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In an era when validation-seeking venture capitalists are lauded as much as high-flying founders, Maverick Ventures’ small team of investors have opted to stay quiet.

Now, the years-old firm is ready to publicize its successes and shed some light on its global strategy. Today, Maverick is disclosing for the first time the size of its evergreen venture fund: a $382 million early-stage vehicle.

Launched in 2015 as the venture arm of 25-year-old hedge fund Maverick Capital, San Francisco-based Maverick has funneled cash into direct-to-consumer wellness brand Hims, new-age insurer Devoted Health and primary care services provider One Medical. Led by David Singer (pictured above, center), the former chief executive officer of genetics company Affymetrix and drug developer Genesoft Pharmaceuticals, Maverick has oft supported healthtech startups.

“We are thematic, but this business is all about opportunism,” Singer told TechCrunch. “The whole challenge of venture is to figure out what’s next and that, by nature, doesn’t fit into one bucket.”

With that in mind, Maverick has deviated from healthcare, a decision that led it to some of its biggest successes. The firm became the first institutional investor in Coupang, Korea’s largest e-commerce business, which recently brought in $2 billion from SoftBank’s Vision Fund at a reported $9 billion valuation and is poised for a multi-billion exit. It also supported the Tencent-acquired video streaming platform Youku and the now-public Korean texting service Kakao.

Grocery delivery service FreshDirect, facial recognition startup D-ID and cloud-based software firm Aptible are also among its non-healthtech portfolio companies.

In total, Maverick has helped build 13 unicorns across a portfolio of 100 companies. The firm, Singer explained, almost always provides its companies follow-on capital, beyond the seed, Series A or Series B investment they initially provide. Why? Because they believe in their companies, as any good VC should, but also because Singer admittedly has a hard time saying no to Maverick’s startups.

“I’ve lost money from being too emotionally invested,” he said. “We are old-school. We feel this is a business to help build strong companies. It’s not a quick flip. For better or for worse, that’s what we like doing.”

In addition to Singer, Maverick’s investment team includes former Bessemer Venture Partners vice president Ambar Bhattacharyya and Oscar’s former director of finance Prateesh Maheshwari.

from Startups – TechCrunch https://tcrn.ch/2RSGY1q

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For decades, women in business have lacked the resources necessary to navigate to or sustain executive roles. Finally, venture-funded projects have emerged to fill this gap.

The latest is Chief, a private network for New York-based women in senior roles in tech, retail, enterprise, finance, media and more. The company launches today with $3 million in venture capital funding to provide its 200 members access to a Tribeca clubhouse, monthly executive coaching and leadership development sessions and a salon series, which includes “intimate dinners with captains of industry” and celebrity fireside conversations.

The catch? Chief membership costs $5,800 per year for members with a vice president-level job title and even more for those in the C-suite at $7,800. Its founders, Carolyn Childers and Lindsay Kaplan, say the ideal is for companies to pay the way for members, similar to how a startup might pay to send one of its employees to a conference.

Chief and its investors, Primary Venture Capital, Flybridge Capital Partners, Accel, Box Group, Able Partners, XFactor Ventures, Silas Capital and BBG Ventures, are betting the company’s coaching sessions, clubhouse, mobile application and network of successful women will keep its members coming back every year — $5,800 check in hand.

“Companies are looking for something like this,” Kaplan, the former VP of communications at Casper, told TechCrunch. “They have these amazing women, they know there is a problem with equality up top and this isn’t something they can provide within their own four walls.”

Though Chief’s initial 200-person cohort does not include any men, the group is open to all genders. Given the controversy surrounding The Wing’s former membership policy, which barred men from entry, Chief’s decision to accept anyone ready “to fight the 200-year gap in gender equality,” in the words of Kaplan, will probably save them a headache down the line.

“We are a very mission-based company,” Childers, the former VP of operations at household services marketplace Handy, told TechCrunch. “If a man is inspired to help women get to the C-suite, they can apply and become a part of Chief.”

Though Chief wasn’t able to provide specific data on membership diversity, Childers and Kaplan did say its “top of mind” and when I first spoke with the pair this fall, months before launch, they said they planned to offer grants to members who are unable to pay the annual fee.

“We don’t want to see a 1 percent increase in female management in 10 years,” Childers said. “We want to close that gap as quickly as possible.”

The startup seems to have the best of intentions, though what Chief appears to be is an expensive networking opportunity for New York’s existing elite. With that said, if Chief only helps the existing 1 percent of women in business maintain executive roles, at least its helping move the needle ever so slightly.

from Startups – TechCrunch https://tcrn.ch/2SVjWVb

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It turns out Stride.VC isn’t going to focus exclusively on the U.K. after all. Pia d’Iribarne is leaving Accel to join Stride.VC as a partner.

Stride.VC was originally co-founded by former Accel partner Fred Destin along with Harry Stebbings, producer of “The Twenty Minute VC” podcast. Back in October, when TechCrunch’s Steve O’Hear covered the official closing of the £50 million fund, the pair said that they would focus on the U.K. at first. Arj Soysa also joined the firm as operating partner around the same time.

“Currently, the firm is 100 percent focused on the U.K., but Destin and Stebbings say they will relax that rule once Stride.VC’s operations are well honed,” my colleague wrote.

And it’s happening a bit sooner than expected — d’Iribarne is going to spend most of her time in Paris and travel back and forth between Paris and London. The firm’s new partner d’Iribarne worked at Accel for three and a half years, including a couple of years with Destin. Before that, she worked at Felix Capital and McKinsey.

