| | | | | | | | | | Axios Pro Rata | | By Dan Primack · Sep 05, 2023 | | | | | | Top of the Morning |  | | | Illustration: Axios Visuals | | | | I'm excited to announce details for our next Axios BFD event, which will bring together dealmakers and top biz leaders for a morning of discussion and doughnuts. Request your invite. - Where: New York City
- When: Thursday, Oct. 12.
- Why: You asked us to do it again, and we've got tons to talk about.
Confirmed guests include (in alphabetical order): Noubar Afeyan (Flagship Pioneering CEO, Moderna co-founder and chair), Keily Blair (OnlyFans CEO), Jonathan Gray (Blackstone president and COO), Wendy McMahon (CBS News president and CEO), Steve Stoute (UnitedMasters and Translation founder and CEO), Ron Shaich (Panera founder, Cava chair, Act III Holdings managing partner), and Mustafa Suleyman (Inflection AI co-founder and CEO, DeepMind co-founder). - Plus a series of Expert Voices breakfasts moderated by Axios Pro Deals reporters.
Really looking forward to seeing a lot of you in person. Space is limited, so be sure to request an invite. |     | | | | | | The BFD |  | | | Illustration: Shoshana Gordon/Axios | | | | Victory Park Capital is struggling to sell Perch, an Amazon marketplace rollup platform that in 2021 raised $775 million, per Bloomberg. Why it matters: The clock has struck midnight for many of these Amazon aggregators, which have turned into rotting pumpkins after a couple of years of pandemic-fueled prancing. - The most obvious error was buying up lots of small e-commerce brands at a market peak. But another is debt, as many of these aggregators — including Perch — leveraged their "venture capital rounds" to accelerate their buying capacity. As rates have increased, fortunes have fallen.
- For example, New York-based Benitago last week filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, despite having raised $325 million in a 2021 Series A round that included both equity and debt.
Details: Victory Park and Perch lender Apollo Global Management reportedly thought they had a deal to sell Perch to Germany's Razor Group, in which Victory Park has a debt position, but it was scuttled by Razor equity investor L Catterton. - In addition to Victory Park, other Perch equity backers include SoftBank and Spark Capital.
The bottom line: "The disagreement between Apollo and L Catterton highlights the tension between debt holders and equity stakeholders in the Amazon aggregator industry as it melts down. Debt holders are generally first in line to get paid and want to recover as much principal as possible. Equity holders want the debt holders to accept a loss on principal to make the companies stronger financially and increase their value." — Spencer Soper, Bloomberg | | | | | | | | Venture Capital Deals | | • Butternut Box, a London-based fresh dog food company, raised £280m from General Atlantic and insider L Catterton. https://axios.link/3Pp2w2I 🚑 Star Therapeutics, an SF-based developer of antibody drugs, raised $90m in Series C funding. Sofinnova Investments led, and was joined by Qatar Investment Authority, Catalio Capital Management, Agent Capital, Soleus Capital, NYBC Ventures and insiders Westlake Village BioPartners, OrbiMed, Redmile Group, RA Capital Management, New Leaf Venture Partners, Cormorant Asset Management and Cowen Healthcare Investment. https://axios.link/3Evj3M8 • ThetaRay, an Israeli anti-money laundering startup, raised $57m. Portage led, and was joined by JVP and OurCrowd. https://axios.link/3ZbBvDd • Envisics, a British developer of holographic tech for autos, raised $50m in new Series C funding ($100m round total) from firms like M&G Investments. Existing backers include Hyundai Mobis, InMotion Ventures and Stellantis. https://axios.link/3sHxWZr • Harmonya, a New York-based provider of product data analytics for CPG brands, raised $20m in Series A funding. Bright Pixel Capital led, and was joined by Team8, J Ventures, Silicon Road Ventures, Allen & Co., LiveRamp Ventures and Susa Ventures. https://axios.link/3PqzdwM • Atomicwork, an SF-based employee support startup, raised $11m in seed funding. Blume Ventures and Matrix Partners co-led, and were joined by Storm Ventures and Neon Fund. https://axios.link/3sHjIHW • Point.me, a New York-based