Deal of the week
I wanted to turn your attention to an autonomous vehicle company that seems to be able to raise abundant amounts of capital and still remain under the radar.
I’m talking about Nuro, the autonomous delivery company founded in 2016. The company raised $600 million in a fundraising round led by new investor Tiger Global Management. Google was another new investor in this round.
The funding has pushed Nuro’s valuation to about $8.6 billion — or some 72% higher than a year ago — according to people who spoke to me on condition on anonymity. A group of mostly existing investors joined the Series D round, including Baillie Gifford, Fidelity Management & Research Company, China-based venture firm Gaorong Capital, grocery retailer Kroger, SoftBank Vision Fund 1, funds and accounts advised by T. Rowe Price Associates, Inc. and Woven Capital, a venture arm of Toyota subsidiary Woven Planet.
Much of it will be spent on commercializing and scaling the production of its third-generation vehicle at a new facility in Southern Nevada. Construction on its manufacturing facility will begin in December and is expected to be completed in 2022.
Other deals that got my attention …
42dot, a South Korea-based autonomous transportation-as-a-service startup, raised $88.5 million (104 billion WON) in a Series A round of funding that included participation from new investors like Shinhan Financial Group, Lotte Rental, Lotte Ventures, STIC Ventures, We Ventures, DA Value Investment and others.
Autobrains, an Israeli-based company that develops AI technology for assisted and autonomous driving, raised $101 million in Series C funding round led by Temasek. Additional participants in the round include new investors Knorr-Bremse AG, VinFast and existing investor BMW and strategic partner, Continental.
Breadfast, an online grocery delivery company that wants to become a regional leader in the sector, raised $26 million in Series A financing from lead investors Vostok New Ventures and Endure Capital. JAM Fund (led by Tinder co-founder Justin Mateen), YC Continuity Fund, a large unnamed Saudi-based fund, Shorooq Partners, 4DX Ventures and logistics giant Flexport also participated.
Delimobil, Russian car-sharing company, decided to postpone its initial public offering due to market conditions, Reuters reported.
Momenta, an autonomous vehicle developer from China, raised another $500 million that was added to its Series C round. The funding comes two months since it announced a $300 million investment from General Motors. This latest injection of capital brings the total of the startup’s Series C to over $1 billion.
Opibus, a Swedish-Kenyan EV conversion company, raised $7.5 million in pre series A round. The startup raised $5 million in equity and $2.5 million in grants in a round led by Silicon Valley fund At One Ventures, backed by Factor[e] Ventures and pan-African VC firm Ambo Ventures.
Rivian hopes to raise up $8.4 billion in its initial public offering, according to a regulatory filing posted this past week. The Amazon-backed company said in the filing that it plans to offer 135 million shares at a price between $57 and $62. Underwriters also have an option to buy up to 20.25 million additional shares. If underwriters exercise that option, Rivian would raise as much as $9.6 billion.
Based on the number of outstanding shares, that would put its market valuation at about $53 billion. If employee stock options and other restricted shares are considered, Rivian’s valuation could be as high as $60 billion.
Spartan Radar, a biomimetic radar company, closed $15 million in a Series A round led by Prime Movers Lab. Additional investors include 8VC and Mac VC. The round follows a $10 million raise earlier this year.
Scale AI acquired SiaSearch, a spinout of European venture studio Merantix that has built a data management platform that acts as a search engine for petabyte-scale data captured by advanced driving assistance and automated driving systems.
Zepto, a new Indian-based grocery delivery startup, raised $60 million in a round led by Glade Brook Capital. Nexus, Y Combinator, Global Founders Capital, as well as angel investors Lachy Groom, Neeraj Arora and Manik Gupta also participated in the round, which values Zepto at $225 million.
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