venture capital

Physical AI startup BrightAI bootstraps to $80m in revenue

When Alex Hawkinson was the CEO of SmartThings, the consumer-focused connected devices company he co-founded and sold to Samsung for around $200 million, he kept thinking that internet of things (IoT) technology could probably solve bigger issues. He left SmartThings in 2018 to figure out where connected devices could make the largest impact. He co-founded […]

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In 2023 VCs returned the lowest level of capital to their investors since 2011

It’s no secret that the venture capital industry is facing a liquidity crisis as IPOs and other exits remain few and far between after 2020 and 2021’s record-breaking years. Now, we have numbers that show just how bad it’s gotten. In 2023, the U.S. VC industry invested $60 billion more into startups than it collected

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From Lauri Moore to Vic Singh, venture capitalists continue to play musical chairs

From Keith Rabois to Ethan Kurzweil, a lot of VCs have switched firms or spun out of storied VC institutions to launch their own funds this year. These employment changes are surprising because unlike in many other fields, venture capitalists don’t traditionally move around very much — especially those who reach the partner or general

From Lauri Moore to Vic Singh, venture capitalists continue to play musical chairs Read More »

Consumer tech is bouncing back, and consumer founders like Brynn Putnam are bouncing back with it

When Brynn Putnam sold her last company, Mirror, to Lululemon for $500 million at the start of the pandemic, it looked to this editor like she’d sold the smart fitness company too soon.  Instead, the timing proved brilliant. The home fitness craze crashed nearly as abruptly as it peaked during that first year of lockdowns.

Consumer tech is bouncing back, and consumer founders like Brynn Putnam are bouncing back with it Read More »

Here’s the full list of 44 US AI startups that have raised $100M or more in 2024

For some, AI fatigue is real — but clearly venture investors haven’t grown tired of the category. AI deals continued to dominate venture funding during the third quarter. AI companies raised $18.9 billion in Q3, according to Crunchbase data. That figure represents 28% of all venture funding. The third quarter also saw the close of

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The US IPO window hasn’t reopened yet, but startups take what they can

Welcome to Startups Weekly — your weekly recap of everything you can’t miss from the world of startups. Want it in your inbox every Friday? Sign up here! Despite the short workweek in many locations, the last few days have been crammed with deal announcements and funding news, although it is too early to tell how much was just on hold before

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Sales tax automation startup Kintsugi doubled its valuation this year

A 2018 Supreme Court ruling eliminated the requirement that an e-commerce retailer needed a physical location in a state in order for said state to be able to collect sales tax on purchases made by residents. While the decision was a boon for states, it created a headache for e-commerce sellers. Kintsugi is looking to

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General Catalyst and Khosla Ventures back data mapping startup Lume

Data integration is a necessary part of many workflows from onboarding customer data to exercising payroll, but for many data sets the process is long and manual. Data is siloed into databases and SaaS applications that each keep the information in different formats, which makes it difficult to move information from one database to another.

General Catalyst and Khosla Ventures back data mapping startup Lume Read More »

Brazilian fintech Tako emerges from stealth with sizable seed round led by a16z and Ribbit Capital

Running payroll is hard in any country, but perhaps especially so in Brazil thanks to consistently changing laws and extremely influential unions that make it significantly harder to get it right. Fernando Gadotti struggled with this as the co-founder and CEO of DogHero, LatAm’s version of Rover. When Gadotti left the company in 2022, after

Brazilian fintech Tako emerges from stealth with sizable seed round led by a16z and Ribbit Capital Read More »