Top image via Pixabay. CC0 Creative Commons
Minnesota companies both big and small were scooped up this year. Here are some of the most significant deals:
- Bite Squad, a Minneapolis-based food delivery startup, reached a deal to be sold for $321 million to Waitr Holdings.
- Microsoft acquired Minneapolis-based tech startup Flipgrid, an education-technology platform, for an undisclosed amount. As part of the deal, Microsoft will start offering Flipgrid free for schools, and customers who already paid for a subscription will receive a prorated refund. Microsoft will retain Fliprid’s operations in Minneapolis. This is Microsoft’s first acquisition of a Minnesota startup.
- WholeMe, a startup making grain-free snacks, was sold to Twin Cities food manufacturer Log House Foods. Terms of the deal were not disclosed. Former bakery owner Krista Steinback and Mary Kosir, previously a Carlson School of Management dean, launched WholeMe to create healthy snacks about four years ago. The startup raised capital through both a Kickstarter campaign and from private investors. It closed on $1 million from angel investors about two years ago.
- Biotech startup Rebiotix was sold to a Swiss pharmaceuticals company for an undisclosed amount. Rebiotix is developing a product to treat severe infections using microbes harvested from human stool. The company’s product has yet to receive regulatory approval, but was accepted into the FDA’s fast track program in 2013.
- Perforce Software was sold to Santa Monica, Calif.-based Clearlake Capital Group around two years after moving its headquarters from California to Minneapolis. Terms weren't disclosed.
- Tech startup MyAlerts, which lets consumers track products online and receive notifications of price drops and other changes, was sold to private equity firm Think3 for an undisclosed amount. MyAlerts is currently led by local serial entrepreneur Doug Berg. As part of the deal, Austin, Texas-based Think3 said its founder, Andy Tryba, will take over as CEO of MyAlerts.
- Inspire Medical, which makes an implantable medical device that treats sleep apnea, raised $108 million in its IPO.
- Reeher, which makes software that uses predictive modeling to help colleges and universities identify likely donors, was sold to Blackbaud for $43 million.
- Software company Ceridian HCM Holdings completed its IPO April 26, bringing in at least $462 million. The company, which is technically based in Bloomington, but run largely out of Toronto, priced its shares at $22 apiece. That topped the high end of its expected range of $19 to $21. The money raised by Ceridian is more than the seven most recent Minnesota IPOs combined.
- Health-IT company Ability Network Inc. was sold to Bowie, Maryland-based Inovalon Holdings for $1.2 billion.
- HelpSystems was sold to California private equity firm HGGC for $1.1 billion.
- Twin Cities med-tech company NxThera agreed to be sold to Boston Scientific in a deal worth up to $400 million. As part of the deal, NxThera planned to spin out a new startup that would pursue regulatory approval of a device that will treat prostate cancer.
- Medical-device maker Cogentix Medical reached a deal to be sold to Canadian company Laborie Medical Technologies for $239 million.
