CircleUp

Last updated
CircleUp
Type Private
IndustryFinancial Technology
Founded2011;12 years ago (2011)
FoundersRyan Caldbeck, CEO
Rory Eakin, COO
Headquarters San Francisco, California
Number of employees
55 (2017) [1]
Website circleup.com

CircleUp is a financial technology company based in San Francisco that focuses on consumer goods startups. [2] Since its official launch in April 2012, CircleUp has helped several consumer companies raise equity, including Back to the Roots, [3] Halo Top Creamery, [4] Little Duck Organics, [5] Rhythm Superfoods [6] [7] and others. General Mills has an investment fund that is partnered with CircleUp to invest in companies listed on the platform. [8] [9] [10]

Contents

History

CircleUp was founded in 2011 by ex-private equity professionals Ryan Caldbeck and Rory Eakin. [11] Prior to launch, CircleUp raised $1.5 million from investors such as Clayton Christensen, David Topper (ex-head of Equity Capital Markets at JP Morgan) and Maveron (a venture capital firm founded by Howard Schultz). [12] The company officially launched in 2012 as a platform for entrepreneurs to raise capital and for investors to find companies to fund that were not part of the tech industry. [13] [14] Only original shares of the company are sold through the CircleUp platform. [14] On the site, entrepreneurs can connect with investors and investors are able to find investment opportunities as well as diligence materials such as investor presentations, financials, product details, industry information and third-party data. [15] CircleUp partnered with SecondMarket to cross-list companies seeking investments. [16] In 2014, CircleUp raised $14 million in a financing round led by Canaan Partners and including previous investors Google Ventures and Union Square Ventures. [17]

In 2015, CircleUp raised a $22 million fund, the CircleUp Growth Fund, which would match investments coming through its platform. [18] On November 11, 2015, the company announced its Series C funding round of $30 million led by Collaborative Fund. [19] [20]

In 2016, CircleUp ran a closed trial of its Marketplace Index Fund, designed to give larger investors access to a portfolio of consumer products companies, which were identified through the company's classifier software, which was later named Helio. [13]

CircleUp Credit Advisors was announced in July 2017 as an online lender for companies seeking credit with favorable investment data. Community Investment Manager partnered with CircleUp to provide a $20 million credit facility. [20]

In October 2017, the company launched a $125 million investment fund, CircleUp Growth Partners, dedicated to early-stage consumer companies. The fund uses CircleUp's Helio software. [21] CircleUp joined the Nielsen Connected Partner program in December 2017. The partnership allows CircleUp to use Nielsen data for its Helio software. [22]

On December 11, 2018, it was reported that CircleUp's founder and CEO Ryan Caldbeck was "talking about building a systematic fund in the private markets." [23]

Helio

The Helio software, originally referred to as The Classifier, analyzes public and private company data from public records, partnerships and information the company has acquired to identify potential investments. [2] [24] [25] It identifies brands which make between $1 million and $15 million in revenue as signs that they are likely to breakout. It creates analyses with classifications such as reach of distribution, product quality, brand strength, information on the management team as well as company financials which is then reviewed by a team of analysts. [1] [26] [27]

CircleUp Credit Advisors

CircleUp Credit Advisors was established to extend lines of credit to companies in need of additional working capital or small amounts of capital needed for company growth. As the loans are repaid, CircleUp can fund additional companies. At the time that CircleUp Credit Advisors launched, it had initially issued 50 loans to companies identified by the Helio software. [28] [29] [30]

CircleUp Growth Partners

CircleUp Growth Partners was launched in 2017 as a $125 million fund designed to invest in startup consumer product companies. Initial investments included HUM Nutrition and, 4505 Chicharrones. The fund was backed by Temasek Holdings, former BlackRock executive Ken Kroner, co-founder of Bumble and Bumble hair care Tevya Finger, former Annie's Homegrown CEO John Foraker, founder of Plum Organics Gigi Lee Chang and Euclidean Capital. [31] [32] [33]

