📅 [11/9/20-11/15/20] DWDG Weekly Digest #7
👋🏽 Welcome to Doing Well by Doing Good, a newsletter and podcast series highlighting the companies aiming to be profitable with a purpose.
Happy Monday folks! Hope you’re off to a great start on your Monday! Here’s the latest in Doing Well by Doing Good news, fundings, and jobs.
DWDG News
Columbia is hosting their 19th Social Enterprise Conference — Capital For Good completely online. They have had a number of virtual events already, with the next one scheduled on December 4th. Sign up for updates here
DWDG Fundings
Zikooin, a three-year-old, Seoul-based start-up whose technology turns grains, oats and nuts into Unlimeat, an alternative to the popular Korean-style beef, has raised $4 million in first-round funding, mostly from U.S. venture capital firms. [Financial Times Report]
Doing Good: Zikooin is one of the many companies tackling alternative meats through more sustainable methods, which contributes to reducing the carbon footprint of meat production.
Carbon Health, a five-year-old, San Francisco-based primary care company that blends real-world and virtual visits, has raised $100 million in Series C funding led by Dragoneer Investment Group, with added participation from earlier backers Brookfield Technology Partners, DCVC and Builders VC. The company says it will use the capital to open 100 pop-up clinics across 20 U.S. markets. [TechCrunch Report]
Doing Good: Carbon Health creates pop-up clinics in underutilized spaces to serve underserved populations across the US.
R-Zero, an eight-month-old, San Francisco-based biosafety company at work on a germicidal UV device that it says offers the same or better efficacy as the systems used in hospitals, has raised $15 million in Series A funding led by DBL Partners, with participation from Bedrock Capital and HAX / SOSV. [VentureBeat Report]
Doing Good: R-Zero’s focus is democratize access to disinfecting technology from just hospitals to maximize the prevention of diseases prone to spread by bacteria.
Heroes, a five-month-old, London-based company that's setting out to buy third-party private label businesses on Amazon and scale them up, has raised $65 million in equity and debt funding (it isn't breaking out the ratios) from Fuel Ventures, 360 Capital Partners, and Upper90, an alternative capital provider for e-commerce assets. [Tech.eu Report]
Doing Good: Heroes, perhaps by the name itself, is aiming to help small businesses vulnerable to takeover by big behemoths sustain their businesses and livelihoods.
Kuda, a two-year-old, London- and Lagos, Nigeria-based startup that operates a popular mobile-first challenger bank for consumers and, soon, small businesses, has raised $10 million in seed funding led by Target Global, with participation from Entrée Capital, SBI Investment (once part of SoftBank) and numerous founders and angel investors. [TechCrunch Report]
Doing Good: Kuda is helping the mobile-first population in Nigeria to access financial products through their smartphones providing opportunities to small business and individuals.
Buoy Health, a 6.5-year-old, Boston, Ma.-based symptom checker using A.I., has raised $37.5 million in Series C funding. Cigna Ventures and Humana led the round, joined by Optum Ventures, WR Hambrecht + Co, and Trustbridge Partners.
Doing Good: Bouy Health lowers the barrier to access by enabling anyone to quickly connect with a chatbot and real physician to check their symptoms.
Spora Health, a six-month-old, San Francisco-based primary care provider that's focused on people of color and is operating a telemedicine-only basis for now, has raised $1.2 million in seed funding. Founder Dan Miller began working on the idea while an entrepreneur-in-residence with Human Ventures. [TechCrunch Report]
Doing Good: Spora Health is focused on building a primary care service for Black patients, focused on their needs and optimized to improve their outcomes. By competing on price, and educating physicians on implicit biases, they aim to bridge the gap in primary care coverage in the US.
LinkAja, a year-old, Jakarta, Indonesian state-owned payments company that facilitate cashless transactions over smart phones, has raised $100 million in funding led by the Singapore multinational mobile tech giant Grab. Other participants in the round include Telkomsel, BRI Ventura Investama and Mandiri Capital Indonesia. [Pymnts Report]
Doing Good: LinkAja is helping expand the reach of traditional banking to the populations with the least access to these mediums typically.
Solv Health, a 4.5-year-old, San Francisco-based patient booking and management platform, has raised $27 million led by Acrew Capital, with participation from MultiCare Health System, Light Street Capital, Benchmark, and Greylock. [Axios Report]
Doing Good: Solv Health brings urgent care access to more Americans by optimizing the underlying patient and urgent care booking service.
Springtide, a nine-month-old, New York-based multi-site practice treating children with autism, has raised $18.1 million in Series A funding co-led by Deerfield Management Co. and Optum Ventures. [MobiHealth News Report]
Doing Good: Springtide’s in-person and telehealth practice enables brings autism and other developmental disabilities to the forefront, helping populations in this segment better cope with the disease.
Nana, a three-year-old, Bay Area-based startup that runs a free academy to teach people how to fix appliances, then gives students the option of becoming a part of its own marketplace to connect them to people needing repairs — has raised $6 million in seed funding. Spero Ventures led the round, joined by Next Play Ventures (the new fund of former Linkedin CEO Jeff Weiner), former Stripe employee Lachy Groom, and numerous others. The company has now raised $10.7 million altogether. [TechCrunch Report]
Doing Good: Nana’s marketplace provides vocational training for free to students traditionally unable to access the market lowering the barrier to entering the appliance repair market and lowers the time to obtain a monetary benefit for their students
Didactic, a three-month-old, Austin, Tex.-based e-learning company co-founded by Udemy co-founder Gagan Biyani and AltMBA co-founder Wes Kao, has raised $4.3 million in seed funding led by First Round. [TechCrunch Report]
Doing Good: Didactic is focused on lowering the barrier for teachers to make money from their courses thus expanding access to those without the means to do it otherwise. The platform is to be as simple as Substack, and makes money only if teachers do.
Kyklo, a five-year-old, Buffalo, N.Y.-based startup that helps wholesale distributors of electrical and automation products launch e-commerce stores, has raised $8.5 million in seed funding, Felicis Ventures and IA Ventures led the round, joined by Jungle Ventures, and numerous others. [TechCrunch Report]
Doing Good: Kyklo’s platform allows small businesses historically unable to digitize and expand their market, access to create e-commerce stores to expand their reach and improve the process for both sides of the market.
DWDG Careers
Collective [Seed, Mission]
Hinge Health [Series C, Mission]
Until next week! Stay safe, stay sane, and stay positive. Good things are happening all around us, we just don’t always know it!
✌🏽Anand