Some normality is returning to markets as we recap a cracking few months. We're continuing to disrupt the traditional VC model with the launch of our Mavericks program, announce the exit of CohortGo, and celebrate therecognition of our portfolio companies in the worldwide press. Read on to see what else we've been up to recently.
Mavericks take-off 🚀
Our co-pilots on ascent. In an effort to expand our dealflow and access a new perspective on early-stage investing, we have assembled an entourage of co-pilots. Known as the Mavericks, we’ve partnered with most promising emerging managers / solo-capitalists starting with Australia and New Zealand.
Our Mavericks act like venture partners, and deliver us (TEN13) the highest quality new deals from previously undiscovered corners of the startup ecosystem to share with our investors. We then work with approved Mavericksto share their best deals with the TEN13 investor network and leverage theTEN13 technology platform.
So excited to be working with our pilot Mavericks: Brendan Hill, Side Stage Venture, & Harrison Uffindell. Read more about their backgrounds here.
Read about Mavericks in The Australian here!
What's going on in our portfolio?
CohortGo takes flight with Flywire
Cross-border tuition payments company and Transition Level portfolio company CohortGo has been acquired by listed counterpart Flywire (NASDAQ:FLYW).
The amazing story is that co-founders Mark Fletcher and Paul Jones were the first paying customers of River City Labs way back when. Incredible to see them come full circle after Steve invested in their first angel round in 2013. Notch up another great story of Aussie founders going the full journey.
Flywire acquires CohortGo - Read on 💸
Clipchamp has the corner Office
Word, Outlook, Excel and…Clipchamp; the staples of the Microsoft Suite. In the past weeks, Brisbane founded Clipchamp (prior TEN13 portfolio company) has been added to Microsoft’s suite of offering in their tooling panel. What was a product enjoyed by 16 million users when they were acquired in 2021 is now accessible within a click by Microsoft Office’s 345m users.
Clipchamp allows anyone to edit video content directly from their PC or phone. What Canva did for graphic design and Instagram did for photo editing, Clipchamp is doing for video.
Congrats to Alexander Dreiling, Sören Balko, David Hewitt, Tobias Raub, and their team for creating what's likely to become the world’s most widely used online video editor.
One to watch
EntryLevel has been recognised by Forbes as a top 100 startup to watch in Asia.
EntryLevel is on a mission to reskill 1 billion people with the expertise they need for new jobs. Without needing a new university degree, within 6 weeks employees can gain skills in data science or product management or even VC to prepare them for a new role.
Well done to Ajay Prakash and his team. To check in on the most exciting startup trends in Asia, the full list is well worth a read too. Singapore accounted for 13% of the list, the region leader, while Australia had 6 startups represented.
Forbes Asia 100 Startups to Watch 🤩
Layering up
Layer has been gaining press attention for their approach in-game licensing, read the coverage from VentureBeat on their innovative marketplace.
Layer is building a marketplace to allow brands connect to game developers to incorporate IP into the digital world. For example, Snickers can have their chocolate bars seen in a game with complete wrapper and details. It’s helping unlock the incredible valuable stored within the digital gaming worlds that gamers are spending increasing amount of time in. The average gamer in theUS spent over 16h per week on their console.
Layer changes how brands cut licensing deals 🍽
The Innovators
Another Top 100 list, this time The Australian newsletter recognised theTop 100 Innovators in the country.
We were very proud to see 11 founders across 6 portfolio companiesrepresented. To Ajay from EntryLevel (again), Stefan and Wyatt from Alts.co, Kim, Kerry, Adrian, and Andrei from Mr Yum, Andy, Ben,Jordy and Peter from Heaps Normal, Justin and Sandy from PUSHAS, and Jon from Vitruvian.
The Top 100 Innovators - The Australian 🦘
Outliers ⚡️
We’ve been in your inboxes quite often recently. Last Wednesday, we went live with our 6th issue of Outliers.
Outliers is our new, weekly newsletter focussing on the innovation, progress and successes in emerging market economies. So much of the startup narrative is centred around Silicon Valley. Still, we see so many exciting opportunities and success happening all over the world. India has crossed 100 unicorns, Israel has more startups per capita than anywhere else, China is home to the world’s most dominant social app in TikTok.
We aim to shine a spotlight on these huge successes when few others will. After all, we’re an Australian venture firm who have invested across 6 continents so far, we are as thankful for such progress as anyone.
To read our past issues, like how Israel became the number one startup nation, or why Africa has outperformed the VC downturn in 2022. Please send through any feedback or content ideas and feel free to share our signup page with your colleagues and friends!
Great businesses build
TEN13 sees up to 150 new startups every single month. Often, only 1 or 2 end up as investments. In this article with Business News Australia, Stew Glynn sits down and goes deeper on TEN13’s approach to VC investing. Starting with a strong founding team, Stew steps through some of the key factors we look at before making an investment. While VC may seem like a Black Box, it doesn’t have to be. This article sheds further light on our process, our model and our team.
Stew goes deep on the TEN13 model & background ⚡️
Your seat at the table
TEN13 is opening its doors and offering you a seat at the table, we are hosting our latest Virtual Boardroom Lunch for prospective investors.
Stew Glynn and Sophie Robertson will present on the state of the market, our approach to VC investing and the benefits of a deal-by-deal, network-based model for investors and founders.
Register on Zoom here. Sophisticated investors only.
Join us to talk tech investing 📺
What we’re consuming
- Valuation sensitivity on 20VC - 13 of the greatest investor minds on when to pay up and when to walk away cause the price is too high.
- Virtual Reality - coming soon? Bessemer talks on the near-term arrival of virtual reality and immersive experience.
- Listen to the story of Ravi Gupta. Investor at KKR, turned CFO and COO of scaleup Instacart.
- 15 charts every investor needs to memorise.
- Growth is no longer the best predictor of a company's value by Tomasz Tunguz.
- Fintech OG on 20VC - Sheel Mohnot on investing in Chipper Cash and FlexPort.
Hiring across the portfolio
👩💻 TEN13 is hiring a Ruby on Rails Engineer - Fullstack. Come join us!
💸 Pearler is hiring across product, data and engineering
🎶 Audience Republic is hiring for 15 roles including a Head ofEngineering.
🛒 Carted has 2 senior engineering positions open:a Golang and a QA role.
🎮 Layer is searching for a Full Stack Engineer.
📕 Bookipi has 11 roles open including a Senior UX designer.
💰 Glider is hiring a DevOps and Senior Engineer.
🤩 Amplified Intelligence hiring across Product, Content, DevOps, & Software
👡 Preezie hiring across Customer Success and Engineering.