| | | | | | Good morning, Term Sheet readers. | | Remember when I brought to your attention The Wing, the latest startup to launch a print magazine? Today, the company has a bigger announcement — it raised $32 million in Series B funding from WeWork and New Enterprise Associates. | | | | . |  | | . | | | | The Wing, a women-only club and co-working space, launched its first location a year ago in the Flatiron District of New York. It recently opened an office space in SoHo and plans to expand into Brooklyn and Washington D.C. during the first quarter of 2018. A Wing membership costs approximately $3,000 per year for unlimited access to its locations. | | A recent New York Times article said the company was poised to bring its "Instagrammable feminism" to the masses. With its millennial pink decor and library of books written by and about women, The Wing also hosts a number of events including panel discussions, book clubs, and movie screenings. Only if you can get past the 8,000-person waiting list, that is. | | "We look at membership through the lens of diversity of all types — your profession, age, race, and ethnicity," CEO and co-founder Audrey Gelman told Term Sheet. | | My question is: Can you consider yourself an inclusive community when there are 8,000 women on the waitlist willing to pay thousands of dollars to join? | | That's where the fresh infusion of capital comes in. Gelman says the company will use the money to hire more employees, expand its physical footprint, invest in technology that will beef up its digital member portal, and more importantly, add a "scholarship program" for professional women who can't afford The Wing's rates. This program will become important as the co-working company tries to penetrate smaller, less affluent markets. | | "We want to be able to plant a flag in major U.S. and international cities first, but beyond that we're just getting started," she says. "We've only been around for a year, so it's hard to be able to tell how the business is going to change in those ways." | | Flush with venture capital dollars, WeWork swooped in to lead The Wing's round. The investment comes on the heels of the co-working behemoth's acquisition of the Lord & Taylor flagship store and The Flatiron School. So it's not so far-fetched to think The Wing could be next. | | "We're looking at this as a very long relationship and nothing is presupposed but nothing is off the table either," said WeWork COO Jen Berrent. "We're not doing this lightly. We are doing this to produce a long-term footprint, but at the same time, we're not saying this has to end in an acquisition in order for it to be successful." | | Here's an interesting parallel: WeWork may be evolving into the Facebook of physical space. It recently raised $4.4 billion in funding from Softbank's Vision Fund, and it's now making strategic investments in more specialized niche versions of its business. If WeWork is going down the Facebook path, it will continue to invest and acquire smaller players and do whatever it takes to hold its market position. | | | | . | | |  | | | | | | THE LATEST FROM FORTUNE... | | | | | | • TransferMate, an Ireland-based B2B payments provider, raised 30 million euros in funding. Investors include Allied Irish Banks. • Locus Robotics, an Andover, Mass.-based provider of autonomous, mobile robots for use in ecommerce fulfillment warehouses, raised $25 million in Series B funding. Scale Venture Partners led the round. • Candid Co., a New York-based startup developer of teeth aligners, raised $15 million in Series A funding. Investors include Greycroft, Bessemer, e.ventures, and Arena Ventures. • Pixvana, a Seattle-based virtual reality technology startup, raised $14 million in Series A funding. Vulcan Capital led the round, and was joined by investors including Raine Ventures, Microsoft Ventures, Cisco Investments, Hearst Ventures and Madrona Venture Group. • AISense, a Los Altos, Calif.-based artificial intelligence startup, raised $10 million in Series A funding. Horizons Ventures led the round, and was joined by investors including Draper Associates and Draper Dragon Fund, David Cheriton and Bridgewater Associates. • Buildup, a Mountain View, Calif.-based mobile collaboration and task management platform for construction job sites, raised $7 million in Series A funding. Investors include TLV Partners, UpWest Labs, 01 Ventures, Abstract Ventures, as well as Check founders Guy Goldstein and Ahikam Kaufman. • Sendwithus, a Canada-based communications management platform that enables organizations to streamline their email creation process, raised $5 million in Series A funding. BlueRun Ventures led the round, and was joined by investors including Initialized Capital and acequia capital. Existing investors Baseline Ventures, SV Angel, Maiden Lane, Y Combinator and Scott Banister participated. | | . | | | | | • Gen Cap America Inc acquired The Bargain Barn Inc, an Athens, Tenn.-based grocery outlet. Financial terms weren't disclosed. • SK Capital acquired Perrigo Company plc's (NYSE:PRGO) active pharmaceutical ingredients business and renamed it to Wavelength Pharmaceuticals. Financial terms weren't disclosed. • Washington Equity Partners made an investment of an undisclosed amount in Arc Drilling, a Cleveland, Ohio-based provider of electrical discharge machining solutions. Financial terms weren't disclosed. | | . | | | | | • Marvell Technology Group Ltd will buy rival Cavium Inc (Nasdaq:CAVM) for about $6 billion, according to Reuters. Read more. • Nestle SA is among companies exploring a purchase of Hain Celestial Group Inc., a Lake Success, N.Y.-based maker of organic and vegetarian food, according to Bloomberg. Read more. • Alibaba acquired 36.16% of Sun Art Retail Group (SEHK:6808) for HK$22.4 billion (around US$2.88 billion). | | . | | | | | • Highland Acquisition, a Dallas-based blank check company formed by Highland Capital Management, withdrew its $250 million IPO plan. The company sought to acquire a healthcare, media, telecom, entertainment, or energy business. Ladenburg Thalmann was sole underwriter in the deal. It planned to list on the Nasdaq as HLACU. • Big Rock Partners, a Delray Beach, Fla.-based blank check company formed to acquire a senior housing company, raised $60 million in an IPO of 6 million shares at $10. EarlyBirdCapital is lead manager in the deal. The company plans to list on the Nasdaq as BRPAU. | | . | | | | | • The Carlyle Group (NASDAQ: CG), agreed to acquire BenefitMall, a Dallas, Texas-based provider of employee benefits and payroll services, from an investor group led by Austin Ventures. Financial terms weren't disclosed. • Avista Capital Partners acquired Miraca Life Sciences, an Irving, Texas-based anatomic pathology lab. The seller was Miraca Holdings Inc. Financial terms weren't disclosed. | | . | | | | | • Crosslink Capital, a San Francisco-based private equity and venture capital firm, is seeking to raise $250 million for its eighth fund, according to an SEC filing. | | . | | | | | • WorldQuant Ventures named Mark Danchak as a managing director. Previously, Danchak was at Carbon6 Ventures. | | . | | | | | | | | | | | This message has been sent to you because you are currently subscribed to Term Sheet
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