Marketplace Index Fund

The Marketplace Index Fund is CircleUp's version of an ETF for early-stage private markets. The fund has a minimum $25,000 investment. [2]

Related Research Articles

A startup or start-up is a company or project undertaken by an entrepreneur to seek, develop, and validate a scalable business model. While entrepreneurship includes all new businesses, including self-employment and businesses that do not intend to go public, startups are new businesses that intend to grow large beyond the solo founder. At the beginning, startups face high uncertainty and have high rates of failure, but a minority of them do go on to become successful and influential.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Venture capital</span> Form of private-equity financing

Venture capital is a form of private equity financing that is provided by venture capital firms or funds to startups, early-stage, and emerging companies that have been deemed to have high growth potential or which have demonstrated high growth. Venture capital firms or funds invest in these early-stage companies in exchange for equity, or an ownership stake. Venture capitalists take on the risk of financing risky start-ups in the hopes that some of the companies they support will become successful. Because startups face high uncertainty, VC investments have high rates of failure. The start-ups are usually based on an innovative technology or business model and they are usually from high technology industries, such as information technology (IT), clean technology or biotechnology.

Seed money, sometimes known as seed funding or seed capital, is a form of securities offering in which an investor invests capital in a startup company in exchange for an equity stake or convertible note stake in the company. The term seed suggests that this is a very early investment, meant to support the business until it can generate cash of its own, or until it is ready for further investments. Seed money options include friends and family funding, seed venture capital funds, angel funding, and crowdfunding.

A series A round is the name typically given to a company's first significant round of venture capital financing. The name refers to the class of preferred stock sold to investors in exchange for their investment. It is usually the first series of stock after the common stock and common stock options issued to company founders, employees, friends and family and angel investors.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Index Ventures</span> European worldwide venture capital firm

Index Ventures is a European venture capital firm with dual headquarters in San Francisco and London, investing in technology-enabled companies with a focus on e-commerce, fintech, mobility, gaming, infrastructure/AI, and security. Since its founding in 1996, the firm has invested in a number of companies and raised approximately $5.6 billion. Index Venture partners appear frequently on Forbes’ Midas List of the top tech investors in Europe and Israel.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Insight Partners</span> American investment manager

Insight Partners is a global venture capital and private equity firm that invests in high-growth technology, software, and Internet businesses. The company is headquartered in New York City, with offices in London, Tel Aviv, and Palo Alto.

Andreessen Horowitz is a private American venture capital firm, founded in 2009 by Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz. The company is headquartered in Menlo Park, California. As of April 2023, Andreessen Horowitz ranks first on the list of venture capital firms by assets under management.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Indiegogo</span> American crowdfunding website

Indiegogo is an American crowdfunding website founded in 2008 by Danae Ringelmann, Slava Rubin, and Eric Schell. Its headquarters are in San Francisco, California. The site is one of the first sites to offer crowd funding. Indiegogo allows people to solicit funds for an idea, charity, or start-up business. Indiegogo charges a 5% fee on contributions. This charge is in addition to Stripe credit card processing charges of 3% + $0.30 per transaction. Fifteen million people visit the site each month.

Seedrs is an online equity crowdfunding company, headquartered in East London's Tech City, founded in 2009 and launched by Jeff Lynn and Carlos Silva in 2012. Since 2022 it has been a subsidiary of American crowdfunding company Republic.

Seedcamp is a European seed-stage venture capital fund, headquartered in London, launched in May 2007 by a group of 30 European investors. The fund's Managing Partners are Reshma Sohoni and Carlos Espinal.

MicroVentures is an equity crowdfunding website offering investments in early stage companies. MicroVentures connects accredited investors with startups, businesses and services looking to raise funds or participate in select secondary market opportunities. It is the only major equity crowdfunding site that is a broker-dealer registered by the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) and the first to take a portfolio company to a successful exit. As of October 2013, MicroVentures had raised $20 million, spread among 45 companies including Twitter, Facebook, and Yelp.

