VNTR Capital News September 24, 2023 – News, Events, VC Reads
Venture Capital, Web3, and Private Equity – September 24 News, Events, and VC Reads
Hello friends,
Happy Sunday!
VNTR Capital Newsletter is delivered to 50k+ investors weekly to share the latest news, events, and articles from the global VC and startup ecosystem.
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Scroll down for VNTR Capital Community News, Upcoming Events, and VC News/Reads.
VNTR CAPITAL COMMUNITY NEWS
Spotlight
Who should join VNTR — We are an inclusive, exclusive community of Venture (VNTR) Capital investors with a goal to provide a safe place and platform to connect with co-investors, share deal flow, and support each other. Active investment decision-makers can create a free account (VNTR LITE) and attend VNTR events globally. Upgrade to VNTR PRO to enjoy our premium services: mastermind groups, get peer support, match-making, and personalized interactions service, and have priority access to events and offers.
Web Summit — Our flagship event of the year will occur on Nov 14 during Web Summit in Lisbon, where we will gather VCs, angels, and family offices. Companies can apply to join as a partner of the event and connect with investors.
We are recruiting:
Chapter Directors in Riyadh, Berlin, and Los Angeles to help us launch and grow the VNTR Capital community and serve as a gateway for the Venture Capital global community. Apply here
This week
New VNTR PRO Members:
San Francisco — We hosted our second VNTR Investors Roundtable on Sep 20 as a side event to TechCrunch Disrupt (view photos) hosted by Kayvan Baroumand in partnership with Innowise.
Barcelona — We launched our VNTR Barcelona Chapter on Sep 21, led by Jordi Bosch as Barcelona Chapter Director (view photos).
Munich — The first VNTR Investors Roundtable in Munich will take place tomorrow, Sep 25, as a side event to Bitz & Pretzels and Octoberfest 2023.
Upcoming
Masterminds — We are hosting VNTR PRO Masterminds next week on Oct 3-5. Join VNTR PRO membership to grow with other VNTR PRO peers.
London — The next VNTR Investors Roundtable London will be on Oct 5 as a side event to Zebu Live (Complimentary passes for VNTR PRO members).
Tbilisi — VNTR Investors Roundtable Tbilisi on Oct 8 will gather investors during the DeGameFi Web3 annual conference.
Dubai — We are back with Dubai Chapter events and will host two events in October:
Oct 11 VNTR Investors Roundtable Dubai as a side event to Future Innovation Summit. Approved investors will get complimentary passes.
Oct 17 VNTR Investors Roundtable Dubai as a side event to GITEX Global and Expand North Star. Approved Investors get complimentary passes.
New York — We are launching the VNTR New York Chapter during NY Tech Week with our 2nd VNTR Investors Roundtable NY on Oct 19.
Miami — The launch of the VNTR Miami Chapter will take place on Oct 20 to host recurring events to engage the local investors community.
Las Vegas — Our first VNTR Investors Roundtable in Las Vegas will take place on Oct 23 as a side event to Money 20/20.
Lisbon — The Lisbon chapter will gather local investors at the VNTR Roundtable on Oct 19 and international investors at our flagship event, VNTR Roundtable on Nov 14 during Web Summit.
Thank you to our Partners:
Stellar is a decentralized, fast, scalable, and uniquely sustainable network for financial products and services. It is both a cross-currency transaction system and a platform for digital asset issuance, designed to connect the world’s financial infrastructure. Financial institutions worldwide issue assets and settle payments on the Stellar network, which has grown to over 7 million accounts. The Stellar Development Foundation (SDF) is a non-profit organization that supports the development and growth of Stellar, an open-source network that connects the world’s financial infrastructure.
Liquid Crypto is leading the way for the next generation of DeFi. Users can effortlessly complete all of their transactions within one platform with confidence, knowing they will always be offered the lowest possible rate in the market. Liquid Crypto’s AI enables projects, traders, and investors to effortlessly realize outsized returns in an omnichain reality by bridging the gap between CeFi, DeFi, Money Managers, and Market Makers. You can contact Choua Lee to learn more.
dEquity is a pioneering FinTech company transforming residential rental properties into lucrative, income-generating investments. dEquity provides innovative solutions that empower individuals from all backgrounds to participate in the real estate market, offering opportunities for passive income and financial growth. You can contact Mark to learn more.
