TWIS #188
Tau Group, Ventive, and others raised funding. Bending Spoons close to raising €200m? Italian funds invest abroad (in life science startups). A survey about the culture of growth in Italian startups.
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.
💡Advanced Incubation Program by Almacube (sponsor)
Applications are open for the Advanced Incubation Program organized by Almacube, the innovation hub of the University of Bologna and Confindustria Emilia Area Centro.
By participating, you can take advantage of:
🎥 Live workshops led by experts, delving into crucial topics for your startup. The first one takes place in preview on February 15th, 2024. Register for free.
📊 One-on-one consulting and mentorship with professionals and experts, supporting you in strategic decisions for your project.
🤝🏻 Networking events to expand your network of B2B contacts.
🎤 Final Demo Day, an opportunity to present your startup to potential investors and customers.
For more information, visit the website and 🗓️book an insight call by Feb. 16.
The Money 💰
Tau Group, an energy transition startup, raised €11m in Series B extension funding led by CDP Venture Capital and Santander Alternative Investments.
Ventive, a consulting and investment firm for startups , 🇮🇹raised €2.4m from a syndicate of investors.
Sikuro, a building site security startup, 🇮🇹raised €1m in a crowdfunding round led by Fleap Holding Spa and Azimut.
Renewcast, an energy forecasting startup for wind energy, 🇮🇹raised €850k in a round led by Helen Ventures and Tech4Planet.
Glutensens and VisioNing 🇮🇹raised €204k and €184k from Farming Future and ToSeed&Partners.
Bending Spoons 🇮🇹announced it is preparing to raise a €200m round.1 I was impressed by their 2023 EBITDA reported in the article: €200m!
The Money, international edition 💰🌍
Panakès Partners led a €30,4m round in Enterprise Therapeutics.
Angelini Ventures 🇮🇹invested €8m in Noctrix Health Inc. and COUR Pharmaceuticals.
Neophore raised an additional $12.2m in its Series B round from Neva SGR, LIFTT, and Simon Fiduciaria.
New Funds 💫
CDP VC’s fund-of-funds arm invested in Seroba Fund IV, a €123m life sciences fund.
M&A 🥩
Zucchetti 🇮🇹acquired a majority stake in Awms.
Safilo 🇮🇹acquired a minority stake in Spaarkly.
Poké House 🇮🇹acquired Poké House Belgium.
Reading this week 📚
SECO was accepted into the Qualcomm IoT Accelerator Program.
Opyn 🇮🇹is expanding its BNPL service for businesses to Europe, UK, and Switzerland.
🇮🇹15 startups incubated by the Startup Builder to keep an eye on.
The Italian “Gazzetta Ufficiale” (the primary source of legal information and the official vehicle for the publication of new laws, decrees, regulations, and other acts of the Italian government) was released as a data set on HuggingFace. Will LLMs manage to understand the intricacies of our legal system?
A ✍🏻 survey about the culture of growth in Italian startups: if you are a founder of an Italian startup with a couple of minutes to spare, 🇮🇹click here.
Scalapay 🇮🇹appointed Andrea Fumagalli as country manager for Italy.
More than 100 businesses 🇮🇹adopted JetHR since its launch.📈
Yes, it is cricket: Italy gives the go-ahead to insect flour for human use.
🌟Jobs in Italian Startups🌟
If you want to have one or more job positions relevant to the Italian ecosystem listed, fill out this form. Each position will remain visible for 30 days at this link.
Latest positions:
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Startup Events in Italy🎪
Keep an eye on the upcoming events in the Italian ecosystem2. Feel free to add an event through this form.
Newly added events:
→ See all the other events coming up.
Fundraising Tracker 📈
Ending Notes📝
I am experimenting with sponsorships in the newsletter. If you want to know more about sponsoring TWIS (and/or the podcast episodes), read some info here and send me a note!
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.
I am not adding Bending Spoon’s round to the tracker yet, as it is unclear whether it was only announced or already raised.
The following events are welcome, but feel free to submit your entry!
Demo days
Calls for startups
Startup fairs, events, happy hours…