Our Next Energy, a battery production startup, announced on Wednesday it raised a whopping $300 million Series B, bringing total funding to $390 million and raising its valuation to $1.2 billion, according to Crunchbase data.

The Series B was led by Franklin Templeton Investments and real estate-focused Fifth Wall with additional participation from the likes of Temasek Holdings and Coatue. The latest raise will help fund the operations of its battery cell factory that completed construction in December and will formally launch in 2024.

“We are transitioning from a startup funded by venture capital to a manufacturer fueled by growth capital,” said ONE CEO Mujeeb Ijaz. (Ijaz previously worked at Ford and Apple’s secretive transportation initiative before founding the company in 2020.) “That’s important in this environment where urgent demand for U.S.-based cell manufacturing is on the rise.”

Charging up the market

Indeed, the U.S. trails China in battery manufacturing. And, thanks to the rise of electric vehicles and the subsequent need for high-powered, easy-to-scale battery technology, that’s something the U.S. government is looking to change. 

The Inflation Reduction Act promises subsidies for EV companies, including a tax credit for those that use battery materials sourced in the U.S. The U.S. also passed a new law called the Invent Here, Make Here Act to prevent new developments in battery technology made in the U.S. from going overseas.

This comes at a time when supply chain issues and the rising cost of battery and metal material are bottlenecking U.S.-based electric-car manufacturers. Funding for electric-vehicle startups has plummeted from its 2021 highs thanks to the rising cost of materials. General Motors announced on Tuesday electric-vehicle production would slow down due to manufacturing and logistics issues. 

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While last year shattered records in venture capital, 2022 started off slow and only declined from there. Large, late-stage rounds were most affected as venture capital started to pull back. However, 10 companies in the U.S. were still able to break the $1 billion barrier in individual raises this year. 

As we close out the year, let’s take a look at the top rounds of 2022:

1. Epic Games, $2B, gaming: The metaverse is going to be epic — at least that is what both Sony and KIRKBI — the family-owned holding and investment company behind The LEGO Group — are betting on. Both invested $1 billion in  North Carolina-based Epic Games, valuing the gaming giant at $31.5 billion. The deal came just a week after Epic announced a partnership with LEGO to develop a “family-friendly” metaverse for kids. The company said the new cash will “advance the company’s vision to build the metaverse.” Founded in 1991, the Fortnite creator has raised more than $7 billion to date, according to Crunchbase data.

2. SpaceX, $1.7B, space travel: Elon Musk was everywhere this year — including here. Along with the seemingly never-ending Twitter purchase, his SpaceX company made headlines after it raised $1.68 billion in June. It was reported that the raise values the Hawthorne, California-based company at around $125 billion. SpaceX raised $1.9 billion in funding in April 2020 and has raised a total of $7.8 billion in funding, according to Crunchbase data. Previous investors in the company include NASA, Stack Capital, Bracket Capital and the United States Space Force, among others.

2. (tied) Lineage Logistics, $1.7B, logistics: Logistics were big this year with the supply chain still supremely mucked up. Novi, Michigan-based Lineage Logistics rode that interest to a huge $1.7 billion private equity round led by D1 Capital Partners in January. The past couple of years exposed many flaws in the global and domestic supply chains — and investors have taken note that it is an industry ripe for disruption. Other startups such as Seattle-based Convoy and San Francisco-based Flexport also landed large rounds in 2022.

4. (tied) Anduril, $1.5B, defense: Costa Mesa, California-based Anduril locked up a Series E worth nearly $1.5 billion in December that valued the company at $8.5 billion. That nearly doubles the company’s previous valuation in June 2021. The funding round was led by Valor Equity Partners. Anduril was founded in 2017 by Palmer Luckey, most famous for selling virtual reality company Oculus to Meta — then called Facebook — for $2 billion. Anduril builds software and hardware enhanced with artificial intelligence and machine learning for the military and defense industry. It works with the U.S. and its allies to create drones, underwater vehicles, and different operating and control systems. Luckey has said he started Anduril because many big tech firms were turning their backs on doing business with the U.S. Department of Defense, hurting the U.S. military’s ability to modernize as defense needs change.

