INSUBCONTINENT EXCLUSIVE:
The Wall Street Journal published a thought-provoking story this week, highlighting limited partners& concerns with the SoftBank Vision
The fund &decision-making process is chaotic,& it over-paying for equity in top tech startups and it encouraging inflated valuations,
sources told the WSJ.
The report emerged during a particularly busy time for the Vision Fund, which this week led two notable VC deals in
Clutter and Flexport, as well as participated in DoorDash $400 million round; more on all those below
So given all this SoftBank news, let us remind you that given its $45 billion commitment, Saudi Arabia Public Investment Fund (PIF) is the
Vision Fund largest investor
Saudi Arabia is responsible for the planned killing of dissident journalist Jamal Khashoggi.
Here what I&m wondering this week: Do CEOs of
companies like Flexport and Clutter have a responsibility to address the source of their capital Should they be more transparent to their
customers about whose money they are spending to achieve rapid scale Send me your thoughts
And thanks to those who wrote me last week re: At what point is a Y Combinator cohort too big The general consensus was this: the size of
the cohort is irrelevant, all that matters is the quality
We&ll have more to say on quality soon enough, as YC demo days begin on March 18.
Anyways…
Pinterest is going public!
Surprise! Sort of
Pinterest has joined a growing list of tech unicorns planning to go public in 2019
The visual search engine filed confidentially to go public on Thursday
Reports indicate the business will float at a $12 billion valuation by June
Pinterest key backers — which will make lots of money when it goes public — include Bessemer Venture Partners, Andreessen Horowitz,
FirstMark Capital, Fidelity and SV Angel.
Lyft IPO is imminent
Ride-hailing company Lyft plans to go public on the Nasdaq in March, likely
beating rival Uber to the milestone
Lyft S-1 will be made public as soon as next week; its roadshow will begin the week of March 18
The nuts and bolts: JPMorgan Chase has been hired to lead the offering; Lyft was last valued at more than $15 billion, while competitor Uber
is valued north of $100 billion.
Deal of the week: DoorDash
Despite scrutiny for subsidizing its drivers& wages with customer tips, venture
capitalists plowed another $400 million into food delivery platform DoorDash at a whopping $7.1 billion valuation, up considerably from a
previous valuation of $3.75 billion
The round, led by Temasek and Dragoneer Investment Group, with participation from previous investors SoftBank Vision Fund, DST Global,
Coatue Management, GIC, Sequoia Capital and Y Combinator, will help DoorDash compete with Uber Eats
The company is currently seeing 325 percent growth, year-over-year.
Clutter Flexport
Here are some more details on those big Vision Fund
Deals: Clutter, an LA-based on-demand storage startup, closed a $200 million SoftBank-led round this week at a valuation between $400
million and $500 million, according to TechCrunch Ingrid Lunden reporting
Meanwhile, Flexport, a five-year-old, San Francisco-based full-service air and ocean freight forwarder, raised $1 billion in fresh funding
led by the SoftBank Vision Fund at a $3.2 billion valuation
Earlier backers of the company, including Founders Fund, DST Global, Cherubic Ventures, Susa Ventures and SF Express all participated in the
round.
Here your weekly reminder to send me tips, suggestions and more to kate.clark@techcrunch.com or@KateClarkTweets.
Fresh funds
Menlo
Ventures has a new $500 million late-stage fund
Dubbed its &inflection& fund, it will be investing between $20 million and $40 million in companies that are seeing at least $5 million in
annual recurring revenue, growth of 100 percent year-over-year, early signs of retention and are operating in areas like cloud
infrastructure, fintech, marketplaces, mobility and SaaS
Plus, Allianz X, the venture capital arm attached to German insurance giant Allianz, has increased the size of its fund to $1.1 billion and
London Entrepreneur First brought in $115 million for what is one of the largest &pre-seed& funds ever raised.
Startup cash
Flipkart
co-founder invests $92M in OlaRedis Labs raises a $60M Series E roundChinese startup Panda Selected nabs $50M from Tiger GlobalImage
recognition startup ViSenze raises $20M Series CCircle raises $20M Series B to help even more parents limit screen timeShowfields announces
$9M seed funding for a flexible approach to brick-and-mortar retailPodcasting startup WaitWhat raises $4.3MZoba raises $3M to help mobility
companies predict demand
Indian delivery men working with the food delivery apps Uber Eats and Swiggy wait to pick up an order outside a
(INDRANIL MUKHERJEE/AFP/Getty Images)
Uber Eats India may sell to Swiggy
According to Indian media reports, Uber is in the final stages of
selling its Indian food delivery business to local player Swiggy, a food delivery service that recently raised $1 billion in venture capital
Uber Eats plans to sell its Indian food delivery unit in exchange for a 10 percent share of Swiggy business
Swiggy was most recently said to be valued at $3.3 billionfollowing that billion-dollar round, which was led by Naspers and included new
backers Tencent and Uber investor Coatue.
New unicorn
Lalamove, a Hong Kong-based on-demand logistics startup, is the latest venture-backed
business to enter the unicorn club with the close of a $300 million Series D round this week
The latest round is split into two, with Hillhouse Capital leading the &D1& tranche and Sequoia China heading up the &D2& portion
New backers Eastern Bell Venture Capital and PV Capital and returning investors ShunWei Capital, Xiang He Capital and MindWorks Ventures
also participated.
Founders Fund gets Keith Rabois
Longtime investor Keith Rabois is joining Founders Fund as a general partner
Here more from TechCrunch Connie Loizos: &The move is wholly unsurprising in ways, though the timing seems to suggest that another big fund
from Founders Fund is around the corner, as the firm is also bringing aboard a new principal at the same time — Delian Asparouhov — and
firms tend to bulk up as they&re meeting with investors
It also kind of time, as these things go
Founders Fund closed its last flagship fund with $1.3 billion in 2016.&
Listen to me talk
If you enjoy this newsletter, be sure to check
out TechCrunch venture capital-focused podcast, Equity
In this week episode, available here, Crunchbase News editor-in-chief Alex Wilhelm and I discuss Pinterest IPO, DoorDash big round and
SoftBank upset LPs.
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