- The month drew more than $156 million through 33 rounds of funding, with a large volume concentrated in the Series B stage;
- Numbers of the first half of 2020, however, show a 51% drop in the YoY comparison;
- Startups Tembici, Cortex, Remessa Online, and BizCapital attracted the largest VC rounds in the month.
June ended with positive numbers in the Brazilian venture capital sector. According to data from the innovation platform Distrito, the month drew more than $156 million through 33 rounds of funding, with a large volume concentrated in the Series B stage. In May, venture capital deals brought $36 million to Brazilian startups.
However, numbers of the first half of 2020 show a contraction in the YoY comparison, as $669 million was the total amount in VC investments, a figure 51% lower than the first six months of 2019 when nearly $ 1.4 billion was raised.
According to Distrito, this has to do with three particular rounds received by Brazilian startups in June 2019: Gympass, Creditas, and Loggi, which, together, raised $681 million. Disregarding these three contributions, the volume invested in 2019 and 2020 was close. As for numbers of deals, the first half of 2020 saw 167 rounds of funding against 149 in 2019’s first semester, a 12% growth.
The rental bike business Tembici was one of June’s highlights with a $47 million Series B round led by the venture capital firms Valor Capital and Redpoint eventures. Data analytics platform Cortex, which specializes in data management for marketing and sales, has also raised a Series B round of $ 22.3 million, backed by Softbank, Redpoint eventures, and Endeavor Catalyst.
Brazilian fintech Remessa Online has also grabbed a significant share of June’s deals. Backed by Kaszek Ventures, the platform for international remittances announced a $ 20 million round on June 16.”The current crisis is accelerating the digitization of various sectors around the world and Remessa Online is at the forefront of this movement, transforming and revolutionizing the international transfer market in Brazil, especially for SMBs,” said Hernan Kazah, co-founder of MercadoLibre and Kaszek Ventures, at the occasion.
Led by DEG, the international investment arm of the German development bank KfW, BizCapital‘s round represented one of the biggest VC contributions in the month, with a $ 12 million Series B round. The startup provides credit for small-medium businesses.
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M&A
Mergers and acquisitions remained in a growth trend, with six deals during June. Brazilian broker XP stood out with three acquisitions in a row: investment platform Fliper, insurance brokerage DM10, and Antecipa, focused on the anticipation of receivables.