4. (tied) Fanatics, $1.5B, retail: Jacksonville, Florida-based Fanatics raised $1.5 billion in a funding round that values the sports platform company at $27 billion. The company — which has exclusive licensing deals with most U.S.-based professional sports leagues and many universities to make and sell official team merchandise — was most recently valued at $18 billion, less than a year ago. The latest funding round includes new investors Fidelity, BlackRock and MSD Partners, as well as existing investors. Earlier this year, Fanatics acquired Topps trading cards for $500 million.

6. Cruise, $1.35B, autonomous cars: This was a strange one. In February, Cruise announced that SoftBank Vision Fund would invest $1.35 billion now that Cruise was operating fully driverless cars. The thing is — SoftBank reneged. That would be the first sign of SoftBank’s growing problems and poor investment strategy. SoftBank had made the commitment to invest when the company hit the milestone back in 2018 with its initial funding of $900 million. After SoftBank backed out, however, General Motors acquired SoftBank’s equity ownership stake in Cruise for $2.1 billion and made the startup whole on the round.

7. Citadel Securities, $1.15B, financial services: Miami-based market-maker Citadel Securities locked up a $1.15 billion minority investment led by Sequoia. The company provides both institutional and retail investors with liquidity to execute transactions across an array of equity and fixed income products. Citadel Securities works in more than 50 countries, supporting more than 1,600 clients.

8. (tied) TeraWatt Infrastructure, $1B, electric vehicles: San Francisco-based charging startup TeraWatt Infrastructure landed a huge Series A of more than $1 billion back in September. Launched out of stealth in May 2021, TeraWatt Infrastructure has built out a network of charging stations. The company acquires property in “strategically relevant” locations and helps customers operate EV fleets without the need to own and operate their own infrastructure. The new funding comes from funds managed by Vision Ridge Partners and existing investors Keyframe Capital and Cyrus Capital, and will be used for further development and expansion, including the buildout of a growing portfolio of charging centers. The round is the largest raised by a VC-backed startup in the electric vehicle segment this year, according to Crunchbase data. The company says it previously raised a $100 million seed round.

8. (tied) Securonix, $1B, cybersecurity: No cybersecurity company raised a round larger than this Lone Star State cyber company. The $1 billion-plus round was led by Vista Equity Partners, and is cybersecurity’s largest raise since San Jose, California-based cloud security provider Lacework closed a $1.3 billion round in November 2021. That was cybersecurity’s only round worth $1 billion or more last year. Addison, Texas-based Securonix offers security information and event management, and extended detection and response capabilities to companies. While we covered the heat the XDR sector has seen here, it is also interesting to add a note about the SIEM space. Earlier this year, news broke that Cisco had looked at buying Splunk in what would be the giant’s largest acquisition ever. While Splunk does a lot of things, many looked at the deal as a way for Cisco to enhance its IT security with Splunk’s SIEM platform and ability to use data to improve security.

8. (tied) Verily, $1B, health care: Google and its parent, Alphabet, have been active health care investors — especially recently. That trend has continued as Alphabet led a $1 billion investment in its former life sciences unit, Verily. Alphabet spun out what would become Verily as its own independent subsidiary in 2015. The South San Francisco-based firm — which introduced a COVID-19 testing program in 2020 — has now raised more than $3.5 billion in capital, according to Crunchbase.

Big global deals

While U.S.-based startups were able to weather the chilly conditions and raise large rounds, three of the five biggest global rounds were raised by companies outside the U.S.

• Denmark-based energy trading house Danske Commodities raised a $3.7 billion corporate round.
• China-based GAC Aion New Energy Automobile, which has five different EVs in the market, raised a Series A worth approximately $2.5 billion.
• Viacom18 Digital Ventures, a joint venture operation in India between Viacom, raised a $1.8 billion venture round.

Methodology

We tracked the largest rounds in the Crunchbase database that were raised by U.S.-based companies for the year. Although most announced rounds are represented in the database, there could be a small time lag as some rounds are reported late.

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Fourteen unicorns — private businesses valued at $1 billion or more — joined our unicorn board in October, bringing the total new entrants to the board this year to 295. That’s down sharply from the 614 new unicorns in 2021, but still well above the 173 minted in all of 2020.

October marked the fourth month since July when fewer than 20 companies joined the board. Recent months have had the lowest counts of new unicorns created since August 2020, when nine new companies joined the board.

