Austin ended 2019 with its biggest fourth quarter since PitchBook started collecting comparable data in 2013. And local tech startups were off to the races as soon as the calendar flipped to 2020.
Vapor IO's $90M funding and FlashParking's $60M investment announcement topped the month's funding news. But there were plenty of other stellar deals logged in January, along with several acquisitions and some interesting activity at local venture capital firms.
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Alright, let's check out the deals from January 2020 ...
Funding Rounds
The Guild, an Austin-based startup providing short-term stays at stylish apartments, raised $25M in new investment to expand to a total of a dozen markets by 2021. The new round came from traditional venture capital firms Maveron, Convivialite Ventures and ATX Venture Partners — and from strategic real estate partners RXR Realty, Corigin and Nicol Investment Group. That comes after a $8.5M Series A led by Maveron in 2018.
Locally based accounts receivable and collections software startup CollBox announced it landed a $1M seed round. The investment was led by new Austin venture firm Bala Investments, which is led by managing director Rajiv Bala, former VP of S3 Ventures and previously invested in Raleigh- and Austin-based Allstacks. Bala will join the company’s board as part of the deal. Other investors included Long View Technology Ventures, Capital Factory and the Alamo Angel Network. CollBox’s software analyzes overdue debt and ties in with collections agencies and other collections solutions. It was co-founded by CEO Cameron Desautels and Matt Darner.
Austin-based Shep, which developed a browser extension to help companies manage travel purchased outside of normal corporate policies, secured an undisclosed minority investment from FCM Travel Solutions. They’re a New Jersey based travel management company, and they plan to integrate Shep’s extension into its next travel platform product. Shep was founded in 2016 by Daniel Senyard, Rey Garcia and Rafael Torres. It has attracted investment from Capital Factory, Moonshots Capital and Plug and Play. Its angel investors have included Ellen Keszler, former president at Travelocity Business; Kathy Misunas, former CEO at Sabre; Mariano Dima, former CMO of HomeAway; Jim Finnigan, co-founder at SoFi; and Don Birch, former CEO of Abacus GDS. The new investment follows a $1.4M seed round in 2018.
TeleVet, an Austin telemedicine startup for veterinarians and pet owners, closed a $2M seed round that was co-led by Omaha-based Dundee Venture Capital and Houston’s Mercury Fund. Also in on the deal was GAN Ventures, the venture arm of Denver-based Global Accelerator Network. TeleVet was founded in 2015 by Steven Carter and Price Fallin. It has raised $2.3M to date. Its mobile app extension provides scheduling, digital prescriptions and other communications.
Locale LLC raised $11M to fuel its growing hospitality business. Locale was founded in 2016 and has now raised a total of $14M, according to a Jan. 13 announcement. Piggybacking on the popularity of short-term home rentals made popular by companies such as Airbnb and Vrbo, Locale works with owners and developers of urban apartment buildings to turn some of their units into hotel rooms. The Austin-based startup’s $11M series A round was led by Amplo Ventures, which led a prior $2.5M round in April 2019. Also participating in the most recent round were Susa Ventures, Malking Holdings, Rogue Insight Capital and Metropolis Capital Partners.
OpsLock, a Montreal-based industrial risk management platform with offices in Austin, reported raising $2.5M in equity funding. This appears to be its first filing for venture funding for OpsLock, which was founded in 2017 and was previously known as Pelorus Inc. It has posted several jobs, but they’re all listed in Montreal or Houston.
FlashParking raised a $60M strategic investment from L Catterton, a private equity firm in Connecticut. The money will help FlashParking hire about 150 new employees in Austin and continue expanding its mobility hub operating system. FlashParking, founded in 2011, already has about 150 employees, most of whom are based at the company’s only office near South Lamar and Highway 360.
Austin-based Criquet Apparel reported raising about $677K in new equity funding. As you may recall, their shirts caught a small wave of media attention back in October when members of the Washington Nationals baseball team sported the shirts, with a team insignia, during the World Series.
Vapor IO, which hasn’t previously disclosed its funding, said it closed a $90M Series C funding round led by Boston-based private equity titan Berkshire Partners and Houston-based cell phone tower and wireless communications giant Crown Castle. The round was first announced in 2018 and now has been expanded.
