Tech IPOs may be slowing to a historic crawl, but a new report says venture funding is at a 15-year high. Here’s how some of that money got spent this week:
Capital Gains: Vessel and Slack Swallow More Cash
Slack, Vessel and a bunch of cloud software companies announced big rounds this week.
Todd Bernard
- The office productivity software maker Slack confirmed a report from last month saying the company had raised an additional $160 million round at a $2.8 billion valuation. The company now has $340 million in funding to date.
- Enterprise security startup Illumio raised $100 million in funding from BlackRock and Accel Partners, giving it $142 million in total funding thus far. Additional investors in the company include Salesforce CEO Marc Benioff, Yahoo co-founder Jerry Yang and Microsoft chairman John Thompson.
- The online video startup Vessel, led by ex-Hulu chief Jason Kilar, locked up another $58 million in funding in a round led by Institutional Venture Partners. Last June, the company raised $77 million from Benchmark, Greylock and Jeff Bezos.
- The on-demand food delivery service Sprig raised $45 million in a new funding round led by Social Capital and Greylock Partners, giving the company $57 million in total funding. One interesting investor: Sam Kass, executive director of Michelle Obama’s Let’s Move Initiative and former White House chef (Fortune).
- Vlocity, a cloud software startup that specializes in Salesforce’s Customer Success Platform, raised $42 million in a funding round led by Salesforce Ventures, with participation from Accenture (ZDNet).
- Appirio, which designs software to help companies make the transition to cloud-based services like Salesforce and Workday, landed $35 million in a new investment led by Fidelity Investments (The Wall Street Journal).
- The chip security firm Skyport Systems raised $30 million in a Series B round led by Index Ventures with participation from Sutter Hill Ventures and Intel Capital. The startup is still operating in stealth, revealing few details about its actual work (Forbes).
- Peloton, a New York-based startup that operates a live-streamed and brick-and-mortar spinning class service, raised $30 million in Series C funding. The round was led by True Ventures and the hedge fund Tiger Global Management (New York Business Journal).
- 2015 is shaping up to be an important year for companies making “smart” technology for cars, and it’s translating to significant funding dollars for companies like the car display maker Navdy, which just raised $20.3 million in a funding round led by Upfront Ventures (Fortune).
- Planet Labs is the satellite manufacturer that counts Russian billionaires, SpaceX investors and now The World Bank among its backers. The World Bank’s International Finance Corporation is putting $20 million behind Planet Labs, giving the company $170 million in total funding (Reuters).
- EyeEm, an Instagram-like service for professional photographers, raised $18 million in a funding round led by Peter Thiel’s Valar Ventures.
- The Flatiron School, which makes educational software to teach computer science, raised $9 million in a Series B led by Thrive Capital with participation from Matrix Partners and CRV (TechCrunch).
- The read-it-later service Pocket raised $7 million in new funding from New Enterprise Associates, which means the company now has $14.5 million in total capital.
This article originally appeared on Recode.net.
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