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Whatnot, started in a Funko Pop-flooded rental house, is now a $20 billion company.\u00a0<\/p>\n
The live commerce platform exclusively told Fortune it recently raised its $545 million Series G, almost doubling Whatnot\u2019s valuation from $11.5 billion in its October 2025 round. It\u2019s an unlikely story in all sorts of ways, from the tech giant\u2019s previous failed efforts to bring live selling to the U.S. to Whatnot\u2019s own seemingly niche beginning. In a moment where it seems like every venture dollar is chasing OpenAI or Anthropic, Whatnot\u2019s continuous growth is anomalous, and makes for interesting conversations with VCs.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen you look at Silicon Valley it\u2019s 99.99% AI right now,\u201d said Grant LaFontaine, Whatnot CEO and cofounder. \u201cThere can be friction there, where you\u2019ll talk to some firms and they\u2019ll say: \u2018No, all I do is AI, sorry.\u2019 But there are people looking ahead, watching everyone chase the same ten AI deals. So, there are some people who say, \u2018God, it\u2019s nice to see a consumer company with network effects, strong growth, and a good operating team, because I can see value here.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
This new round\u2014led by ICONIQ, Lightspeed and Avra\u2014includes investors old and new. New investors in the mix include Kleiner Perkins, Wellington Management, and others. Andreessen Horowitz, Bond, DST Global, and Greycroft, among others, are all returning. Y Combinator, an existing investor, is in along with new backer Standard Capital, the new firm of former YC partner Dalton Caldwell. Alphabet\u2019s CapitalG is also back, having led three previous rounds in Whatnot dating back to its $150 million Series C, closed at a $1.5 billion valuation in 2021.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cThe biggest change since our first investment in 2021 is the sheer scale and complexity of the business,\u201d said CapitalG managing partner Laela Sturdy via email. \u201cIn 2021, Whatnot was in five categories, all collectibles and only in the U.S. Today Whatnot spans hundreds of categories across multiple countries.\u201d<\/p>\n
Sturdy\u2019s very right: Whatnot\u2019s categories span Pok\u00e9mon cards to designer bags to fresh food. Fortune broke the news earlier this summer that Whatnot had crossed one billion orders, and the company has now raised about $1.5 billion since its 2019 beginnings.\u00a0<\/p>\n
But it hasn\u2019t been all \u201cup and to the right\u201d: Whatnot recently faced concerns that the platform encourages gambling-like levels of excessive spending. (Whatnot says it bans all gambling-style activity\u2014like raffles and lotteries\u2014and enforces this through seller requirements and other controls.) It wasn\u2019t easy in the early days, either: On the Term Sheet Podcast, LaFontaine recently told me that raising money was tough, because investors would look at Whatnot and think\u2014live selling is hard, marketplaces rarely work, and that collectibles were a decisively limited market. There\u2019s a lesson there, perhaps.<\/p>\n
\u201cSomething people get wrong: The idea that you have to start with the most horizontal consumer platform because the TAM has to be X-Y-Z big,\u201d said Yoonkee Sull, Iconiq general partner. \u201cThe reality is that oftentimes when you\u2019re building these consumer businesses, you have to be extremely focused. [Whatnot] started with a community that could look small, but they\u2019re very engaged and super passionate\u2026. That gave them the opportunity to build a marketplace that would actually exhibit strong network effects.\u201d<\/p>\n
That\u2019s the thing about marketplace businesses: The rare times they take off, they compound. LaFontaine\u2019s relationship to Whatnot\u2019s valuation, nevertheless, is loose. He frames valuation as a possible risk to employees and investors if mismanaged. \u201cWhenever we do a fundraising round, we pull our own multiples back into a valuation range we feel we can, with relative confidence, grow into.\u201d<\/p>\n
