Archives for November 2011

Allena Pharmaceuticals secures $15MM series A funding

NEWTON, Mass. – November 16, 2011 – Allena Pharmaceuticals, Inc., a company developing and commercializing innovative non-systemic oral protein therapeutics, today announced that it has secured $15 million in Series A venture capital financing. Top-tier venture investors Bessemer Venture Partners, Frazier Healthcare and Third Rock Ventures led the round. Proceeds from the financing will be used to accelerate the development of Allena’s non-systemic protein therapeutics to treat metabolic and orphan diseases, with a particular focus on nephrologic and urologic conditions.

Founded by Alexey Margolin, Ph.D., founder and former chief executive officer of Alnara Pharmaceuticals, Inc., and Robert Gallotto, former chief business officer of Alnara, Allena is leveraging its leadership team’s unique expertise in protein therapeutic design and development, as well as their operational and transaction experience.

“Allena’s innovative and proven approach for the development of oral protein therapeutics offers the potential to provide breakthrough treatments for patients with limited or no treatment options,” said Dr. Margolin, president and chief executive officer of Allena. “We are committed to rapidly creating value for our investors and working with renowned scientific leaders in metabolic, nephrologic and urologic disorders to advance our program. We expect to announce our initial disease indication shortly.”

The management team is joined by an experienced board of directors, including Stephen Kraus, partner, Bessemer Venture Partners, James Topper, M.D., Ph.D., general partner, Frazier Healthcare Ventures, and Robert Tepper, M.D., partner, Third Rock Ventures.

“We see Allena as an opportunity to create a world-class pharmaceutical company driven by a proven technical approach and strengthened by innovative research and science,” said Robert Tepper, M.D., partner, Third Rock Ventures. “Our experience working with this team in the past has yielded tangible success, including the acquisition of Alnara by Eli Lilly & Co. in 2010, and we look forward to working with Allena to create value and positively impact the lives of patients.”

Marketo raises $50MM funding with Battery Ventures leading

San Mateo, Calif. – November 16, 2011 – Marketo, the fastest-growing provider of Revenue Performance Management (RPM) technology, today announced it has secured $50 million in new venture financing. Battery Ventures led the round, with existing investors Institutional Venture Partners, InterWest Partners, Mayfield Fund and Storm Ventures also participating. In just five years since its founding, Marketo has delivered a proven business solution for any company looking to accelerate predictable revenue growth. Marketo will use the infusion of new capital to further its aggressive growth strategy.

“Because of our industry-leading growth in revenues and market share, Marketo had many options for capital. To stay focused on growth, our best choice was to secure private equity from a top-shelf firm, and I am very pleased to welcome Battery Ventures as an investor,” said Phil Fernandez, co-founder and CEO of Marketo. “This new investment gives us a war chest in excess of $70 million. We plan to use these funds aggressively to expand our award-winning product suite, further extend our global reach and look beyond our four walls to complement our own innovation engine. This investment validates our vision – and success – in building a platform to dramatically speed the way any company can grow revenue.”

From Fortune 500 to small and mid-sized companies, Marketo’s RPM technology drives businesses beyond traditional marketing automation and lead nurturing to optimize interactions with buyers across the entire revenue cycle and accelerate predictable revenue growth. The result is an incredibly more efficient way of doing business through a larger pipeline of better sales leads.

The entirety of the new $50 million investment is primary capital into the company. In total, Marketo has raised $107 million since it was founded in 2006. Also with this new round of financing, Neeraj Agrawal, Battery Ventures general partner, joins Marketo’s board of directors.

“From the moment we first engaged with Phil and the team at Marketo it became clear that the company was powering a revenue revolution,” said Agrawal. “We are bullish on the company’s ability to execute, and believe they are destined to be a true winner.”

“When we first invested in Marketo a year ago, they made an aggressive commitment to double revenue, and they’ve delivered,” said Norm Fogelsong, general partner at Institutional Venture Partners, whose other investments include leaders like Kayak, Twitter and Zynga. “Now we are doubling down on the future of this remarkable company and its ability to dramatically increase revenues for its customers.”

2011 is a benchmark year for Marketo. So far, the company has more than doubled its revenue, opened its EMEA headquarters in Dublin and launched Spark by Marketo™, an entirely new product solution specifically designed for the SMB sector. The company also released a study showing its vision to make a $2.5 trillion impact on its customer base over the next three years.

Fernandez adds, “When we started the company, our vision was to be the very best at delivering products and thought leadership to help companies grow revenue faster than ever before, and the market response has been incredible. Based on publicly available data, we now know we are, in absolute terms, adding more customers and more revenues this year than anyone in the RPM market.”

VentureWeek.com launches new Venture Capital News portal

November 7th, 2011 – Orange County, CA.  VentureWeek.com announces new Venture Capital News portal.

Evisors – $600M – Seed

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Evisors obtained a $600,000 seed investment from New York Angels.

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