Hello and happy Monday,

Today's main headlines:

• Sony hiring 100+ talents in BCN 👩‍💻

• Travelperk move in to new HQ in 22@ 🏢

• Four-day work week roll out at Telefónica 💼

Are we feeling the startup investment slow down in BCN?

Just a few weeks ago the renowned accelerator Y Combinator sent an alarming email to their startups telling founders to ‘plan for the worst’ amid a bearish market sentiment 📉. The reasoning was that amidst record-like inflation rates and a projected increase in interest rates, startup funding would start drying up. What followed were panic-stricken mass lay-offs at leading startups and talent flocking to “boring” corporates as precautionary measures.

What do we observe in Barcelona? Well, if we look at this week as an example, we couldn’t find a single new report of local startup funding 😱. Of course, this might be simply an anomaly – it has happened before. Also, it’s not unusual for startup funding to dry up around summer when the holiday season kicks in. Plus, Minoryx recorded a €50M+ funding round just last week. What this means, only time will tell.

But being Barcinno, we do want to put a (legitimate) positive spin on things. Raising funds grabs headlines, but it’s not everything. It’s much more important to see startups grow. And for that, we still got plenty of good vibes ✌️ stories: Wallapop just boosted its turnover by 65%, Freshly Cosmetics opened two new brick-and-mortar stores, and Travelperk's continuous growth was highlighted by their current move to a new 9,400m2 HQ.

The takeaway? We’re not saying all is great. Tough times might indeed be ahead. But Barcelona startups are led by fantastic entrepreneurs who will make sure they get out of this period stronger. 💪

Build great things! 🤝

Startup & Investment News

Barcelona investment news

• none

Barcelona startup news

• Wallapop’s turnover up 65% in 2021 to €51M

• Freshly Cosmetics to open 2 new stores; one in BCN’s Glòries mall & another in Reus

• Travelperk to move to new ​​9,400-square-meter headquarters in 22@

• Unnax obtains its EMI passport to operate throughout the EU

• Factorial’s Desky is now live, a 100% free app for teams to book office workspaces

• Glovo to finally close Delivery Hero sale after agreeing to comply with Spanish rider law

• Bike subscription service Kleta upgrade their warehouse to double rentals in 2022

Spanish investment news

• Madrid & Boston-based cloud-native logging & security analytics provider Devo get €93.3M; Spanish VC Kibo Ventures takes part

• Navarran alt protein food-biotech startup Cocuus land €2.5M pre-series A

• Madrid-based year-old ehealth startup Galeneo obtain €1M

• Madrid food delivery firm Kilimanjaria raised €800K

• Spanish growth services company Product Hackers received €555K

• Madrid-based AI access startup Dedomena close €500K 

• Cybersecurity firm SIA (of Indra) acquires Extremadurian biometric ID firm Mobbeel

• Madrid-based women’s health app Woom acquired by UK virtual fertility clinic Apricity

• Zucchetti Group’s Spanish division acquires SMB consulting firm ALTAI Soft

VC, investment & crowdfunding news

• All Iron Ventures rolls out €30M fund to invest in VC managers across Europe

• Mundi Ventures participated in €19M round of British insurtech startup Urban Jungle

• Wayra invests in a US startup for the first time: social audio company Gimme Radio

• LLYC Venturing makes its first investment; €200K in Spanish data & analytics startup Erudit

• BStartup’s investments have generated 1.6K jobs; 40% also have a social impact

Open calls, accelerator news & incubator stories

• Equity-free accelerator FI Boost opens 5th call for Spanish tech startups; apply until June 17

• Soltec’s Solteach program to grant 45 solar energy training scholarships in Spain, Mexico & Colombia; apply between June 1 and 20

• Up-and-coming Web3 & blockchain accelerator Open Web Collective announced a new €596K fund; apply until June 30

• Equity-free program AWS Startup Loft Accelerator is offering tech & product development, market advice & funding prep to early-stage startups; apply now

• Womenalia & Amazon launch training program to help women entrepreneurs digitize their businesses and sell online

Barcelona startup & entrepreneur profiles & interviews:

• Àngel Llull: International president of The Knot Worldwide says new offices in BCN

• Eusebi Llensa: CEO of Outvise, “The brain drain in Spain is physical and virtual”

• Marc Coloma: Co-founder of Heura says "This year we will go beyond meat"

• Tribuapp: Platform to rent empty office space to 3rd parties for remote workers

Tech News

Tech news in Barcelona:

• Sony employs 100+ engineering and innovation, marketing & sales professionals in its Barcelona offices 

• Digital & technology school EPITECH expands facilities in Barcelona to train 1K new tech professionals in 5 years

• Barcelona vs Madrid: will the “two-horse” Tech Race pay off?

Tech & big company news in Spain:

• Telefónica rolls out four-day work week

• Santander launch new SaaS Ulity, a subscription-based solution for the mobility service sector

• German SaaS solution Sastrify will launch in Spain

• Chinese e-commerce fast fashion giant Shein opens first pop-up store in Madrid

• Trucksters open new corridor to cut UK-Spain freight transport times by 50%

• Zero-waste foodtech startup Choco report a 333% growth in Spain in the last year

Politics, Legal & Economics

• Spain to relax work permit rules for foreigners in 4 industries, including tech 

Good Reads

• Spain’s top seed and Series A VC investors

• Spanish unicorns: the founders and their universities

• Who is Meta's new COO? Meet Spaniard Javier Olivan

• Want to be a founder? 7 dos and don’ts of starting a company

• 15 Spanish fintech startups with promising growth outlook

• The 15 best Spanish incubators & accelerators according to Novolabs

Good Videos & Podcasts

• Who's been hit hardest by the mass tech layoffs & how can startups survive the storm? (EN)

• Talk with co-founders of Valencian startup Staxe, a platform enabling music & creative production economies on Web3 (EN)

• Tech talks: How can organisations make themselves more welcoming to members of the LGBTQIA+ community? (EN)

• Video interview with Javier Pérez-Tenessa, Co-founder of eDreams (ES)

• From engineer to product & then to business with Daniel Espejo from Klarna (ES)

Great Events

This week:

• Wed, 15 Jun @18:30: Startup Grind BCN hosts Pep Gomez (Founder @ Reby & Fever)

• Wed, 15 Jun @18:30: BCN Video Tech - Summer Edition Meetup

• Thu, 16 Jun @09:00: Hired!BCN Talent Acquisition Conference

• Thu, 16 Jun @15:00: Building Bridges: networking between startup ecosystems in Lithuania & Spain 

• Thu, 16 Jun @17:00: Bcapital Day: Investment Forum #10 Pitch to Investors

• Fri, 17 Jun @10:00: Barcelona Startup Games Football Tournament

Upcoming:

• 26-28 Jun: European Blockchain Convention in Barcelona

• Wed, 13 Jul @18:30: BCN FinTech Afterwork #002: feat. Loïs Duhourcau, CEO at Novicap

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

Jobs

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

• OneCoWork is looking for a Junior Accountant

• Kleta is hiring a Product Manager

• Ukio is recruiting a Sales Intern (German Speaker)

• fonYou is hiring a:

• - Software Engineer

• - Cloud System Administrator

• Prestalo is looking for a:

• - Product manager

• - Social Media & Content Intern (FR market)

• Opticks is recruiting an Implementation Specialist

• Riverbed Technology is hiring a

• - Digital Sales Representative

• - Digital Solutions Engineer

• Netcentric is looking for several IT positions