Startups swarm to build bee businesses
Much is abuzz in the small world of bee-related startups. A Crunchbase News analysis finds upstart companies are offering pollination as a service, a bee brokerage network, an online honey marketplace, hive analytics, and a host of other ventures aimed at boosting bee productivity.
General Electric—hamstrung by a rough year on the public markets and other assorted woes—is looking to sell its GE Ventures unit. The venture firm has been a prolific startup backer, with over 160 investments. Yet corporate VC portfolios rarely go up for sale, and valuing assets will be a complicated endeavor.
Facebook has just made its first known startup investment within India: putting an undisclosed yet reportedly sizable sum into Meesho, which helps people resell goods from home to make money. Bangalore-based Meesho previously raised around $62 million, at a reported valuation around $250 million.
Zume, a heavily funded startup best known for robot-enabled mobile pizza kitchens, is expanding into the packaging space with the acquisition of Pivot Packaging, a producer of compostable boxes made from sugar cane fibers.
Online pet supply retailer Chewy priced its initial public offering at $22 a share, above the expected range, setting a reported initial valuation around $8.8 billion. The deal is the latest indication that, Uber aside, the IPO climate for tech and Internet deals remains super hot.
More than 50 companies have crossed the $1 billion valuation threshold so far this year. An analysis of the Unicorn Class of 2019 shows that newcomers tend to be more U.S.-based than previous years, with a far smaller share coming from China.
Shares of Fiverr, a marketplace for creative and freelancing services, soared more than 30 percent in first-day trading Thursday. Earlier, the Israel-based company priced shares for its IPO at $21, above the projected range.
Security companies are raising huge sums, going public at super-high-valuations, and getting acquired for a lot of money lately. Crunchbase News takes a look at the latest big deals and exits, along with what’s prompting the flood of dollars into the space.
Scooter consolidation is coming to a sidewalk near you. Scoot-sharing pioneer Bird confirmed that it has acquired Scoot, another aspiring startup in the crowded space.
Setting valuations for private companies has always been a complicated business. But lately, it seems like private backers, bankers and public market investors have more disparate views on pricing than usual. The CrowdStrike IPO is a case in point.
