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Startup funding news 💸

• Barcelona-based IoT company Worldsensing raised €8.3 million from McRock Capital, ETF Partners and Cisco
• Mobile marketplace app Fever announced a new €4.3 million round and that it has hit break even
• Fintech startup Finizens raised €4 million from insurance company Caser and Fintech Ventures
• Language learning startup Lingokids scores $4 million in funding and partners with Oxford University Press
• Hunters of Magic raised €161,000
• Vegaffinity raised €160,000
• SeedRocket4Founders disclosed three investments: Holded, Stayforlong, Pulpomatic and Coverfy

Investor & accelerator news 🚀

• Rodrigo Martinez of Point Nine Capital was promoted to partner at the Berlin-based VC
• Santander InnoVentures announced three new investments: Pixoneye, Curve and Gridspace. More info on Santander’s involvement in Curve here. The Spanish bank also announced a partnership with supply chain finance startup Tradeshift
• There’s a new accelerator in Galicia aimed at companies building products for the timber industry
• Felix Capital, the London-based VC firm that backed Olapic (which sold for $130 million) announced a new $150 million fund
• IAG (Iberia, British Airways) is planning to launch a travel accelerator program in Spain

Startup news 💡

• El Español published an interesting article on how fintech startup Kantox has slightly changed its business model, from a pure P2P forex marketplace to a SaaS selling to companies
• La Vanguardia profiled Oscar Pierre, co-founder and CEO of Glovo
• Ecommerce company Deporvillage has launched its own brand, which means higher margins for the startup if it succeeds selling those products
• El Español looked at various projects that have been recently launched in Spain following the Casper model: DNVB that sell mattresses online
• Fintech startup Novicap wants to do more business in Northern Europe
• Startup interviews and profiles: Datmean (audience technology market), Showea.com (fashion ecommerce), Domesting (house cleaning services)

Big company news 🏢

• MasMovil graduated from Spain’s MAB and has now joined the regular stock market, scoring a valuation north of €1.2 billion
• El Español says that Novum is a new project under development at Telefonica that would change the way clients communicate with the company and with each other. More info on the project here
• Correos is running tests with French IoT tech giant Sigfox to monitor the geolocation of packages
• Amazon to open three additional logistic centres in Spain
• DHL Express launched On Demand Delivery in Spain, a service aimed at online stores that want to provide fast delivery to consumers. Also on the logistics front, PcComponentes announced last week that it can deliver orders in less than two hours in Madrid
• El Español analysed the strategy of Mercado, Carrefour and Dia to compete in ecommerce

Tech and policy 💂🏼

• Airbnb and Madrid’s local government could soon reach an agreement to regulate vacation rental activity in the city. Also last week, Airbnb agreed to reject all Barcelona listings that are illegal according to local laws, a significant move for the city
• Spain’s antitrust regulator CNMC is trying to get rid of limits on VTC licenses that Cabify and Uber must have to operate
• Spanish fintech startups are looking forward to new regulations in the country, including a regulatory sandbox
• El Pais looked at the labour market conditions of those working for companies such as Deliveroo in Spain. El Confidencial also wrote about the topic
• Oracle gets lucky and won’t have to pay €10 million in taxes in Spain

Interesting reads 🤓

• Diego Mariño explains what he would do differently if he were to start Ducksboard now. A very relevant read for anyone interested in building SaaS companies
• Verse CMO Juan Carlos on launching a product in 27 countries in one year

Podcasts of the week 🎧

• K Fund interviewed Aquilino Peña (Kibo Ventures), Nico Goulet (Adara VP) and Iñaki Arrola (K Fund)
• MasQueStartups interviewed Alberto Molpeceres and Gonzalo Valverde