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It is possible that you have been in the nightclubs all weekend doing the Robot and other dance moves. The fun will continue into your workweek. There are five carefully selected reasons to attend the Robotics event on Thursday. Have a great and inspiring week!
The TechCrunch Top 3
Startups and VC
We have been keeping an eye on the electric vehicle market over the last few weeks. There are reviews of the F-150 Lightning and the Rivian R1T on the way.
One of the Winklevoss twins wrote a letter after an internal ops memo was leaked.
The bull should be taken by the horns.
- Putting cred into credit card: X1’s income-based credit card is finally available to the public reports Anita.
- Putting good into CPG: SupplyPike, a supply chain SaaS company, raised $25 million to develop software so that CPG brands can be compliant with retailer needs and able to more efficiently deliver products on time, reports Christine.
- Putting ack! into acquisition: Podchaser, the “IMDB for podcasts,” closed a $4 million Series A round of funding last year. It was just acquired by Acast for $27 million, reports Paul.
- Putting no into renovations: In late June, Modsy, an online interior design services startup, abruptly ceased offering design services, laid off its designers, and left customers with unfinished renovations and project orders in process, Kyle reports.
- Putting art into artificial intelligence: Kyle and Devin summarize the state of AI, and how machines are making remarkable progress at solving math problems, translating 200+ languages, and drawing kangaroos.
- Putting Mouse into Autonomous(e): Syrius Robotics, a Chinese startup that makes autonomous robots for warehouses, just secured $7.4 million in a Series B funding round, lifting its total raised so far to $40 million, Rita reports.
I think I'll call it quits because the jokes stopped making sense and I'm putting the "LOL" into "philolsophy"
As fundraising gets harder, founders should ask investors for a flat round
When capital dries up and survival becomes an issue, it can be a good idea to take a flat round, even though aiming for the sky is good.
If you're struggling to find an investor to extend your runway to at least 24 months, your best course of action may be to go to the well once and get what you need.
Everyone has no control over macro economic cycles. The ones who can get in front of these tough conversations will be the ones to reach the next milestone, even on a less attractive path.
As fundraising gets harder, founders should ask investors for a flat round
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Big Tech Inc.
If you missed the Better.com updates, you are in luck. You might remember that the digital mortgage lender had some less-than-stellar downsizing techniques. During its first time trying to go public, the company was sued for misrepresentation. We will see how this one turns out.
Lucas andAnita reported in their latest newsletter that GameStop is cashing in on its meme money fame and launching an NFT marketplace in an effort to broaden its revenue stream. The privacy concerns in web3 were addressed by a crypt technique written byAnita.
Our colleagues were working in Big Tech as well.
- Snap, crackle and Insta: We always enjoy Aisha’s coverage of social media, and today she writes about Snap’s launch of Snapchat for Web, which brings the long-time app to a desktop. In addition, Instagram is coming out with a new payments feature that enables users to buy promoted products via direct message.
- Not as “clear” as you might think: Cleartrip, a travel-booking platform in India, confirmed to Jagmeet that it experienced a data breach. Exact details are not yet known, though the dark web post where the data was being sold was taken down.
- These schools will not be able to “Google” much: A new Denmark ruling citing data transfer risks means that schools across the country will no longer be able to use Chromebooks and Google Workspace, Paul reports.
- Press pause: It was Meta’s day today, Ingrid reports. The company was battling some antitrust legislation in the United Kingdom regarding an order for Meta to sell GIF marketplace Giphy, and an appeals tribunal has sent the case back to the antitrust regulator for reassessment.
- And here we thought sports were already lucrative: ESPN+ lovers are going to see their monthly and annual bills rise in August, Lauren writes.
- Same with smartphones: Smartphone shipments dropped 9% in the second quarter, and a new study that Brian read and dissected for us is pointing to the same thing going on with everything else — inflation is keeping people from trading up.
