Last Week in Deeptech - 16/05/2023
Welcome to the Deepsight weekly newsletter, where we run through last week's notable events in the world of deeptech.
Last Week in News:
Israeli start-up LightSolver has unveiled the world’s first pure laser-based processing unit (LPU) which requires no electronics to compute (The Quantum Insider)
Commodity trading and mining giant Glencore has announced plans to develop what would be Europe’s biggest electric car battery recycling plant (Financial Times)
Helion Energy announced that Microsoft will be its first major customer - and that the startup will provide them with fusion power as early as 2028 (Techcrunch)
TL;DR - Venture Markets:
60 deeptech ventures collectively raised $995mn from investors.
3 VC funds announced closure, raising a total of $1,085mn from LPs.
6 companies achieved exits, creating $9,370mn in value for shareholders.
Featured Insights:
“Nuclear Energy's Moment Has Come” (Charles Oppenheimer in TIME)
12 startups tackling cancer to watch, according to VCs (Sifted)
Moody’s Analytics' latest market research with Rigetti uses quantum-based signature kernels to predict the odds of a recession (The Quantum Insider)
The open-source AI boom is built on Big Tech’s handouts. How long will it last? (MIT Technology Review)
Tech Breakthroughs & Partnerships:
Mosa Meat has opened the largest cultivated meat plant in the world. The 29,708sqft facility is the company’s fourth scale-up facility and marks the completion of its Center for Advanced Meat Production, Upscaling & Sustainability (CAMPUS) (Food Matters Live)
Physicists from MIT, working together with quantum startup Quantinuum, have created the first elusive particles that can remember their pasts (Quanta Magazine)
A project based at the University of Edinburgh, and funded by Meta Platforms, has demonstrated a new data compression scheme that could improve the sensitivity and usability of multispeckle diffuse correlation spectroscopy (DCS) instruments (Optics.org)
Our Top 10 Funding Picks:
London-based startup Ascend Gene & Cell Therapies, which was founded by VC firm Monograph Capital, has raised $132.5mn for its gene therapy manufacturing technology.
Delta Diagnostics secured $5.7mn in Series A funding to revolutionize the life sciences industry with their groundbreaking, label-free, multiplexed biosensing technology
In a record investment for Danish quantum technology, Sparrow Quantum raised $4.9mn in seed funding to become a market leader in light-matter interfaces.
‘Space Village’ developer and startup Orbital Outpost X has raised $5mn in the form of a convertible note from VC investor Space Infrastructure Ventures.
AccelerComm raised £21.5mn ($26.8mn) in series B funding from Parkwalk, Swisscom, Hostplus and a cohort of existing investors to supercharge 5G radio performance.
The UK Ministry of Defence (MOD) has injected £1mn of fresh capital into Oxford Space Systems (OSS) to exclusively develop and build their ‘wrapped rib’ antenna.
AI and robotics pioneer AMP Robotics has successfully closed its series C funding round, raising $8mn from a total of 11 institutional investors.
French biotech startup DiogenX closed just over $30mn in series A funding led by Boehringer Ingelheim Venture Fund, to develop their pancreatic beta-cell modulators.
GPTZero, a ChatGPT-detection tool designed to detect AI-generated text, has raised a $3.5mn seed round amidst growing concerns around fake content and spamming.
China-based Qingdian Photovoltaic Technology has raised a monster $216.5mn series A round to scale its photovoltaic power generation technology and services.
See the full list here.
Announced VC Fund Closes:
Swedish climatetech VC firm Pale Blue Dot is back with its second oversubscribed fund, closing at €93mn ($100mn) in fresh capital from LPs (announced via tech.eu here)
Mayfield raises nearly $1bn across two funds (read the crunchbase analysis here)
AI-focused AI2 Incubator has raised its second fund totalling $30mn, including LP commitments from Madrona, Sequoia, Two Sigma, Evergreen and Vinod Khosla.
Champagne-Worthy Exits (M&A & IPOs):
Viasat’s proposed $7.3bn acquisition of Inmarsat receives unconditional clearance From the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority (read the press release here)
Swedish Orphan Biovitrum (Sobi) are set to acquire CTI BioPharma for a total of $1.7bn, enhancing Sobi's position in rare haematology (Sobi’s press release)
Alternative fuel supplier ReFuels successfully listed on the Euronext Growth Oslo Exchange, raising just under $5mn at a valuation of $140mn in the process.
Key Hires and People Movements:
WANdisco has appointed ex-Sage boss Stephen Kelly as interim CEO as the company faces continued regulatory roadblocks and fraud probe (read the UKTN coverage here)
Dave Kielpinski - considered a pioneer in quantum computing, and known for building the framework for the architecture of large-scale ion trap quantum computers - will join Q-CTRL as their new Principal Quantum Control Scientist (The Quantum Insider)
Current Mynaric Co-CEO Mustafa Veziroglu is set to become the sole CEO - effective from the next AGA - with Bulent Alta (other Co-CEO) joining the supervisory board.
Policy & Government Initiatives:
It was an unusually (but somewhat refreshingly) quiet week in the world of policy and government last week. However, one interesting case has arisen, with the US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) currently investigating a pharmaceutical industry merger. But not on the basis of the pharmaceutical products themselves, but instead, the $8 billion digital advertising market.
You can check out Politico’s coverage of events so far between the FTC and those involved - IQVIA and Propel Media - in this article: Feds turn antitrust focus to digital pharma ads.
That’s all for this week!
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If you have any feedback - or want to see more of something covered in the newsletter - please do reach out to me via email: dan@deepsight.news.
Thanks for reading!
Dan