Whatnot\u2019s now reached the place where the question around what\u2019s next, from a financial perspective, starts to grow louder: When will the company go public? \u201cI\u2019d probably prefer to stay private as long as we can,\u201d said LaFontaine. \u201cBut the calculus changes, and we\u2019ll be prepared to go public. That\u2019s like the honest truth.\u201d<\/p>\n
See you Monday,<\/p>\n
Allie Garfinkle
X: @agarfinks
Email: alexandra.garfinkle@fortune.com<\/p>\n
Submit a deal for the Term Sheet newsletter here.<\/p>\n
Joey Abrams curated the deals section of today\u2019s newsletter. Subscribe here.<\/p>\n
VENTURE CAPITAL<\/p>\n
– Hadrian, a Torrance, Calif.-based developer and operator of AI-powered factories for aerospace and defense manufacturing, raised $1.37 billion in funding. WCM Investment Management, Washington Harbour Partners, Valor Equity Partners, 137 Ventures, and Baillie Gifford led the round.<\/p>\n
– Yellow Card, an Atlanta, Ga.-based stablecoin payments-infrastructure provider, raised $40 million in funding from SC Ventures by Standard Chartered, Sony Innovation Fund, Polychain Capital, Blockchain Capital, and others.<\/p>\n
– Na\u00efve, a Palo Alto, Calif.-based AI lab, raised $28.5 million in Series A funding. Nexus Venture Partners led the round and was joined by Y Combinator, Zetta, Liquid 2, and angel investors.<\/p>\n
– Malachyte, a New York City-based behavior intelligence company, raised $10 million in seed funding. Bessemer Venture Partners and Gradient Venture led the round and were joined by Harpoon Ventures.<\/p>\n
PRIVATE EQUITY<\/p>\n
– BNP, backed by Godspeed Capital, acquired U.S. Cost Incorporated, an Alpharetta, Ga.-based global cost management and project controls firm. Financial terms were not disclosed.<\/p>\n
– Facility Grid, a portfolio company of Nexa Equity, acquired PingCx, a Farmingdale, N.Y.-based autonomous commissioning platform for building automation systems. Financial terms were not disclosed.\u00a0<\/p>\n
– M-One Capital agreed to acquire a majority stake in Shared Practices Group, a Scottsdale, Ariz.-based dental support organization. Financial terms were not disclosed.<\/p>\n
– Reynolda Equity Partners acquired Southeastern Pond Management, a Calera, Alabama-based pond management company. Financial terms were not disclosed.<\/p>\n
– TRP Infrastructure Services, a portfolio company of Arlington Capital Partners, acquired Interstate Barricades & Markings and Alamo Roadway Materials, both San Antonio-based traffic control and pavement marking suppliers; Traffic Control Products Co., a Pearl, Miss.-based traffic control products supplier; DIJ Construction, a Bertram, Texas-based construction company; and Batterson, a Houston, Texas-based pavement marking and traffic control company. Financial terms were not disclosed.<\/p>\n
EXITS<\/p>\n
– TPG acquired Smith + Howard, an Atlanta, Ga.-based assurance, tax, advisory and wealth management firm, from Broad Sky Partners. Financial terms were not disclosed.<\/p>\n
– Veritas Capital agreed to acquire a majority stake in Saber Power Services, a Houston, Texas-based provider of electrical design, construction, testing, and maintenance services for critical power infrastructure, from Greenbelt Capital Management. Financial terms were not disclosed. <\/p>\n
IPOs<\/p>\n
– Braveheart Bio, a San Francisco-based biopharmaceutical company developing therapies for hypertrophic cardiomyopathy and other serious cardiovascular diseases, raised $383 million in an offering of 18.8 million shares priced at $18 on the Nasdaq.\u00a0<\/p>\n
PEOPLE<\/p>\n
– Battery Ventures, a Boston, Mass.-based venture capital firm, promoted Brandon Gleklen to Partner.\u00a0<\/p>\n
– Paceline Equity Partners, a Dallas, Texas-based private equity firm, promoted Jonathan Rosen to partner.\u00a0<\/p>\n
#AIobsessed #Silicon #Valley #live #commerce #platform #Whatnot #notched #funding #valuing #billion<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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