The Venture Codex

Participated · Equity · Sep 2016

LeEco is a Beijing-based web video company that has expanded into televisions and transportation. It is pursuing electric vehicle development and unveiled the LeSEE, a concept sedan intended to be completely autonomous. LeEco has a partnership with U.S.-based Faraday Future around its EV plans. The company raised $1.08 billion to fund its first car, with funding coming from Legend Holdings Corp., Yingda Capital Management Co., and China Minsheng Trust. The raise is intended to accelerate its EV plans and to position LeEco as a competitor to Tesla. Chinese government support for EVs and plug-in hybrids is contributing to investor interest in domestic EV development.

Led · Series F · Mar 2016

WeWork operates as a global flexible-space provider delivering technology-driven turnkey solutions, flexible spaces, and community experiences. The company is undergoing Chapter 11 restructuring and has secured a $450 million new‑money financing facility to support operations during the cases. Through its restructuring Plan, WeWork expects to eliminate approximately $4 billion of outstanding prepetition debt obligations. The Bankruptcy Court approved the company's Disclosure Statement and several additional motions, and extended Plan exclusivity and lease assumption periods to keep control of the restructuring process. WeWork will immediately solicit votes on the Plan and has requested final approval and Plan confirmation at a hearing scheduled for May 30, 2024, with an expected emergence by the end of May. Management says the reorganization will leave the company better capitalized, more operationally efficient, and positioned for continued investment in products and a return to long‑term growth. WeWork operates shared workspaces and a global membership platform spanning 111 cities in 29 countries and serving more than 527,000 members each day. The company had planned an IPO and was expected to go public in 2020 but delayed that offering. It has pursued rapid expansion while reporting heavy losses — nearly $1 billion in the six months ending June 30. WeWork previously raised more than $8 billion in equity and debt funding. Facing severe cash pressure and said to be weeks from running out of cash, the company has been shopping assets, slashed hundreds of jobs, and closed its school, WeGrow. Recent leadership changes include co-founder Adam Neumann relinquishing control and moving to a non-executive chairman role, with Sebastian Gunningham and Artie Minson serving as co-CEOs. WeWork operates flexible coworking spaces and membership services for individuals and enterprises. Led by co‑founder and CEO Adam Neumann, the company had more than 400,000 members at 425 locations in 100 cities across 27 countries as of early 2019. Enterprise customers (members with over 1,000 employees) accounted for over 30% of the membership base. WeWork announced the launch of The We Company to establish WeWork, WeLive, and WeGrow as three distinct business lines. The company has received significant strategic capital from SoftBank, supporting its global expansion. Following the latest investment the company’s post‑money valuation is $47 billion. WeWork provides shared workspaces and related flexible office services to businesses and individuals. The company has expanded rapidly with substantial outside capital and close involvement from SoftBank, which holds two board seats. SoftBank's recent $3 billion investment is structured as a warrant that can be exercised before September 2019, with the exercise price varying depending on whether WeWork goes public, is acquired, or raises a $1 billion round beforehand. Financially, WeWork sold $702 million in bonds rated as junk by credit agencies. For the first three quarters it reported a $1.22 billion loss on $1.25 billion in sales. If revenue continues at September's pace, the company would surpass $2 billion in revenue over the next 12 months; last year it lost $933 million on $866 million in revenue. WeWork offers shared physical and virtual workspace, community and services to members ranging from startups and freelancers to small businesses and Fortune 500 companies. The company was co‑founded by Adam Neumann and Miguel McKelvey in New York City in 2010 and is privately held. WeWork has more than 5,000 employees globally. In China, since opening its first location two years ago the company serves about 20,000 members across nearly 40 locations in three cities. The business provides space, community and services to help local creators and businesses start, scale and expand internationally. The company intends to use the new funding to accelerate the growth of WeWork China.

Led · Series D · Sep 2015

Social Touch provides mobile social marketing solutions and related services to enterprises in China. Its offerings include strategy, marketing SaaS, big data analytics and mobile advertisement management. The company serves more than 150 blue‑chip brands, including P&G, Tencent, Airbnb, Alcon and JD. Founded in 2011 and led by CEO Zhang Rui, Social Touch is based in Beijing and employs a team of more than 800 people. The firm raised new capital to expand its product and service capabilities and to hire additional talent. It intends to invest the proceeds in marketing SaaS, big data analytics and mobile advertising.

Participated · Series B · Jan 2014

保险极客 was founded in 2014 and is headquartered in Beijing, with branches in nearly 20 regions including Shanghai, Shenzhen and Hangzhou. The company says it has served more than 10,000 enterprises across IT, internet and other new-economy sectors. Its core product, GIDE, is a digitalized group-insurance solution that builds an ecosystem from front-end marketing and channel empowerment to back-end service and insurer underwriting. GIDE comprises three main modules—product innovation center, channel support center and after-sales service center—and features an efficient quoting system, a data-driven risk-control center and a flexible system-integration center. The platform is positioned to lower group-insurance entry barriers, support rapid market changes, and address employers’ and employees’ needs around cost control, efficiency, experience and digital interaction. CEO Ren Bin leads the company as it pursues wider adoption of digitalized group-insurance services. 保险极客 is an enterprise insurance customization platform that sells employee welfare insurance and health-management solutions to SMEs. The company was founded in 2014 and is led by founder and CEO Ren Bin. It announced a ¥100 million Series B and plans to use the proceeds to hire technology and finance hybrid personnel and to upgrade enterprise efficiency through intelligent systems. The business has a financing history that includes a ¥5 million angel round in 2014, a several-tens-of-millions-yuan A round in March 2016, and a ¥50 million A+ round in December 2016. No operating metrics (revenue/users) were disclosed in the article.