Upcoming VNTR Capital events:
Oct 25 VNTR Investors Roundtable Barcelona (During European Blockchain Week)
Nov 1 VNTR Investors Roundtable Hong Kong (During Hong Kong FinTech Week)
Nov 3 VNTR Investors Roundtable Istanbul (During Istanbul Tech Week)
Nov 9 VNTR Investors Roundtable Singapore (During Bloomberg New Economy Forum)
Nov 14 VNTR Investors Roundtable Lisbon (During Web Summit)
Dec 1 VNTR Investors Roundtable Helsinki (During SLUSH)
Dec 10 VNTR Investors Roundtable Miami (During Art Basel Miami)
RSVP to Upcoming VNTR Capital Events
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UPCOMING VC EVENTS
Sep 24-26 Bits and Pretzels, Munich, Germany
Sep 26-28 Meridian by Stellar, Madrid, Spain
Sep 26-27 TechEx Europe, Amsterdam, Netherlands
Sep 26-28 Mobile World Congress, Las Vegas, USA
Sep 26-28 Elevate Festival, Toronto, Canada
Sep 27-30 Monaco Yacht Show, Monaco
Oct 3-4 CV Summit, Zug, Switzerland
Oct 4-5 Sifted Summit, London, UK
Oct 5-6 Zebu Live, London, UK (Complimentary for VNTR PRO members)
Oct 7-8 DeGameFi, Tbilisi, Georgia (10% off VIP passes with VNTRVIP10)
Oct 8-9 Wow Summit, Dubai, UAE (15% off with WOWDXBVNTR15)
Oct 10-11 Future Innovation Summit, Dubai, UAE (Complimentary for VNTR PRO members)
Oct 12 LetsIgnite, Bengaluru, India
Oct 15-18 Expand North Star Dubai Harbour, UAE (free for qualified investors)
Oct 16-20 GITEX Global, Dubai, UAE (free for qualified investors)
Oct 16-22 NY Tech Week, New York, USA
Oct 19-20 Bitcoin Unleashed, London, UK
Oct 19-21 VC Weekend, Dubai, UAE
Oct 20-23 Plan B Forum, Lugano, Switzerland
Oct 22-24 Money 20/20, Las Vegas, USA
Oct 23-24 SOCAP23, San Francisco, USA
Oct 24-26 Digital Nigeria, Abuja, Nigeria
Oct 24-25 Blockchain Life 2023, Dubai, UAE
Oct 25-26 Urban Tech Forward, Warsaw, Poland
Oct 30-Nov 3 Solana Breakpoint, Amsterdam, Netherlands
Oct 30-Nov 5 Hong Kong FinTech Week, Hong Kong
Oct 31-Nov 2 Singapore Week of Innovation and Technology
Nov 7-10 Nearcon, Lisbon, Portugal
Nov 8-9 Wolves Summit, Vienna, Austria
Nov 11-12 Australian Crypto Convention, Melbourne, Australia
Nov 13-16 Web Summit, Lisbon, Portugal
Nov 13 Europas, Lisbon, Portugal
Nov 13-17 AIBC Europe, Malta
Nov 14-16 SALT iConnections Asia, Singapore
Nov 15-17 Singapore Fintech Festival, Singapore
Nov 30-Dec 1 SLUSH, Helsinki, Finland
Nov 30-Dec 1 TechEx Global, London, UK
Dec 4-5 Next Block Expo, Berlin, Germany
Dec 4-8 West Tech Fest, Perth, Australia
Dec 8-10 Art Basel, Miami, USA
Dec 12-13 New England Venture Summit, Boston Dedham, MA, USA
If you would like to submit VC-related events, please respond to this email or Telegram @byuric
Follow us on Social media: Instagram, LinkedIn, Facebook, Flickr, and Twitter.
Check out VNTR Capital upcoming events
VC Reads
View curated VC news and articles on the VNTR Platform
Battle of the funds: Do VC specialists outperform generalists?
Fundraising for venture investors has become significantly more challenging in recent times, and firms are increasingly looking for ways to differentiate themselves in order to secure commitments. One strategy has been for firms to focus on specific sectors, with the result that specialist vehicles have accounted for a larger share of overall VC fund count in recent years—26.4% this year compared to 22.2% in 2014. But does specializing result in better returns compared to being a generalist fund?
