Barcelona Startup News May 22, 2017

Hello and happy Monday! We hope you had a great weekend!

Our humble startup ecosystem got a BIG capital injection last week as Verse announced a $20M Series B round to expand their P2P payments platform AND Aragon raised a record $25M in 15 minutes validating the worldwide demand for decentralized company creation and enterprise management tools.

Ok, technically Aragon is a decentralized organization itself, but whatever, Luis is Barcelona so we’ll claim it.

This week, OuiShare is leading the charge for the future of work with their Rethink & Remix Business Experience starting on Tuesday.

Lastly, SEAT revealed the first batch of startups to enter the first edition of the mobility-focused accelerator program, and Barcelona’s PopPlaces merged with Germany’s Go-PopUp to take the popup revolution to Asia.

Ok, let’s take a look at the latest Barcelona startup news from this week: 

THIS WEEK’S HIGHLIGHTS:

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Startup & Investment News

• Blockchain startup Aragon raised $25M in record ICO
  • The Aragon Token Sale: The Numbers
• Barcelona-based fintech startup Verse raises $20M
• Barcelona’s Scytl receives €3M to complete financing round
• Biotech firm AptaTargets closed a €2.7M investment round
• Greentech startup Solaris Offgrid secured a €1M investment
• Lock Up raised €500k to launch app for tourism appartments
• Sports tech startup from Barcelona, FirstVision lands €100k
• Mercatrace raised €90k in crowdfunding on Bolsa Social
• Barcelona startup PopPlaces merged with Berlin’s Go-PopUp
• Barcelona startup Devicare ready to enter the French market
• NUMA Barcelona is looking for startups to join their program
• ESADE BAN & Crowdcube Spain to coinvest in startups
• This are the 11 startups selected by SeedRocket in Barcelona
• Meet Nuclio Venture Builder’s new insurtech startup Brokoli
• New edition of Bizbarcelona features investment speed dating
• PromoFarma exceeds 25,000 24h-deliveries in first month
• Barcelona’s Datumize is looking for €2M investment round
• Gartner names Barcelona legaltech firm Onna a ‘Cool Vendor’

Tech News

• Tesla chooses Barcelona to open its first store in Spain
• Catalonia to become a pioneer testing ground in Europe in the field of autonomous & connected vehicles
• Alibaba may install its Southern Europe hub in Catalonia
• Jose Nascimento has been named Head of Lab of SEAT Metropolis:Lab Barcelona
• CaixaBank to create department for entrepreneurs & startups
  • And they win “European Retail Bank of the Year” award
• Forrester Research crowns BBVA the best mobile bank in EU
• Crowdfunding in Spain more than doubles to reache €113M
• Infographic about latest cyberattack ransomware WannaCry
• Queues at El Prat airport to continue throughout summer
• Orange plans to offer home automation services in Spain
• Why do courts in Spain & EU allow BlablaCar but ban Uber?

Good Reads

• SEAT Accelerator by Conector: The First Batch
• We found the perfect VP of sales, and we didn’t hire him
• How to develop truly conversational bots
• What matters (and not) when getting press for your startup
• The truth behind leadership

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GREAT EVENTS THIS WEEK

• Mon, 22 May @ 12:00: Masterclass Open Innovation
• Tue, 23 May @ 18:30: How to build the future of humanity
• Tue, 23 May @ 19:00:  Nomadtalks: Johnny FD
• Tue, 23 May @ 19:00: 3rd HardwareXchange
• Wed, 24 May @ 19:00: Affiliate marketing: monetize traffic
• Thu, 25 May @ 19:00: Taller de Visual Thinkiing
• Thu, 25 May @ 19:00: Taller de Antiprocrastinación­
• Thu, 25 May @ 19:30: Biotech Meetup with CREB UPC
• Fri, 26 May @ 16:00: Run your own Design Sprint
• Sat, 27 May @ 8:30: Applause 2017: App Marketing Congress

See the full Event Calendar here

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STARTUP JOBS IN BARCELONA

• OneCoWork is recruiting a Junior Accountant
• Skyscanner is hiring Principal & Lead Engineers
• Xing is looking for a Software Engineer to join their team
• ElectricFeel is recruiting a Ruby on Rails Developer
• LoveToKnow is hiring a Sr Web Engineer (Telecommute)
• Research design and tech firm L&R is looking or a:
  • Software Engineer
  • Mobile Engineer

Barcelona startup news May 22, 2017 cover all the latest stories about Barcelona’s Tech & Startup scene from May 15th until May 22th, 2017.