Hello and happy Monday!

Today's main headlines:

• Freshly Cosmetics bags €18.9M

• Catalan brewery hit by cyberattack

• AI-based Spanish language model system MarIA hits milestone

🍻 A toast to Damm! No, this is not a promo of the Catalan brewery. The firm is featured twice in today’s newsletter so that inspired today's intro. Surprisingly for a beer company, they’re quite an active and important member of the Barcelona innovation ecosystem. For instance, they’ve just won an award for their open innovation program (more on this further down in this newsletter). Plus, not only are they a main partner at Tech Barcelona but they also (co-)organize several startup initiatives (like this one) and promote innovation with universities. Of course, they’ve also been sponsoring several popular events in our ecosystem, such as StartupGrind BCN, for a very long time - typically providing great venue space and/or free beverages. So if you’re not impressed by their contribution to our ecosystem, at least the latter merits saying: Cheers! 🙏

(Disclaimer: this is not a commercial copy. In fact, DAMM if you read this, why not reach out to us now to sponsor this newsletter? 😉)

Have a great week!

Startup & Investment News

Barcelona investment news

• Digital natural cosmetics brand Freshly Cosmetics raises €18.9M

• All-in-one hospitality solution Amenitiz closes a €6.5M seed round

• Florists startup Blaine Box completes €720K investment round

• Sales intelligence solution KBOX SalesTools lands €200K

Barcelona startup news

• Wallbox & Nuvve announce the first of its kind V2G collaboration in Iberia

• Glovo announces rental of new 30.000m2 office space which they hope to unveil next year

• Natural and toxic-free cosmetic brand Cocunat opens store in La Rambla

• Colvin crowned best startup of the year by Esade Alumni and Banco Sabadell

• Health monitoring firm Kamleon wins Allianz Startup Challenge organized by the Barça Innovation Hub and Allianz insurance

• Sports tech firms Oliver and Volava named among 15 Spanish startups that are transforming the sports sector

• Home fitness startup Volava sees its CEO win the Premio Líder empresarial del año award

• MOWOOT becomes the first Catalan medtech company featured on EIT Health’s digital venture capital & crowdfunding platform

Spanish investment news

• Madrid-based TapTap Digital bought by Bd-Capital in a transaction valued near €100M

• Valencia-based Fermax acquires 8% of security startup Qvadis Innova

• Madrid startup Wetaca raises €2.5M

• Zaragoza-based Singerfy receives €500K

VC, investment & crowdfunding news

• VC firm COREangels Madrid gets €500K+ to invest in European startups

Open calls, accelerator news & incubator stories

• Cellnex Foundation announces the three startups to receive support in developing their social impact projects

• Caixabank & Enisa open call for 15th edition of Emprendedor XXI awards; apply until 3 Dec

• Banco Santander is launching the 13th edition of the Explorer program to promote young entrepreneurship via the development of real projects through "learning by doing" & mentoring methodology; apply until 9 Dec

• SpinUOC opens call for innovative, entrepreneurial and knowledge transfer projects; apply until 23 Jan

Barcelona startup & entrepreneur profiles & interviews:

• Freeverse: enabling the creation and management of live assets on the blockchain

• Tiendeo: consumer app for consulting brochures and deals from stores nearby

• Vitaance: insurtech firm providing life insurance products & aims to improve people's quality of life

• Josep Lluis Sanfeliu: co-founder & managing partner of healthtech VC Asabys

Tech News

Tech news in Barcelona:

• MarIA, the first large-scale AI-based Spanish language model begins summarizing and generating texts

• GSMA reveals first details of MWC Barcelona 2022 which will take place on 28 Feb-3 Mar under the theme Connectivity Unleashed

• Government of Barcelona and several local universities launch 'Barcelona Deep Tech Node', an initiative that aims to position Barcelona as a European benchmark in deep tech

• Damm wins “Barcelona mai s'atura” ('Barcelona never stops') award at Bizbarcelona in the category talent that transforms for its open innovation program LAB1876

• Cyber attack turns off the taps at Barcelona's Damm brewery

• Mano Mano joins Tech Barcelona as a Corporate Partner

• Port of Barcelona stationed ‘Hutchison Ports BEST’, awarded best container terminal in Europe

Tech news in Spain:

• Tech giant Intel considers Spain for newest headquarters

• US solar equipment manufacturer Array Technologies to buy Spanish firm Soluciones Tecnicas Integrales Norland for about €570M

• CaixaBank completes the largest tech migration in the history of the financial sector in Spain to move 7.6M clients of now defunct Bankia on its own platform

• Telefónica prepares a new voluntary redundancy plan for 3,000 employees

• El Corte Inglés sees turnover of 5.5 billion in the first semester and touches the retail sales of 2019

• Tech firm Sngular to join BME Growth

• Amancio Ortega enters the renewables business and buys 49% of a wind farm in Zaragoza from Repsol

Politics, Legal & Economics

• Only half of Spanish Government’s budget for minimum income scheme has been spend so far this year

Good Reads

• Barcelona and its 'factory of the future': the digital node for southern European industry based on technology

• How Barcelona attracts digital multinational companies

• How Barcelona manages to be attractive to tourists and startup pioneers alike

• Overview of the Spanish fintech ecosystem in 2020 & 2021

• Space sector exec: Spain must stand out among its neighbors in nascent domain

• Can we stomach the latest emerging food innovations?

Good Videos & Podcasts

• Interview with Carlos Otermin, COO at Lazada (by Hablando con líderes),

• Interview with Alberto Rau, Business Development at Wolt, and Ana Jimenez, Head of Operations at Trendier

• Interview with Miguel Carranza, co-founder & CTO at RevenueCat

• Interview with Josefa Marzo, portfolio director at Kalonia Venture Partners

• A look inside a dark store in Spain

Great Events

This wek:

• Mon-Thu, 15-18 Nov: Circular Economy Hotspot Catalonia

• Tue, 16 Nov @18:30: Startup Grind BCN hosts Vicenç Martí (Ketonico)

• Tue-Thu, 16-18 Nov: Smart City Expo World Congress

• Tue-Thu, 16-18 Nov: PuzzleX

• Wed-Fri, 17-19 Nov: Mediterranean Week of Economic Leaders

Upcoming:

• 22-23 Nov: Tech Spirit Barcelona 2021

• 24-26 Nov: VIII S2B Impact Forum

• 25 Nov: How to scale a business to €30M per year using the CRO; feat. Cuideo CMO

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

Jobs

• Opticks is hiring a Sales Development Representative

• Caravelo is recruiting a Backend Engineer (Java) & Intermediate Frontend Engineer

• Riverbed Technology is hiring a Digital Sales Representative (fluent in German)

• MarsBased in is looking for a Senior Node.js Full-stack Developer (Full Remote)

• Touchstream is recruiting a Marketing Manager

• QMENTA is hiring several tech & business roles

• Honest Greens is looking for an Honest Beans Director & Partnerships Intern

• Unnax is recruiting several tech & marketing positions

• Netcentric is looking for several IT positions