Company
San Francisco
Every published round Square took part in, and every parcel of existing shares it bought off another holder. Deals we hold but haven't published yet are not counted.
Companies Square has backed in a published round, and companies whose existing shares it bought off another holder.
| Company | What it does | First invested | Rounds | Led |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| No portfolio companies recorded yet. | ||||
Fund closes reported for Square, as distinct from the investments it has made.
Companies Square has backed that another company then bought. An exit for the holding, not a deal Square did.
| Company | Bought by | Kind | Announced | Price |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| No portfolio company of Square is recorded as having been acquired. | ||||
Companies Square acquired or merged with, per published coverage. Buying a company is not investing in one: nothing here counts in the deals column.
Stories naming Square. Where several outlets covered the same round, they are bundled under whichever ran the fullest account.
Zeller has rolled out a point-of-sale application for small Australian businesses, replacing subscription pricing with per-transaction charges and adding an AI assistant inside its merchant dashboard.
Airwallex co-founder Jack Zhang recounts turning down Stripe's billion-dollar buyout, describes building a licensed global payments network, and argues the Melbourne fintech can now challenge Stripe directly.
TechCrunch profiles Airwallex's new point-of-sale offering letting businesses take payments in person across countries, pitting the Australian firm against Stripe, Square and Adyen, and recalls its rejection of Stripe's 2019 buyout bid.
Brisbane food-safety software firm Squizify has opened a Japanese subsidiary and revealed a $10 million Series A that Coreline Ventures led months earlier; clients include 7-Eleven Australia and it has partnered with Square.
Also Startup Daily
Melbourne payments provider Zeller is launching in Britain, its first overseas market, appointing ex-ByteDance executive Lars Weber to head new London operations and building a 40-strong local team.
First Australians Capital has reached a $20 million first close on its Catalytic Impact Funds, drawing commitments from foundations, family offices and corporates, plus Queensland government funding for its Indigenous business program.
Scalare Partners announces its investment in Brauz, an omnichannel retail platform, and that chief executive Carolyn Breeze will take a non-executive board seat at Brauz.
Business-to-business buy-now-pay-later fintech BizPay has entered voluntary administration, appointing BRI Ferrier's Jonathon Keenan and Peter Krejci; about 15 staff affected, with a sale or restructure now being explored.
Also Startup Daily
Jessica Box reflects on leadership lessons from her years in senior product roles during Linktree's rapid growth, covering culture, organisational systems and market moats, before leaving to found her own startup.
Fintech Zeller launches standalone transaction accounts and debit cards for small businesses, distributing physical cards through Officeworks stores nationwide as it challenges the big banks.
Payments company Zeller says larger merchants now drive its growth as it moves upmarket, and the piece recalls its 2021 and 2022 venture raises that produced a $1.1 billion valuation.
Profile of Zeller's co-founder Ben Pfisterer covering the payments firm's Melbourne base, unicorn valuation, early backers, product range and growth since launching in 2021.
Weekly tech wrap: cloud-market trends, Tiger Global's cheques into Stake, Shippit and Carma, new VC funds, several acquisitions, grocery delivery startups Send and Quicko collapsing, and Elaine Stead joining M8 Ventures.
Also Startup Daily
AfterWork Ventures reflects on backing Stropro in February 2020, explaining why the platform opening structured bank products to sophisticated investors fits its unbundling-of-banks thesis and Asia-Pacific ambitions.
One-click checkout startup Fast, founded by Dominic Holland and Allison Barr Allen, is shutting down a year after a $131 million Series B backed by Stripe and Addition, amid weak revenue and fading investor appetite.
Block has completed its purchase of Afterpay, and Square is rolling out Afterpay's buy-now-pay-later option to its online sellers in the US and Australia, with a free trial until May 2022.
Also Australian FinTech
OIF Ventures' third monthly portfolio roundup: XM Cyber's roughly billion-dollar sale to Schwarz Group, Assignar's secondary raise, new investments in Inspace, mod.io and Atelier, plus portfolio awards, customers and product launches.
Crypto exchange CoinList, founded by Brisbane-born Graham Jenkin, raised US$100 million in Series A funding led by Agman and Accomplice, reaching a US$1.5 billion valuation, after a Dorsey-led US$10 million round in 2019.
KPMG's Fintech Landscape 2021 counts 718 active Australian fintechs and highlights record corporate M&A, including NAB buying 86 400, Latitude buying Symple Loans and Square's pending Afterpay takeover.
Retrospective on five Australian technology companies bought for nine-figure sums in 2021, detailing buyers, prices and founder reactions for CitrusAd, Quantium, Invoice2go, Task and A Cloud Guru.