At Accel, she sourced many interesting deals for the VC firm, particularly on the French market — Doctolib, Shift Technology, Selency, PayFit, Framer and Zenaton. She has been a board observer at PayFit, Selency and Shift Technology.

But Accel is also a well-oiled machine. While d’Iribarne loved working there, she couldn’t miss today’s opportunity. For instance, she spotted PayFit way before Accel invested in the Series B round — it is now one of the most promising software-as-a-service startups in Paris. Being able to invest at the seed level with more flexibility is exactly what she was looking for.

“I learned so much there but I had the urge to invest at an earlier stage and do something more entrepreneurial,” d’Iribarne wrote in an email. “I am very grateful for the incredible exposure I got at Accel and am proud I was able to contribute some meaningful opportunities to the firm, but it was time for me to branch out and go earlier stage.”

Stride.VC is focusing on seed rounds that are slightly larger than your typical seed round. With such a small team, the firm doesn’t want to spread itself too thin across dozens of investments. It isn’t going to invest all over Europe — the U.K. and France remain the focus for now. So far, Stride.VC has officially announced two investments — Forward Health and Cazoo.

Prior to the closing of Stride.VC’s initial fund, Bloomberg reported in July 2017 that Destin was facing an accusation of inappropriate behavior with a female founder at an event in 2013. Destin later issued a statement and apologized. Stride.VC told us it was not specifically looking to hire a woman for this role.

“[Gender balance] is an important topic for our industry and I’m delighted that more and more of us are in a position to make investment decisions; having said that I will hopefully be known for being a great VC, not just a great woman VC!” d’Iribarne said.

Natasha Lomas contributed reporting to this article.

from Startups – TechCrunch https://tcrn.ch/2CkuOER

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Quinyx, the cloud-based workforce management solution, has raised a further $25 million in funding. The investment was led by the startup’s existing investors Alfvén & Didrikson, Battery Ventures, and Zobito.

Founded in 2005 by Erik Fjellborg, Quinyx’s CEO, after he spent the summer working at McDonald’s, the company’s workforce management software helps businesses of all sizes manage employee scheduling, communication, task-management and payroll integration.

Quinyx’s core focus is shift-based or ‘flexible’ workers, including but not limited to those operating in the fast-food industry. Clients include McDonald’s, London City Airport, Burger King, Rituals, Swarovski, IHG, and Boots. I’m told that more recent wins include Daniel Wellington, and Odeon Cinemas Group.

The software’s feature-set includes scheduling, shift planning and swapping, timesheet functionality via workers checking in using Quinyx’s mobile apps, and budget forecasting.

To give you a better idea of the company’s scale: it currently has close to 500,000 employees on its platform. Its core customer base is in Europe, and Quinyx has offices in U.K., Sweden, Finland, Germany, Norway, Denmark and the Netherlands.

Meanwhile, the global workforce management market is estimated to be worth $2.4 billion overall.

To that end, Quinyx says the new funding will be used to further accelerate Quinyx’s roll-out of “innovative features and new AI technologies” that will automate and streamline workforce management processes. This will include developing and embedding new technologies into the platforms “to unlock the full potential of the flexible workforce,” says Fjellborg.

Adds Michael Brown, general partner of Battery Ventures: “Having joined the board at Quinyx when we invested in the company last year, I’ve seen first-hand the ambition and drive Erik and his team have shown in going after this large market. Quinyx has made significant progress in the last year by continuing to focus on the strength of its technology. This new investment will help take Quinyx’s business to the next level”.

from Startups – TechCrunch https://tcrn.ch/2ClFymA

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Manual, a ‘wellbeing platform’ for men, has closed £5 million in seed funding. Backing the round is the U.K.’s Felix Capital, Germany’s Cherry Ventures, and U.S.-based Cassius Capital.

The first iteration of the startup’s offering is being launched today: a new website that aims to arm men with the knowledge and tools they need “to proactively solve their wellbeing and look after their health”.

“At Manual we want men to take control of their health and happiness by helping guide them to the choices that work best for them. We believe this starts with promoting a change in how men approach their wellbeing,” Manual CEO George Pallis, who co-founded the company along with Michalis Gkontas, tells me.

“Michalis and I both have first hand experience of the physical and mental toll that can happen when you’re not looking out for yourself, and at Manual we want to encourage men to talk openly, challenging the outdated notions of masculinity where ‘being a man’ meant sweeping problems under the carpet”.

Pallis says Manual’s vision is to improve the everyday lives of men by providing knowledge and solutions for key parts of their wellbeing, citing a report by the National Pharmacy Association that suggest almost 90 percent of men don’t seek help unless they have a serious problem.

“The goal is to change habits in the way men understand and fix their problems,” he says. “Manual will provide users with products, services and in-depth information so they can implement a holistic approach to their wellness”.

At launch, Manual is focussing on solutions to what Pallis says are two of the most common men’s health problems: erectile dysfunction (ED) and hair loss. The plan is to then build up other wellbeing offering from there, “from sex to skin, and hair to general wellbeing”.

It is also worth noting Pallis and Gkontas’ startup and entrepreneur backgrounds. Pallis was most recently an Entrepreneur in Residence (EIR) at Felix Capital. Before that he ran marketing at Deliveroo, as Director of Marketing, and before that he was an early employee at TransferWise. Gkontas built and exited healthy food startup Forky to Vivartia in 2018. The pair say that the stresses associated with startup life also informed their decision to build a platform targeting men’s wellbeing.

Meanwhile, Manual says its seed funding will be invested into the development and growth of the platform. In addition, the new capital will be used to scale the team, split between its HQ in London and a technical team in Athens, and for further European expansion.

from Startups – TechCrunch https://tcrn.ch/2RMSMCx