News July 18, 2022: Acast, MOVS, Kavalri Games, Stark Future, Zimpler, Bärta and more
Here is today's curation of news from Sweden's startup and tech sector.
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Subscribe to Swedish Tech News to get access to a daily newsletter that brings you a brief overview of news from the Swedish startup & tech sector, curated by Martin Weigert.
Or, if you prefer a free weekly newsletter, subscribe to Swedish Tech Weekly!
Mergers & acquisitions
- Acast (Stockholm, podcasting platform) is acquiring US-based startup Podchaser, described as "world’s most comprehensive and authoritative podcast database". Acast pays $27.2M in a mix of cash (85%) and newly issued shares. The deal also includes potential add-ons of up to $6.8M based on an earnout (English, Swedish).
Funding news
- MOVS (Stockholm, subscription service for bikes, e-bikes, e-scooters and e-mopeds): SEK45M (€4.3M, $4.3M) from Svea Bank, Jula Holding and existing investors, at a valuation of SEK200M, for the European expansion (Swedish, machine translation).
- Kavalri Games (Stockholm, game studio focused on horse games): SEK7M (€660K, $660K) from existing investors Amplifier Game Invest and Coffee Stain Studios. This financing was raised in February 2022 but hasn't been announced until now (Swedish, machine translation).
>> Daily updated, subscriber-exclusive Google sheet with all funding rounds raised by private Swedish startups and scaleups. Request access.
News from Swedish startups, the tech sector and VCs
- Swedish entrepreneur Anton Wass co-founded Barcelona-based next-generation electric motorcycle startup Stark Future, which is gearing up for production of its first motocross bike - for which the company has 13,000 pre-orders (Swedish, machine translation).
- Zimpler, Stockholm-based provider of account-to-account payment solutions for merchants, is launching in Norway – the company's 8th market (English, Swedish).
- Bärta, Karlshamn-based foodtech startup producing pea-based vegan and organic foods, is running an equity crowdfunding campaign aiming to raise SEK11M-SEK15M, and has received additional commitments from existing investors Kale United and Almi Invest (Swedish, machine translation).
Swedish tech earnings reports
- Appspotr (Gothenburg, low-code app builder): Swedish, machine translation.
- Albert (Gothenburg, digital learning subscription service for kids and teens): Swedish, machine translation.
Other interesting things from the startup/VC world
- Stripe is the latest fintech to falter, taking a 28% internal valuation cut (English).
- Tiger Global: The poster child of the tech meltdown (English).
Other interesting things related to Sweden
- "We need energy for more useful things than Bitcoin, to be honest. We are moving from a period of administration to an extreme expansion where our entire manufacturing industry is seeking to electrify", says Sweden's Energy Minister Khashayar Farmanbar (English / Bloomberg paywall, alternative URL).
- 10 years ago, researchers at Umeå University discovered a tree on Fulufjället in Sweden near the border with Norway that turned out to be 9 500 years old – likely the world's oldest tree (English).
- As of August 1, operators in Sweden are required by law to register personal customer data before activating a new prepaid SIM card, as a measure intended to fight organized crime (Swedish, machine translation).
End note
Swedish Tech News now has a neat tag-based search feature. You can use it to quickly find news from a specific Swedish startup or tech company. The archive goes back to early 2022 when I started Swedish Tech News.
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That's it for today.