The 14 new unicorns added $36 billion in value to the board this past month. That compares with September, when 12 companies joined and added $19.6 billion in value. In contrast, 50 companies joined the board in October 2021, adding $98 billion in value.

Last month’s new unicorns hail from nine countries. Of those, six are U.S.-based, and five are from Asia — one each from China, Japan, Indonesia, India and Israel. Three hail from Europe with one new unicorn each from the U.K., Spain and Liechtenstein.

Funding to all unicorn companies reached $6.6 billion for October 2022, a total of 25% of venture capital this past month.1

Overall in 2022, around 28% of venture capital was invested in unicorns, far below the 44% invested in unicorns in 2021.

Most highly valued

The most highly valued new company on the list is Guangzhou-based electric vehicle company GAC Aion New Energy Automobile, a subsidiary of Guangzhou Automobile Group.  The company raised $2.5 billion in a Series A strategic investment which valued it at $14.3 billion. It is the most highly valued private Chinese electric vehicle company out of 17 currently listed on The Crunchbase Unicorn Board.

Exit

One company exited The Crunchbase Unicorn Board in October:

Cambridge, Massachusetts-based gene editing biotech company Prime Medicine went public at a valuation of $1.7 billion, raising $175 million in the process and marking the only IPO from the board last month. The company was most recently valued at $1.2 billion in 2021.

Crunchbase Pro queries listed for this article

All Crunchbase Pro queries are dynamic, with results updating over time. They can be adapted by location and/or timeframe for analysis.

Unicorn queries

• Unicorn leaderboard (1,411)
• Unicorns in the U.S. (703)
• Unicorns in Asia (437)
• European unicorns (194)
• Emerging unicorn leaderboard (353)
• Exited unicorns (406)
• Unicorn fundings in 2022 ($116B)

Methodology

Funding rounds included in this report are seed, angel, venture, corporate-venture and private-equity rounds in venture-backed companies. This reflects data in Crunchbase as of Nov. 2, 2022.

The Crunchbase Unicorn Board is a curated list that includes private unicorn companies with post-money valuations of $1 billion or more and is based on Crunchbase data. New companies are added to the Unicorn Board as they reach the $1 billion valuation mark as part of a funding round.

Funding to unicorn companies includes all private financings to companies that are tagged as unicorns, as well as those that have since graduated to The Exited Unicorn Board.

Please note that all funding values are given in U.S. dollars unless otherwise noted. Crunchbase converts foreign currencies to U.S. dollars at the prevailing spot rate from the date funding rounds, acquisitions, IPOs and other financial events are reported. Even if those events were added to Crunchbase long after the event was announced, foreign currency transactions are converted at the historic spot price.

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An electric vehicle charging startup may have raised the biggest round, but the real winners of the week were biotech and drug discovery companies. The list this week is dominated by biotech and health care startups as investors continue to see the value in new and innovative treatments.

1. TeraWatt Infrastructure, $1B, electric vehicle: A San Francisco-based charging startup tops the list this week with a huge Series A of more than $1 billion. Launched out of stealth in May 2021, TeraWatt Infrastructure has built out a network of charging stations for the operation of light- to heavy-duty fleets. The company acquires property in “strategically relevant” locations and helps customers operate EV fleets without the need to own and operate their own infrastructure. The new funding comes from funds managed by Vision Ridge Partners and existing investors Keyframe Capital and Cyrus Capital, and will be used for further development and expansion, including the buildout of a growing portfolio of charging centers. The round is the largest raised by a VC-backed startup in the electric vehicle segment this year, according to Crunchbase data. The company says it had previously raised a $100 million seed round.

2. Gotham Greens, $310M, agtech: Startups that solve some of the farming and food issues we are now facing due to drought, environment and changing habits have been quite popular with investors. New York-based Gotham Greens is the latest to raise big—securing a $310 million Series E led by the BMO Impact Fund and Ares Management Fund. The indoor farming startup sells leafy greens grown in hydroponics-equipped greenhouses. The company says using hydroponics in their greenhouses allows them to use 97% less land when compared to farming. Gotham Green’s goal is to have 13 locations across nine states by 2023. So far, the company is building new greenhouses in Texas, Colorado and Georgia, in addition to existing greenhouses in Chicago and Providence. Launched in 2009, the company has raised $435 million to date, per Crunchbase.

