I’ll defend the $700M fizzy water • TechCrunch

Foolish season is out in enterprise capital land.

As we speak buyers and founders alike will bore your ears off with notes about incremental money move positivity and their timeline to adjusted EBITDA profitability.

Lame.

Regardless of the final boringness of at present’s enterprise capital panorama, replete with conservative valuations, falling deal sizes, and clucking buyers sitting atop a mountain of capital, we discovered at present that at the least some people are having enjoyable.

Enter Liquid Demise, a direct-to-consumer water firm that simply raised a $70 million spherical at a $700 million valuation, per Bloomberg reporting. The transaction makes Liquid Demise 70% of a unicorn, which is rattling spectacular given the state of most DTC firms — see right here — that we are able to monitor on the general public market exchanges.

Why the massive price ticket? As a result of water is a progress enterprise, child! Bloomberg’s Katie Roof — a former TechCruncher — writes that the corporate is “on monitor for $130 million in income this yr,” up from $45 million value of prime line final yr. That’s the kind of progress that buyers covet.

Liquid Demise has just a few issues going for it that make the deal considerably affordable from my perspective. Certain, it’s straightforward to dunk on a $700 million water startup when cheaper alternate options abound; different fizzy water manufacturers, making your personal bubbly, or ingesting straight faucet water like a peasant are all choices.