BrokerDealer-Backed Symphony Is Singing Happy Tune

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BrokerDealer.com blog update is courtesy of coverage from MarketsMuse.com Tech Talk and profiles the latest from Symphony, the brokerdealer-backed financial communications program that is looking to make the Bloomberg terminals (or at least their most-used messaging application) mute.

This David v. Goliath type battle pitting well-backed upstarts against the ubiquitous Bloomberg LP could become a trend among other aspiring fintech, trading system and specialty financial data providers and terminals  when considering last week’s snafu that, for a few hours, rendered the Bloomberg LP terminal farm “tradus interruptus” across the globe (albeit, the fix was made prior to the opening bell of US markets.)

Tom Glocer
Tom Glocer

As spotted first by of all places, the NY Post, “Tom Glocer, former CEO of Thomson Reuters and a managing partner of Angelic Ventures, is joining Symphony’s board of directors, according to a person directly familiar with the company’s plans (according to the NY Post).”

Symphony, which received a $66 million investment last year from 15 financial companies has been seen as a viable alternative to the $24,000-a-year Bloomberg terminal.

The company’s backers include a who’s who of Wall Street financial companies: Bank of America Merrill Lynch, BNY Mellon, BlackRock, Citadel, Citi, Credit Suisse, Deutsche Bank, Goldman Sachs, HSBC, Jefferies, JPMorgan, Maverick, Morgan Stanley, Nomura and Wells Fargo.

Last fall, these companies contributed $66M to finance Symphony, and using that money, purchased Perzo, a company that was building a secure communications platform. After the purchase, they named Perzo founder David Gurle as Symphony CEO.

In addition to providing encrypted chat services, Symphony doesn’t store any communications as a third party, and allows a bank’s compliance officers to stop chats from leaving the company — an increasingly important factor for banks who are seeing chat records in court papers.

The addition of Glocer is only the latest of alum of the news and financial data company to join Symphony.

David Gurle, Symphony’s founder and CEO, was global head of collaborative services at Thomson Reuters, and worked on the company’s chat tool, according to the company’s Web site.

In addition to Gurle, there’s Eran Barak, Symphony’s global head of business operations, and Koray Oztekin and Ann Demirtjis, who do product management, according to the company’s Web site.
At least four other Symphony employees in business development have formerly worked at Thomson Reuters, according to LinkedIn.

Symphony is already in wide use at Goldman Sachs, which led the round of funding last year. The service is expected to be broadly rolled out to Wall Street by July.

BlackRock Balks at Quality of European IPOs

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BrokerDealer.com blog post courtesy of extracts from FT.com

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BlackRock, the world’s largest institutional investor, has sounded the alarm over the quality of European IPOs as hedge funds increase their bets against private equity-backed flotations, after the market for companies going public was soured by a string of high-profile failures. BlackRock said the flotation process needed to be improved, after the best six months for European IPOs since the financial crisis was ruined by poor market debuts from companies including Saga, the UK retirement group, Applus, the Spanish industrial testing business and eDreams Odigeo, the online travel agent.

Mr Leach told the Financial Times that the sheer volume of IPOs coming to market this year had affected communication between issuers and investors: “There has not been the same level of thoughtfulness and dialogue on valuation and structure.”

BlackRock tracked 104 IPOs in Europe in the first six months of this year, of which 38 deals – just over a third – are trading below their issue price. The Eurostoxx index is down around 0.5 per cent so far this year. Twenty companies which had been planning to go public – including names such as retail chain Fat Face – pulled their flotations. This year €33.7bn has already been raised in the European IPO market, more than in any full year since 2007, according to PwC.

Some of the worst performing IPOs in Europe have been those brought to market by private equity investors, with eDreams Odigeo, backed by Permira and Ardian, and Applus, the Carlyle-backed inspection group, both issuing profit warnings soon after listing. Many private equity groups use independent advisory firms such as STJ Advisors, which investment bankers say are too aggressive on pricing.

Investment bankers hit back at BlackRock’s criticisms of recent IPOs. A senior banker at one large bank said: “BlackRock wasn’t complaining after the first quarter when all the IPOs were up. Every potential investment should be looked at on its individual merits. The last time I checked, fund managers weren’t forced to invest.”

For the entire story from FT.com, please click on this link.

Uber Snags $1.2Bil in Funding at $17Bil Valuation: Deal Investors Drive Record Raise for Car-Ride Service

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A BrokerDealer.com/blog special:

Bankers, Broker-Dealers, venture and private equity investors, and the universe of fast-growth start-ups who keep an eye on the pulse of pre-IPO funding rounds were salivating on Friday after Uber, the car ride service, announced it raised $1.2bil from “institutional investors, mutual funds, private equity and venture capital,” with a second round of investors coming soon. The new round of financing values the company at a total $18.2 billion. The company’s pre-money valuation, not counting the latest round of funding, was $17 billion.

Investors hope the company, which allows users to summon a ride on their smartphones, can expand globally and diversify into logistics.
The investors in the round valued Uber “pre-money” at $17 billion, the blog post said. The $1.2 billion infusion took the startup’s valuation to $18.2 billion.

Fidelity Investments put in about $425 million, Wellington Management added $209 million and BlackRock Inc contributed $175 million, according to a person familiar with the matter.

Venture firms Summit Partners, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, Google Ventures and Menlo Ventures also participated in the round, a person familiar with the matter said. Kleiner’s investment came from its Digital Growth Fund, run by former stock analyst Mary Meeker, known for her bullish recommendations during the first dot-com boom. Her fund has had recent hits, including traffic app Waze, acquired last year for $1.1 billion by Google.

“Uber is one of the most rapidly growing companies ever, and we believe there are opportunities for continued tremendous growth,” Joan Miller, a spokeswoman for Summit Partners, an investor in the funding round, said by telephone.Uber, which did not give details about its latest investors, operates in 128 cities across 37 countries.

Kalanick said he expected to close a second round of funding from strategic investors of about $200 million