#UVnewsletter
hello 2023
Dear All,
It's been a while since the last edition of United Ventures' newsletter, so bear with us if this is going to be a long one!
Last year was an eventful one for this author, who spent most of it enjoying a blissful maternity leave, and for United Ventures, which welcomed many great companies to its portfolio and made important additions to its team. We will bring you through the most significant moments of the year that just ended, and we will share an AI-themed selection of readings that sparked our curiosity over the last few months.
Now, onto 2023 and the challenges ahead. With the conviction that today more than ever, the tech industry must focus on business fundamentals and on solving big, real-world problems.
Best wishes to us all for a year full of energy, creativity, and growth 💫
New Investments
🥕 In November, we led the €6.3m Series A round of Babaco Market, the subscription service that saves ugly&odd foods from suppliers and delivers weekly unordinary boxes directly to customers’ homes. Did you know that 88m tons of food is wasted in the EU annually, and 26.4m tons is wasted at the production and processing level, where Babaco Market works? The company recovers imperfect fruit and vegetables that would have otherwise gone to waste, creating a more efficient and equitable food system for farmers as well as for customers looking for healthier, more sustainable, and more affordable choices.
⚙️ We led the €5.3m Series A round of Zerynth, the industrial tech startup building an IoT platform that helps companies connect industrial machines and optimize industrial processes. Although IoT projects are maturing, manufacturing companies keep facing several challenges in the digitalization and integration process, such as legacy equipment, technical complexities, and security issues. This is where Zerynth comes in, providing a complete end-to-end, hardware–software IoT solution to enable the digital transformation of any industrial process.
🪂 In July, we backed the journey of insurtech Wallife beyond the boundaries of risk by leading their €12M Series A round. Founded in 2020 and based in Rome, Wallife develops innovative insurance products focused on protecting individuals from new and emerging risks arising from technological and scientific progress, namely in the areas of genetics, biometrics, and biohacking. Its mission is visionary and ambitious: building the first company in the world able to provide answers about safety and protection from still unknown risks.
☁️ We invested in Fido and led their €5M Series A. Fido operates in the identity verification sector and aims to unlock the power of digital footprints. Through the use of proprietary machine learning algorithms, Fido provides online user evaluation models for companies of all sizes and for different applications: credit rating, fraud prevention, KYC & AML, and lead qualification. The analysis and use in full compliance with the rules of digital footprints is a crucial point for all companies in every sector - and Fido’s solution has the potential to become an international standard.
👩🏫 Also in July, we invested in Futura, an ed-tech startup, founded in 2020 by three under-25s, that develops artificial intelligence models to revolutionize the study process. Futura leverages its AI-powered platform to test the skills of each individual student and automatically create a personalized study path that updates as learning progresses. Their €1.8 million round is the largest seed investment in the education sector in Italy and is fueling the company’s ambitious project to become the benchmark in the European test preparation and tutoring market.
During Q1’22, we also announced two companies that joined the portfolio of UV T-Growth, our fund boosting the growth of exceptional founders and companies operating in large technology sectors: 🛰️ D-Orbit, the first company addressing the logistics needs of the space market, committed to helping companies profitably and sustainably maximize the opportunities to do business in space today and into the future; and 🛒 Everli, Europe’s leading online grocery marketplace, on a mission to help its diverse customer base to achieve peace of mind, by simplifying their life when shopping for groceries.
Portfolio highlights
🎮 In January ‘22, we announced the successful exit of our portfolio company FaceIT, the premier platform for gamers to compete in their favorite games. The company has been acquired along with ESL Gaming by Savvy Gaming Group, resulting in a multiple of 7,4x for our investors. In conjunction with the acquisition, the two companies merged to create the world's largest competitive gaming platform under the name ESL FACEIT Group. Learn more about our journey with FaceIT in our blog post and in this interview with Massimiliano Magrini by Beniamino Pagliaro.
🏦 Also in January, Moneyfarm announced a £44.1 (€53M) Series D funding round led by M&G plc and participated by Poste Italiane + a commercial partnership with M&G for the launch of an innovative, digital product aimed at the next generation of retail customers in the UK. In December, it announced the acquisition of Profile Pensions, the UK’s leading digital pension adviser - a deal that marks another step in the international expansion of Moneyfarm and drives the company's AUM to more than 3.8 billion euros for more than 115,000 customers.
🇫🇷 In June, Young Platform raised a €16 million Series B round led by Azimut, one of the leading independent asset managers in Europe, to simplify access to the world of cryptocurrencies. The funding is supporting Young's development plans, starting with the consolidation of the team with the best talent from technology and finance and the geographic expansion into new markets such as Spain and France. A few days ago, Young Platform announced it obtained an operating license from the French financial markets authority (AMF), confirming the soundness of a model that protects users.
🎶 In July, Musixmatch announced a significant investment from TPG, a leading global alternative asset management firm. For eight years, we’ve held the privilege of actively partnering with Musixmatch’s founders on their mission to build the world’s largest lyrics catalog and enhance the experience of music worldwide. Now that the company has welcomed new investors and begun a new phase of its journey, we congratulate the whole team for the hard work it took to reach this milestone and the ongoing vision that will drive Musixmatch from here. Can’t wait to see what’s ahead!
🚜 In August, xFarm Technologies secured one of Europe’s largest Series B funding rounds in the agtech sector, raising €17 million. Back in 2019, we invested in xFarm because we believed it would become the reference platform for farmers who want to manage their farms digitally and were inspired by the vision to make agriculture sustainable through innovation. Today, xFarm Technologies simplifies the work of 110.000 farms spread over 1.5 million hectares in more than 100 countries around the world.
