These aspiring Milan tech startups secured highest VC fundings in Q2 2020

The tech startup ecosystem in Milan is vibrant with countless events that attract venture capital funds, business angels, and investor club deals. In addition to the committed and aspiring entrepreneurs and talent out there, Milan is also a city where the living cost is not too high as compared to the other major cities in Europe. 

Top deals in Milan in Q2 2020 

Being home to a number of tech startups, Milan attracts VC deals focussed on the growth of these companies. And, here is a list of top VC deals bagged by these startups in Q2 2020 as sourced from Pitchbook. 

Milkman

Founder/s: Antonio Perini, Tommaso Baù

Founded year: 2015

Total funding: €32.8 million

Milan-based logistics and delivery platform Milkman focuses on last-mile logistics and e-commerce companies and provides shoppers the choice of specifying the delivery times and the ability of tracking shipments. With Milkman, users have the option of either same-day delivery or half-hour delivery on a day depending on their schedule. Its notable clients include Coop, Nespresso, Zara, Eataly Today, and Tannico. 

Back in May this year, Milkman secured €25 million investment from Poste Italiane, Vertis, Italia500, P101sgr, and 360 Capital. This investment will include an agreement between Poste and Milkman for a new premium service called MLK Deliveries for the former’s customers. 

Genespire

Founder/s: Luigi Naldini, Alessio Cantore

Founded year: 2020

Total funding: €16 million

Genespire is an Italian biotechnology company that focuses on the development of transformative gene therapies for patients suffering from genetic diseases. Genespire was founded in March 2020 as a spin-off of the San Raffaele-Telethon Institute for Gene Therapy (SR-Tiget), one of the world’s leading cell and gene therapy research institutes. 

Recently, Genespire bagged €16 million Series A funding from Sofinnova Partners, which is a leading European life sciences venture capital firm located in Paris, Milan and London. The investment will be used to advance the leading-edge platform technologies for the development of novel gene therapies in both primary immunodeficiencies and metabolic genetic diseases.

AppQuality 

Founder/s: Edoardo Depoli, Luca Manara, Filippo Renga

Founded year: 2015

Total funding: €4 million

AppQuality is a crowd testing platform, which uses the power of the crowd to test websites, apps, chatbots, Facebook pages, newsletters, landing pages, digital products, and ADV campaigns online. The crowd-based platform brings together a community of more than 14,000 remote testers to help companies create high-quality websites and apps with a great user experience. Some major clients of AppQuality include Moncler Allianz, Vodafone, Dyson, Enel, Allianz, Unicredit, BMW, etc. 

AppQuality raised €3.5 million led by P101 SGR and ITA500 along with participation from Italian Angels for Growth and Club Italia Investimenti 2. The startup will use this investment to accelerate services, minimise cost and make them more effective compared to traditional testing methods. Also, AppQuality aims to expand into more European markets. 

inVRsion

Founder/s: Matteo Esposito, Paolo Pascolo, Flora Caroli, Luca Ferrari Trecate

Founded year: 2015

Total funding: €7 million

Italian Virtual Reality startup InVRsion serves the retail industry since its debut in 2015. It specialises in the stimulation of retail spaces, products, showrooms and shopping experiences. The company supports B2B activities including shopper research, trade marketing negotiations and training. 

The company secured €3 million funding from a group of both existing and new advisors including Invest Italy SIM Spa and BackToWork 24 Srl that covered 50% of the fund and others such as LiftT Spa, Finebeauty Srl, and Italian Angels for Growth. Apart from the investment, InVRsion’s advisory board ropes in De Nardis, an investor, advisor, and director along with Eugenio Perrier and Lorenzo Thione. It will use their expertise to scale up in the US starting from its newly established subsidiary based in New York.

Datrix 

Founder/s: Fabrizio Milano d’Aragona, Mauro Arte, Claudio Zamboni 

Founded year: 2018

Total funding: €2.3 million

Datrix develops proprietary Augmented Analytics solutions for marketing, sales, finance and publishing purposes. Recently, the company secured €2.3 million capital from United Ventures SGR SpA, an independent VC manager specialising in software and digital technology sectors. The other notable investor includes Nerio Alessandri’s Wellness Holding. The investment will be used for the acceleration on the marketing and commercial front with a view to grow globally and expand the customer base to SMEs. Also, it will focus on intensifying R&D and product development activities. 

Soisy

Founder/s: Andrea Sandro, Pietro Cesati

Founded year: 2015

Total funding: €3.4 million

Soisy is an Italian Payment Institution offering installment payments at point-of-sale (POS) financed via marketplace lending. The company wants to innovate installment payment on e-commerce to make it easier and cheaper for both individuals and companies. Soisy intends to make it easy for people to lend, borrow and exchange their money with a platform available on desktop and mobile devices. Operating with the intention to reinvent the world of financial services and make them faster, more transparent, accessible and easier, this startup secured €2.4 million funding back in April this year.  

PinCell

Founder/s: Carlo Pincelli, Alessandra Marconi

Founded year: 2008

Total funding: €1.7 million

PinCell is a biotech company focused on the research of therapeutic molecules based on new targets related to the pathomechanisms of inflammatory and neoplastic skin diseases. It is an academic spin-off of the University of Modena and Reggio Emilia by the world-class dermatology experts Prof. Carlo Pincelli and Dr. Alessandra Marconi. PinCell received seed funding from Sofinnova Partners. 

In May, PinCell completed the seed financing round of €1.65 million led by Sofinnova Partners, a leading European life sciences venture capital firm based in Paris, London and Milan. The financing was part of a series of investments recently made through The Sofinnova Telethon Fund, the largest fund in Italy dedicated to early-stage biotech startups targeting cures for rare and genetic diseases. This investment will be used to advance the company’s development of first-in-class anti-inflammatory therapies for the treatment of rare and severe skin diseases with limited therapeutic options.

Main image credits: Noppasin Wongchum/Shutterstock