It is Wednesday! And we. Are. Outta here. (Until early January.) Happy New Year, everyone! See you soon.
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Top News in the A.M.
The Beatles are coming.
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18 Female Founders Who Killed It In 2015
Last week, on an internal conversational thread over at my second job with TechCrunch, the staff began chatting about some of female founders who’ve made a major dent on the tech scene in 2015, and the thread quickly became a very long and involved one.
The following are some of the people who popped immediately into mind. This list is in no way comprehensive, so please do reach out with your own thoughts about some of the women impacting the world of startups right now. We welcome any and all nominations.
In fact, since publishing this list yesterday afternoon, we’ve received many great suggestions, including Leura Fine of the interior design marketplace Laurel & Wolf (her company raised $20 million in Series B funding led by Benchmark in September), and Ida Tin of Clue, a Berlin-based fertility tracking app that raised$7 million in Series A funding led by Union Square Ventures in October.
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New Fundings
ChargeItSpot, a three-year-old, Philadelphia, Pa.-based provider of cell phone charging stations for retail chains and other indoor public venues, has raised $5.3 million in Series A funding from Robin Hood Ventures, SeedInvest and SoundBoard Angel Fund. More here.
Eved, a five-year-old, Chicago-based provider of event management software, has raised $14.3 million in new funding led by Huizenga Capital Management, with participation from Pritzker Group Venture Capital, Merrick Ventures and MK Capital. ChicagoInno has more here.
Feedvisor, a nearly five-year-old, Tel Aviv, Israel-based company that sells algorithmic repricing and revenue intelligence software to online retailers, has raised $5 million in funding led by Square Peg Capital, with participation from earlier backers JAL Ventures and Titanium Investments. More here.
Foursquare, the 6.5-year-old, New York-based startup, is close to finalizing a funding round that will value the company at about $250 million — less than half of what investors thought the company was worth two years ago, reports Recode. TechCrunch had reported earlier that the company, which focuses on local business recommendations, was raising a down round. More here.
Gojimo, a three-year-old, London-based app that helps U.K. high school students prepare for exams, has raised $1.8 million in seed funding, bringing the total raised by the startup to just more than $3 million. Investors in the round include father and son duo Robin and Saul Klein, Deborah Quazzo of GSV Advisors, seed-stage investment platform Firestartr, and the London Mayor’s London Co-Investment Fund. TechCrunch has more here.
The Happy Home Company, a 1.5-year-old, San Diego, Ca.-based “home manager” that aims to eliminate the headaches of home maintenance and improvement by finding the experts for each job, has raised $3.5 million in seed funding from a long list of investors, including Lowercase Capital, SV Angel, Slow Ventures, Freestyle Capital, and Box CEO Aaron Levie. TechCrunch has more here.
HomeTouch, a three-year-old, London-based company that operates a home care marketplace to let families with elderly parents and others needing care to find vetted help, has raised an additional undisclosed amount of funding from Passion Capital. TechCrunch has more here.
Neural Analytics, a nearly three-year-old, L.A.-based developer of devices and services that measure, diagnose and track brain health, has raised $10 million in Series A funding from JSR Ltd. and Taiyu Capital. More here.
PsiKick, a 3.5-year-old, Santa Clara, Ca.-based semiconductor startup that’s building ultra-low-power sensors for use in Internet of Things applications, has raised $16.5 million in Series B funding led by Osage University Partners, with participation from earlier backers New Enterprise Associates, the University of Michigan Investment in New Technologies Fund, and unnamed individual angels. The company has now raised $22 million altogether. More here.
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New Funds
Greenspring Associates, the 15-year-old, Owing Mills, Md.-based venture capital fund-of-funds, is raising a $100 million secondaries fund, shows an SEC filing that states the first sale has yet to occur. It’s also raising a $225 million “opportunities” fund, shows a separate filing. Last month, the firm closed on $430 million for its Greenspring Global Partners VII. Like its previous six funds, the money for that fund will largely be earmarked in part for emerging venture capital managers.
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IPOs
Nutanix, a six-year-old, San Jose, Ca.-based company that sells data center hardware that combine elements of servers and storage arrays, filed to raise $200 million in an IPO yesterday. The company has raised $317.6 million in funding, including a $140 million Series E funding round in August of 2014. Investors include Blumberg Capital, Lightspeed Venture Partners, Khosla Ventures and Battery Ventures. VentureBeat has more here.
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People
The 2015 Silicon Valley “Nice” List.
Jack Dorsey on managing his busy life.
Sapphire Ventures (formerly known as SAP Ventures) has promoted three of its colleagues just in time for the holidays: Kevin Diestel, who joined the firm in 2012, is now a principal; Winter Mead, who joined last year, is now a VP; and David Pordes, who also joined last year, has been promoted to controller. (Congrats, all.)
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Jobs
Google Capital is looking for a senior financial analyst. The job is in Mountain View, Ca.
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Essential Reads
Drone registration may seem like unnecessary hassle for some, but an incident at the alpine skiing world cup this week illustrated why the FAA is pushing for regulation.
Rising costs have Amazon seeking alternative delivery routes, straining relations with its longtime shipping ally, UPS.
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Detours
The 12 best iPhone apps of 2015, by Mashable.
Forbes on 20 startups to watch in 2016.
The best sandwiches in New York.
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Retail Therapy
Wine bottle fire extinguisher. Just don’t drink the stuff.