3. ACELYRIN, $300M, biopharma: ACELYRIN is the first biopharma/biotech company on our list this week, but it won’t be the last by any means. The Los Angeles-based startup raised a $300 million Series C led by Access Biotechnology. ACELYRIN has now raised $550 million in less than 12 months. The company is developing treatment for inflammatory diseases and is entering late-stage trials. Founded in 2020, the biotech startup has raised $558 million to date, per Crunchbase data.

4. Verkada, $205M, security: Although we often focus on cybersecurity, there is still a real need for security in the physical world. That is something technology can help with, too. San Mateo, California-based Verkada is doing just that and closed a large $205 million Series D led by Linse Capital that values the company at $3.2 billion. The company offers a plethora of products that include video security cameras, door-based access control, environmental sensors and more. Founded in 2016, Verkada says it has raised more than $360 million.

5. Atlas, $200M, human resources: Chicago-based Atlas raised a $200 million Series B funding led by San Francisco-based growth investor Sixth Street. Atlas helps companies build a presence in new countries by dealing with compliance and payroll as the employer of record. “Atlas is enabling companies to seize the opportunity to be competitive, flexible, and borderless” said Rick Hammell, its founder and CEO.

6. RayzeBio, $160M, biotech: Another biotech and another big round. San Diego-based RayzeBio locked up a $160 million Series D financing co-led by Viking Global Investors, Sofinnova Investments and Wellington Management. The company is developing targeted radiopharmaceuticals to use against tumors and said it has “several novel drug candidates for clinical evaluation in the near future.” RayzeBio says it has now raised $418 million since starting operations in August 2020.

7. Nimbus Therapeutics, $125M, biotech: Cambridge, Massachusetts-based clinical-stage medicine developer Nimbus Therapeutics closed a $125 million private financing, which included participation from new investors Bain Capital Life Sciences and SV Health Investors, among others. Founded in 2009, the company has raised $427 million, according to Crunchbase data.

8. Capstan Therapeutics, $102M, biotech: San Diego-based cell-engineering startup Capstan Therapeutics closed a $102 million Series A led by Pfizer Ventures. Founded last year, the firm has raised $165 million, according to the company.

9. Galvanize Therapeutics, $100M, biotech: San Carlos, California-based biomedical platform Galvanize Therapeutics raised a $100 million Series B financing led by Fidelity Management and Research Co. Founded just this year, the startup has now raised a total of $148.5 million in funding, according to Crunchbase data.

10. Forge Biologics, $90M, biotech: Columbus, Ohio-based gene therapy-focused biotech company Forge Biologics raised a $90 million Series C co-led by Drive Capital and Aisling Capital. Founded in 2020, the startup has raised $330 million, per the company.

Big global deals

The top 10 rounds announced this week all came from U.S.-based startups—a rarity. The largest deal outside the U.S. was:

• India-based Yulu, which offers shared electric two-wheelers to reduce traffic congestion, closed a Series B worth approximately $82 million.

Methodology

We tracked the largest rounds in the Crunchbase database that were raised by U.S.-based companies for the seven-day period of Sept. 10 to 16. Although most announced rounds are represented in the database, there could be a small time lag as some rounds are reported late in the week.

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These newly minted unicorns raised a total of $3.2 billion over time, and added $19 billion in value to the board. 

This signals a big change in the venture markets from August a year ago when 45 companies joined the board, adding $82 billion in value at that time. 

New unicorn counts are also slightly down month over month from July when 14 newly valued unicorn companies joined the board.

Of the 12 new unicorns, seven hail from the U.S., two from China, and one each from India, Indonesia and South Korea. Companies are from varied sectors, from real estate to car hailing, wallets to marketplaces, and electric vehicles to shipping. 

Adam Neumann‘s Flow is one of the companies to join the board this past month with a $350 million investment from Andreessen Horowitz that valued the company north of $1 billion. It has yet to build a website, but plans to build a company that reinvents the rental market experience in a world of remote work. 

The most highly valued unicorn from this past month is Shanghai-based Zhiji Auto, an electric vehicle company jointly created by SAIC Motor and Alibaba Group. Zhiji was valued at $4.4 billion in a Series A funding. 

