It's The Alternatives Era

Rhyming EBITDA with Fajita

December 21, 2023

Since last post we’ve seen 9 acquisitions, 6 fundraising rounds, 11 people moves & promotions, 1 new fund launch, 2 articles, 2 partnerships, 4 roles, 3 newly added events, and a collection of memes.

This week was also the 1-year anniversary of the It’s Pronounced Data Newsletter. Substack tells me that there were 39,597 unique readers (will be interesting to see what the cookieless future does for these metrics). I’m incredibly humbled and…haha just kidding, this isn’t a LinkedIn post for a humblebrag. But seriously, thank you all for the support and looking forward to more things to come in 2024.

I’ll be at Data Happy Hour this evening at Legends (33rd and 5th) in NYC. Come through!

Firm Holiday Videos

There have been some incredible moments in music history. T-pain rhyming Mansion with Wisconsin. That time Travis Kelce put an unknown girl from Pennsylvania on the map <Swiftie Trigger Warning>. and now Blackstone rhyming EBITDA with Fajita.

M&A

*transactions have been announced but may not be closed

Fundraising

  • BlueMatrix (investment research content creation and distribution) announced a strategic growth investment from Thoma Bravo.

  • Crescenta (digital fund manager for private equity) raised an additional €2M in a Pre-Seed round.

  • Datalogz (business intelligence ops) raised $5M in a round led by Great Point Ventures.

  • Excarta (AI-powered weather forecasting) raised $2.5M in a Seed round led by Village Global.

  • PolicyMap (GIS and mapping) raised $3M in a Series A led by Reinvestment Fund.

  • UltiHash (data storage optimization) raised $2.5M in a Pre-Seed round led by Inventure.

People Moves, Promotions, and Appointments

  • Fred Bower joined Chronograph as Head of Marketing.

  • Travis Clinger was promoted to Chief Connectivity and Ecosystem Officer at LiveRamp.

  • Kevin Dean joined Truthset as General Manager.

  • Matthew Ekroth was promoted to Head of EMEA Corporate Data Strategy at Bloomberg.

  • Jim Fanning joined Databricks as VP of Sales.

  • Malte Gabriel joined Cleverbridge as Chief Product Officer.

  • Alex Golbin joined Hudson Bay Capital Management as MD, Chief Data Officer.

  • Michael Morabito joined BWG Strategy as Head of Healthcare Research.

  • Alistair Tye joined FactSet as Principal, Real-Time and Tick History

  • Dean McIntyre was promoted to Global Head of Commercial at SimCorp.

  • Eric Weber joined Grammarly as Head of Data.

New Fund & Company Launches

  • Falfurrias Capital announced a $400M raise for Falfurrias Growth Partners (FGP), its inaugural growth fund. The new fund leadership includes:

    • Cam Dyer, Chair of Investment Committee (prior Co-Head of Global TMT Sector at Carlyle)

    • Michael Clifton, Partner (prior Co-Founder of Supernova Partners and Investor on the U.S. Buyout Team at Carlyle)

    • Amy Brandt, Partner (prior Operating Executive Director at Serent Capital and CEO of Docutech)

    • Hugh McColl IV, Vice President (prior Executive Director at Parexel and Investor at Welsh, Carson, Anderson & Stowe)

Who’s Hiring

Something Different

My friend Simon Abrahms of Chesterfield Gallery is hosting glass artist Ben Young’s exhibition, Delicate Space, with an opening reception January 11th 6pm-8pm in Chelsea, NYC. This will be the artist’s first solo exhibition in the Western Hemisphere and will be a comprehensive showing of his most recent works, all made in 2023.

Using concrete to create mountains, crevasses, sand bars, and cliffs, Young’s innovative use of materials is transportative. With hand-carved glass as his guiding medium, Young amplifies light and its relationship with water – our most sacred element – to create a glowing unity that people from around the world connect with on a personal level, whether they are beachside or in the desert.

For more information on the exhibit and to see a catalog of works, check out the link here. RSVP is not required for the event, but if you’d like to arrange a viewing, or to learn more about glass art as an investable asset, contact Simon Abrams at [email protected]

What I’m Reading

Partnership Corner

  • Dun & Bradstreet and Climate Engine partnered to provide unique visibility into climate-related business risks. Link

  • Seek AI and Prodigy partnered to enhance data access for brand marketers. Link

Upcoming Events

*new events added since last newsletter

And a few more for good laughs…

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Views here are my own and not of my current or former employers.