Our Track Record
Innovation X Advisors typically targets companies with a market cap of greater than 3 billion and which have been operating for over 5 years. Our strategy is to identify investment opportunities in privately held companies that possess innovative or “disruptive” technologies and present opportunities for a liquidity event within approximately three-four years from the date of the investment.
Click on each investment below to see more details.
Investment Thesis: Initially seeded with funding from the CIA, Palantir provides commercial enterprises and governments with software solutions to manage their data and aid in mission-critical decision-making. With its large TAM and ample liquidity for growth, Palantir is a leader in its sector. Their top-tier investor base includes BlackRock, Tiger Global Management, Founders Fund, and Michael Dell. Palantir was co-founded by Peter Thiel, who previously co-founded PayPal.
Investment Thesis: Uber Technologies is a rapidly growing global transportation network company that operates the world’s largest rideshare service. With operations across 65 countries serving over 75 million riders, Uber is far and away its industry leader. It is the most valuable private company in the U.S. and has a savvy investor base that includes SoftBank Group, Goldman Sachs, Tiger Global Management, and BlackRock. In addition to its operational businesses, Uber’s equity stakes in other rideshare platforms alone are worth an estimated $17 billion, representing 25% of its valuation. Furthermore, the appointment of Dara Khosrowshahi to CEO is a clear sign that an IPO filling is imminent.
Investment Thesis: Although Lyft is the No. 2 player in the rideshare space, their pure-play focus and emphasis on the U.S. market provided a clear path to profitability and the opportunity to be traded at a significant discount to their competitors. Lyft also has an attractive investor base, anchored by General Motors and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. This base provided a potential strategic M&A exit and includes leading VC funds, such as Founders Fund and Andreessen Horowitz.
Investment Thesis: Airbnb is one of the world’s largest accommodation and experience booking platform. The company created a new category of travel and can scale its business globally. Prior to 2020, Airbnb was growing well over 60% year-over-year, had gross margins of over 75%, and was nearing positive free cash flow. Its investor base is led by top funds, such as Andreessen Horowitz, General Atlantic, Kleiner Perkins, and Sequoia Capital.
Investment Thesis: With a global presence and rapidly growing user base, Spotify is the No. 1 music-streaming subscription service. Its subscription-based membership provides an attractive and predictable recurring revenue stream, enabling them to source shares at a discount to the previous primary raise. Spotify’s strong investor base contains strategics, such as Sony Music Entertainment, Warner Music Group, and Universal Music Group, and top venture capital funds, such as DST Global, Kleiner Perkins, and Accel.
Investment Thesis: Snapchat is a fast-growing social media platform with over 150 million daily users. Its popularity with teenagers and young adults stems from the app’s emphasis on short videos and images, which disappear after 24 hours. For Snapchat, a short-term trading opportunity arose from an ability to secure a favorable IPO allocation. The company’s IPO was heavily oversubscribed due to its cultural popularity and a recent dearth of tech IPOs. Because of the strong demand, the IPO was expected to trade up more than the average first-day IPO pop of 24%.
Investment Thesis: With a DNA database of over 5 million individuals, 23andMe is the world’s largest genetic and phenotypic resource. It is the only consumer genetic testing company with FDA approval to sell customers’ information about their susceptibility to certain heritable traits. Their ability to monetize access to its database and the potential to develop in-house therapies and partnerships, like its collaboration with GSK, provide significant growth opportunities. The company has already identified seven target therapies, any one of which has the potential to be worth billions. 23andMe’s impressive strategic investor base includes Johnson & Johnson, GSK, Genentech, and GV.
Investment Thesis: Pinterest is the internet’s dominant image-sharing platform with over 240 million monthly, active users and an annualized revenue of over $500 million. It was the fourth most popular site in the US, lagging behind only Facebook, Twitter, and Snapchat in terms of traffic. Pinterest also has one of the world’s largest databases of catalogued images and is one of the most robust visual search engines. Although its revenues are primarily from advertising, Pinterest has numerous data monetization and e-commerce opportunities to drive further growth. It is also uniquely positioned to be one of the core ways people search the internet for images.
Investment Thesis: As a cloud-based messaging and delivery platform for teams, Slack was extremely popular with software developers and is the leading developer of the “freemium” distribution model. It has a robust balance sheet with minimal risk of further dilution due to a $1 billion investment from SoftBank Group. Slack’s other leading investors include Dragoneer Investment Group, General Atlantic, and GGV Capital.