Funding in 2022

Unicorn startups have raised just over $102 billion this year as of the end of August. This contrasts with the peak in unicorn funding in 2021, where unicorn companies raised $305 billion in private financing, with 85% of that in late-stage and private equity rounds. 1

Exits

Three companies exited the board via the public markets in August 2022. They include South Korea-based car sharing company Socar, last valued at $1 billion in a corporate round in March, and more recently valued around $632 million as of Aug. 31 in the public markets. 

Kentucky-based waste and recycling company Rubicon went public via a SPAC deal. It was last valued at a billion dollars in 2017, and its current value is around $258 million on the public markets. 

And Washington, D.C.-based predictive analytics company FiscalNote went public via a SPAC merger. It was last valued at $1.4 billion in 2021. Its current valuation on the public markets is close to $1 billion. 

Despite the slowdown, the Unicorn Board keeps growing in size and currently hosts 1,395 private companies. 

Update: The new unicorns of August 2022 now count 12 companies adding $19 billion in value to the board. Seven of the new unicorns are U.S.-based companies.

Crunchbase Pro queries for this article

All Crunchbase Pro queries are dynamic, with results updating over time. They can be adapted by location and/or timeframe for analysis.

• Unicorn leaderboard (1,395)
• Unicorns in the U.S. (697)
• Unicorns in Asia (433)
• European unicorns (189)
• Emerging unicorn leaderboard (355)
• Exited unicorns (404)
• Unicorn fundings in 2022 ($104B)

Methodology

Funding rounds included in this report are seed, angel, venture, corporate-venture and private-equity rounds in venture-backed companies. This reflects data in Crunchbase as of Sept. 1, 2022. 

The Crunchbase Unicorn Board is a curated list that includes private unicorn companies with post-money valuations of $1 billion or more and is based on Crunchbase data. New companies are added to the Unicorn Board as they reach the $1 billion valuation mark as part of a funding round. 

Funding to unicorn companies includes all private financings to companies that are tagged as unicorns, as well as those that have since graduated to The Exited Unicorn Board. 

Please note that all funding values are given in U.S. dollars unless otherwise noted. Crunchbase converts foreign currencies to U.S. dollars at the prevailing spot rate from the date funding rounds, acquisitions, IPOs and other financial events are reported. Even if those events were added to Crunchbase long after the event was announced, foreign currency transactions are converted at the historic spot price.

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The layoffs amount to around 840 employees, and come less than a year after Rivian went public in the largest IPO of 2021. 

“Over the last six months, the world has dramatically changed with inflation reaching record highs, interest rates rapidly rising and commodity prices continuing to climb—all of which have contributed to the global capital markets tightening,” Rivian CEO RJ Scaringe wrote in an email to employees, according to the WSJ.

Rivian went public in November 2021, raising $11.9 billion through its IPO, Crunchbase data shows. The Plymouth, Michigan-based company was valued at $66.5 billion at the time of its IPO.

The company’s stock price is down around 68% since the beginning of the year, and had a market cap of about $29.6 billion on Thursday. The company warned employees earlier this month that layoffs were coming. 

Growth stocks have been hit hard by the turmoil in the public markets. More than 32,000 employees of U.S.-based tech companies have been laid off so far this year, according to a Crunchbase News tally. The tech industry and tech-adjacent companies like those in the electric vehicle and biotech spaces seem to be bearing the brunt of the layoffs.

Rivian has faced some production challenges since it’s been public as well. In March, the company cut its production forecast in half to 25,000 vehicles, pointing to a parts shortage, according to the WSJ.

Rivian is not the only electric vehicle company to conduct layoffs. Tesla also laid off some employees and closed an office in California after CEO Elon Musk said he had a “super bad feeling” about the economy. 

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According to our friends at TechCrunch, the round values the eight-year-old company at more than $1 billion. It was raised just eight months after Sila Nano’s $70 million Series D that was led by Sutter Hill Ventures and brings its total venture raised to $295 million, according to the company.

Alameda, Calif.-based Sila Nano said it has come up with new manufacturing methods to create a silicon-based anode to replace graphite in a lithium-ion battery. Its chemistry allows for “lighter, safer, higher energy density batteries for mass adoption of electric vehicles, smarter, longer-lasting portable electronics, and broader use of renewable power source,” according to the company.

