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Two SPACs seek $425M for proptech deals

Plus, Fifth Wall upsized its blank-check company to $300M

Cousins Brian and Ben Friedman teamed up with a San Francisco Giants minority owner. (Getty, Friedman Capital)
Cousins Brian and Ben Friedman teamed up with a San Francisco Giants minority owner. (Getty, Friedman Capital)

 

Another day, another SPAC.

The latest is from Scott Seligman, a real estate investor and minority owner of the San Francisco Giants, who is teaming up with cousins Brian and Ben Friedman to raise $175 million for a proptech deal. Brian is a managing partner at investment firm Foxhall Partners while Ben is a former senior trader at Citigroup.

BOA Acquisition Corp. is targeting a business with an enterprise value north of $500 million, the company said in a regulatory filing. It aims to invest in digital technology that can streamline the real estate marketplace, but will only consider one with a proven business model. “We do not intend to invest in startup companies or entities with speculative business plans or excessive financial leverage,” the filing said.

BOA’s board includes Shane Battier, a former basketball player for the Miami Heat, and Sri Batchu, head of advertising at Instacart and an early executive at Opendoor. (That iBuyer went public after a SPAC deal with Chamath Palihapitiya’s Social Capital.) Its strategic advisors include David Glazer, CFO at Palantir, and Sam Beznos, whose Detroit-based Beztak Companies owns 35,000 apartments and 1.6 million square feet of office and retail space.

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Proptech is a small but growing focus for blank-check firms, with major players like Tishman Speyer, CBRE and Fifth Wall jumping into the craze.

This week, Fifth Wall upsized its SPAC offering from $250 million to $300 million. The proptech VC, which has invested in Opendoor and VTS, is betting its track record and $1.3 billion in committed capital will give it a “substantial competitive advantage,” according to filings. Its shares are set to start trading Friday under the ticker symbol FWAA.

On Thursday, Benchmark Real Estate Group’s Jordan Vogel and Aaron Feldman filed plans for a second SPAC, dubbed Property Solutions Acquisitions Corp. II. The company is looking to raise $250 million for a proptech deal, the filing said.

Vogel and Feldman’s first SPAC merged last month with Faraday Future, aluxury electric car maker that had previously run into financial trouble.

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Fifth WallIPOProptechSPAC