Ledger.

Venture capital fund · 2 deals

Wildcard Ventures

Venture fund for sports, health and entertainment tech startups

Melbourne, VIC

Coverage

Stories naming Wildcard Ventures. Where several outlets covered the same round, they are bundled under whichever ran the fullest account.

Fund close ~$49m

Tennis Australia's VC fund aces first close with nearly $50 million from blue chip investors

Tennis Australia's venture arm AO Ventures has reached a first close on its new sports, media and health tech fund with about $49 million committed by local and international backers.

3 deals

‘Game changer’: Samsara Eco raises $100 million for infinite recycling of plastics

Australian plastics recycler Samsara Eco secured a Temasek-led Series A+ of $100 million to scale enzyme-based infinite recycling, with Southeast Asian facilities planned, adding to its 2022 Series A.

Also TechCrunch Venture·SmartCompany·@AuManufacturing·Techboard·SmartCompany·@AuManufacturing·@AuManufacturing·@AuManufacturing

Funding announcement

AO Startups serves up 5 companies for its Australian Open accelerator program

Five startups joining Tennis Australia's inaugural AO StartUps accelerator cohort have been named, each trialling its technology at the Grand Slam tournament; two further participants are still to be revealed.

Seed $2m

Investment Notes: SwingVision

AfterWork Ventures explains why it joined SwingVision's $2 million seed round led by Tennis Australia's Wildcard Ventures, alongside Roddick, Blake and the MyFitnessPal co-founders; the app brings pro-grade tennis analytics to amateurs.

Also Startup Daily

14 deals

Ignition Lane's Weekly Wrap: Unicorns galore, online marketplaces put on notice, VC pyramid schemes

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.

Also Startup Daily·SmartCompany

Key hire

ACE IDEA: Tennis Australia launches its own VC fund

Tennis Australia is creating Wildcard Ventures, a fund and syndicate backing early-stage sports, health and entertainment tech, and has named its investment team and advisory committee.

Something wrong? Tell us