Cyber Defenders. Top startup exits. Tencent's investment spree.
clHola,
Honeypots, decoys, bucket brigade attacks, zero-day attacks, and quantum encryption … If it seems like I’m just babbling plot points from a low-budget thriller, you should read our first-ever annual Cyber Defenders report. It highlights 9 trends and 30 companies on the forward edge of digital security.
And yes, your company is already f’ed.
To me the most surprising thing I learned from the report is that hackers are already lurking in virtually every company’s networks.
P.S. BTW we also recently came across our new favorite name of a startup, belonging to an Israel-based cybersecurity company: Secret Double Octopus. Go on, try to beat that. Would love to hear anything that comes close.
P.P.S. Double Octopus’ products include “nuclear launch code safety algorithms.” I think I know a country or five that may have a pressing need there.
This week in data:
4: The number of billion-dollar VC-backed exits that occurred in the first quarter of 2017, including those of Snap and AppDynamics. This week, we published our real-time Unicorn Exits Tracker that looks at the top VC-backed startup IPOs and M&As since 2009. Check out our Unicorn Exits tracker here.
2%: In the closest Round 1 match-up of our March Madness bracket to select the most innovative product since the iPhone, Makerbot’s Desktop 3D Printer trails behind Amazon’s Echo by only 2 percentage points. Both are in competition to win the title along with 62 other tech and non-tech products. Voting for round 1 closes this Sunday, so head to the polls, check out the other match-ups, and cast your votes.
8,167,544: Chinese internet giant Tencent is on an investment spree, purchasing a 5% share in Tesla for about $1.7B this week, giving it a total of 8,167,544 shares in Elon Musk’s car manufacturer. Earlier this month, Tencent also took part in a $600M Series D round to autonomous car developer NIO. Other investments include last week’s $350M Series D round to video platform unicorn, Kuaishou, and this week’s $200M round to healthcare community platform Hao Daifu, along with participation in a $1B Series J round to Flipkart.
$120M: Food delivery service Munchery is reportedly trying to raise a total of $15M for recapitalization in order to stay afloat, after raising some $120M in funding over the last 7 years. Food delivery has proved to be a difficult space for many startups. We looked at the pace of consolidation in that industry over the past few years, with the number of mergers and acquisitions picking up considerably in 2015 and 2016, as funding has declined and smaller companies risked shutting down.
100,000: This week, pet-sitting businesses Rover and DogVacay have agreed to merge, with Rover acquiring DogVacay in an all-stock deal. The arrangement will lead to a combined network of more than 100,000 pet-sitters, and the new company will be headquartered at Rover’s Seattle location. Both companies can be found on our pet tech market map.
$7.62: The amount raised by cybersecurity company Votiro in Series B funding. The company raised from second-time investor Redfield Asset Management, which previously invested $4M into the company in 2016. Check out our Cyber Defenders report and our periodic table of cybsersecurity for a host of other startups, investors, and top exits in the space.
$25M: The amount raised by Freightos, an online marketplace for international shipping, in a new Series B funding tranche backed by GE Ventures. Check out our periodic table of supply chain & logistics tech for other startups working across the space, from shipping logistics to freight operations to inventory management, and more.
24 hours: SpaceX, manufacturer of advanced rockets, successfully launched and landed its first reused rocket, a Falcon 9 that was previously sent to land on a drone ship last April. With its success, Elon Musk announced his goal of having rockets reflight within 24 hours.
400,000: In an audit of its digital ads, JPMorgan Chase found its advertisements on about 400,000 websites, some of which proved to display “toxic” or “offensive” content. When JPMorgan decided to limit its display ads to 5,000 websites that were preapproved, the company saw little change in cost of impressions and visibility of the ads across the internet, along with no performance deterioration, seeming to indicate major marketers should be able to spend less on ads, and cater to more specific and relevant audiences. The experiment also raises the question of whether ad tech companies and smaller websites that profit from ad impressions will suffer as a result of companies following JPMorgan’s footsteps.
