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Valar Ventures
Valar Ventures is a US-based venture capital fund founded by Andrew McCormack, James Fitzgerald and Peter Thiel. Historically, the majority of the firm's investments have been in technology startups based outside of Silicon Valley, including in Europe, the UK, the US and Canada. Valar Ventures originally spun out of Thiel Capital, Peter Thiel's global parent company based in San Francisco, and is now headquartered near Madison Square in Manhattan. The firm's namesake is the Valar of J. R. R. Tolkien's legendarium, who are god-like immortal spirits that chose to enter the mortal world to prepare it for their living creations. Andrew McCormack and James Fitzgerald are the managing partners of the firm. Investments Valar was notably the first venture fund to invest in Xero. The fund made its initial investment in Xero in October 2010 at a valuation of approximately $98 million. Since then, the firm has spearheaded successive rounds of investment in the company and Xero's market c ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Peter Thiel
Peter Andreas Thiel (; born 11 October 1967) is a German-American billionaire entrepreneur, venture capitalist, and political activist. A co-founder of PayPal, Palantir Technologies, and Founders Fund, he was the first outside investor in Facebook. , Thiel had an estimated net worth of $7.19 billion and was ranked 297th on the Bloomberg Billionaires Index. He worked as a securities lawyer at Sullivan & Cromwell, as a speechwriter for former U.S. Secretary of Education William Bennett and as a derivatives trader at Credit Suisse. He founded Thiel Capital Management in 1996. He co-founded PayPal with Max Levchin and Luke Nosek in 1998, serving as chief executive officer until its sale to eBay in 2002 for $1.5 billion. After PayPal, he founded Clarium Capital, a global macro hedge fund based in San Francisco. In 2003, he launched Palantir Technologies, a big data analysis company, serving as its chairman since its inception. In 2005, he launched Founders Fund with PayPal partn ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Market Capitalization
Market capitalization, sometimes referred to as market cap, is the total value of a publicly traded company's outstanding common shares owned by stockholders. Market capitalization is equal to the market price per common share multiplied by the number of common shares outstanding. Since outstanding stock is bought and sold in public markets, capitalization could be used as an indicator of public opinion of a company's net worth and is a determining factor in some forms of stock valuation. Description Market capitalization is sometimes used to rank the size of companies. It measures only the equity component of a company's capital structure, and does not reflect management's decision as to how much debt (or leverage) is used to finance the firm. A more comprehensive measure of a firm's size is enterprise value (EV), which gives effect to outstanding debt, preferred stock, and other factors. For insurance firms, a value called the embedded value (EV) has been used. It is also ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Vehicle Subscription
Vehicle subscription is a service where a customer pays a recurring fee for the right to use one or more automotive vehicles. Some vehicle subscriptions offer insurance and maintenance as part of the subscription fee; other subscriptions allow the subscriber to switch between different vehicles during their subscription period. Industry commentators consider vehicle subscription to be an alternative to owning or leasing a vehicle. Vehicle subscriptions have been available since 2010 when Rima Braden of Autosource, LLC offered a short-term flexible auto acquisition program from his dealership in Honolulu, Hawaii that he coined "Flexlease". Rebranded as "Carousel" in 2013, the program was restricted to the city and county of Honolulu and remains in operation today. In 2014 flexdrive, now jointly owned by Cox Automotive and Holman Enterprises, launched. Clutch Technologies, a start-up, launched a subscription service for consumers in Atlanta in mid-2014; Flow Automotive Compan ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Acton Capital Partners
Acton Capital (Acton Capital Partners) is an international venture capital fund, founded in Munich (Germany) and investing in tech-enabled startup companies in Europe and North America. History As one of the first venture capital funds in Europe, Acton Capital invested in startups of the early Digital Economy. The first investment was online auction platform Alando in Germany, acquired by eBay in 1999 for $43 million. In November 2019, Acton Capital announced the closing of its fifth fund "Acton V" at $215 million. Investments and exits Acton Capital's investment focus is on tech-enabled business models like platforms, software as a service (SaaS) or online marketplaces and in fields such as financial technology (fintech), mobility, healthcare and Direct-to-consumer or recommerce. Exited investments include online marketplace AbeBooks - acquired by Amazon in 2008, online retailer of pet supplies zooplus - IPO in 2008, luxury fashion platform mytheresa.com - acquired ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Financial Technology
Fintech, a portmanteau of "financial technology", refers to firms using new technology to compete with traditional financial methods in the delivery of financial services. Artificial intelligence, blockchain, cloud computing, and big data are regarded as the "ABCD" (four key areas) of fintech. The use of smartphones for mobile banking, investing, borrowing services, and cryptocurrency are examples of technologies designed to make financial services more accessible to the general public. Fintech companies consist of both startups and established financial institutions and technology companies trying to replace or enhance the usage of financial services provided by existing financial companies. A subset of fintech companies that focus on the insurance industry are collectively known as insurtech or insuretech companies. Key areas Academics Artificial intelligence (AI), blockchain, cloud computing, and big data are considered the four key areas of FinTech. Artificial intelli ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Stash (company)