In the short term, Sila Nano said it plans to use the new capital to focus on ramping up production volume so that it can supply its first commercial customers in consumer electronics within the next year. Longer term, it will continue to scale up production to bring its batteries to market, along with partners BMW and Daimler, “accelerating the path toward powerful, low-cost electric vehicles.”

The company also announced that Jeff Immelt, former CEO of General Electric, will be joining its board as an independent director.

The deal also marks Daimler’s 11th startup investment since January 2018, according to its Crunchbase profile. It also recently put money in Chinese autonomous driving startup Momenta and Bay Area-based Proterra, a maker of zero-emission, battery-electric buses.

Illustration: Li-Anne Dias

Over the past two years, we’ve seen a massive spike in venture funding by major auto manufacturers. Deal counts are up, more automakers are investing, and more big rounds are getting done.

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However, an analysis of Crunchbase funding data for the twenty largest global automakers finds wide variance in investment sizes, timing, and strategic focus. Some automakers have focused on unicorns and mega-rounds, while others are active at the early stage. Still others have yet to park much capital in startups, illustrating a long-term reticence to engage actively in the venture space.

None of this is especially surprising to industry insiders. Automakers “operate at a different clock speed than the technology industry,” said Chris Stallman, a partner at Fontinalis Partners, a transport-focused venture firm with offices in Detroit and Boston. Five to seven year vehicle product cycles make startup partnerships difficult because there is uncertainty about whether the company will still be around when a car comes to market.

That said, it’s no secret that automakers have shown more interest in startups lately. Nor is it any secret what’s driving that surge, given the massive shifts the industry faces from the rise of electric cars, autonomous vehicles, ride-hailing services, and other emerging technologies and transportation business models.

Below, we set out to quantify combined investment by automakers in startups of all stripes, along with acquisitions, with a focus on how individual automakers compare.

Deal Pace Speeds Up

First we look at deal count. Broadly, funding records for the past five years show a dramatic rise in startup investment beginning in 2016 and revving up further in 2017.

In the chart below, we look at the number of disclosed venture and seed rounds with participation by the major automakers. Keep in mind, these are only disclosed rounds, so the actual number of investments may be quite a bit higher, as automakers are known to do stealth deals as well.

Deal-making isn’t concentrated in any particular sub-sector. We see sizeable rounds, for instance, for Shift, a car-selling platform, ChargePoint, a provider of electric vehicle charging stations, Turo, a provider of peer-to-peer car-sharing, StoreDot a battery developer, and Momentum.ai, an autonomous driving startup.

Car companies aren’t just doing more deals; they’re doing bigger investments. In all, automakers participated in at least eight mega-rounds ($100 million or more) this year, up from zero a few years ago. In the following chart, we look at mega-rounds over the past five years:

Ride apps have dominated so far this year, with at least four companies in the space securing mega-rounds with automaker participation: Via, Grab, Gett, and Careem. Autonomous vehicles were also big, with Nauto and ArgoAI scoring mega-rounds.

Carmaker M&A

While it was a big year for startup investment by automakers, M&A has been slower. That’s not abnormal, as car companies generally don’t buy a lot of startups, although they do the occasional big deal or smaller asset purchase.

So far this year, we haven’t seen any large M&A transactions involving automakers. The most recent large-dollar purchase was GM’s purchase of self-driving technology startup Cruise Automation for $1 billion in 2016.

The latest deal, Volvo’s purchase this month of valet parking app developer Luxe, by contrast, was a smaller asset sale involving a startup that had ceased offering its service. Other recent deals, including Ford’s purchase of commuter transit provider Chariot, and PSA Group’s acquisition of online auto repair platform Autobutler, were smaller deals involving early stage companies.

Whether they opt to partner or acquire, however, automakers are cultivating more relationships with startups, Stallman told Crunchbase News. The global recession of 2008-2009 required heavy cuts to R&D for many struggling automakers, and in the last couple years they’ve been playing catch-up. Bringing in an outside startup can be a good way to speed up internal efforts.

How The Biggest Automakers Stack Up

Not everyone’s operating at the same speed, however. Some automakers like venture investing a lot more than others.

Looking at deal count, Germany’s BMW was the most active automaker by a wide margin, with more than 30 disclosed investments since 2012, including 10 so far this year. A majority are through its corporate fund, BMW iVentures, which invests across multiple sectors including autonomous driving, electric vehicles, AI, and automotive cloud technology.