Tidal Ventures' investment note explains why it backed FrankieOne from its 2019 seed and joined the KYC/AML platform's newly announced A$20 million Series A, co-led by Greycroft and Airtree Ventures.
Also TechCrunch Venture·Startup Daily·Australian FinTech·Cut Through Venture·SmartCompany·Startup Daily·Startup Daily
Archa, once a consumer neobank, has released a business credit card with spend management tools for Australian small businesses, and is seeking growth funding co-led by two investment firms.
Airwallex has raised a US$200 million Series E at a US$4 billion valuation, led by Lone Pine Capital, with its founders also unveiling a $200 million fund amid a wave of big local raises.
Weekly venture roundup covering Scalapay's giant series A, numerous Australian raises, acquisitions of Clipchamp, Paidy and CipherTrace, Houseparty's closure, crypto regulation developments, and Atlassian appointing a Cloudflare founder as director.
TechCrunch reports Zip's purchase of South African buy-now-pay-later firm Payflex, arguing Africa is an underserved market, and recaps the Australian company's earlier deals for Spotii, QuadPay and Twisto.
Columnist and longtime Afterpay critic Stephen Mayne reacts to Square's agreed all-share takeover of the Melbourne BNPL company, valuing it at $43 billion, and notes the windfall for its founders and federal tax coffers.
A retrospective of Afterpay's journey from its 2014 founding and only venture raise to its ASX listing, US and European expansion, and its agreed $39 billion takeover by Square, alongside partnerships and controversies.
Square is acquiring ASX-listed buy-now-pay-later firm Afterpay in a US$29 billion (A$39 billion) scrip deal, with co-founders Anthony Eisen and Nick Molnar joining Square once it completes in early 2022.
A Matrix Partners venture investor reflects on Square's agreed merger with Afterpay, crediting the Sydney-founded buy-now-pay-later pioneer with sparking a global payments shift that rivals rushed to copy.
Australian buy-now-pay-later firm Afterpay has agreed to a US$29 billion acquisition by Square, with founders Nick Molnar and Anthony Eisen expected to join the payments company once the deal completes in early 2022.
Also Startup Daily·SmartCompany·SmartCompany·SmartCompany·Startup Daily·SmartCompany·SmartCompany·Startup Daily·SmartCompany·Australian FinTech·Australian FinTech·Australian FinTech
Square has agreed to acquire Australian buy-now-pay-later firm Afterpay in an all-stock transaction valued at $29 billion, expected to complete in early 2022, with Afterpay's co-CEOs set to join Square.
Also TechCrunch Venture·TechCrunch Venture·Tech Funding News - Australia·TechCrunch Venture·TechCrunch Venture
Weekly roundup reporting Invoice2go's sale to Bill.com, raises by Go1, Employment Hero, InDebted and others, Rokt's secondary sale, Wildcard Ventures' launch, plus global deals including Zoom-Five9 and Salesforce-Slack.
Square Peg's podcast interviews Zeller chief executive Ben Pfisterer about building the Melbourne payments fintech, his path through NAB, Visa and Square, and challenging Australia's major banks.
Weekly roundup covering CBA's strategic stakes in Little Birdie and Amber, several Australian funding rounds, Zip's BNPL acquisitions, Tritium's planned NASDAQ listing, Amazon's MGM purchase and other global tech news.
Also Startup Daily·Startup Daily·Startup Daily·Startup Daily·SmartCompany·Startup Daily·SmartCompany·Startup Daily·Startup Daily·Startup Daily·SmartCompany·Women's Agenda
Ignition Lane's weekly roundup reports Tyro buying Medipass, several startup raises, ASX listings, Hey Tiger shutting down, Airwallex culture complaints, CSIRO's technology spending plan, and Musk's bitcoin antics.
Also Startup Daily
Daily roundup covering the Microsoft-Google clash over news bargaining, Seequent's sale to Bentley Systems, Stripe's huge funding round, and DroneShield's repeat government contract.
Also SmartCompany·Startup Daily·Tech Funding News - Australia
Weekly roundup by Ignition Lane covering Vend's sale to Lightspeed, Roblox's listing, raises at Pipe, DataGrail, Mastt, Sonnant and Corvus, LaunchVic's new fund for women founders, and Scale Investors' new co-CEOs.
Also Startup Daily·LaunchVic
Roundup: Square takes majority control of Jay Z's Tidal for US$297 million; WeLab banks a US$75 million Series C led by Allianz; construction software startup Mastt raises $2.2 million.