Stash Financial, Inc., or simply Stash, is an American financial technology and financial services company based in New York, NY. The company operates both a web platform and mobile apps, allowing users to incrementally invest small amounts, commonly known as micro-investing. It also provides robo advice. By summer 2017, it had approximately 1 million users. As of July 2020, the number has grown to over 5 million. History and services Stash was founded in February 2015 by Brandon Krieg, David Ronick, and Ed Robinson. It was launched on the iOS App Store in October 2015 and was made available on Android in March 2016. In February 2018, the firm raised $37.5 million in a Series D funding in a round led by Union Square Ventures. In April 2020, it raised another $112 million in a Series F funding in a round led by LendingTree. Reception In February 2018, CNBC praised the app's automation and ease-of-use. Products and services Stash offers retirement, banking, individua ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
New Zealand
New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island country by area, covering . New Zealand is about east of Australia across the Tasman Sea and south of the islands of New Caledonia, Fiji, and Tonga. The country's varied topography and sharp mountain peaks, including the Southern Alps, owe much to tectonic uplift and volcanic eruptions. New Zealand's capital city is Wellington, and its most populous city is Auckland. The islands of New Zealand were the last large habitable land to be settled by humans. Between about 1280 and 1350, Polynesians began to settle in the islands and then developed a distinctive Māori culture. In 1642, the Dutch explorer Abel Tasman became the first European to sight and record New Zealand. In 1840, representatives of the United Kingdom and Māori chiefs ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Andreessen Horowitz
Andreessen Horowitz (also called a16z, legal name AH Capital Management, LLC) is a private American venture capital firm, founded in 2009 by Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz. The company is headquartered in Menlo Park, California. Andreessen Horowitz invests in both early-stage start-ups and established growth companies. Its investments span the mobile, cryptocurrency, gaming, social, e-commerce, education and enterprise IT (including cloud computing, security, and software as a service) industries. Founding and partnering Between 2006 and 2010, Marc Andreessen and Ben Horowitz actively invested in technology companies. Separately, and together, they invested $4 million in 45 start-ups including Twitter. During this time, the two became known as "super angel" investors. On July 6, 2009, Andreessen and Horowitz launched their venture capital fund with an initial capitalization of $300 million. In November 2010, at a time when the field of venture capitalism was contracting, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
TransferWise
Wise (formerly TransferWise) is a London-based financial technology company founded by Estonian businessmen Kristo Käärmann and Taavet Hinrikus in January 2011. History Wise was founded by Taavet Hinrikus (Skype's first employee) and financial consultant Kristo Käärmann. Its system has been compared to the hawala money transfer system. In its first year of operation, transactions through Wise amounted to €10 million. In 2012, Wise was named as one of "East London's 20 hottest tech startups" by ''The Guardian'', Start Up of the Week by ''Wired UK'', one of five "start-ups to watch" at Seedcamp's 2012 US Demo Day by TechCrunch, and appeared in Startups.co.uk's list of the top 100 UK start-ups of 2012. In April 2013, Wise stopped letting users purchase Bitcoin, citing pressure from banking providers. Independent comparison site Monito reported that Wise was on average 83% cheaper than the big four UK banks on major currency "routes", but could be up to 90% cheaper in ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Xero (software)
Xero is a New Zealand-based technology company that provides cloud-based accounting software for small and medium-sized businesses. The company has offices in New Zealand, Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States. Xero's products are based on the software-as-a-service model and sold by subscription, based on the type and number of entities managed by the subscriber. The products are used in over 180 countries. History In 2006, Xero was founded by Rod Drury and Hamish Edwards in Wellington, where Xero Limited's headquarters are still located. The company was originally called Accounting 2.0. By 2017, Xero had more than one million customers globally, and the following year, it had more than one million subscribers in Australia and New Zealand. In April 2018, Steve Vamos was appointed as CEO, replacing Rod Drury who remained on the board as a non-executive director. Vamos announced in November 2022 that he would step down in February 2023 and be replaced by Sukhinder ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Broadway (Manhattan)
Broadway () is a road in the U.S. state of New York (state), New York. Broadway runs from State Street (Manhattan), State Street at Bowling Green (New York City), Bowling Green for through the Boroughs of New York City, borough of Manhattan and through the Bronx, exiting north from New York City to run an additional through the Westchester County, New York, Westchester County municipalities of Yonkers, New York, Yonkers, Hastings-on-Hudson, New York, Hastings-On-Hudson, Dobbs Ferry, New York, Dobbs Ferry, Irvington, New York, Irvington, and Tarrytown, New York, Tarrytown, and terminating north of Sleepy Hollow, New York, Sleepy Hollow.There are four other streets named "Broadway" in New York City's remaining three boroughs: one each in Brooklyn (Broadway (Brooklyn), see main article) and Staten Island, and two in Queens (one running from Astoria, Queens, Astoria to Elmhurst, Queens, Elmhurst, and the other in Hamilton Beach, Queens, Hamilton Beach). Each borough therefore has ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Tolkien's Legendarium
Tolkien's legendarium is the body of J. R. R. Tolkien's mythopoeic writing, unpublished in his lifetime, that forms the background to his ''The Lord of the Rings'', and which his son Christopher summarized in his compilation of ''The Silmarillion'' and documented in his 12-volume series ''The History of Middle-earth''. The legendarium's origins reach back to 1914, when Tolkien began writing poems and story sketches, drawing maps, and inventing languages and names as a private project to create a unique English mythology. The earliest story drafts (of ''The Book of Lost Tales'') are from 1916; he revised and rewrote these for most of his adult life. ''The Hobbit'' (1937), Tolkien's first published novel, was not originally part of the larger mythology but became linked to it. Both ''The Hobbit'' and ''The Lord of the Rings'' (1954 and 1955) took place in the Third Age of Middle-earth, while virtually all of his earlier writing had been set in the first two ages of the world. ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
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