Action sprinkled with advice…
It’s a new game for startups, with the days of multi-million funding deals over. Before opening their checkbooks, today’s VCs expect startups to be already taking action with a viable product and revenue—sprinkle in some consultants (real consultants with real success and experience), and a startup may have the recipe for success.
And funding seems to favor the solopreneur—the ones who are actionable and open to advice.
“VCs are also adapting and eyeing micro-funding and alternative models like revenue-based financing to fit the unique needs of solo ventures. This shift could see more solopreneurs in diverse, niche markets, weaving networks of mentorship and sustainable growth.”- Crunchbase
Some notable trends this week…
- VCs tighten the purse strings; mostly single-digit deals
- Domestic funders taking the money overseas
- Financial institutions continue to fund startups’ solutions
Up next are this week’s top 5 VC deals…
1PPRO
$93M, Capital| Equity | UK | Payments | Eurazeo, HPE Growth, Sprints, PayPal Ventures, JPMorgan, Citi Ventures, BlackRock | https://www.ppro.com/
LinkedIn Overview:
“PPRO is a fintech company that provides digital payments infrastructure to businesses and banks so that they can scale their checkout, acquiring, and risk services through one connection...”
2Eclipse
$50M, Series A, Capital| Equity | SF | Blockchain | Placeholder, Hack VC, Polychain Capital, Delphi Digital, Maven 11, DBA, Fenbushi Capital, Flow Traders, GSR, Apollo Global Management, OKX Ventures | https://www.eclipse.xyz/
LinkedIn Overview:
“Eclipse is a L2 blockchain startup based in San Francisco, founded by Neel Somani in 2022. Launching in Q2 2024, Eclipse Mainnet is Ethereum’s first SVM Layer 2…“
3Nanonets
$29M, Series B, Capital | Equity| SF | Fintech |Accel India, Elevation Capital, Y Combinator | https://nanonets.com/
LinkedIn Description:
“Nanonets enables self-service artificial intelligence by simplifying adoption. Easily build machine learning models with minimal training data or knowledge of machine learning…“
4Lago
$22M, Series A, Capital| Equity | France | Payments | FirstMark, SignalFire, Addition, YC, New Wave, Script, Meghan Gill, Romain Huet, Clément Delangue | https://www.getlago.com/
Website Description:
“Lago offers a self-hosted and cloud, scalable and modular architecture for metering and usage-based billing, at every stage of your company…”
5Polyhedra Network
$20M, Capital |Equity | Singapore | Blockchain | Polychain Capital, Animoca Brands, Emirates Consortium, Mapleblock Capital, Hashkey Capital, UoB Ventures, Symbolic Capital, Longhash Ventures, MH Ventures, Arkstream Capital, Web3Port Foundation | https://polyhedra.network/
LinkedIn Description:
“At the cutting-edge of blockchain interoperability, Polyhedra Network’s zkBridge harnesses the power of zkSNARKs to streamline cross-chain communications…”
