Roundup of news and ideas from the world of startups – Week ending 29th April 2018
News you can use
Google Holding $11 Billion in Its Startup Investments – Google’s parent company Alphabet Inc. has shared a result from its years of sizeable startup investing for the first time on Monday: The holdings are worth about $11 billion, according to the company estimates. A new accounting rule prompted Alphabet Inc. to disclose the fair value for its private stock holdings in earnings reports starting this year. The figure includes the company’s stake in some of Silicon Valley’s most highly valued startups, such as Uber Technologies Inc., Airbnb Inc. and Stripe Inc.
Corporate M&A
Monsanto closes first startup deal in Brazil – The biotech giant is backing Grão Direto, a platform digitizing the grain buying and selling chain. Monsanto Growth Ventures (MGV) has made its first direct investment in Brazil in Grão Direto, a platform digitizing the grain buying and selling chain. Alongside Canary and the creators of OpenVC fund, Monsanto will invest R$ 2.3 million in the development and growth of the Minas Gerais-based venture in what is the first direct investment for MGV since its inception in 2011.
Amazon leads $12M investment in India-based digital insurance startup Acko – Amazon appears to be restarting its funding efforts in India after Acko, the Digital Insurance Startup in India, confirmed that the U.S. retail giant led a new round of funding for its business. Amazon — which has been linked with an Acko investment since the start of this year — backed lending startup Capital Float last month, and now it has led a $12 million funding round for Acko alongside Ashish Dhawan, the founder of PE firm ChrysCapital, and existing backer Catamaran Ventures. The deal takes Acko to $42 million raised to date. Acko was founded in late 2016 by Varun Dua, one of the co-founders of insurance comparison site Coverfox. With Acko, Dua is taking a deeper step into insurance with a digital-only business aimed at disrupting the $10 billion industry in India by leveraging the growth of internet access in India to democratize coverage and develop more relevant products.
Startup shut and failed last week
Indian micro-delivery startup MrNeeds shuts down – It was trying to stand out against eCommerce giants like Bigbasket, Grofers, and Amazon.in in a hyper-competitive market. MrNeeds was focused on optimizing the supply chain and minimizing delivery costs. It had raised about $500K in pre-Series-A funding from a group of angel investors.
How Nigerian startup founders cope with the stigma of failure in an unforgiving market – Njoku’s words on his Medium post last month were blunt, but they resonate with both experienced and young tech entrepreneurs trying to navigate a tough underfunded, competitive Nigerian market. It’s a far cry from the home of modern startup culture, Silicon Valley, where the popular mantra, “fail fast, fail often” seems to suggest that community respects failure and even encourages startups to fail. The attitude is entirely different in Nigeria where founders often try to keep news of their failure as quiet as possible.