Crowdcube is a British investment crowdfunding platform, established by Darren Westlake and Luke Lang in 2011.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">AngelList</span> Website connecting startups, angel investors, and job-seekers

AngelList is a U.S. website for fundraising and connecting startups, angel investors, and limited partners. Founded in 2010, it started as an online introduction board for tech startups that needed seed funding. Since 2015, the site allows startups to raise money from angel investors free of charge. Created by serial entrepreneur Naval Ravikant and Babak Nivi in 2010, Avlok Kohli has been leading AngelList as its CEO since 2019.

Scale Venture Partners is an early-stage venture capital firm that invests in Series A and Series B rounds. Scale has invested in over 380 Cloud, SaaS, and infrastructure companies over the past 20 years. Of these investments, 159 have resulted in exits, including IPOs for companies like Bill.com, Box, DocuSign, HubSpot, RingCentral, Root Insurance, and WalkMe.

OurCrowd is an online global venture investing platform that empowers institutions and individual accredited investors to invest and engage in emerging technology companies at an early stage while still privately held. Based in Jerusalem, the company launched in February 2013, and has since opened overseas branches in the United States, the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia, Spain, Singapore, Brazil, and the UAE.

SeedInvest is an equity crowdfunding platform that connects startups with investors online. The company was founded in 2012 and launched in 2013. SeedInvest has focused on building liquidity in the platform by attracting high-net-worth individuals, family offices and venture capital firms. SeedInvest screens and vets deals before allowing them to take advantage of the JOBS Act exemption permitting General Solicitation. In September 2014 the company launched a partnership with Angel Investing website Gust. In October 2018, SeedInvest was acquired by peer-to-peer payment company Circle Internet Financial Ltd.

Equity crowdfunding is the online offering of private company securities to a group of people for investment and therefore it is a part of the capital markets. Because equity crowdfunding involves investment into a commercial enterprise, it is often subject to securities and financial regulation. Equity crowdfunding is also referred to as crowdinvesting, investment crowdfunding, or crowd equity.

VentureCrowd is an Australian multi asset class crowdfunding platform, headquartered in Sydney, including equity crowdfunding, property crowdfunding and debt-based crowdfunding. VentureCrowd completed the largest Australian equity crowdfunding raise, $4.2 million, for taxi-booking and payment software company Ingogo in May 2015. This deal is ranked 8th on the List of highest funded equity crowdfunding projects. This deal is ranked 8th on the List of highest funded equity crowdfunding projects. In June 2016, VentureCrowd raised more than $900,000 for a Western Sydney residential project - a 35-lot development in Riverstone East, in partnership with the property developer ClearState. In August 2016, a second project raised $1,700,000 for a 44-lot development project in Austral.

