Exits Intel Capital is reportedly looking to sell up to $1bn worth of its venture assets. Qualcomm meanwhile looks to have scored a major exit after General Motors agreed to buy driverless vehicle technology developer Cruise Automation in a deal reportedly sized north of $1bn. Cruise, which was founded in 2013, had disclosed only $18m … Continue reading "21 March 2016 – Intel Capital, Qualcomm, Spoonrocket, Corvus Pharmaceuticals, Hutchison China MediTech, GenomeDx, LendInvest, DouyuTV, Cainiao and more"

Deals Ant Financial, the financial services affiliate of Chinese giant Alibaba, which is seeking up to $3bn at a valuation of $60bn while it reportedly prepares for an IPO next year. An equally impressive, if significantly less $1bn is being sought by India-based e-commerce company Flipkart, which is hoping to get a commitment from Alibaba … Continue reading "14 March 2016 – Ant Financial, Flipkart, WeWork, Astroscale, Precision Ocular, Replay Technologies, Lasergen, Stanford University and more"

Deals We tracked 132 deals in the month. While this would be the lowest month for deal activity since September 2014, it is not much below activity in many of the months during the last year and a half, while it is significantly above most months in 2014 as well as prior years. We also … Continue reading "7 March 2016 – Google Capital, Alphabet, Magic Leap, Snapchat, Mercari, AXA, Slack, Souqcom, Vertex, Purdue University, Oregon State University and more"

Funds The start of Mobile World Congress which saw Nokia Growth Partners (NGP), the venture capital firm sponsored by communications equipment maker Nokia, start a $350m fund that will invest in internet of things (IoT) technology companies. Electronics manufacturer TCL Corporation and fabless semiconductor producer Tsinghua Unigroup are forming a $1.53bn corporate venturing fund that … Continue reading "29 February 2016 – Tsinghua Unigroup and TCL Corporation fund, University of California and RNT Associates, Uxin, Didi Kuaidi, Razer, Nestlé, Qualcomm and more"

Fundraising Food technology developers like Impossible Foods and Juicero have raised some big rounds over the last year or two and that’s spurring food product makers to start entering corporate venturing in a significant way. General Mills set up a strategic investment unit late last year, and now Campbell Soup has joined the fray, putting $125m … Continue reading "22 February 2016 – Campbell Soup, Statoil, landscaping in China, MindMaze, Yello, Volvo, Google, Pie and more"

Funds Financial services provider BBVA has been a notable fintech investor since early 2013 when it formed a $100m fund that has since backed companies including DocuSign, Taulia and Prosper. The bank has now elected to upgrade its participation, committing another $150m and spinning out its investments into a new VC firm called Propel Venture … Continue reading "15 February 2016 – Chinese new year, fintech investor BBVA, Innogy Venture Capital, triple French biotech fund, Unicef, Shanghai reimburses venture capital firms and more"

Big news – people moves Claudia Fan Munce’s retirement as managing director of IBM’s Venture Capital Group, following other high-profile departures such as Nagraj Kashyap and Arvind Sodhani over the past year. Tom Hockaday leaving Isis. Exits Jasper (Singtel and Temasek) after Gilt last month. Rocket Internet has sold its food ordering sites in Europe, … Continue reading "8 February 2016 – Munce retires, Jasper exit, Sesame Street, Pierre Fabre and more…"