This week in PropTech - 5.15.20
A deluge of office technology articles
Come back to our office buildings, please!
Seems like all I read about these days is how to go back to the office. This is obviously a bit of a thorny issue as people navigate families, politics, and, of course, their own personal health for the sake of getting back to the office.
I wrote about how it will happen and we can discuss how this will be altering the office of the future later.
For now, I thought it would be interesting to have a little show-and-tell on what has come across my desk just this week.
Let’s start with CB Insights, the princes of data viz:
You should also see The Information’s article on Technology that enables Social Distancing in Offices.
TechCrunch talked about How Companies get back to the Office with some quotes from Darren at Brick & Mortar and Brendan at Fifth Wall.
Expect to see more of these pop up in the coming weeks as the reality of reopening offices comes with challenges that only office technology can solve!
Financings:
Zeus Living raised a down round at $110M (instead of $205M from last year)
Swiss office occupant tracker Locatee raised $4M lead by FireFly.
Good to see my friends from Cemex Ventures still funding as they helped StructionSite put together $7M led by D20 Ventures.
Archistar, an Australian property intelligence platform, raised $6 million in Series A funding led by AirTree Ventures.Â
Briq, a construction finance startup, raised a $10m Series A round led by Blackhorn Ventures.
Northspyre, a cloud-based CRE intelligence platform, raised a $7.5M A round led by Craft Ventures.
Quartz, a software + hardware construction safety platform, raised $7.75M led by Baseline Ventures.
Data:
As I mentioned above, I love good data visualization. Even though this isn’t B2B (where I focus), I love what Lenny put together on strategies to get your first 1,000 customers:
Writing:
In case you missed it, I posted an article on What the Economy needs now is PropTech.
Check out Steve Levine on The Harsh Future of American Cities and the NYT talking about coronavirus and elevators.
Other News:
Fifth Wall and Lime talked about Urban Life Innovation after COVID. (Note, Lime just saw it’s valuation drop from $2.4B to a little more than $500M. Ouch.)
Along the back-to-work lines, check out Softhard’s Smart Restroom solutions.
Check out this security robot.
There is a German PropTech Summit sponsored by Union Investment happening on the 19th.
I also find it interesting that CoStar bought the commercial arm of TenX for only $190M. That seems super cheap. Interesting . . .
Reader Question:
I know I’m not the only one getting tired of Zoom. Anyone have recommendations for alternatives? I’m on the waitlist at Around and have been playing with AirMeet and Jitsy. What else have I missed?
Have a great weekend and feel free to send me notes or feedback as I try to improve this newsletter.