TWIS #160
TWIS #160
Blendee, Jet HR, Planckian, and others raised funding. Alchimia SpA sold a stake in Fenice. Tata Communications to acquire Kaleyra Inc. Masayoshi Son is going all-in on AI.
Hello,
Welcome back to The Week in Italian Startups. This is Niccolò from Primo Ventures: every week, I publish my curated list of the latest news from the Italian startup ecosystem.
The Money
Blendee, born by the merger between Neodata and Adabra, two martech startups, 🇮🇹raised €6m from Blacksheep.
Jet HR, an hr-tech startup, raised €4.7m from Exor Seeds and a syndicate of prominent seed VCs, entrepreneurs, and angels.
Planckian, a quantum batteries startup, raised €2.7m from Eureka!, Exor, and business angels.
Greeat, a fast-food startup, 🇮🇹raised €1m from business angels.
Hotiday, a hospitality-tech startup, 🇮🇹raised €500k from Bonsai Ventures, B4i, Moonstone, and others.
Smilee Finance, a UK-based on-chain protocol for derivatives, raised $2m from a group of web3 and crypto investors.
Panakes Partners led a €14.35m round in EBAmed, a Swiss medtech startup.
M&A
Alchimia Spa sold a portion of its stake in Fenice, Chiara Ferragni’s brand company, valuing Fenice €75m (and realizing a sizable multiple).
Tata Communications to acquire Kaleyra Inc. for $100m.
Italiana Assicurazioni 🇮🇹acquired Plurima, an insuretech startup, for an undisclosed amount.
Digital Magics and LVenture Group 🇮🇹agreed on the terms of their merger.
Reading this week
Venture capital in Italy: unleashing innovation and driving economic growth.
Coatue’s EMW 2023 presentation.
Masayoshi Son going all-in on AI (Softbank presentation, worth a look).
The SEC rejected the latest Bitcoin ETF filings.
Fundraising Tracker
Ending Notes
Giacomo Mollo and I comment weekly on the latest news: subscribe to our podcast on YouTube, Spotify, Apple Podcast, Amazon Music, and other platforms to get additional insights on what is happening in the Italian ecosystem.
Have a great week,
N.