The Week in Italian Startups

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The week in Italian startups - Issue #34

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The week in Italian startups - Issue #34

Niccolò Sanarico
Nov 22, 2020
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The week in Italian startups - Issue #34

dealflowit.niccolosanarico.com

The Money

  • Satispay [cb], a mobile payments provider, raised €93M in a Series C round from investors including Square, Tencent, LGT Lightstone [cb], and TIM Ventures [cb] (the CVC arm of TIM, a telco). The reported post-money was €248M. Fun fact: all capital raised by Italian fintech startups in 2019 amounted to €250M (according to the EY report we met in issue #25).

  • SIGHUP [cb], a startup specialized in cloud computing automation, 🇮🇹 raised €14M from White Bridge Investments [cb].

  • Gellify [cb] 🇮🇹 invested in a Poggipolini spinoff, Sens-in, an IoT startup developing a smart screw for industrial uses. Amount undisclosed.

M&A

  • Two weeks ago I reported about the ongoing talks between Italy's Nexi and Denmark's Nets: the two found an agreement and Nexi announced it will acquire Nets in an all-share deal worth €7.8Bn. The resulting company will be one of the global champions in the digital payments industry.

  • Lanieri [cb], a "digital tailor" startup with 48% of its revenues coming from outside of Italy, 🇮🇹 was acquired by Gruppo Reda for an undisclosed amount. Reda is a €120M+ group based in Biella and specialized in high-quality textiles. According 🇮🇹 to this article, Lanieri had a €4.9M turnover in 2019.

  • Milan-based ImpactLab, a genetic laboratory provider, acquired Lisbon-based HeartGenetics [cb] for an undisclosed amount.

"Surging homegrown talent and VC spark Italy's tech renaissance"

  • Mike Butcher authored a long article about the current and future state of startups in Italy, including interviews with senior members of the most prominent Italian VC funds. Interesting reading on Techcrunch - partially behind a paywall.

A new fund in CDP portfolio

  • CDP Venture Capital 🇮🇹 added another fund to its portfolio, the €200M "relaunch" fund to support startups and innovative SMEs.

  • The fund was announced in August but got stuck in the approval process. It will invest up to €1M in each target company, by matching private investors in a 4:1 ratio (i.e. the fund can invest up to 4 euros for each 1 euro of private capital).

  • Professional investors (including non-Italian investors) will be required to register on a dedicated website in order to qualify for this investment scheme - I will share the URL as soon as it is made public.

Fireside chat with Enrico Resmini, head of CDP Venture Capital

  • Speaking of CDP, Resmini and Martìn Varsavsky, a serial entrepreneur and investor, will discuss the outlook of venture capital on Tuesday 25th, at 6 pm CET. You can signup for free here.

Insuretech 100

  • YOLO [cb], an on-demand insurance provider based in Milan, was nominated in Fintech.global's Insurtech100 for 2020.

The App Store becomes small-biz friendly(-ier)

  • Apple announced it is planning to lower its 30% fee to 15% for small developers (i.e. those earning <$1M in annual revenues).

  • The interesting bit in the article is the (reportedly) extremely skewed distribution of revenues on the store: 98% of publishers would be eligible for the cut, but in aggregate they make up for only 5% of total revenues. Another instance of power laws in the digital world?

  • If this is true, Apple is making headlines but not so much putting a dent in its bottom line 🙄.

  • On the other side, a sudden 15% surge in marginality can be extremely important for early-stage startups - I for one welcome the decision 💪🏻.

Only for SaaS startups

  • If you run a SaaS company (or invest in them), then the Openview 2020 SaaS expansion benchmarks is a good reading to compare with your peers' metrics. This edition appears to be in a love/hate relationship with Product Led Growth - this is the buzzword you should care about in 2020!

Ending notes

As I mentioned in the introduction, what a week! FintechItaly is alive and kicking.

As always, thank you for your feedback and links. Keep pushing!

Take care, and stay safe,

N.

Supported by VC Hub Italia
Supported by VC Hub Italia
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The week in Italian startups - Issue #34

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