Edit №66 — It’s all for you (and us) — Weekly Newsletter on Corporate Innovation & Venture
by Stu Iverson and Clay Maxwell
The Recap
March 21, 2021
More big bets placed this week — with GV, Intel Capital, Tencent, and Salesforce all involved in $100m plus rounds.
Plenty of interesting strategic innovation plays across the board too.
Snap bought a “fit analytics” business, signaling its e-commerce intentions and instantly increasing its footprint across a huge number of retailers. This might eventually feed into its AR ambitions (as discussed last week), but in the near-term will help diversify Snap’s revenues and strengthen its offering to consumers and retailers alike.
Walmart signaled an emphasis on its in-house brands by tapping Brandon Maxwell to serve as Creative Director for Free Assembly and Scoop. This advances them against their mission of “accessible fashion.” Dick’s Sporting Goods is also driving growth around in-house labels, announcing a men’s athleisure line to pair with the Calia by Carrie Underwood women’s brand. A year ago, Dick’s reported that in-house labels had jumped to 14% of total revenue.
For both, these are plays with multi-dimensional benefits, with a margin boost in addition to an increase in brand loyalty that — with stores reopening — can drive retails sales.
On theme with serving up multi-sided benefits, Facebook is navigating the lengthy list of privacy and security issues to serve up an Instagram-like experience to under 13 year-olds, to increase and broaden their relevance with younger demographics.
All of the above show a push for the transactional to become more relational, and to drive relevance and loyalty through more targeted partial-personalization. We’re sure this trend will leap out of retail and e-commerce and into other arenas (it’s already happening in fintech, for example), so we’ll be watching to see what unfolds.
Quick Links — Interesting reads from the rest of the market
👓 Facebook shows off how you’ll use its neural wristbands with AR glasses.
👩⚕️ Amazon to offer telehealth service to other U.S. firms this summer.
🚗 Uber drivers in the UK will now get minimum wage and paid vacation.
✏ LEGO Education launches comprehensive professional development for educators.
☕️ Starbucks launches technology to make stores more accessible to visually impaired.
👟 Gucci Is selling $12 (virtual) sneakers.
💵 Flutterwave and PayPal partner to empower African eCommerce.
📰 Facebook to offer self-publishing tools for content creators.
The Water Cooler — Conversation starters for around the (virtual) office
WallStreetBets donates more than $350,000 to gorilla charity to prove ‘apes together strong’. A peek inside what happened to the New York Times’ cooking community Facebook group. Goldman Sachs analysts reveal abusive working conditions in leaked survey. Jell-O Is giving away DIY stapler prank kits in an ode to The Office. Elon Musk has officially changed his title to “Technoking of Tesla”.
The Corporate Card — Corporate Venture Deals
GV joined the $400m Series C of drug discovery and development startup Insitro.
Tencent Holdings co-led the $300m Series E of IP analytics startup PatSnap.
GV & Intel Capital joined the $180m Series E of cybersecurity startup SecurityScorecard.
Salesforce Ventures joined the $150m Series C of healthcare network startup Unite Us.
Wells Fargo Strategic Capital, Inc. & Citi Ventures joined the $100m Series D of digital identity verification startup Socure.
Intel Capital, Warner Music Group, & Ubisoft joined the $52.5m Series C of UGC as a service startup Overwolf.
NatWest Group, National Australia Bank, & Mastercard joined the $50m Series C of FinTech data startup Pollinate Networks.
Sapphire Ventures led the $45m Series B of location data analytics startup SafeGraph.
Salesforce Ventures, GV, & Citigroup joined the $45m Series B of fintech-focused low-code startup Genesis Global.
Amazon joined the ₹1.8B Series C of Indian beauty startup MyGlamm.
Samsung NEXT joined the $10m Series A of healthcare IoT security startup Cylera.
Gradient Ventures joined the $2.5m Seed Round of future of pet care startup Digitail.
Amazon Alexa Fund invested an undisclosed amount in a strategic investment with consumer data protection startup Inpher.io.
Tencent Holdings led the Venture Round of cloud gaming startup ubitus with participation from Sony Innovation Fund and other gaming companies.
The Bulletin Board — Job openings and opportunities
Executive Director, Corporate Innovation & Product Innovation at Estee Lauder. The principle objective of the role is to work in the research, initiation, evaluation, development and follow-through of new global product launches. Remain knowledgeable of new competitive introductions/industry technologies and determine how they can apply to ELC brand philosophy. Maintain the quality of the existing Brand product line and generate changes in conjunction with Marketing.
Director, Early Innovation Partnering at Johnson & Johnson. J&J’s goal is to build a pipeline of innovative technologies, products and solutions that will benefit patients and consumers and will augment long-term corporate growth. Operating within major hubs of innovation allows J&J the opportunity to access technologies earlier and to help translate them into products for patients by contributing financial, intellectual, and human capital. The leading diversified healthcare company in the world, J&J seeks external innovation across a broad range of sectors, including pharmaceuticals, medical devices, consumer healthcare, vision care, diagnostics, and digital health.
