The Crunchbase News Briefing: Weds., Sept. 16

Here’s what you need to know today in startup and venture news, updated by the Crunchbase News staff throughout the day to keep you in the know.

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Portworx acquired by Pure Storage

Portworx, a Kubernetes data services platform based in Los Altos, California, agreed to be acquired by Pure Storage (NYSE: PSTG) in an all-cash deal valued at approximately $370 million.

Mountain View, California-based Pure Storage, which provides storage as-a-service, said this was its largest acquisition to-date. The company acquired Compuverde in 2019 and StorReduce in 2018.

Since its inception in 2014, Portworx has raised a total of $55.5 million in venture-backed funding, according to Crunchbase data. Pure Storage will combine Portworx’s container data services with its suite of data services that can be deployed in-cloud, on bare metal, or on enterprise arrays.

Funding rounds

• Zwift spins up $450M in fresh funding for connected fitness: Long Beach, California-based Zwift, operator of an online fitness platform that provides indoor riding and running workouts immersed in virtual worlds, announced it has raised $450 million in a Series C round led by KKR. [Read more here.]
• VanMoof raises $40M for e-bikes:  Dutch e-bike startup VanMoof, has raised a $40 million investment from Norwest Venture Partners, Felix Capital and Balderton Capital. The investment comes amid surging demand for electric bikes in recent months.
• Veem raises $31M for expansion: Global payments network Veem announced a $31 million capital raise, led by Truist Ventures. Also participating in the round were MUFG Innovation Partners, AB Ventures, Paper Excellence and Myer Family Investments. Existing investors participating in this round include: GV, Goldman Sachs, Kleiner Perkins, Silicon Valley Bank, National Australia Bank Ventures and Trend Forward Capital. Funds will go toward expanding Veem’s geographic footprint and product development.
• Seeqc raises $22.4M for System-On-A-Chip: Seeqc, a digital quantum computing company, secured a $22.4 million round of Series A funding. The financing was led by EQT Ventures with participation from FAM AB, M Ventures, BlueYard Capital, New Lab Ventures and the Partnership Fund for New York. Seeqc is developing a System-On-A-Chip approach and will use the new funds to advance them commercially.
• Monte Carlo closes on $16M for data reliability: Monte Carlo, founded by the wife-and-husband team of CEO Barr Moses and CTO Lior Gavish, announced a $16 million Series A round of funding to go after the data reliability category. Backing the San Francisco-based startup is Accel, which led the round with participation from GGV Capital, as well as a group of angel investors including DJ Patil. Monte Carlo touts building the “first end-to-end platform for enterprises to increase trust in data and eliminate data downtime, aka, times when data is inaccurate, missing or otherwise erroneous.”
• Signifier secures $10M for sleep disorder tech: Signifier Medical Technologies, a company focused on the development and commercialization of sleep disorder tools, said it closed on a $10 million Series C funding round led by Alan Howard. Other participants in the round include James Blair, and existing investors The Pritzker Organization, Kieran Gallahue and Resmed. Signifier has two devices, eXciteOSA and Snoozeal, and will use the proceeds for product development.
• Dendra Systems raises $10M to expand globally: Ecosystem restoration company Dendra Systems said it closed on $10 million in new investments aimed at helping the New York-based company expand its AI and drone technology for rebuilding whole ecosystems to a global audience. Investors in the round of funding include Airbus Ventures, At One Ventures, Future Positive Capital, LowerCarbon Capital, Lionheart VC, SYSTEMIQ and Venture Souq.
• GoTab secures $6M for contactless ordering: GoTab, a mobile contactless ordering and payment platform for hospitality, said it raised a $6 million investment that it will use for product development, partnership acquisition and to roll out its GoTab’s Mobile POS. Investors backing the Arlington, Virginia-based company include Anthony Bruce, Greg Cohen, Jodie McLean, Will Graylin, Jim Hirshorn, George Krautzel, Andrew Newcomb and Jonathan Zabusky.

M&A

• ChargePoint poised to go public in reverse merger: Reuters reported that electric vehicle charging network ChargePoint was close to going public through a reverse merger with Switchback Energy Acquisition Corp. The deal would value Campbell, California-based ChargePoint at more than $2 billion. It’s still possible that the deal could dissolve, but sources told Reuters if not, the merger could be announced as early as next week. Switchback, based in Dallas, was created in 2019 as a special-purpose acquisition company, aka SPAC, and raised $300 million in its IPO, Reuters reported. In August, we reported on ChargePoint’s $127 million Series H extension round of funding that gave the company a total of $660 million in funds raised since its inception in 2007, according to Crunchbase data.
• Kahoot acquiring Actimo: Oslo-based online education platform Kahoot announced it will acquire Danish startup Actimo ApS for up to $33 million in cash and stock. Founded in 2012, Actimo operates a mobile workspace for remote employees to improve the way organizations connect with and engage their teams.
• SEMrush acquires Prowly: SEMrush, a Boston-based online visibility management and content marketing SaaS platform, said it has acquired Warsaw-based public relations SaaS startup Prowly.com. Financial details of the acquisition were not disclosed. SEMrush Chief Strategy Officer Eugene Levin said in a statement that the company “had Prowly on our radar for several years, and once we saw that they could generate international traction, we decided to make an offer.” SEMrush will add content marketing tools to Prowly.

IPOs:

• Unity raises IPO price targets: Video game software developer Unity Software on Wednesday morning raised the expected price range of its upcoming IPO to $44 to $48 per share, up from the previous estimate of $34 to $42 per share. In that range, Unity could raise up to $1.2 billion in its public market debut and be valued at up to about $12.6 billion. The San Francisco-based company raised its range after DevOps platform JFrog and cloud data warehousing company Snowflake each did as well. Snowflake begins trading publicly on Wednesday after its IPO priced above expectations in what will be the largest software IPO of all time. Unity is slated to price on Thursday and begin trading on the New York Stock Exchange on Friday under the ticker symbol “U.”

Venture capital

• Wix.com creates new fund: Free website creation service Wix.com created a new venture capital initiative, Wix Capital, to invest in tech entrepreneurs focused on the future of the web and helping businesses operate in the digital landscape. Wix Capital will invest in seed and early-stage rounds, and has deployed more than $5.6 million into several companies including communication and workflow tool Spike, digital fintech company Oriente, dropshipping platform Modalyst, and RestAR, a 3D capturing and AI product visualization tool.

Illustration: Dom Guzman