Hello and happy Monday!

Today's main headlines:

• Amenitiz land €27.5M 💰

• TMB rolls out first hydrogen bus 🚌

• Streaming firm opens tech hub in BCN 🏙️

🥚 Egg hunt: where to find BCN’s startup unicorns 🦄

As we’re in Semana Santa (or Easter Week for non-Spanish speakers), it seems fitting to go on an egg hunt, or in the context of this newsletter, where to find the next startup unicorns from Catalonia. But before looking ahead and taking some guesses, it makes sense to look at current unicorns from our region and derive some learnings that might support our predictions.

According to Catalonia Trade & Investments, Barcelona is home to 6 unicorns right now:

• Adevinta (prev. Schibsted; online classifieds; B2C)

• Glovo (last mile deliveries; B2B/B2C)

• Letgo (online marketplace; B2C)

• Wallbox (EV charger vendor; B2C)

• eDreams (travel tech; B2C)

• TravelPerk (travel tech, SaaS; B2B)

So what does this tell us? Well, the main takeaway is that most local unicorns so far are typically B2C firms focusing on services around e-commerce or travel. Maybe it’s because Barcelona is a popular city, giving home-grown startups a brand image boost. Or maybe it’s just that this is what we’re really good at building – which is by no means a bad thing, there are many ways to skin a cat. Plus, often one big startup exit or success can spur a whole new set of related solutions.

On the back of this, we see TravelPerk, one of the most recent additions to this list, as a welcome boost for the local SaaS industry. This may allow Barcelona to break out of the “B2C” stereotype and put our tech and SaaS ecosystem on the map. And it’s actually what might happen.

Looking at several different sites that analyzed future Spanish startups (1, 2, 3, 4) and adding our own experience and knowledge, we’ve selected the following 7 Barcelona startups as the most likely to become the next unicorns:

• Colvin (online flower shop; B2C)

• TradeInn (sports e-commerce)

• Badi (rental marketplace; B2C)

• Paack (last mile deliveries; B2B/B2C)

• Red Points (brand protection SaaS; B2B)

• Factorial (HR SaaS; B2B)

• Typeform (online form builder SaaS)

While this is by no means investment advice, we do feel very strongly about each of these companies. The most positive aspect of this list though, besides it consisting of 7 great candidates, is that we observe an increasing amount of SaaS startups – which investors are very high on these days. This is great news for Barcelona as our ecosystem diversifies itself away from “just” being a place for B2C, e-commerce, or lifestyle companies.

Have a great week! 🌻

Startup & Investment News

Barcelona investment news

• ‘Shopify for hotels’ Amenitiz get €27.5M 

• Workplace mental health platform Oliva raise €5.76M

• On-demand car maintenance app Cafler secure €5M

• Aerospace technology startup Sateliot receive €1.5M 

• Property management neobank Unibo raises €600K and begins operations in Lleida 

• Plant-based meat firm Heura launches new crowdfunding campaign to continue accelerated growth

Barcelona startup news

• Parlem Telecom demos 5G online shopping with augmented reality, real-time products

• SME software startup Holded tops up their payout from recent acquirer Visma by €71M

• MagicBell launch on Product Hunt 

• GoodNews to expand its hip coffee business in Amsterdam and Copenhagen

• Founder of Fever and Reby Pep Gómez makes Forbes’s 30 under 30 list

Spanish investment news

• Spanish-American developer platform Tinybird secure €33M 

• Spanish medtech startup ​​Savana receive €23M

• Madrid-based smart housing solution Libeen close a €2.5M round 

• Madrid proptech platform Housers obtain €1.5M

• Madrid-based fintech startup Reveni raised an €800K round 

• Valencian management masterclass platform Magistral.com bag €333K

• Spanish renewable energy firm Grenergy launch in the US

VC, investment & crowdfunding news

• Crowdcube helped 13 Spanish firms raise €17M in 2021, a 150% increase compared to last year

• Get to know the 36 vehicles in Spain’s Venture Builder ecosystem

• Barcelona's Inveready’s divests in SEC Newgate following its acquisition by Three Hills Capital

Open calls, accelerator news & incubator stories

• Nominations are open for Catalunya’s DonaTIC awards, which celebrates female professionals, academics, and students in the digital world 

• Decathlon have launched a new program to assist innovative startups in the sportstech and retail tech sectors; apply now

• Open call for startups to help Cruïlla, Ship2B & Estrella Damm create the most sustainable festival in the country; apply until April 21st

• Lefebvre Sarrut launches 2nd edition European legaltech accelerator Lightspeed; apply until April 25th