Enzyme Health was reborn as Wheel and raised a $13.9M Series A. Fortune’s Term Sheet added that CRV led the round, with participation from investors like Tusk Venture Partners and Silverton Partners.
Austin-based Stoplight, which developed an API design management tool, announced a $6M Series A round that was co-led by local firms Next Coast Ventures and Bill Wood Ventures. The company’s API designer, Stoplight Studio, has taken off and the startup has seen 200% year-over-year growth, a news release says. The company is led by founder and CEO Marc Macleod. It has now raised $10M, which includes a prior $3M round led by Bill Wood Ventures, who previously co-founded Austin Ventures and founded Silverton Partners. NextGen Venture Partners, Next Coast Ventures, Social Starts and Capital Factory also participated in Stoplight’s seed round.
Austin-based clinical stage gene therapy company Genprex, Inc. closed its common stock offering for a total of $8M. A release on the move adds that the company sold an aggregate of around 7.6M shares at $1.05 per share. Genprex leadership said it would use the net proceeds from the CSO to further develop its non-small cell lung cancer lead clinical programs, as well as for “general corporate purposes” and working capital.
Orchard, a home-buying platform based in New York and with offices in Austin, announced a $36M round led by Navitas. Others in on the round were FirstMark, Juxtapose and Accomplice. The company, which used to be called Perch, also has offices in Dallas and San Antonio. It was founded in 2017. This follows a $220M round in April. It’s $30M Series A came in 2018. It employs about 150 people in the U.S. and plans to double by the end of the year.'
Mergers and Acquisitions
Arlington-based sole proprietor B2B sales and marketing company Brand Message Clarity announced it will operate under Austin-based Sellerant, a fully-integrated strategy, sales and marketing firm for B2B startups – a move that comes as Brand Message Clarity CEO Daisy McCarty joins Sellerant as its new director of marketing and business development. Brand was founded in 2008.
Locally based electronic payments startup ePayPolicy announced a new investment led by Serent Capital, a PE firm with offices in Austin and San Francisco. They didn’t report the size of the funding. The company, which focuses on the insurance market, was founded in 2014 by Milan Malkani and Todd Sorrel.
LogicMonitor, a California-based tech company with major offices in Austin, acquired Sweden-based AIOps company Unomaly, which was founded in 2012. LogicMonitor has about 550 employees, and Austin is home to its largest group of workers. The company is partially owned by Austin-based Vista Equity Partners.
Austin’s Miratech, which makes risk management software, acquired ClusterSeven, a London-based business software company, the Statesman reported. It was Miratech’s ninth acquisition.
Other Venture Capital Activity
Billie Inc., a New York-based subscription service for women’s razors, grooming and beauty products, is being acquired by P&G. That would add to P&G’s brand lineup, which includes Venus and Braun. Austin VC firm Silverton Partners was a lead investor in the company’s $6M seed round in 2018, and Silverton’s Mike Dodd was on the company’s board of directors. Last year, Billie went on to land a $25M Series A round led by Goldman Sachs’ Private Capital Investing Group, which Silverton also joined in on.
Tritium Partners, an Austin PE firm, led a $33M investment into Vancouver-based private tours marketplace ToursByLocals. It’s the latest travel-related investment for Tritium, which has also backed Austin-based RVshare.
Silverton Partners, an Austin VC firm, promoted Roger Chen to partner. He originally joined Silverton in 2017 as principal. Before that, he was a principal at Genacast VEntures in New York. In addition, Tina Dai has joined as principal. She joins from First Round Capital in San Francisco. Before that, she worked in product and strategy at McKinsey.
UT professor and local actor you might have heard of Matthew McConaughey is pitching in on a $50M round of funding for The Athletic, a subscription-based digital sports media company based in San Francisco. McConaughey’s share comes via Plus Capital, which includes a lot of big name entertainment stars.
Ironspring, a local VC firm, is adding Ty Findley as a managing partner. Findley, who is relocating to Austin from Chicago, has spent nearly a decade in the digital industrial space, both as a venture investor and as an engineer. He was most recently responsible for early and growth-stage investments as VP of Chicago-based Pritzker Group Venture Capital. Before that, he was a senior associate at GE Ventures. He also spent a year as a venture fellow analyst with Austin-based, early-stage investment firm 51 Capital. He joins Managing Partners Adam Bridgman and Peter J. Holt who founded the firm in 2019.
