Blair, Expressable, Vagon, Carted, Recurate— May 10th, 2021
We see about 5,000 startups each week, and I want to give you a glimpse into how we at Headline think about trending tech companies and tracking new investment opportunities. In this post, I’m highlighting top tech companies that have announced or raised a seed round within the past week.
Breaking news…. e.ventures is now Headline!
Headline is an expression of the many eyes that make up our global perspective. It is our full-conviction, full-lifecycle commitment. It is the energy we gain from our relationships, and hope to spread around the world.
I am excited to continue to write this newsletter under this brand as there is still an incredible crop of companies that announce their Seed round every week. Let's get back to it!
Blair
EVA Growth Index:
No external sources showing growth
Product:
Pay for student financing in return for income share agreements
Lead Investors:
Tiger Global Management
Total Raised:
$7M
Comparables:
Defyance
My Thoughts:
I see income share agreements as an incredibly promising solution to the US student debt problem. Within this, democratizing the financing of these agreements looks to be a massive opportunity as they become the premier structure to finance tertiary education.
Expressable
EVA Growth Index:
Product:
Digital speech therapy provider
Lead Investors:
NextView Ventures, Lerer Hippeau, Amplifyher Ventures
Total Raised:
$5M
Comparables:
Sprout Therapy
My Thoughts:
With around 7.5M Americans experiencing speech impediments, I see a digital provider like Expressable drastically lowering the barriers for individuals to take action.
Vagon
EVA Growth Index:
Product:
Easy to use web-platform that allows users to leverage cloud-processor to transform any local device into a super-computer
Lead Investors:
APY Ventures
Total Raised:
$480K
Comparables:
Google Cloud, Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud
My Thoughts:
I like to think I am not a complete computer noob, but still have no idea how to use Amazon or Google to help me boost my processing power. I’d love to see a new entrant take some market share here by lowering the barriers to entry for this value proposition.
Carted
EVA Growth Index:
No external sources showing growth
Product:
API-enabled developer tool that lets developer easily integrate e-commerce capabilities into any application
Lead Investors:
Undisclosed
Total Raised:
$11M
Comparables:
Twillio for ecommerce
My Thoughts:
With e-commerce evolving from static websites into integrated experiences, Carted could become the platform that fuels e-commerce 3.0.
Recurate
EVA Growth Index:
Product:
Allows Shopify stores to host P2P marketplace on their site.
Lead Investors:
Gradient Ventures
Total Raised:
$3M
Comparables:
N/A
My Thoughts:
Super intriguing concept, as marketplaces notoriously dig moats by building liquidity as they scale, letting Shopify stores to build competitive advantages beyond just brand. It will be exciting to see what type of business will be enabled by Recurate!
See last week’s Seeds to watch in the link below:
Hi, I am Nicolas von Blottnitz, an Associate at Headline’s SF office focusing on Consumer, Fintech, and SaaS business. Since joining the firm in 2018, I have led our investments in Tabnine, Polygon, Flockjay, Solid, and Grin.
What is the EVA Growth Index?
The EVA Growth index is a composite of third-party data sources around a company’s website traffic. The vertical green lines in the charts represent a point in time where the company raised outside capital.