Although most deals are Series A or B, BMW i Ventures invests across stages, and many of its early stage rounds are quite large. This summer, the fund participated in a $38 million Series C for Shift, and a $159 million Series B for Nauto, a developer of AI-enabled camera technology for automotive fleets.

Germany’s Daimler was also quite active in 2017, with eight investments, including participation in two mega-rounds for two ride apps, New York-based Via and Dubai-based Careem.

In the chart below, we look at the number of disclosed investments since last year by major automakers:

A few automakers have so far stayed out of startup investing. Fiat Chrysler, in particular, has been reticent to invest, although a recent self-driving car partnership with Google demonstrates an interest in partnering with Silicon Valley companies. Nissan and Mazda have also shown little appetite for VC.

The Road Ahead

Looking ahead, it’s not far-fetched to presume that the momentum for startup investing among automakers will continue. If anything, signs point to further acceleration, with Toyota recently unveiling a $100 million AI-focused venture fund and Ford scaling up its tech-focused Ford Smart Mobility division.

Moreover, if any industry’s investment activities are going to follow Newton’s first law of thermodynamics, it ought to be transportation.

As Ford weathers a declining stock price in face of its rival, General Motors, Fortune reports that the company, per its new CEO Jim Hackett, wants to be a “mobility smorgasbord.” So what does that actually mean? We’ll leave it to Adam Lashinsky to explain:

At a high level—a level where Hackett frequently dwells—his plan for Ford revolves around focusing the company on revenue sources other than making vehicles with internal-combustion engines. These include producing electric and autonomous cars as well as offering services like the Ford-owned Chariot “micro-transit” system and “curb-management” software that eases congestion in cities.

Of course, one way to accomplish these goals is to simply acquire them. It’s a strategy employed by a number of public tech companies, and the acquisition of tech companies has been leveraged by more traditional staples, such as Walmart, in an attempt to keep pace with the market. Ford, on the other hand, has apparently not seen the value in an acquisition strategy.

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According to Crunchbase, Ford has only acquired six companies, with no deals reported thus far in 2017. But of the two deals it reported in 2016, Chariot and SAIPs, both fall in line with the automaker’s “smorgasbord” ambitions. But Ford isn’t the only acquisition shy automaker. Its rival, General Motors, has only acquired eight companies, also with none reported in 2017.

What that means for Ford’s ambitions to get back in the green and catch up with its peers in autonomous driving is unclear. The tech industry and the auto industry have, in efforts to work together, hit bumps in the road. And it’s not as if acquiring your way to relevance is a bulletproof strategy, as Yahoo learned the hard way.

The company also hasn’t completely bypassed the tech industry in terms of financial support. Ford invested in two auto tech companies over the past year: Argo AI, an autonomous software company, for $1 billion, and AutoFi, an online sales system for financing vehicle purchases, for $10 million. Alongside those deals, Ford has invested in ten other startups—a modest pipeline for future acquisitions. Meanwhile, GM has only made four investments, with its most notable being in Lyft’s $1 billion Series F raise. Since that deal, the world’s largest automaker has worked closely with Lyft to hasten its own autonomous ambitions.

But for now, Ford appears to want to be the smorgasbord of mobility without the help of tech startups. Indeed, the company appears to prefer to act autonomously—even if its cars don’t.

From The Crunchbase Daily: 

Apple unveils ways to part with paycheck

• Apple aficionados got plenty of fresh product news to digest following the company’s keynote address this week, including a shiny, new, premium-priced smartphone, the iPhone X. The company also unveiled other new stuff, including the iPhone8, an updated Apple Watch, and technology to unlock phones using facial recognition.

BridgeBio raises $135M

• BridgeBio Pharma, a developer of medicines for patients with genetic diseases, has raised $135 million in a new financing round led by Viking Global Investors and KKR. Palo Alto-based BridgeBio, founded in 2015, currently operates ten drug programs, including a heavy focus on cancer treatments.

23andMe confirms $250M funding

• Genetic testing company 23andMe formally announced the close of a $250 million funding round led by new investor Sequoia Capital. The financing brings total capital raised by 23andMe to $491 million.

