Blue Apron, the meal-kit company backed by the likes of Bessemer Ventures and First Round Capital in private markets, is trying just about everything to raise cash.
During its fourth-quarter earnings report Wednesday, the boxed-dinner maker said it was considering a merger, a potential sale of all or a part of its assets, a capital raise through public or private markets, or some combination of the above.
Blue Apron is an interesting thesis on paper: Meal planning can be arduous and grocery trips frustratingly multi-legged. At a time when you can get just about anything with a click on Amazon, why not build a company that plans the meal for you and cuts out Wegmans and Walmart?
But its execution is a lot less clean-cut. Once valued at $2 billion, Blue Apron now sits around $58 million in private markets.
Turns out, the model is easily replicated, marketing spend is high, and the act of cooking itself is still time-consuming. Meanwhile, consumers continue to dine out or order delivery. Other meal kit makers such as Plated (acquired by Albertsons Companies) and Chef’d have shuttered their doors.
Blue Apron is still a sizable business, for sure: It reported $454.9 million in revenue for 2019 and losses of $61.1 million. But compare that to a peak of $881.2 million in revenue in 2017, and the difficulties of maintaining growth in the direct-to-consumer market become stark.
“We continue to believe that we have the right strategy to drive our resumption of growth as we work to launch additional new capabilities and test new product offerings,” CEO Linda Findley Kozlowski said, according to the press release.
Meal kits aren’t completely dead: HelloFresh, which trades in Frankfurt, is currently valued around $4.1 billion and has traded healthily since its IPO.
But meal kits have been less of a revolution than some imagined, with the CEO of Berlin-based HelloFresh telling the Wall Street Journal in December that the overall market was growing “not as much as we thought.”
Done Dell Deal: Dell Technologies is selling one of its cybersecurity units, RSA, for $2.08 billion to a consortium of investors including Symphony Technology Group, the Ontario Teachers’ Pension Plan Board, and AlpInvest partners. Dell acquired RSA in 2015, as part of its larger deal to buy EMC for $67 billion that year.
Lucinda Shen
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Housekeeping: It’s been a pleasure working on Term Sheet for the past two days! Let me know if any of your supply chains have been affected by coronvirus in China. Separately, Polina returns tomorrow. Please send new deals to [email protected].
VENTURE DEALS
- CANbridge Pharmaceuticals Inc., a Beijing-based biopharmaceutical company developing drug candidates to treat underserved medical conditions in China and other markets, raised $98 million Series D funding. General Atlantic and WuXi AppTec led the round.
- Outrider, a Golden, Colo.-based firm focused on autonomous yard operations, emerged from stealth and says it has raised $53 million in funding. The seed and series A funding rounds were led by NEA and 8VC, respectively.
- Maven, a New York-based women’s and family digital health company, raised $45 million in Series C funding. Icon Ventures led the round, and was joined by investors including Reese Witherspoon, Natalie Portman and Anne Wojcicki.
- Whatfix, a San Jose, Calif.-based SaaS platform for digital adoption, raised $32 million in Series C funding. Sequoia Capital India led the round, and was joined by investors including Eight Roads Ventures, F-Prime Capital, and Cisco Investments.
- Scipher Medicine, a Waltham, Mass.-based developer of a molecular technology platform, raised $25 million in add-on Series B funding. Optum Ventures, part of UnitedHealth Group, was an investor.
- Aisera, a Palo Alto, Calif.-based AI-driven platform to automate workflow, raised $20M in Series B funding. Norwest Venture Partners led the round, and was joined by investors including Menlo Ventures, True Ventures, Khosla Ventures, First Round Capital, Ram Shriram, and Maynard Webb Investments.
- Wiliot, an Israel-based maker of semiconductors that use ambient nanowatts of electromagnetic energy from cellular, WiFi and Bluetooth networks, raised $20 million in additional Series B funding. Vintage Investment Partners led the round and was joined by investors including Verizon Ventures, Maersk Growth, PepsiCo, and NTT DOCOMO Ventures. The additional brings its total Series B raise to $70 million.
- DROPPS, a Philadelphia-based eco-friendly direct-to-consumer household cleaning products company, raised $16 million from The Craftory.
- Algo, a Troy, Mich.-based maker of supply chain technology, raised $15 million in funding from Integrity Growth Partners.
- Negotiatus, a New York-based purchasing software startup for finance and operation teams, raised $10 million in Series A funding. Rally Ventures led the round and was joined by 645 Ventures, Green Visor Capital, Stage 2 Capital, and Uncommon Denominator.
- Ordway, a Washington D.C.-based billing and revenue automation platform, raised $10 million in Series A funding led by CRV.
