Daily Crunch: Coinbase will reduce its workforce by 18% to ‘stay healthy during this downturn’

Every day at 3 p.m., you'll get a rundown of the biggest and most important stories from the site. Don't forget to subscribe here.

Bill Gates is chilling at the next table in Berkeley, California on June 14, 2022. We just released some new tickets for our party. Is it possible to see you there?

TechCrunch’s Annual Summer Party 2022

The TechCrunch Top 3

• More layoffs: We tried to think of something more clever than that, but let’s just get on with the bad news. Coinbase, Redfin and Compass are the latest companies to announce that big chunks of their employees will not be soon. Ivan writes that Coinbase laid off 18% of its workforce, or about 1,100 people, which had everyone doing the math on how many employees it actually had. And though Coinbase was well within its right to cut access to its systems before telling affected employees, we can’t help but wonder if there were some early birds wondering what the heck was going on. Meanwhile, Mary Ann reports a one-two punch of higher mortgage rates and fewer home sales led both Redfin and Compass to lay off a combined 920 employees today.
• “Gonna take some time to do the things we never had”: Launch Africa, a venture capital firm that has already backed over 100 startups, closed its first fund with $36.3 million in commitments, Tage reports. The fund boasts an impressive list of over 230 retail and institutional investors spanning 40 countries, and a large portion of it has already been put to work in startups.
• SPACs lie here: We may now be reporting tech layoffs every day, but it wasn’t that long ago that we were doing the same for special purpose acquisition companies, fondly known as SPACs. Alex and Anna look into the fruits of that labor, but we warn you some of it is rotten.

Startups and VC

We write a lot of words about the recession. There is a lot of new funds popping up on the other side.

According to Kate, the World Innovation Lab raised $1 billion to bridge the innovation gap between corporations and startups.

Billions of dollars were raised from our Asia-focused VC desk.

Dcode Capital closed a $50 million fund for startup wanting to work with the federal government.

There are more highlights...

• Some things just click, you know: Frederic shares about Keychron’s Q3 mechanical keyboard nerdery that’s making our credit card feel a little glow-y in our wallets.
• Zzzzzzz … Sorry, what was that?: Simple Habit founder launches a new app, Sleep Reset, that aims to help you sleep better, Ivan writes.
• Call me on my sell phone: Proving that contact center tech remains desirable, Invoca raises $83 million, reports Kyle.
• Mining their own business: Meanwhile, there’s more than 600 crypto or blockchain companies now headquartered in Southeast Asia, Rita reports.
• Auto-AI-mune: Meta Pharmaceuticals lands $15 million to develop new autoimmune drugs with AI, writes Rita.

A decade after the bubble burst, 5 climate tech investors explain why they’re all in

China's dominance over solar power manufacturing and low natural gas prices weren't the only factors hobbling the industry.

The wrong model for clean energy innovation was found in a working paper. Not every investor is willing to pay for a decade of R&D to create economies of scale.

The paper said that if a new and more diverse set of actors avoids the mistakes of the cleantech VC boom and bust then they may be able to support a new generation of cleantech companies.

According to a McKinsey report, climate tech could attract up to $2 trillion of capital investment by the year 2025.

Tim De Chant spoke to five investors about the state of the industry in the third quarter of 2022. Their answers show how VCs are reacting to the downturn, which tech may have the greatest potential for impact, and what they're looking for at the moment.

The general partner is PaeWu.

Christian is a partner at the energy investment company.

There is a venture partner of the company.

Andrew is a managing director.

The president of the company is Amy Burr.

A decade after the bubble burst, 5 climate tech investors explain why they’re all in

Techcrunch+ is a membership program that helps startup teams. You can join here.

Big Tech Inc.

If firms want to hide who uses their services, they will have to leave the country. Firms are now willing to work with them. It is the latest to say it is removing its services. Laura Tyrylyte, head of public relations at NordVPN, said that they are concerned about the effect the regulation will have on people's data.

Two years after leaving Amazon Robotics, Brad Porter came out with his new passion, which will study human-robot interaction, Brian writes. It was too early for Porter to say what he was working on, but he did say that it wouldn't be likeTesla's Optimus robot It may be more like a Megatron robot.

Another European country is looking into Apple's privacy framework. The antitrust watchdog in Germany wants to know if the tech giant is acting unfairly.

There are at least two cybersecurity breeches to discuss. A breach of approximately 70,000 patient records was caused by someone gaining access to an employee's email It is not known why it took the company months to report what happened, but it is possible that it was the result of phish. Millions of farmers in India were exposed to the new Aadhaar data leak, which means their confidential 12-digit identity numbers were no longer confidential.

There are more highlights from today.