Cabify to raise at least $300m. Amovens sues BlaBlacar. Telefonica's Pallete gives first interview.

June 25, 2019 • Issue #69

Startup funding news 💸

Spanish ride-sharing company Cabify is seeking at least $300 million in new funding, at a valuation of more than $1 billion
Barcelona-based Signaturit raised €2.8 million from Banco Sabadell, Faraday and other investors
Travel startup TripUniq raised €170,000 from Cabiedes & Partners, Lanta Capital and business angels

TheVentureCity is a new startup accelerator and investment vehicle launched by former Facebook executive Laura Gonzalez-Estefani. The program will be based in San Francisco, Miami and Madrid
Former Tuenti executives Feliz Ruiz and Hugo Arevalo, Kibo Ventures and Bernardo Hernandez have invested €9 million in a company that buys and manages VTC licenses
Kippel01 interviewed Carlos Blanco about the current state of the Spanish startup accelerator ecosystem
The founder of fashion startup Mam Originals has launched Dynamic Growth, a Barcelona-based venture builder

Spanish transportation startup Amovens sued Blablacar, accusing the French company of unfair competition. Amovens says that Blablacar uses bots to extract “private” information from its platform to adjust prices. Blablacar says that they’re not extracting any private information
Hawkers sold €25 million worth of glasses in 2015
CARTO named a 2017 cool vendor by analyst firm Gartner
Mr Jeff says it will wash and clean your clothes for less than €1/day
Mobile app Peeople updates itself to try to reach 1 million registered users
Octopocket is a Spanish project that has received funding from messaging app Telegram
Proptech startup Housfy launched in Madrid
Fitness app Strava is looking for a Spanish country manager
Startup profiles: Aplazame (fintech), Endado (e-commerce)

BBVA launched Trust.u, an in-house fintech startup that offers financing to SMBs
Amazon to start selling Spanish oil, wine and charcuterie in Germany and the UK
The ecommerce giant is said to be in negotiations with multiple providers of Inditex to help grow its first European fashion brand
ZTE is losing money in Spain after its contract with Jazztel expired
Accenture to open a tech innovation center in Madrid
El Pais interviewed Telefonica’s CEO and president Jose Maria Alvarez Pallete

El Confidencial interviewed Chip Conley, Airbnb’s head of global strategy and hospitality: “Barcelona already had a tourism problem before Airbnb”
Spanish regulator CNMC has fined Nokia with €1.7 million
The CNMC is worried that Airbnb and Uber may receive special fiscal treatment from Spanish municipalities
A Spanish judge has ruled that Cabify does not represent unfair competition to the taxi industry

Video to amount to 79% of all internet traffic in Spain in 2021, according to Cisco
From Germany to China: the 10 countries that purchase most technology coming out of Spain
Interview with Patrick Puck, former VP of software development at Oracle: To the cloud and beyond: engineering the future in Barcelona
5 startups that’ll help you make the best of your summer in Barcelona
How to get under the skin of your users with UX research
Vozpopuli looked at the Spanish VR and AR sector
Jordi Romero of Factorial explains how they raised €500,000 and why they chose their investors
Entrepreneurship activity in Spain has gone down as the economy has improved
Javier Escribano (OnTruck) suggests to Spanish designers to move away from consulting firms and join startups