- Swivel, Inc., an Austin-based office leasing platform, raised $8m in Series A funding. Jim Breyer of Breyer Capital led the round, and was joined by JLL Spark.
- BluBracket, a Palo Alto, Calif.-based enterprise security firm, raised $6.5 million in seed funding. Unusual Ventures led the round, and was joined by investors including Point72 Ventures, SignalFire and Firebolt Ventures.
- Croquet Corporation, a Los Angeles-based game and app developer platform for AR and 5G, raised $2.7 million in seed funding, including $2.0 million from SIP Global Partners.
- InVideo, a San Francisco-based AI-powered video editor, raised $2.5 million from Sequoia Capital India and angel investors.
- Canoe Intelligence, a New York-based fintech seeking to automate and improve alternative investment operations for institutional investors, allocators and asset servicing firms, raised Series A round of financing. Investors include Nasdaq Ventures, Hamilton Lane, Portage Partners, and Promus Capital. Financial terms weren't disclosed.
PRIVATE EQUITY DEALS
- RedBird Capital Partners, ‘Parasite’ studio CJ Entertainment and Merchandising, and Tencent are investing $275 million in Skydance Media, the Californian film studio behind the Terminator franchises. The deal values Skydance at $2.3 billion.
- Sky Island Capital made a majority investment in Polished Metals Limited, a Hillside, N.J.-based polisher and supplier of architectural and ornamental metals. Financial terms weren't disclosed.
- Valence Surface Technologies, backed by ATL Partners, acquired Fountain Plating Co., a Springfield, Mass.-based product finishing services firm for aircraft engine and critical components for the aerospace and defense industry. Financial terms weren't disclosed.
- Cadence Aerospace, a portfolio company of Arlington Capital Partners, acquired Premier Processing, a Wichita, Kansas-based surface finishing and special processing capabilities for aerospace and defense customers Financial terms weren't disclosed.
- CoSoSys, a Romanian provider of data loss prevention solutions, received a strategic investment from Turn/River Capital. Financial terms weren't disclosed.
- Veronis Suhler Stevenson completed a structured capital investment in Ascent Behavioral Health a Utah-based provider of wilderness therapy, residential treatment, and therapeutic boarding school programs for adolescents with mental health issues such as depression, anxiety and attachment disorder. Financial terms weren't disclosed.
EXITS
- Värde Partners and J.C. Flowers sold Fairstone Financial, a Montreal-based non-bank provider of credit solutions for near-prime borrowers, to Duo Bank of Canada, which is backed by Centerbridge Partners and Ontario Teachers' Pension Plan.
OTHERS
- Franklin Resources [NYSE:BEN], an investment management organization operating as Franklin Templeton, agreed to acquire Legg Mason, Inc. [NYSE:LM], a Baltimore, M.D.-based asset manager, for $4.5 billion in cash or $50.00 per share of common stock. Franklin Templeton will also assume approximately $2 billion of Legg Mason’s outstanding debt.
- Ally Financial Inc. (NYSE: ALLY) agreed to acquire CardWorks, a Woodbury, N.Y.-based non-prime credit card provider and consumer lender, in a transaction valued at approximately $2.65 billion.
- Quorum Software acquired EnergyIQ, a Denver-based well master data management software platform. Financial terms weren't disclosed.
- Eddyfi/NDT acquired Halfwave, a Bergen, Norway-based maker of an ultrasound-based technique that allows for high-precision measurements. Financial terms weren't disclosed.
- Affiliated Managers Group Inc acquired a minority equity interest in Comvest Partners, a middle market private equity firm. Financial terms of the transaction were not disclosed.
- BitGo will acquire Harbor, a San Francisco-based digital securities platform. Venture firms including Andreessen Horowitz, Craft Ventures, Fifth Wall, Valor Equity Partners and VY Capital backed Harbor. Financial terms weren't disclosed.
- LendingClub has agreed to buy Radius Bancorp and unit Radius Bank in a cash and stock deal valued at $185 million.
F+FS
-Atomico, the European venture capital firm founded by Skype’s Niklas Zennström, closed its fifth fund at $820 million.
- Greencoat Capital launched a closed-ended private markets fund, Greencoat Renewable Income LP (GRI). It has raised 277 million pounds so far from Brunel and SAUL.
- Align Capital Partners closed its second private equity investment fund at its hard cap of $450 million.
- More Ventures raised $76 million for its third fund.
PEOPLE
- Intermediate Capital Group hired Uzair Dossani and Evan Eason as Principals and Kevin Gregory as Managing Director.
- Prudence Holding hired Jordan Viniar as Principal.
- Greg Rosen is re-joining BoxGroup as a Venture Partner. Greg was previously at Benchmark and Bedrock.
