Welcome to Startups Weekly — your weekly recap of every little thing you may’t miss from the world of startups. Need it in your inbox each Friday? Join right here.
This week was a little bit of a carryover from the one earlier than as Bolt’s drama retains unfolding — one other story to be continued. However capital additionally flew to startups with traction, VC funds with observe data, and worthy theses.
Most fascinating startup tales from the week
Some tales emerge and die in a matter of days. Others require us to remain tuned for extra, and this week introduced us a number of of those.
Bolt cleaning soap: It’s no overstatement to say that the fallout after Bolt’s letter to buyers has been wild. The $14 billion valuation the fintech startup stated it was in search of appeared as stunning because the phrases of the potential deal. Now one in all its proposed new backers, The London Fund, has been discovered to be scrubbing its internet web page, and the saga is probably going not over.
Board strain: Ailing startup Fluid Truck, a Zipcar for business vehicles, noticed its board oust its sibling co-founders amid allegations of mismanaging funds, sources stated. The management shake-up follows a number of rounds of layoffs and different cost-cutting measures, which clearly weren’t the tip of the story.
Meals squared: Only some weeks after GrubMarket acquired Good Eggs for an undisclosed sum, the $3.6 billion meals supply and provide chain startup made one other acquisition. This time, its goal was FreshGoGo, a New York-based B2C platform promoting Asian groceries and ready-made dishes. The businesses didn’t disclose the phrases of the deal, which might not be the final because the meals supply area retains on consolidating.
Exec shuffles: AI professional Andrew Ng stepped down as CEO of Touchdown AI, the pc imaginative and prescient firm he co-founded, which is able to now be headed by ex-COO Dan Maloney. As for Ng, he transitioned to an government chairman position, however we additionally count on to listen to extra information from his AI Fund quickly.
Open pockets: OpenAI is reportedly in talks to shut a brand new funding spherical led by earlier backer Thrive Capital at a valuation of greater than $100 billion. As soon as once more, keep tuned.
Most fascinating fundraises this week
On the threat of stating the apparent, fundraising is lots simpler when you have got traction, and information this week confirmed this.
Enterprise useful resource planning: Opkey, an AI-based ERP testing platform, has closed a $47 million Sequence B spherical of funding. ERP apps are a big supply of IT spend for giant organizations, which makes automated testing invaluable. This helped the corporate safe 200 giant enterprise clients and partnerships with system integrators like KPMG and PwC.
Expertise for payments: With cloud spending one other high concern for companies, nOps raised a $30 million Sequence A to assist corporations optimize their AWS invoice. The corporate additionally stated that its buyer base grew 450% over the previous 18 months.
Quick cash: Comun, a neobank centered on serving Latino immigrants in the USA, has raised a $21.5 million Sequence A lower than 9 months after its earlier spherical due to its traction: It reported rising month-to-month income by “50x” within the first six months of 2024. Its founders plan to make use of the capital to develop the crew with a view to scale and launch new merchandise.
Large fish: Canadian AI startup Viggle raised a $19 million Sequence A led by Andreessen Horowitz, with participation from Two Small Fish. The corporate is liable for JST-1, a 3D-video basis mannequin it educated on YouTube movies, which lets customers management animated characters, inspiring many memes.
Most fascinating VC and fund information this week
Swiss-made: Helped by its observe document, Redalpine, a science-heavy European VC agency created in 2006, raised $200 million for its seventh early-stage fund. With places of work in Zurich and Berlin, it additionally plans to open one in London, partly because of its curiosity in college spinouts.
Bettering most cancers care: With $30 million in dedicated capital, Oncology Ventures is a brand new VC agency that may be a part of the ranks of different cancer-focused VC corporations — however with a deal with startups that enhance affected person care. It’s led by Ben Freeberg, a solo GP and most cancers survivor.
ICYMI: Being a solo GP or perhaps a small VC fund is tough, however the SEC simply made life a little bit simpler for rising funds. The greenback threshold for a automobile to be thought of a “qualifying venture fund” and profit from corresponding exemptions is now $12 million, up from $10 million.
Final however not least
The secondaries market is scorching, fueled in large half by an urge for food for shares in scorching AI corporations, and the previous couple of days have introduced us extra proof. An SEC submitting revealed that New Enterprise Associates (NEA) reentered the area by elevating greater than $468 million for NEA Secondary Alternative Fund, one more fund devoted to the shopping for of secondary shares. In the meantime, it emerged that Paris-based Palico received approval from the Monetary Business Regulatory Authority (FINRA) to be the primary firm in a position to facilitate end-to-end LP secondaries transactions.