50% of VCs think startup M&A - and fundraising - is on the up
It will have escaped few that when it comes to fundraising, the days of 2021 are now a distant memory. But how bad is it out there in the world of VC? And what do VCs really think about founders and the companies they are trying to persuade them to invest in? Sifted surveyed over 100 VCs to find out. Just over half of respondents to our survey said that they invest mainly at pre-seed and seed stage, with the remaining half split between Series A (27.3%), angel (10.9%) and Series B+ (10%). Over 90% are based in Europe, with a tiny fraction based in the US and Asia.
The vast majority of NFTs are now worthless, new report shows
Tens of thousands of NFTs that were once deemed the newest rage in tech and dragged in celebrities, artists and even Melania Trump have now been declared virtually worthless.
According to a new report by dappGambl that reviewed data from NFT Scan and CoinMarketCap, 69,795 out of 73,257 NFT collections have a market cap of 0 Ether, leaving 95% of those holding NFT collections – or 23 million people – with worthless investments.
How are crypto firms responding to US regulators' enforcement actions?
United States regulators including the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) have ongoing civil cases against major cryptocurrency firms including Binance, Coinbase, and Ripple, but not every company has been subject to the same treatment. Gary Gensler, serving as SEC chair since 2021, has been widely criticized by many lawmakers and industry leaders for a “regulation by enforcement” approach to crypto companies and offerings. Some of the cases have ended up in federal courtrooms to determine what may qualify as a security in the United States, and not all judges’ decisions have necessarily been favorable to the regulator.
Foreign investors retreat from Greater China's VC market
The venture ecosystem of Greater China—defined as China, Taiwan, Macau and Hong Kong—has become increasingly insular as foreign investor participation in deals reached its lowest recorded figure in the first six months of this year. A total of 264 deals worth $4.3 billion featured non-Chinese investors in H1, according to PitchBook's H1 2023 Greater China Venture Report, representing 10% of overall deal count in the region. Some 92.4% of rounds include investors based in Greater China.
Are you ready to be a public company?
Going public is not the same as being a public company. When you go public, your company’s performance suddenly has a real-time scoreboard: your stock price. It’s easy to think that high growth can make up for a low stock price, especially for founders at fast-growing late-stage startups that are still burning cash. But as a public company, the reality is that a low or volatile stock price sucks and can hurt your business. It’s bad for employee morale and retention, it’s bad for recruiting and hiring new executives, it’s bad for using your stock for M&A, and it often gives competitors the opening to point at your stock price and say, “the market’s figured it out. They’re a disaster.”
$100B+ of enterprise value created, 800+ venture studios worldwide. Hear from the operators of the top venture studios.
Venture capital, as a model, is being pulled in many directions. One of the directions taking hold: venture studios and incubations. Rising competition and escalating early-stage valuations are contributing to its popularity. As of July 2023, there were 800+ venture studios worldwide.
Increasingly, funding great early-stage investments includes building them. Sutter Hill Ventures, who incubated Snowflake, turned their stake in the company into $12B. Science’s Dollar Shave Club sold for $1B in cash to Unilever. Expa deployed $120M across 20 incubated companies with combined valuations of $3B+. Human Ventures has 10 active builds creating over $7.5B in enterprise value. Affirm, created by HVF Labs, was valued at $12B at the time of its IPO.
The Migration of the World’s Millionaires in 2023
Just like everyone else, High Net Worth Individuals (HNWIs) traveled less than usual during the pandemic, and as a result their migration numbers trended downwards. But millionaires and billionaires are on the move again and it is anticipated that 122,000 HNWIs will move to a new country by the end of the year.
Special purpose vehicles 101 — what are SPVs and how do they work?
Say you’re a seed fund and one of your breakout deals makes it to Series B. You have a good relationship with the founders but you can’t invest because it falls outside your fund’s thesis. Enter the SPV — or special purpose vehicle — a legal entity that allows you to pool capital to invest in a specific opportunity. Here’s what they are and how they work.