This is how Pro Rata works

• In the latest installment of our series on the weird and confusing dynamics of startup funding, Crunchbase News takes a look at pro rata, a common financing mechanism that lets investors maintain their stake in a company in follow-on rounds. In other news, we look at the upcoming IPO of Latin American online travel company Despegar.com.

Join us at Disrupt SF

• Join us at TechCrunch Disrupt in San Francisco next week for a live broadcast of Equity, the weekly startup and IPO-focused show featuring Crunchbase’s Alex Wilhelm. Get your special $500 discount for being a Crunchbase subscriber.

Yesterday, Tesla announced plans to issue $1.5 billion in debt to fund production of its Model 3 car. The new fundraising is not a surprise. As our recent analysis on electric vehicles (EVs) makes clear, the EV space is a cash-burning machine:

Despite basking in the center of media attention, Tesla is no exception.

Why Does Tesla Need More Money?

Since the launch of Model 3, its least expensive model to-date, Tesla has picked up around 1,800 orders per day. While most Model 3 orders are expected to be delivered starting late 2018, at the current pace of orders, Tesla needs to scale its production up to 500,000 vehicles per year by the end of 2018.

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Scaling production is not cheap. Hence the need for more capital.

Tesla has a history of missing delivery targets (the company even created a Delivery Estimator to appease its stans). On one hand, it’s good news for Tesla that it has received more orders than its current manufacturing capacity can handle. On the other hand, missing production deadlines again may damage the firm’s reputation, and correspondingly, relations with its investors and customers.

Tesla’s Cash Needs

It’s uncommon for companies to raise money after going public. Most companies that decide to IPO have either reached a certain maturity or have established stable revenue streams. Tesla, however, went public in 2010 with almost no product to market (besides the dying Roadster whose production ended by 2012), and it attempted to sell to Google in 2013 as it neared the brink of bankruptcy.

Given how unusual Tesla’s fundraising activities are, we decided to take a look at the company’s post-IPO funding rounds.

In the following chart, the navy blue is Tesla selling new shares, whereas the light blue is the company raising debt that can convert into shares later. Note that the chart is not inclusive of the new $1.5 billion.

Tesla has not stopped raising money since it went public. The company has gyrated between selling shares directly, and raising capital through convertible debt, which can have dilutive impacts down the road.This March alone, Tesla raised almost $2.2 billion from issuing equity and convertible debt. The giant chunk of funding makes sense since the company needs to cover the costs of acquiring SolarCity as well as gearing up for Model 3’s launch.

This time around, rathering than making equity offerings and issuing convertible debt, which convert into shares, Tesla has decided to go with junk bonds. In the world of high-yield corporate bonds, or junk bonds for short, the investors trade risk of default for higher yield, the issuer quickly raises a large sum by paying a higher interest rate.

The $1.5 billion debt offering marks the first time of Tesla entering into the high-yield junk bond market. But the move shouldn’t come as a surprise. Just as Jason Lemkin, Founder of SaaStr, predicted five months ago on TechCrunch’s Equity Podcast, Tesla continues to push the boundaries of the public market:

“My general rule with Tesla is that [Elon Musk] raises every dollar possible at the highest valuation and then more. My guess is that [even if] he couldn’t raise $3 billion today, he will still raise that $3 billion and push it to the limit…Eventually he will get it done, and it may even be 90 days before he is out of money.”

How long until Tesla goes back for more?

From the Crunchbase Daily:

Google said to fire memo author

1. Google has fired the author of a controversial and widely-read memo blasting the company’s diversity policies, Bloomberg reports. The company said the memo violated its code of conduct and advanced harmful gender stereotypes.

Oryx raises $50M for LiDAR

• Oryx Vision, an Israel-based developer of LiDAR technology for autonomous vehicles, has raised $50 million in a Series B round led by Third Point Ventures and WRV and joined by new and existing investors.

Carmaker Faraday leases factory

• Electric carmaker Faraday Future has signed a lease on a production facility in Hanford, Calif., after recently abandoning plans to build its own factory in Nevada. Faraday says it plans to have its first vehicle on the road by the end of 2018.

IPOing like it’s 1986

• Crunchbase takes a trip back to 1986, when Microsoft went public as a profitable, fast-growing company that didn’t need the money. In other words, it was in many ways the complete opposite of what we see in the current tech cycle. (For more stories, follow @crunchbasenews on Twitter and check us out on Facebook.)