metasearch engine for flights using loyalty program reward points, raised $10m in Series A funding. Thayer Ventures led, and was joined by PAR Capital Ventures, RiverPark Ventures, Plug and Play Ventures and MoreThanCapital. www.point.me • AlixLabs, a Swedish developer of energy-efficient chip manufacturing solutions, raised around $9m from Navigare Ventures, Industrifonden and Forward.one. https://axios.link/46gEAV5 🚑 ViAqua Therapeutics, an Israeli startup focused on animal health in aquaculture, raised $8.3m. S2G Ventures led, and was joined by Rabo Ventures, The Trendlines Group, Agriline, Nutreco, I-Lab Angels and Circle Investments. https://axios.link/3PpJ1qP • ReOrbit, a Finnish provider of software-enabled satellites, raised $7.4m. Inventure VC led, and was joined by 10x Founders, Icebreaker.vc, Expansion and Yes VC. www.reorbit.space 🌎 Opna, a London-based carbon projects financing platform, raised $6.5m in seed funding. Atomico led, and was joined by insiders Pale Blue Dot, MCJ Collective, Angelinvest and Tiny VC. https://axios.link/3Po19kW 🌎 Kind Designs, a Miami-based developer of 3D-printed seawalls, raised $5m in seed funding from GOVO Venture Partners, M4 Investing and the Florida Opportunity Fund. www.kinddesigns.com 🚑 Jude, a London-based bladder health startup, raised $4.2m in seed funding co-led by Eka VC and Joyance. https://axios.link/3sE7ks7 • Enzai, a Belfast-based provider of AI governance software, raised $4m in seed funding. Cavalry Ventures led, and was joined by Seedcamp and Techstart Ventures. www.enz.ai • Anchor, a Nigerian banking-as-a-service startup, raised $2.4m in seed funding. Goat Capital led, and was joined by FoundersX, Rebel Fund, YC and Byld Ventures. https://axios.link/3Z1f6Z4 • Orange Quantum Systems, a Dutch quantum chip testing startup, raised €1.5m in pre-seed funding from QDNL Participations and Cottonwood. https://axios.link/3Lc2mJI | | | | | | | | A message from Axios | | The current state of VC, M&A and PE | | |  | | | | Axios Pro journalists reveal which key trends and insights dealmakers are watching for the rest of 2023. Download whitepaper now. | | | | | | Private Equity Deals | | • Arcapita acquired DataFlow Group, a Dubai-based provider of credential verification services, from EQT. www.dataflowgroup.com • Battery Ventures acquired the software unit of GrammaTech, a Bethesda, Md.-based provider of app security testing products owned by Five Points Capital. www.grammatech.com • CVC Capital Partners agreed to buy a majority stake in DIF Capital Partners, a Dutch infrastructure investor with €16b in AUM, with the FT reporting a $1.1b price tag. https://axios.link/44K4AXn • ECI Partners acquired Commify, a British provider of messaging solutions for local enterprises, at a €300m valuation from Hg. https://axios.link/3r0pFPH • Godspeed Capital Management acquired Florida-based Synalovski Romanik Saye Architects, which will be merged with Stratus, Godspeed's engineering, architecture and consulting platform. www.synalovski.com • Ontario Teachers' fund agreed to acquire a majority stake in 7IM, a British wealth manager with around £21m in AUM, from Caledonia Investments. https://axios.link/3R94tl3 🚑 Permira agreed to buy British pharma services firm Ergomed (LSE: ERGO) for £703m. https://axios.link/44xtFoA 🚑 PracticeTek, a Knoxville, Tenn.-based portfolio company of Lightyear Capital and Greater Sum Ventures, acquired Practice Solutions, a Campbell, Calif.-based provider of practice management and electronic health record software whose backers include Waud Capital Partners (which is reinvesting as part of the merger). www.practicetek.com • Saudi PIF agreed to buy Saudi Iron & Steel Co. from Saudi chemicals firm Sabic for $3.3b. https://axios.link/3PoNxGc ⚡ Shell (NYSE: SHEL) agreed to sell its U.K. and German home energy retail business to Octopus Energy, a British firm backed by CPP Investments. https://axios.link/3EHN4c5 🚑 Thoma Bravo is in advanced talks to buy NextGen Healthcare (Nasdaq: NXGN), an Irvine, Calif.