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References

  1. 1 2 Griffith, Erin (27 February 2017). "Investment Platform CircleUp Is Using a Moneyball-Style Algorithm to Identify the Next Hit Consumer Brand". Fortune. Retrieved 26 January 2018.
  2. 1 2 3 McAlone, Nathan (30 September 2016). "Why this top tech investor is funding a startup that could chop away at his own business". Business Insider. Retrieved 26 January 2018.
  3. ↑ Bercovici, Jeff (28 January 2016). "Why This Food Startup Says Hold the Technology". Inc. Retrieved 26 January 2018.
  4. ↑ LaVito, Angelica (29 June 2017). "The future of ice cream looks a lot like Halo Top". CNBC. Retrieved 26 January 2018.
  5. ↑ "Melt Raises Equity Through Crowdfunding". Archived from the original on 2012-10-01. Retrieved 2012-10-20.
  6. ↑ Watson, Elaine (13 January 2016). "Rhythm Superfoods closes $3m financing round led by Gen Mills' 301 INC arm and CircleUp; plans new beet chip launch". Food Navigator. Retrieved 26 January 2018.
  7. ↑ Giammona, Craig (17 January 2017). "General Mills Turns to Kale Chips to Boost Growth". Bloomberg. Retrieved 26 January 2018.
  8. ↑ Leena Rao (11 November 2015). "Where The Next Ben & Jerry's Can Find Investors". Fortune. Retrieved 26 January 2018.
  9. ↑ Kolodny, Lora (4 November 2015). "General Mills Fund to Back Food Startups Through CircleUp". The Wall Street Journal. Retrieved 26 January 2018.
  10. ↑ Clifford, Catherine (4 November 2015). "Why This $34 Billion Company Is Dipping a Toe Into Crowdfunding". Entrepreneur. Retrieved 26 January 2018.
  11. ↑ "$1,000 and a Click". Archived from the original on April 21, 2012.
  12. ↑ "Backed with $1.5M, CircleUp Aims High".
  13. 1 2 Ugolik, Kaitlin (26 May 2016). "CircleUp Rethinks Venture Capital for Consumer Goods". Institutional Investor. Retrieved 26 January 2018.
  14. 1 2 Needleman, Rafe (18 April 2012). "CircleUp: Crowdfunding for the 1 percent". CNet. Retrieved 26 January 2018.
  15. ↑ "Crowdfunding for Accredited Investors".
  16. ↑ Griffith, Erin (10 January 2013). "CircleUp funds five food companies, partners with SecondMarket". Pando. Retrieved 26 January 2018.
  17. ↑ Alden, William (26 March 2014). "Crowdfunding Site CircleUp Raises $14 Million". The New York Times. Retrieved 26 January 2018.
  18. ↑ Lunden, Ingrid (13 July 2015). "CircleUp Raises $22M To Invest In Consumer Brands On Its Crowdfunding Platform". Tech Crunch. Retrieved 26 January 2018.
  19. ↑ Kolodny, Lora (2015-11-11). "CircleUp Banks $30 Million to Help Investors Find Top Food Startups" . Retrieved 2015-11-11.
  20. 1 2 "CircleUp Adds Lines of Credit To Equity Finance Platform". Pymnts.com. 27 July 2017. Retrieved 26 January 2018.
  21. ↑ "CircleUp Launches New $125M Venture Capital Fund". Finsmes. 31 October 2017. Retrieved 26 January 2018.
  22. ↑ "CircleUp Joins Nielsen Connected Partner Programme". Research Live. 14 December 2017. Retrieved 26 January 2018.
  23. ↑ Term Sheet: A Direct Public Debut, Fortune
  24. ↑ Kessler, Sarah (17 March 2016). "When Sata – Not Humans – Guide VC Funding, More Women Win". Fast Company. Retrieved 26 January 2018.
  25. ↑ Mims, Christopher (7 March 2016). "Software Is Disrupting Venture-Capital Sector". The Wall Street Journal. Retrieved 26 January 2018.
  26. ↑ Konrad, Alex (31 October 2017). "CircleUp's $125 Million Fund Looks To Bring Moneyball To Backing Consumer Brand Winners". Forbes. Retrieved 26 January 2018.
  27. ↑ Watson, Elaine (31 October 2017). "$125m CircleUp fund will take 'human bias' out of early stage CPG investments". Food Navigator. Retrieved 26 January 2018.
  28. ↑ Lawler, Ryan (26 July 2017). "CPG investing platform CircleUp will now issue loans to help consumer brands grow". Tech Crunch. Retrieved 26 January 2018.
  29. ↑ Wack, Kevin (26 July 2017). "Crowdfunding platform expands into small-business lending". American Banker. Retrieved 26 January 2018.
  30. ↑ Calvey, Mark (26 July 2017). "CircleUp expands into lending to consumer startups". San Francisco Business Times. Retrieved 26 January 2018.
  31. ↑ Kolodny, Lora (31 October 2017). "A new fund uses A.I. to invest in consumer and retail products with the best chance of success". CNBC. Retrieved 26 January 2018.
  32. ↑ Roof, Katie (31 October 2017). "CircleUp announced $125 million venture fund". Tech Crunch. Retrieved 26 January 2018.
  33. ↑ Ortenberg, Carol (31 October 2017). "CircleUp Closes $125M Fund Powered by Machine Learning". Bevnet. Retrieved 26 January 2018.
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