The Week’s 10 Biggest Funding Rounds: Mapbox Leads Another Huge Week For AI
There are some reports the AI craze may be cooling, but that’s not the case in funding this week. Three of the top four rounds went to startups directly tied to AI — with the other going oddly enough to an insurance tech company. All in all, it was a slow week that ended rather quietly.
African private equity fundraising dries up
Africa has always been a minnow in the global private equity pond. But fundraising levels this year have been particularly low, with just four closes of Africa-headquartered funds. The $55 million Joliba Capital Fund I of Ivory Coast was the biggest vehicle to close in the region, which typically sees 10 to 15 fund closes in any given year. The continent's economies have been hit particularly hard by global headwinds including the war in Ukraine, which has created major food security challenges and energy price hikes. This is making investment in African countries, already a niche, even more challenging. LPs have generally been seeking safer opportunities in funds investing in more predictable markets.
3 Tips For VCs With Struggling Portfolio Companies
With VC investment remaining slow, especially for late-stage investment, we can expect higher than usual startup failure rates, which generally already average 30% of an investment firm’s portfolio. When this happens, venture investors generally have two tactics to mitigate risk: Developing those portfolio companies with better chances of succeeding or abandoning those that are performing poorly, but helping them if you see they can survive. In my experience, for a successful return on investment, investors should not only engage with their startups that are successfully growing and increasing their capitalization, but also with those that face huge difficulties but still have the potential to survive.
Telehealth startups attract checks in challenging market
Market headwinds have taken their toll on several ecosystems and digital health is no exception. Deal activity for the sector reached a new low in Q2, and new startups have been struggling as the deals completed so far this year have tended to be for companies with existing investors, according to PitchBook analyst Aaron DeGagne. Funding for digital health is not expected to trend upward for the next few quarters. However, teletherapy has been a rare bright spot amid the gloom as funding momentum has increased in the space, according to PitchBook's Q2 2023 Digital Health Report.
Stablecoin exodus: Why are investors fleeing crypto’s safe haven?
In a year filled with uncertainty in the cryptocurrency space, a new trend has been unraveling: a stablecoin exodus that has now lasted for 18 consecutive months and has seen the market dominance of stablecoins drop to 11.6%.
According to a report from CCData, the total market capitalization of the stablecoin sector in July was $124 billion amid a 18-month decline that affected most major stablecoins. While Pax Dollar (USDP), USD Coin and Binance USD all saw declines, the largest stablecoin by market cap, Tether, has kept on growing. Stablecoins are a class of cryptocurrencies that attempt to maintain price stability through a variety of methods. Most leading stablecoins are backed by fiat currencies, although others are backed by cryptocurrencies or commodities, or are based on algorithms.
Why There Needs To Be More Allyship Among Investors To Diversify Venture Capital
Anyone who pays attention to the world of investing knows of the disparity between different demographics of founders when it comes to raising. For example, women-founded startups got just 1.9% of all VC funding in 2022, TechCrunch reported, a figure that was down from the previous year. Founders of colour have also seen their share of funding decline from an already low starting point, according to research conducted by BLCK VC and Silicon Valley Bank. That’s an issue, not only because it means entrepreneurs receiving funding don’t represent society’s makeup, but also because it means VCs are highly likely to be missing out on the best deals — it’s proven that more diverse founders are more successful.
Why PE industry consolidation is a double-edged sword
The combined factors of a tougher economic environment and a maturing industry are driving consolidation among private equity managers. In this month alone, CVC Capital Partners bought infrastructure-focused manager DIF Capital Partners, and London-listed Bridgepoint picked up Energy Capital Partners, another infrastructure specialist, for an equivalent of $1.05 billion, including debt. The two deals happened within a day of each other. Even larger firms have become targets of acquisitive peers. In May, TPG paid $2.7 billion for real estate and private credit heavyweight Angelo Gordon. At the end of last year, Sweden's EQT bought Baring Private Equity Asia—one of the Asia-Pacific's most well-established firms—in what is likely the biggest merger of its kind.
Why is applying for EU funding such a nightmare?
The EU's definition of 'great' is ‘safe’, with just a flirtatious wink at innovation, and all wrapped up in a nice thick blanket of bureaucracy
Pull up a chair, pour yourself a glass of sarcasm, and let's give the EU grant funding roulette wheel a spin. I’ll start with a question, one that most European startups will be familiar with: why are EU grants such an absolute nightmare?
