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Startups are not isolated from the world. But this week Funding News did not feel positively correlated from the general news cycle and offered some delay – or perhaps just more time to prepare for “planetary and social health”, as a new fund intends.
Most interesting start -up stories of the week
This week an exit, a lawsuit, a disappointing sale and a scientific controversy.
Openai alumni: Former OpenAI CTO MIRA Murati secured two new high -profile advisers with previous tires to open for its new company, AI Startup Thinking Machines Lab. With regard to the co-founder of OpenAi and the former chief scientist Ilya Sutkever, he opted for the TPU chips of Google Cloud to provide the research of his new AI-startup, Safe Superintelligence, with electricity.
Friends and enemies: OpenAi is said to publish $ 500 million to acquire IO products, the AI -hardware startup that Jony Ive builds with Sam Altman, although the two companies can work together instead. In the meantime, OpenAi’s fight continues with Elon Musk, this time with a countersuit against his former supporter.
Leave part: Part’s head of communication left the HR technology company, which is accused of planting a spy at rival startup babbling.
Colossal or not: Colossal Biosciences claims to have resurrected the terrible wolf, but scientists without ties with the company are challenging the claim – and there is still a debate about the valuation of $ 10.2 billion and whether it is undervalued or exaggerated.
Yo -yo: Lyst, the British fashion marketplace that is once appreciated with a value of around $ 700 million, has been taken over for only $ 154 million in cash by the Zozo established in Japan.
Not so solid: Banking-as-a-Service Startup Solid has submitted bankruptcy protection for chapter 11, stating ‘considerable and expensive court cases’. It had collected nearly $ 81 million, but was faced with a legal challenge in 2023 when Series Backer FTV Capital had charged a complaint to reclaim his investment of $ 61 million.
Most interesting VC and financing news this week
This week was a lot smoother in Startupland than on the stock market, with many deal and fund announcements.
Road Turns: Autonomous Rice Artup Nuro has secured a series of $ 106 million on a valuation of $ 6 billion, by $ 8.6 billion in 2021. The valuation dip not only reflects market trends, but also that the company may need less capital because it is from delivery of its technology.
Power to the people: Base Power, a fast-growing backup provider in Texas in Texas, collected a series B of $ 200 million, under the supervision of addition, Andreessen Horowitz, Lightspeed Venture Partners and Valor Equity Partners.
Stripy: Sipay, a fintech startup established in Istanbul that invoices itself as “Stripe for Emerging Markets”, has raised a series B of $ 78 million on a rating of $ 875 million to expand outside of Turkey.
Let it rain: Earned wage access Startup Rain has led an All-Equity $ 75 million Series B under the leadership of Prosus, which is planning to use to add credit card and save products to the offer.
Look from above: Brinc Drones, a Seattle-based police-drone startup founded by the 25-year-old Dropout Blake Resnick college, raised $ 75 million in new financing led by Index Ventures.
Smaller generation: KREA, a startup based in San Francisco that helps designers and visual creatives with the use of tooling of different generative AI models, announced with $ 83 million in different tranches, including a series of $ 47 million B.
Still hire people: Artisan, a startup of an AI sales agent who is known for his marketing campaign “Stop Hiring Humans”, has collected a series A of $ 25 million to help add 22 members to his team of 35 people.
Billions under management: Signalfire locked more than $ 1 billion in fresh capital, which brought its total assets under management to around $ 3 billion. And Lerer Hippeau closed its ninth fund to $ 200 million, an increase of the eighth fund of $ 140 million, and brought his assets under management to $ 1.4 billion.
Two time is a charm: Berlin VC company Revent has secured a $ 109 million fund to invest in startups “Planetary and Societal Health”. Family Office-Turned-VC Dig Ventures also collected $ 100 million for its second fund, which it will usually use in Europe to support startups at an early stage in B2B Saas, AI and cloud infrastructure.
Last but not least
Mayor Daniel Lurie van San Francisco recently stated during the StriktVC event of Techcrunch that he calls personally tech CEOs to ask how the city can be more supportive. ‘I call entrepreneurs and say:’ How can we keep you here? “Or” How can we bring you back? ” “Lurie said.