-based EHR/EMR company with around a $1.2b market cap, per Bloomberg. https://axios.link/45yhWHA • Xtremepush, a Dublin-based customer engagement platform backed by Grafton Capital, acquired Thunderbite, a British provider of gamification and loyalty programs. https://axios.link/3P6jYHN | | | | | | | | Public Offerings | | 💪 Arm, the British chip design giant, set IPO terms to 95 million shares at $47-$51. It would have a $50.8 billion fully diluted market value, were it to price in the middle, with SoftBank to retain more than a 90% stake. https://axios.link/3qWYAwT • Rubrik, a Palo Alto, Calif.-based data management company, is planning to go public as soon as October, per Bloomberg. It has raised around $1b in VC funding, including at a $4b valuation in 2021, from firms like Microsoft, Greylock, Lightspeed Venture Partners, Bain Capital Ventures, IVP and Khosla Ventures. https://axios.link/45WW1JM | | | | | | | | Liquidity Events | | • Orora (ASX: ORA), an Australian packaging company, agreed to buy French glass bottle maker Saverglass from Carlyle for A$2.16b. https://axios.link/3L8tnh3 • TA Associates and Warburg Pincus hired William Blair to find a buyer for Procare Solutions, a Denver-based provider of child-care management software that could fetch nearly $2b, per Reuters. https://axios.link/45CITtR ⚡ Warwick Capital Partners and GRP Energy Capital agreed to sell mineral and royalty assets in the Permian Basin to Viper Energy Partners (Nasdaq: VNOM) for around $1b in cash and stock. https://axios.link/3Z5WS8V | | | | | | | | More M&A | | • Barclays (LSE: BARC) is seeking a buyer for its U.K. payments unit, which could fetch around $2.5b, per Reuters. https://axios.link/3R1YgaJ • B&M (LSE: BMEB), a British discount retailer, agreed to buy 51 stores from Wilko, a bankrupt discount home goods retailer. https://axios.link/3qWYAwT • Cemex, the Mexican building materials giant hired JPMorgan to find a buyer for its Dominican business, which could fetch more than $1b, per Bloomberg. https://axios.link/3P5B3lv 🚑The FTC will allow Amgen's (Nasdaq: AMGN) to complete its $27.8b takeover of Horizon Therapeutics (Nasdaq: HZNP), following an agreement whereby Amgen said it won't bundle its drugs with Horizon's Tepezza or Krystexxa medicines. https://axios.link/3L9wqFE • Reinold Geiger, the billionaire controlling shareholder of Hong Kong-listed L'Occitane International, has shelved plans to take the Swiss skin care company private. https://axios.link/3sLKMFL 🚑 Stallergenes Greer, a Swiss health care group owned by B-FLEXION, agreed to buy peanut allergy treatment Palforzia from Nestlé (SWX: NESN). Nestlé paid $2.6b to buy Palforzia in 2020, but now is taking a $2.2b impairment charge. https://axios.link/3L4UwS3 | | | | | | | | Fundraising | | 🌎 Catalyst Fund, a VC firm focused on African climate tech startups, is raising $40m for its debut fund. https://axios.link/3sMPV0j • Connect Ventures of London raised an $80m interim close for its fourth fund, per TechCrunch. https://axios.link/45GkK5I • Matrix Partners China raised $1.6b for its seventh fund, per Reuters. https://axios.link/3PnHjWO ⚡ Pickering Energy Partners is launching an oil and gas investment banking unit. https://axios.link/45zkhCg • Unconventional Ventures, a Nordic "impact tech" VC firm, is raising €30m for its first formal fund. https://axios.link/3LePQJh | | | | | | | | It's Personnel | | • Delaney Brown joined Bregal Investments as head of capital solutions. He previously was head of PE funds and secondaries at Canada Pension Plan Investment Board. www.bregal.com • Glenn Borok joined Jump Capital as a VP. He previously was with In-Q-Tel. www.jumpcap.com • Fisher Lynch Capital promoted Chris Alfert to managing director and Caitlyn Dargel to VP. www.fisherlynch.com | | | | | | | | Final Numbers |  Data: LSEG; Chart: Axios Visuals Labor Day is in the rearview, and dealmakers expect laxer lending and increased CEO confidence to spark an M&A rush. Go deeper. | | | | | | | | A message from Axios | | The current state of VC, M&A and PE | | | | | | | | Axios Pro journalists reveal which key trends and insights dealmakers are watching for the rest of 2023. Download whitepaper now. | | | | Thanks for reading Axios Pro Rata, and to copy editors Mickey Meece and Bryan McBournie! Please ask your friends, colleagues and BFD attendees to sign up. |  | | Dive deeper into VC, PE and M&A | | | | | | Axios thanks our partners for supporting our newsletters.
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