London Brief #34 : Vertu is gone
oBikes are left in all the wrong places, and “free” WiFi may cost a lot, but… in London, the business goes as usual. Read more in this issue.
People
Patrick Caiger-Smith, CEO at geo, has received the Queen’s Award on behalf the company. GEO (Green Energy Options) is a Cambridge-based startup that makes hardware and software that helps its users save energy. Congratulations!
Hakan Uzan, a Turkish tycoon living in Paris, has failed to save Vertu. The luxurious phones with concierge service have generated £128 million debt, and its 178 employees, based mostly in Hampshire, have not been paid for June.
In the news
The oBikes launch in London went wrong. Apparently, Londoners do not know how to park their shared bikes, unless a docking station is provided. Boris was right this time.
GCHQ Cyber Accelerator in partnership with Wayra (part of Telefonica) is open for applications.
BTW, You might be required to spend 1,000 hours cleaning toilets. That is, if you have used free Wi-Fi offered by Purple, a Manchester-based company that operates hotspots in such places as Camden Market or your nearest Pizza Express.
Business as usual
- Darktrace, an AI-powered cybersecurity firm, has raised a $75m (£58m) Series D led by Insight Venture Partners. Darktrace has been on our radar for some time, and we are sure they are a true unicorn — currently with almost £825m in valuation.
- Move Guides, a global relocation services platform, has closed a $48m Series C.
- Revolut, a company offering travel-oriented account and a card with free conversion to foreign currencies, has closed a $66m Series B led by Index Ventures.
- Drayson Technologies, a healthcare IoT company, has closed a £15m Series C round led by Woodford Investment Management.
- Metail, a company offering a 3-D virtual fitting room technology, has raised £10m in Series B led by its existing investor, a clothing manufacturer from Hong-Kong, TAL Apparel.
- Curve, offering one MasterCard card to link all your other cards to, has closed a $10m Series A funding round from investors including Santander InnoVentures
- OneDome, a startup that uses data to leverage consumers on the property market, has raised a $4m Series A from industry investors.
- Poq, an app commerce platform, has received £2.5m in an equity funding round led by Beringea
- Sparrho, an AI-powered scientific papers and publications repository, has closed a $3m pre-Series A round led by White Cloud Capital.
- Tailify, an influencer marketing company, has raised $1m in Seed funding from Awin.
- Ably, a data transfer infrastructure company has raised $1m in a round led by Forward Partners.
- Provenance, a startup helping increase the transparency of supply chains, has closed an $800,000 Seed round led by Humanity United.
Number of the day
1,000 hours of cleaning public toilets are the price that visitors of Camden Market might need to pay for the free Wi-Fi service. Read the fine-print, warns Purple!
Idea
London Brief is a weekly selection of essential information about startups, technology and the business scene in London. Got news? Give us a shout at londonbrief@netguru.co.
Piotr Wrzosinski
On behalf of the London Brief Team