🍽️ Also in August, Deliveristo closed a €7 million investment round to support the company’s consolidation of the Italian market, its expansion in Europe, and the launch of new services for customers and suppliers, from data-driven marketing to payments services. Deliveristo is building a digital market where restaurateurs can find everything they need and order in the simplest and fastest possible way.
🧑💻 In December, Fiscozen announced an €8 million raise of additional funding led by Keen Venture Partners with United Ventures’ participation to push its mission to eliminate tax bureaucracy in Italy for all individual businesses, from lawyers to digital workers to small shop owners. Since raising the first €3 million round in early 2020, Fiscozen has seen exponential growth and now works with thousands of happy customers.
News from the Team
2022 was a year of meaningful additions for United Ventures. With regard to the investment team, we’ve been joined by Jacopo Drudi, as portfolio operating partner, and Riccardo Coletta, as portfolio operating manager.
A senior investment professional, Jacopo leverages his industry experience to solve problems facing portfolio companies, focusing on strategic planning, commercial growth, operational efficiency, and financial controls. Before joining United Ventures, he worked in private equity and consulting, gaining an extensive background in M&A.
Riccardo focuses primarily on supporting portfolio companies and sourcing/analyzing new investment opportunities. Before United Ventures, Riccardo was part of the investment team at an Italy-based venture capital firm that invests globally in early-stage companies.
Martina Canarelli is our new executive assistant & office manager. Her enthusiastic and proactive approach ensures everything runs smoothly at United Ventures and supercharges the team’s effectiveness and execution of goals. Previously, Martina gained solid customer service & personal assistant experience in Italy and UK.
Tommaso Palmieri joined us as a full-time data scientist. Tommaso initially joined us for a summer internship in 2021 - now, having completed his mathematics and computer engineering studies at New York University, he is back to take our dealflow to the next level.
Last but not least, Elena Di Maio joined us as fund operations manager to ensure seamless business delivery of fund operations and financial administration activities. Elena has a background in consulting and a double degree in international management from Bocconi and Fudan University in Shanghai.
Things Worth Sharing
Tech insights from the world, trends, perspectives & more.
🤖 Sure enough, we’re in a golden age of progress in artificial intelligence, and Generative AI is the most interesting thing in tech right now. Here are a few food-for-thought essays we’ve been reading lately on the endless possibilities and possible risks of this technology breakthrough.
Dr. Andre Retterath, a partner at Earlybird and author of the weekly newsletter Data-driven VC, recently shared some great insights on What ChatGPT means for the future of startup funding and how VCs can boost 10x their productivity with ChatGPT. Bottom line: Large Language Models will be a fundamental part of the stack, driving startup investing into more efficiency, effectiveness, and inclusiveness.
“With a paintbrush in hand, artificial intelligence has become an engine of wow.” Kevin Kelly authored an optimistic story for Wired, making a very clear prediction: Generative AI will alter how we design just about everything, but not a single human artist will lose their job because of this new technology (as long as they learn to master "the art of prompting").
On a darker note, we need to talk about training data bias, e.g., women uploading their selfies to the Lensa ‘avatar maker’ getting ML-generated nudes back. This story by MIT researcher Melissa Heikkilä is emblematic: her avatars were cartoonishly pornified, while her male colleagues got to be astronauts, explorers, and inventors.
But let’s give the final word to ChatGPT itself, to whom I’ve asked a short poem about venture capital in the style of Emily Dickinson (one of my fav Anglo-American poets):
Venture capital, a curious thing,
A force that makes the impossible spring,
To life and action, like a sudden flame,
It fuels the fire of the entrepreneur's game.
With its backing, dreams take flight,
And challenges are faced with all one's might,
Innovation blooms, and progress is made,
All thanks to the power of the venture capital trade.
But like a flame, it can be fickle and wild,
For every success, many a failure compiled,
But those who persevere and chase their dreams,
Can reap the rewards of their hard work, it seems.
So here's to venture capital,
A catalyst for change and growth,
May it continue to nurture,
The seeds of progress and innovation, from youth.
Frighteningly beautiful, don't you think? Anyway, beyond the media hype and the cool demos, what’s most important is to try to understand all the ways AI is evolving, and what that might mean for our future.
ICYMI
🎤 Between January and September 2022, more than €1.3bn was invested into Milan’s start-ups — an increase of 90% on full-year 2021 figures and beating all previous full-years on record, according to PitchBook Data. Alex Irwin-Hunt, Global Markets Editor at fDi Intelligence, has spoken with many major voices in the local tech ecosystem to understand how and why Milan’s tech scene is finally coming of age and attracting rising levels of venture capital investment. Massimiliano Magrini contributed to this insightful report by sharing his perspective on the current state of play in Milan’s innovation ecosystem and Italy more broadly.
✏️ The December issue of WeWealth featured an in-depth interview with our Sara Lovato on the impact of the current economic and geopolitical scenario on startups globally, the Italian startup ecosystem, how Italy differs from other European countries, the sectors we look at with the most interest, and United Ventures' strategy.
Which areas to focus on, looking at the short and long term?
Those that have not yet experienced significant digitization and that could instead generate more sustainable, collaborative and efficient processes, increasing industry productivity through agile and comprehensive software applications. The current context certainly leads us to think about the entire energy and supply chain sector; but also on new applications in blockchain and quantum computing, health and the environment.
That’s all for today!
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