2023: A Giant Year In Review
This time last year, at a meeting of Giant’s advisory board, we resolved that 2023 would be a year of bold, breakout growth for the firm and our portfolio companies, however tough the macroeconomic conditions might be.
Having remained disciplined during the boom times of 2019-2022, we felt able to be active investors through darker days while others retreated to nurse troubled portfolios. Many of history’s most iconic startups were forged in downturns and we certainly believe the same will be true of 2023.
Our conviction has never been stronger that the defining technology companies of the 2020s will be those solving problems that really matter, from climate change to human health. We already see Giant-backed companies creating extraordinary change.
Let’s look at some of the highlights from the past twelve months…
Exciting new companies came out of stealth
The Casper founders, along with Bulb US GM, launched Haven Energy with funding from Giant and Lerer Hippeau.
Giant Venture Partner and Bulb co-founder Hayden Wood launched Beams, a green home renovation platform incubated by Giant.
Cambridge Ph.D Penelope Jones announced battery software platform Byterat. Giant led the seed round alongside YC and the founders of Voi and Zendesk.
We led BonusX’s seed round, teaming up with Italy’s largest family offices and Raffaele Terrone, co-founder of Italy’s first unicorn, Scalapay to help European citizens access welfare benefits.
… and many more still in stealth, to be announced in the New Year :)
Giant’s seed portfolio companies raised $350M+
Field raised $200M, one of the largest growth rounds of 2023 from one of Europe’s fastest growing climate companies.
Agreena raised a €46M Series B.
Waterplan raised a $11M Series A.
Tenet raised a $10M Series A.
Safi raised a $19.5M Series A.
StudentFinance raised a €39M Series A.
Knot raised a $10M Series A.
Meadow raised a $3.5M Seed.
Giant portfolio founders are building companies that truly matter
Agreena‘s soil carbon removal platform reached two million hectares - the size of Slovenia - and the company was named by Insider as one of the most promising climate startups for 2023.
Doccla, Europe’s largest virtual ward company, was featured in the BBC, and The Economist for bringing hospital-quality care to the home.
$2BN mental health company Calm teamed up with Spotify to offer free access to mental wellness
Sesame announced they will offer virtual doctor visits to Costco members for just $29.
Synonym launched Capacitor - a worldwide database of biomanufacturing facilities - as well as their first-of-its-kind State of Global Fermentation report.
Papaya launched its marketplace for electric mobility, enabling the electrification of Europe’s fleets.
Avalo’s Mariano Alvarez took the stage at TechCrunch Disrupt to present Avalo’s incredible vision to be nature’s innovation lab, advancing natural crop evolution.
Haven launched its Virtual Power Plant, a network of distributed batteries that can store energy from solar in off-peak times and then pool together to serve the electricity grid when needed most.
Invert’s Martin Permin and Holger Thorup were recognised by Forbes 30 under 30 for their work bringing software-driven efficiency to biomanufacturing.
Terradepth became the focus of a Fox News segment about changing the way we explore the ocean.
Kapu drove down the cost of consumer staples for Kenyan members by 10%.
Giant grew market share in 2023
Giant maintains our investment pacing throughout the economic cycle. This year, we made 12 investments from our early stage and growth funds.
The firm raised significant capital across our strategies - look out for an announcement in the New Year…
The Giant team grew. We welcomed Georgia Ritter as Head of Marketing and Community, Jia-Lin Yong as Investor and Amanda Berinson as Executive Assistant.
We were delighted to add The Nature Conservancy CIO Bola Olusanya to our Advisory Board, bringing invaluable investment insight, strengthening our strategic direction.
Giant House is officially open! We have a new home in London’s Notting Hill, designed by the talented Mimi Shodeinde, featured in Wallpaper*.
Giant used our platform to advocate for purpose-driven technology
Giant co-founder Tommy Stadlen told the Giant story on CNBC and joined the BBC to discuss the UN Plastics Treaty. Tommy also wrote about the college dropout fallacy in entrepreneurship for Fast Company.
Giant co-founder Cameron McLain was featured on the critically acclaimed Sunday Times podcast, Danny in the Valley, and by McKinsey on regenerative agriculture.
Jon Dishotsky was a guest on Nordic TV show, “The Switch,” covering his entrepreneurial journey.
We published research on why the NHS should embrace virtual wards, why business should wake up to water resilience, why we need to pay attention to the critical metals gap on the road to net zero, and why the health tech world should recognise food as a medicine, as well as our own lessons from four years of investing in purpose-driven companies.
We convened the purpose-driven technology ecosystem
We hosted our flagship Giant Ideas summit at the Tate Modern, convening the world’s leading purpose-driven CEOs, founders, investors, politicians and athletes (watch the Giant Ideas highlights reel). Speakers included the founders of DeepMind, Airbnb and Calm as well as an NBA All-Star, a US presidential candidate and the creator of ‘Femtech’.
We hosted leading founders for events across the US and Europe with Coatue, Lightspeed, Bessemer, Slush, The Drop, Nasdaq and McKinsey.
Our advisory board of global leaders participated in our dinner series for corporate CEOs and entrepreneurs.
We spoke on panels around the world, from the Financial Times’ Moral Money conference and McKinsey’s Green Business Building Summit to local AI hackathons.
As we close 2023, we're filled with gratitude and excitement for the year ahead. It is a privilege to back companies that matter - from climate and health to inclusive capitalism. Here's to another year of standing on the shoulders of Giants!