During everyday life it's hard to find the time to search for what is going on elsewhere in the World of tech so we bring you the highlights.
It's been a busy few months for major VCs as investment skyrockets, there’s the trend of Cloud businesses listing and the move towards tech-enabled fitness. Sit back and see what you make of this!
The PayMafia effect
As Klarna continues its assault on the Australian market taking on local Buy Now Pay Later players Zip and Afterpay, its former employers are making their own moves with startups in fintech and payments.This poses the question on where future Sydney tech companies will originate from. Former Atlassian employees have taken their experience operating in a global software business and decided to solve problems they've identified, out on their own.
Does a stint at a major player like Atlassian help to instill the right mindset about how to tackle solving problems before making the leap as founders or should budding entrepreneurs persist with the trial and error approach? Another question to ponder is about finding other founders, in a talent-filled environment it can be easier to identify other potential founders that supplement your skillset.
With BigCommerce's recent IPO, will we see a spin up of new tech companies from those employees who got their payday? Will more IPOs of Sydney-based tech companies have the same effect in creating these breeding grounds for the next generation? It worked for Silicon Valley and it's working for the Digital bank mafia with former Revolut and Monzo employees jumping ship to follow their own dreams.
Global funding picks up pace in September
Sixteen largest global capital raises in September detailed by LondonTechWatch tell us major VCs are not worried about a global pandemic, as long as they are investing in tech that is!
What else does it tell us? California is the place to be! Of those 16 raises, seven came from California including one at top in Affirm raising US$500m in a Series G. Yes another Buy Now Pay Later business, does anyone sense a bubble happening here?
Elsewhere there were significant raises in Brazil (x2), India, France, Colombia, the UK, China and two more in the US - Minnesota and New York.
Notable mentions include;
A UK (Cambridge) based Medtech - XtalPi is a biotech firm that uses artificial intelligence and computing to accelerate the development of new pharmaceutical drugs.
Neon, a digital bank raising $300m in a Series C and US-based Chime raising $485m Series F valuing it at $14.5B. How long can the traditional banks hold off the fintech innovators? Will the transition happen faster in economies still heavily reliant on cash and making the transition?
Next Insurance raises $250m and Bright Health (insurance) raises $500m. Is insurance finally going to evolve? As a lagard when it comes to technology, the disruption is certainly heating up as Australian-founded Cover Genius raised $15m following recent partnerships with eBay and Shopee. Who doesn't want to see insurance evolve?!
In the US alone in Q3 VC Market, there were 88 rounds of US$100m+ raised pointing to some optimistic expectations that the economy will get back on track sooner rather than later.
Fitness tech - fad or future?
A notable feature on the list of biggest raises was Long Beach-based Zwift raising a $450m Series C. It’s an online fitness platform used to transform monotonous solo indoor cycling into dynamic and social adventures. This sounds a lot similar to the Peloton bikes that flew off the shelves when everyone realised that lockdown wasn't going to be great for their waistlines!
With some gyms closed, there are a lot of personal trainers looking for a revenue stream and Playbook might just be the answer. Playbook raised US$9m with the aim of being the curator of fitness content, allowing fitness trainers to create and distribute their own video content, allowing them to attract an audience and in turn monetise.
IPO hysteria in the US
Following the major tech IPO in the US recently from data warehousing company Snowflake (even Warren Buffet got in on this one), now Datto in the disaster and recovery space has lined up its IPO by filing to go public.
Snowflake was closely followed by Palantir (big data) and Asana (collaboration) not far behind, the Cloud is the future right? This couldn’t possibly be a Dotcom like boom and bust could it? Snowflake more than doubled its valuation on day of listing to $68bn! Profitable? No, but it’s all about revenue growth...
Next out the gate? The long-anticipated public listing of accommodation disrupter Airbnb!
China to hit the IPO record books
The impending listing of Ant Group, founded by none other than Jack Ma (if you don't know who he is, read this), could break all IPO records with speculation it could raise about $35 billion from the dual listing in Hong Kong and Shanghai at a valuation of at least $280 billion.
Is the future of tech going to be coming from China or will the US continue to dominate? (Don't forget the Aussies!)
Well that's a lot to take in during a period when global travel is on it's knees and no vaccine has been found. Maybe the future of travel will be virtual and we'll go on holiday every night with a headset instead! Till next time.
Despite being in business for over two decades, Phocas’ product launch cadence is still very much like a hot new startup. Engineers get to learn something new every day while exploring new tech stacks while working to fix a lot of ‘world’s first’ problems and assessing the latest technology available to improve existing products and create new ones.
Whether you’re looking to switch roles, advance in your career, or just looking for a change of pace - this article is for you.
You don’t need to look further than the news to know that there’s a lot of pressure on employees in tech… Burnout, the great resignation, tech valuations… It’s a lot. And showing your team some love can make a big difference at times like these.