I’m not just talking about the application process — the evaluation stage is also a disaster, and in many cases takes longer than the actual project.
And when you finally get the money, the project management process may make you wish you’d never applied in the first place.
There are plenty of EU grant opportunities out there, with national grants being the low-hanging fruit and cascade funding from Horizon programmes coming in second. Then there are consortium-based multi-million Euro projects that startups are drooling over.
AI Should Be Decentralized, but How?
The intersection of Web3 and artificial intelligence (AI), specifically in the form of generative AI, has become one of the hottest topics of debate within the crypto community. After all, generative AI is revolutionizing all areas of traditional software stacks, and Web3 is no exception. Given that decentralization is the core value proposition of Web3, many of the emergent Web3-generative-AI projects and scenarios project some form of decentralized generative AI value proposition.
Convenience-focused startups adjust to tighter money, lower expectations
Years of zero interest rate policy (ZIRP) gave the world ambitious venture capital-stuffed companies that sought to make everyday tasks and chores as easy as the tap of a button. But the reality of those business models is much more modest now.
Why it matters: We were promised a new world of hyper-convenience while VCs dreamed of billions in investment returns.
Driving the news: Just in the past week or so, a number of those companies have entered new corporate chapters.
AI School Tools Aren’t Just For Cheating
When ChatGPT burst onto the scene last fall, students were among the biggest early adopters. Unfortunately, teachers weren’t always pleased with their favored use cases. Lately, it looks like educators are getting more tools they might actually like. Amid a surge in AI-related venture funding, sizable investments are going to edtech startups focused on educator-friendly use cases like streamlining lesson-planning and personalizing instruction. Per Crunchbase data, companies at the intersection of AI and edtech have pulled in hundreds of millions in venture capital over the past couple of years.
Germany has produced the second most unicorns in Europe — but who could be next to join the club? Here are the contenders
ermany has its fair share of unicorns, birthing 31 since 2005 — the second most in Europe after the UK. Startup successes include the continent’s best-funded HR startup Personio, AI translation unicorn DeepL and data management for businesses provider Celonis.
With Funding Down, Startups Are Making Fewer Acquisitions
It’s not just venture capital funding that has declined for startups. M&A dealmaking between VC-backed companies has slowed too. This year is on pace to be one of the slowest for VC-backed startups buying other similarly backed startups, per Crunchbase data. So far in 2023, startups have consummated just over 200 such transactions, putting this year on pace for the lowest number of deals since 2017 and just below 2018 and 2020 numbers.
The VC slowdown: Is it set to get even worse?
Amid the downturn, VCs have tightened their purse strings. While Q2 2023 showed some signs of recovery, finally halting a six-month funding decline, funding still remains low. VC deals totalled €14.6bn — a 20% increase on Q1, but a 44% drop from the same period last year.
In our latest Sifted Talks, Sifted’s editor Amy Lewin sat down with Hussein Kanji, a general partner at London-based Hoxton Ventures, to talk about the state of VC investing and what startups need to be prepared for.
Will AI Take Your Job? Maybe. Here Are 2 Skills You’ll Need To Stay Employable
AI knowledge has quickly become table stakes. Literally. If you can’t sit at someone’s dinner table and have a thoughtful, high-level conversation about AI, you’re going to get left behind. This applies to not only business leaders, but any employee whose organization leverages this technology. AI seems to be all anyone can talk about, and each new development rapidly changes the way we work. So far, these effects have been both positive and negative, depending on who you ask. For some people, their fears surrounding AI have become a reality: A recent report found that AI replaced nearly 4,000 jobs earlier this year. We can expect to see more jobs become obsolete as the technology continues to develop. On the other side of the coin, the proliferation of AI will also create new jobs — a staggering 97 million of them according to The World Economic Forum.
Risk is up due to the downturn: Here’s why it’s important to VC
Global markets have slowed in the recent tech downturn, and so too has venture capital activity, falling by 61% in Europe in the first half of 2023. This has made investors more risk-aware and more cautious with their money, but that doesn’t mean they should dismiss disruptive startups. Risk is an inherent part of VC — it powers innovation, diversity and, ultimately, bigger returns.