, Athos Capital, Ignia Partners, True Blue Partners and Fondo Bolsa Social. The AI company helps leaders improve culture and productivity. More info here
• Barcelona-based Incapto, a company that offers the sale of the automatic coffee machine and a subscription system for coffee beans, raised €6m, led by Italian firm P101. The company closed 2022 with €4.2m in sales. Co-founder Francesc Font wrote about the deal here
• Valencia-based crypto platform Criptan raised €3.5m from various funds, including LifeX Ventures and Angels
• Lisbon-based Pleez, a startup that aggregates and uses delivery data to improve restaurant management, raised €3.5m. I've included Pleez in the list because Spain is its largest market
• Valencia-based chatbot and customer support company Aunoa raised €1.2m, led by StartupXplore and Eoniq.fund
• Barcelona-based health tech company Bloome raised €1m, led by Dozen and Scale Lab Andorra
• Madrid-based circular fashion company Recovo raised €1m, led by Zubi Capital and HeartsLab
• Other rounds of funding: Nominis,

M&A activity 🎊

• SysAdminOK, a company that specializes in cloud consultancy services, was acquired by Grupo Aire

Investor & accelerator news 🚀

• Inveready has started the fundraising process for a €75m fund to be focused on the telco sector. Inveready knows a thing or two about the industry, since it was one of the first backers of Masmovil and remains an investor in the company
• Zubi Capital, the sustainability-focused investment firm, announced the launch of a new fund with a target size of €20m to invest in "impact driven companies led by underrepresented founders". The fund will write cheques of €150k to €500k and will be led by Carmen Pumariño as investment director. More info here
• Lanai Partners announced that it's closing in on a new €20m fund to invest tickets of €100k to €1m in seed stage companies. To date, the company has backed the likes of Cobee, Flanks, PayFlow, Bcas or Embat
• Cataluña's Avançsa announced that to date it has made 10 investments for a combined €5.9m. The investments, which can be seen here, range from €100k to €900k

Startup news 💡

• Sponsored
  zenital has been the key ally for companies in Spain, the UK, Switzerland, and the US, helping them grow and understand the most difficult and complex issues about their data. If you're ready to tackle your company's data challenges, contact them today to discuss how we can help you.
• Profile of Civitatis, the online distribution platform of guided tours, activities and day trips. The company, founded in 2008, says it had sales of more than €200m last year (no mention in the article about take rate or net revenue) and it expects to reach almost 10m customers this year. According to Crunchbase, the company raised €100m from PE firm Vitruvian Partners in 2022
• Revel and Payflow recently raised large rounds of funding, with a combination of debt and equity. The debt component was significant in both cases. The founders of both companies talked about why they think it will be more and more common to see large debt rounds in Spain. For those interested in the topic, I think this is one of the best articles published to date about debt and startups: "Debt is coming"
• According to a survey, neobanks have more than 9m customers in Spain. The leaders are Revolut (5.1m customers), Imagin (3.6m) and Openbank (3.4m). Interestingly, the study says that for customers that opened new accounts in 2023, Revolut is the second largest beneficiary in Spain (only surpassed by BBVA), accounting for 12.8% of all new customers/signups
• More on Glovo's legal troubles. The Spanish labour ministry could open criminal proceedings against the company's management
• Overview of the Spanish proptech sector, featuring startups such as Spotahome, idealista, Psquared and many others
• Trade Republic, the German stock broker that's been active in Spain for two years, hired Antón Díez Tubet as its new country managing director. Anton was previously at JP Morgan
• Startup profiles:
• Reclamador: legaltech
• Harbest Market: foodtech

Big company news 🏦

• Spotify did €24.6m in sales in Spain in 2022, +130% YoY
• More news about the acquisition by STC of a 4.9% stake in Telefonica. The company, and the Spanish government, is now waiting for a formal petition and notification to increase that stake to 9,9%. This petition would have to receive the green light from local regulators, given the availability of protectionist measures to prevent the acquisition of Spanish companies in key sectors by foreign entities. According to Bloomberg, Spain weighs placing conditions on Saudi’s stake bid (more on this here ). BlackRock also disclosed last week that it has increased its short position on Telefonica
• Expansion broke the news last week of Zegona's interest in acquiring Vodafone Spain. Zegona is an investment firm that has previously participated in the Spanish telco market. It acquired Telecable in 2015 and it was also for a while one of the main shareholders of Euskaltel. More on Zegona here
• Spain is one of Alibaba's top 5 markets. That might explain why the Chinese giant has chosen Spain as the first European country to launch a debit card, in partnership with Wizink
• Cuatrecasas says it's the first large Spanish law firm to implement LLMs and generative AI in its daily activities. The company is using Harvey

Interesting reads 🤓

• Iñaki Berenguer, serial entrepreneur and now VC with his own fund LifeX Ventures, wrote a very interesting article on "desired Traits that make entrepreneurs investable and proxies to assess them"
• Pedro Torrecillas, co-founder of HR company Circular, wrote an op-ed about why "offering flexible work arrangements becomes crucial" in the current working environment
• Ignacio Arriaga, co-founder of Acumbamail, wrote a thread on SaaS pricing: "Me he recorrido más de 30 años de páginas de pricing de distintos softwares para ver qué técnicas utilizan y cómo evolucionan durante los años"
• David Bonilla, co-founder of Manfred, wrote "David's test: O una forma sencilla de comprobar lo bien —o mal— que gestionas el talento de tu equipo"

Podcasts 🎧

• Itnig interviewed Kiran Thomas, co-founder of Reby
• Jaime Bosch (Voicemod), Miguel Arias (Kfund), Jaime de Mora (Microsoft), Irene Gomez (Telefonica) and more participated in a round table about "Generative AI for Telcos: the Venture Capital Perspective"
• Dani Diestre interviewed Bernat Farrero, co-founder of Factorial, to talk about the product management role