A new venture capital supergroup is forming | Equity Podcast

[Music] Hello and welcome back to equity The Tech runch podcast where we unpack the Numbers and the Nuance behind the Headlines this is Alex and today is May 1st 2024 welcome back to our Wednesday show Where we dig into the critical startup Adventure Capital stories from the week Thus far and this has been a very busy One so on the show today for you my Friends I have browser startups that are Big business and what they share cor Lights latest funding round and why it Is a sign of the times Chow deck a Startup to watch from Nigeria that has Very impressive growth and then over in The Venture category a new fund with a Focused twist and the latest Venture Superg group to join together to build Something new it's going to be a blast Let's Go first up a pair of startup stories That are all about browsers as it turns Out browsers are big business and given That I have long thought that Chrome Needs more competition good so let's Start with the consumer side of things The browser company which makes the arc Web browser it dropped its Windows Version this week now you might recall That the browser company was testing its Windows client back in December it ended Up picking up about 150,000 people that

Used it and now it's weight list of more Than a million can now jump on it and Give it a try themselves the startup Does want to replace your kind of daily Driver browser and as Tech runch writes Recently raised 50 million at a $550 Million valuation I have Arc installed I Have played with it a little bit but I Haven't given it really enough time so I Don't have a comment about how good it Is but I will say that 150,000 users and A million people on a wait list does Indicate that the browser company is Making something people want now pivot Let's talk about the Enterprise and a Company called Island they're making a Browser for businesses and Ron Miller Writes for Tech runch quote they may be The most valuable startup you have never Heard of now the company just announced A 175 million series D that pushes its Valuation up to $3 billion the company Has actually now raised a total of $487 million that's a lot of money so it Got us wondering what is the company Doing that warrants that level of Investment and that price so we asked And Doug Leon a partner over at seoa who Has put money into Island going all the Way back to its series a says that he Was attracted to the company's founding Team unsurprising and also its value Proposition so what is that what is

Island Building that is so interesting Leon told tein that the company quote Had a vision that if you could produce a Browser based on chromium that looks Like a standard browser to the consumer Employee in a corporation but was Secure It would stop bad guys from doing a Whole bunch of things given that I can't Write Tech runch am without discussing Like three or four cyber breaches it Seems lately yeah I can kind of Understand that people want a browser That works companies want to be secure If you can do both why wouldn't that be A big deal but while these browsers will Both challenge Chrome they are only Going to do it from such a distance Because they're both based on chromium Which is software that has an open Source element and is supported by Google and also fits into Chrome so sure New browsers woohooo competition woohoo But chromium still Reigns absolutely Supreme all right let's talk about a big Cyber security round that I think tells Us quite a lot about the state of the Market today so Bloomberg reports that Corite a cyber security company Unsurprising has raised $150 million in A series e so that is super super super Duper late stage money Excel Leed and Corite is now worth $900 million what is The revenue base that supports that Valuation Bloomberg notes that the

Company is heading towards $100 million Worth of annual recurring revenue or ARR In the next couple of months so let's Just say 100 million ARR by the middle Of the year that means that today corite Got a little bit more than a 9x AR Multiple in the round and that leaves us With I think a question so how fast is This company growing because if it is Growing quickly then we are seeing late Stage Venture Capital valuing companies Very much like they are essentially Public so that really lowers the stay Private premium right I think so anyways Corite is nearly IPO size and that means That it could list in the next 12 to 24 Months if it wanted to but given Market Norms I presume that we will see corite File it's S1 sometime in 2050 [Music] Changing topics changing geographies I Want to talk about a company called Chowck it's based over in logos it's Backed by YC I have heard about it for Some time and the company has raised $2.5 Million worth of seed Capital so What is chowck doing it's taking on Nigeria's food delivery Market which Tech reports could reach two to three Billion dollars in value by 2032 so a Quickly growing Market clearly Nigeria Is a highly popular country which means That Chow deck is growing pretty darn Quickly since launching back in 2021 the

Platform has seen pretty darn quick Growth now has more than 3,000 delivery Riders and over a half million users and The company says that of that number About 100,000 are active each month on The platform that adds up to rather Tasty growth the company saw gmv or Gross merchandise value of over 7 Billion Nigerian naira last year that's About 5 .8 million USD then last October The company reached a milestone seeing 1 Billion Nigerian naira or about $83,000 worth of gmv in one month for The first time but by this March which Was not that long ago the company had Doubled that figure crusting more than 2.4 billion Nigerian naira or about $2 Million worth of gmv all of that's cool Growth is good but one thing we have Seen amongst delivery companies in General is exceptional High burn the cool thing here is the Company in this case says hey look we Took it slow we worked on our model we Got the economics right and now we're Scaling So in theory chowck shouldn't Have the same historical burn rates that We have seen from some of its peers in Other countries if it can keep this lowb Bur high growth model going it's going To be worth a lot of money I dig It put the startups down let's talk About venture capital I have two funds For you this morning and the first one

Is an interesting Twist on where Everyone is putting Capital today and by Twist I mean absolute diametric opposite So in 2024 you and I both know it is Very hard to wake up without reading About yet another large funding round For an Enterprise AI company or as we Saw above an Enterprise cyber security Company intuition however is a new Venture Capital firm based over in Paris That wants to do something a little bit Radical by not betting on the Enterprise And instead betting on consumer M Tech Exclusively and that model that thesis That bet that wager that Gambit has seen The firm raise an initial fund of 15 Million euro that works out to about 16 Million USD if you want to run the Exchange rate and unsurprisingly the Company has already done a couple of Deals after its first close but is still Raising more Capital again it's only1 15 Million EUR so far so I'm not shocked That it's still raising nor am I shocked That after a first close a venture Capital has got to work they tend to do That now the thesis techren rights for Intuition is incredibly simple and it Goes like this there is a lack of Consumer Tech investment right now yep I Think we can all kind of agree on that That makes a lot of sense and yes we all Know that investing in consumer is very Very hard because consumers are fickle

Fads are quick etc etc etc but if Everyone's going to bet on the Enterprise it's going to be very Expensive over there and hard to get Into good deals on the other hand it Means probably that consumer Tech Startups are cheaper and easier to get Money into that's why I love a counter Narrative bet that's why intuition is Interesting it's bold and good fun let's See how the returns work [Music] Out and to close out today I have a new Super group for you and know they won't Be playing guitar instead they're just Going to be making a new firm but axios Reports that Ethan Kur of bber venture Partners Christina Shin previously of And Jason Horwitz and Mark Goldberg Who's known for for his time at index Ventures are going to form a new firm And axios Kia kicheva reports that the Three do have a lot of board overlap so This is not a random group these are People who have worked together before I Think the timing here is smart sure it's Definitely harder to raise a new fund These days but if you really want to Generate straight up Bonkers returns Well you probably want to invest when Prices are low and today as we saw with Cor Lights Round they are compared to 2021 in startup land so if you're a VC And you want to go off on your own found

Something new now make a lot of lower Price deals and then when things perk Back up in valuation terms you look like A genius you Bank the carry you buy the Boat and you retire to Twitter to Post until the very end of Time all right friends that is our show For this excellent Wednesday morning of Course Equity will be back on Friday With our news Roundup until then though We are Equity Bond over on X and threads Tech runch pods over on Tik Tok we have A sister show found you look amazing I Will talk to you soon Goodbye Equity is hosted by myself Alex Wilhelm and techren Senior reporter Mary An aeto we are produced by Teresa loans Solo with editing by Kell Bryce Durban Is our illustrator and a big thank you To the audience development team and Henry pette who manages Tech wrench Audio products thank you so much for Listening and we'll talk to you next Time