• Open call for entrepreneurs developing solutions to tackle water scarcity in Southern Europe; apply until April 26th 

• SHOP4CF (Smart Human Oriented Platform for Connected Factories) is offering €100K to manufacturers in their 2nd open call; apply until April 30th

Barcelona startup & entrepreneur profiles & interviews:

• Anna Via: product manager at Glovo: Partner Health: measuring marketplace health as a first step to improve it

• Bernat Añaños: co-founder of Heura, “Barcelona and Catalonia are the perfect place from which to lead the protein transition”

• Partfy: online platform for hiring party planners & professional staff

Tech News

Tech news in Barcelona:

• From 22@ to Via Laietana - Six urban areas of Barcelona undergoing a transformation

• Transports Metropolitans de Barcelona (TMB) rolls out the first hydrogen bus in Spain

• Swedish streaming service Viaplay open a tech hub in Barcelona

• EU funds could create 60K jobs in Catalonia, says Catalan Government

• Barcelona launch €40M project to transform disused Palau d’Esports into Europe’s most advanced sports arena

• Catalan gov to allocate €6M to programs from 2022-24 promoting entrepreneurship 

• Barcelona Innovation Coast (BCI), a public-private platform that aims to strengthen the area of ​​urban innovation along the coast of Barcelona, to have a €235M economic impact on the city & create 40K jobs

• Barcelona chosen to host the 37th America's Cup sailing event in 2024

• Level airline’s initiative takes off: LA & San Fran are now connected to Barcelona with 4 weekly flights

Tech & big company news in Spain:

• IKEA invests €372M in solar park projects in Spain & Germany to offset its energy consumption

• Zara launches its first digital collection in the metaverse

• Spain’s data center sector raises investment in new centers to €6.8B, plus an additional €10B from direct investment, until 2026

• BBVA-backed Wiserentr launches the first Spanish embedded rental solution for consumer electronics  

Politics, Legal & Economics

• Spanish scale-ups club together to shift the tech policy agenda

• Spain to invest €11.4B in chips as part of Sánchez’s plan for economic recovery and transformation

Good Reads

• Barcelona startups: What do we really want?

• The No-Code revolution is flourishing in Spain. What happens next?

• Low carbon transportation systems goes mainstream: Predictions for mobility from Boyd Cohen

• From Mercadona's 'hives' to alliances with Glovo & Uber Eats, this is how Spanish supermarkets manage home delivery

Good Videos & Podcasts

• Sifted interview journalist Tim Smith on the claims of toxicity at Glovo (EN)

• Company culture & hiring tech talent in hyper-growth mode with Factorial’s Jordi Romero (EN)

• Video for those who missed the F10 Spain Batch II demo day (EN)

• Interview with the ‘Patron Saint of Bitcoin’ Michael Saylor (EN)

• Interview with Adrián Mato, designer & developer at GitHub (ES)

• Interview with Pep Gómez of Fever & Reby (ES)

Great Events

This week:

• Fri, 15 Apr @15:00: Online Info Session - Careers & Opportunities after a bootcamp

• Sat, 16 Apr @11:00: Webinar: Women’s Coding Day - Learn to build a landing page

• Semana Santa (usually not much going on)

Upcoming:

• Tue, 19 Apr @18:30: Online Event: Take your first steps in coding with Ruby

• Wed, 20 Apr @19:00: Free Masterclass | Learn to design apps with Figma

• Mon, 25 Apr @18:30: Startup Grind BCN ft. Fuckup Nights BCN

• Wed, 27 Apr & Thu, 28 Apr: EdTech Congress Barcelona

• Thu, 28 Apr @19:00: Masterclass | Marketing Automation: automate your Customer Journey

• Thu, 5 May @18:00: Spring 2022 Barcelona Tech Job Fair

• Tue, 10 May @09:00: IOT Solutions World Congress Startup Competition 2022 

• 26-28 Jun: European Blockchain Convention in Barcelona

See the full event calendar here & add your event here.

Jobs

• Bourbon Creative is hiring a Freelance Content Writer (Native English, 100% remote)

• Honest Greens is looking for a Data Engineer

• Opticks is recruiting a:  

• - Sales Development Representative - French Market

• - Sales Development Representative - Spanish Market

• Heura is looking for a Content Development and Thought-Leadership Manager

• Typeform is hiring a Senior IT Procurement Specialist

• Wallapop is recruiting an: 

• - SEO Specialist

• - Research Ops

• 8wires are hiring a Senior Data Engineer

• Netcentric is looking for several IT positions