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Hello, and happy Thursday. 1 more day to go before the work week. Hey is in Boston to get great shots of the activities going on today at businesskinda.com Early Stage, so I’m holding the fort. And I also mourn my blue Twitter tick, which left me today. Enough about that. Let’s get on with the news! — Christine
Contents
The businesskinda.com Top 3
- Passwords are hard to remember: The company behind the encrypted email service Proton Mail has now unveiled the Proton Pass password manager so you don’t have to remember anything. Roman has more.
- Don’t worry, this is a Primo tool: Also by RomanFrench startup Primo raised $3.4 million to continue developing an IT tool for businesses too small for an IT manager.
- Blue skies smiling at me: Bluesky, the Jack Dorsey-backed Twitter alternative, is now available on Android, writes Sarah.
Startups and VC
Three former general managers at Amex Ventures went on their own to found Vesey Ventures, and now they’ve closed their debut fund with $78 million in capital commitments to support early-stage fintech startups. Mary Ann has more on their journey.
Now on to CoreWeave, which raised a mega-round of $221 million in Series B investments, half of which came from lead investor Magnetar Capital. Kyle writes that this values the general purpose cloud computing company at $2 billion pre-money.
Here are SIX more for you:
- Game on: Rita peels back the layers of Bitkraft Ventures’ vision to invest in Asian gaming startups.
- A robust take on robotics: Robust.AI raised $20 million to scale robot deliveries for pilot customers, reports Brian.
- From hospitality to fleet management: Two brothers in Senegal use their hospitality management skills to help transport companies with their logistics. Their company, Chargel, has now raised $2.5 million in seed funding, Annie writes.
- Focus on mental health: Tage spoke to investors who said that if founders’ mental well-being is linked to innovation and success, it should be lightly targeted, especially in this difficult capital crunch.
- It’s like Barbie’s Jeep, but human-sized: French microcar startup Kate raised another $7.6 million in its quest to produce more small electric vehicles like the K1, reports Roman.
- We assure you, they are real: Singapore-based document verifier Accredify is now even with $7 million to keep telling you if your documents are genuine. Catherine has more.
4 problems that venture capital cannot solve
Image Credits: Oleksandr Shchus (Opens in a new window) /Getty Images
Fundraising is an important aspect of any founder’s journey, but Techstars CEO Collin Wallace says it can also hasten a company’s demise.
For example, raising funds to scale sales and marketing efforts may sound great, but what if the company itself has a negative unit economy?
“Most of the time, it’s not a lack of cash that gets in the way of a company and its ability to achieve scale,” says Wallace.
“It is better to ask: do we have crowding problems? Product problems? Process problems? People problems? Is my business model fundamentally flawed?”
Two more from the TC+ team:
- Ooey sticky pitch deck goodness: In the latest episode of Pitch Deck Teardown, Hey looks at the pitch deck that landed Honeycomb a $50 million Series D series.
- Thread the needle: Dominic Madori spoke to Lisa Lambert, the head of National Grid’s CVC National Grid Partners, who discussed that “environmental and social concerns should be top of mind for any savvy investor right now.”
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Big Tech Inc.
SpaceX finally had the launch of its Starship rocket, which went into orbit for the first time. Darrell writes that “all things considered, this should definitely be considered a success: SpaceX founder Elon Musk had previously said there was essentially a significant chance that Starship wouldn’t even get off the pad on this first try.”
Tricks are for kids, but in the case of Discord, tricks are for the new chatbot. Lorenzo reports that some users have performed a trick called “jailbreaking” on Discord’s Clyde chatbot, causing it to share napalm and meth instructions.
And now there are five more for you:
- Explicit content ahead: Imgur will ban explicit images on its platform, Ivan reports.
- From the mind of…: Kyle writes about Google consolidating its AI research divisions into Google DeepMind.
- Record a word: It’s no secret that group chats tend to suck when there are more than about three people in one. A new app called Wavelength tries to make group chats suck less. Ivan has more.
- We have a convoy: Kodiak Robotics has a new gig to autonomously transport cargo for Tyson Foods, reports Rebekah.
- Respect my authority!: Lauren has details about Paramount that Warner Bros. Discovery would owe $52 million for “South Park” streaming rights.
Daily Crunch: Proton releases end-to-end encrypted password manager for desktop and mobile by Christine Hall, originally published on businesskinda.com
Janice has been with businesskinda for 5 years, writing copy for client websites, blog posts, EDMs and other mediums to engage readers and encourage action. By collaborating with clients, our SEO manager and the wider businesskinda team, Janice seeks to understand an audience before creating memorable, persuasive copy.