Welcome to the VC Roundup, where we’ll parse through venture capital news related to Philadelphia-based private equity firms and the companies they fund. Subscribe to the roundup as an email newsletter. If you have any VC-related news to pass along to us, please drop us a line.
DEFINITE READS
As we posted yesterday, the Philadelphia Media Network announced a plan to sell discounted tablet computers preloaded with PMN content. Also in the announcement: CEO Greg Osberg making good on his promise to create an incubator at 400 N. Broad. The company will incubate four startups with help from the DreamIt Ventures, The Knight Foundation and Ben Franklin Technology Partners.
In case you missed it, we interviewed Safeguard Scientifics CEO Peter Boni about the winning streak his firm has been on. This, of course, was right before Safeguard announced it was acquiring a 36 percent stake in Penn Mezzanine, another local fund.
Damon Clinkscales speculates that DreamIt Ventures is moving to Austin, home of managing partner Kerry Rupp. In an email to Technically Philly, Rupp stated that DreamIt is routinely asked to move to new cities. “Right now we are totally focused on helping the NYC program and selecting companies for the fall Philadelphia program,” she wrote.
MIGHT BE WORTH YOUR TIME
Bike-sharing company CityRyde raised $345,000 this week from Ben Franklin Technology Partners and Virginia-based New Dominion Angels.
LLR Partners has invested $18 million in Plymouth Meeting’s Pet360. According to Philly Tech News, the company operates PetFoodDirect.com.
GIVE A GLANCE
An SEC filing has revealed that DreamIt grad Notehall received $3.7 million in Chegg equity when it sold to the text book renting company. DreamIt Ventures takes a six percent stake in all of its company, which leaves its take at about $222,000. Update: DreamIt says the filing represents only part of the deal and, because of other investors, the math isn’t quite that simple.
Thanks to We Work In Philly, we noticed that one DreamIt Company that will be in the incubator’s Fall class: CloudMine.
The Wall Street Journal notes that Edison Ventures has raised $112.6 million of $280 million for its next fund.
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