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| Here's a look at today's Startups briefing. - Joffre looking to acquire Byju's Epic division for $400M.
- Palo Alto Networks acquires Talon Cyber Security for $625M.
- OS for gig work startup Nowsta raises $35M.
Thank you. Karan
p/karan-chafekar | |
| 1 | | Joffre Capital is reportedly in advanced talks to acquire Indian edtech startup Byju's U.S.-based kids' digital reading platform Epic! Creations Inc. for $400M. Byju's, officially known as Think & Learn Pvt, had acquired Epic for $500M in 2021. Byju's is reportedly selling the unit to pay down its disputed $1.2B loan. More: - Duolingo and other competitors have also expressed interest in purchasing the unit.
- The Indian edtech firm has been locked in a conflict with creditors after missing an interest payment on a $1.2B term loan.
- Earlier this September, Byju's informed creditors that it is looking to pay back the entire $1.2B amount in less than six months by liquidating its assets.
Zoom out: - Byju's reported $429.18M in revenue from its core business divisions for the financial year ending Mar. 2022, missing the initial projections of $1.25B.
- EBITDA losses for the core business shrunk to $270.9M.
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| 2 | | Palo Alto Networks has reportedly acquired Talon Cyber Security for $625M. What the numbers say: The reported acquisition price is nearly double that of the Israeli secure enterprise browser developer company's most recent valuation of $350M from Aug. 2022. An earlier report from September noted that Palo Alto Networks had offered a price of $600M. Relevance: Per Calcalist, Talon's employees are set to receive between $70M and $80M from the transaction. Talon had raised $126M in total funding to date, from CrowdStrike Falcon Fund, Merlin Ventures, SYN Ventures, Lightspeed Venture Partners, Sorenson Ventures, and others. Where to see the impact: This is Palo Alto Networks' second acquisition in recent months, after acquiring Dig Security Solutions at the end of October. The firm has acquired more than a half-dozen firms to date, spending more than $1.5B since 2019. 
Why it matters: Palo Alto Networks' startup acquisition spree comes amidst a slump in M&A activity. Per Pitchbook's latest report, M&A spending dipped 20% in Q3 after remaining flat for four consecutive quarters. | | | |
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| 3 | | Nowsta, a New York-based startup focusing on operating systems for gig work, raised a $35M Series C led by VMG Partners. The company develops tools to help employers source, manage, and build pools of gig workers. More: - "The available size of the workforce has decreased and the preferences of the worker are changing," said Nowsta CEO Nick Lillios, adding that the startup's systems help companies attract and retain workers amid their search for flexibility, strong wages, and purpose.
- The new round, which included participation by Builders VC, brings Nowsta's total funding to $93M.
Zoom Out: - VMG Partners' investment follows a private equity round in 50-minute workout startup Solidcore, customer relationship management software for the car wash industry Rinsed, and customer acquisition channel for e-commerce brands Treat.
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| 4 | | Princeton NuEnergy, a lithium-ion recycling startup, raised a $16M Series A led by Taiwanese electronics company Wistron Corporation. PNE developed a low-temperature plasma-assisted separation process to reduce costs and environmental waste in recycling lithium-ion batteries. More: - The round includes participation by Honda Motor, Traxys North America, and GS Futures.
- Honda is planning to switch to using 100% sustainable materials by 2050. "The plasma-based direct recycling technology will enable the sustainability of the EV battery supply chain," said the automaker.
- PNE previously received $12M and $4.37M via grants from the U.S. Department of Energy and a $7M Seed round.
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| 5 | | Chinese AI startup 01.AI earned a unicorn valuation after raising an undisclosed sum from Alibaba Group and other investors. The startup crossed the $1B valuation mark less than eight months after its formation. The firm also released an open-source large language model (LLM) called Yi-34B. More: - The AI startup was founded and led by Kai-Fu Lee, who is also the CEO of Sinovation Ventures.
- The firm officially began operations in June, but Lee started assembling the team in March.
- 01.AI has more than 100 employees now, including team members of Google's Bard, TensorFlow, Huawei, and Microsoft Research Asia.
- 01.AI has been able to raise significant funding due to its ability to quickly train and implement its model, which has been trained on 34B parameters.
Zoom out: - 01.AI's Yi-34B LLM model significantly outperformed other open models, such as Falcon-180B and Meta LlaMa2-70B, ranking first in the pre-trained LLM models list, per Hugging Face.
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| 6 | | Llama, a smart contracts platform, announced it raised a $6M Seed round led by Founders Fund and Electric Capital. The platform works by encoding roles and permissions to take on-chain actions, such as transferring funds. More: - The round also included participation from the co-founder of the Polygon blockchain, Sandeep Nailwa, and the founder of lending protocol Aave, Stani Kulechov.
- Llama has worked with crypto organizations such as Nouns, Lido, dYdX, and ApeCoin.
- "In Llama, decentralization is achieved through access control. Each governance participant is granted the minimum amount of power to perform the function they are best suited to do," explained the startup's co-founder, Shreyas Hariharan.
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- Prescription services company Surescripts acquired low-cost medication alternatives identification startup ActiveRADAR for an undisclosed sum.
- Equity crowdfunding platform CrowdCube acquired startup secondary transactions platform Semper for an undisclosed sum.
- Dubai Integrated Economic Zones Authority (DIEZ) launched a $136M VC fund called Oraseya Capital to invest in local startups between the pre-seed and Series B stages.
- Real estate brokerage platform Radius Agent bagged $13M in Series B funding. AXA Venture Partners led the funding, with NFX, Cota Capital, and Sierra Ventures participating in the round.
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INSIDE STARTUPS LEADERBOARD (7 DAYS) |
 | Analyst | | Karan Chafekar is a Management Consultant, Business enthusiast, and Licensed Pilot.
Nicolas is a Sr. Analyst at Inside, covering startups and transportation trends. He is an avid map maker and data nerd. Nicolas has worked in the shared-scooter space, as well as advised e-bike and moped start-ups. | | This newsletter was edited by Vibha Chapparike | |
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