It's not just about e-mail, stupid

FromEquity

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It's not just about e-mail, stupid

FromEquity

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Length:

31 minutes

Released:

Jun 19, 2020

Format:

Podcast episode

Released:

Jun 19, 2020

Format:

Podcast episode

Titles in the series (100)

Equity is TechCrunch’s venture capital podcast. In each episode, we bring you the numbers behind the headlines in Venture Captial. TechCrunch reporter Alex Wilhelm teams up with Danny Crichton and Natasha Mascarenhas to give a window into startup land.

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Equity Monday 07/27: Hello and welcome back to Equity, TechCrunch’s venture capital-focused podcast where we unpack the numbers behind the headlines. This is Equity Monday, our weekly kickoff that tracks the latest big news, chats about the coming week, digs into some recent funding rounds and mulls over a larger theme or narrative from the private markets. You can follow the show on Twitter here, and myself here, and don’t forget to check out last Friday’s episode. by Equity
9 min listen
Silicon Valley is built on immigrant innovation: Hello and welcome back to Equity, TechCrunch’s venture capital-focused podcast, where we unpack the numbers behind the headlines. We wound up having more to talk about than we had time for but we packed as much as we could into 34 minutes. So, climb aboard with Danny, Natasha, and myself for another episode of Equity. by Equity
34 min listen
When life gives you lemons, print money with Lemonade: Hello and welcome back to Equity, TechCrunch’s venture capital-focused podcast, where we unpack the numbers behind the headlines. Before we dive in, don't forget that the show is on Twitter now, so follow us there if you want to see discarded headline ideas, outtakes from the that got cut, and more. It's fun! Back to task, listen, we're tired too. But we didn't let that stop us from packing this week's Equity to the very gills with news and notes and jokes and fun. Hopefully you can chuckle along with myself and Natasha and Danny and Chris on the dials as we riffed through all of this: by Equity
33 min listen
Equity Shot: Everyone filed to go public Monday: Natasha and Danny and Chris and myself all piled back onto the mics to dig through all the numbers. Here's a rundown of the companies we went through: Palantir, which filed its formal S-1 during our recording session. Danny covered most of the news last Friday, but the public doc is now live, so happy sleuthing. Unity's huge IPO that shows how big gaming is. Natasha connected it to the broader Apple-Epic dustup, and we all reviled in its growth results. Snowflake had Danny so excited he was conjuring scripted segues, and we were all impressed at its historical growth. Sure, it lost a lot of money last year, but, hey, Snowflake has dialed that back as well. And then there was Asana, a company I've covered quite a lot over the years. Our general take is that the company's growth has been good, if it is losing more money than we anticipated. Still, Asana could set a neat new precedent of raising debt ahead of a direct listing. This is one by Equity
29 min listen
Go SPAC yourself: Hello everyone, it's a busy week with TechCrunch Early Stage underway and a slew of tech earnings to parse through. But that didn't stop the Equity crew from sitting down to chat about the recent wave of SPAC commentary Danny and I wanted to talk about what a SPAC is -- the acronym stands for special purpose acquisition company -- and why everyone seems to be chatting them up. by Equity
16 min listen
Equity Monday 09/14: What a weekend behind us, and what a week ahead. Disrupt kicks off today, so the TechCrunch crew is busy as heck getting all the final touches put on. Snag a ticket here and we will see you soon. On the podcast this morning: Stocks are set to open sharply higher as we hit record, a good and welcome comeback for investors in both private and public tech companies. The NVIDIA-ARM deal is finally a go, so we can put the entire saga to rest at last. All things TikTok: Microsoft losing the deal, Oracle possibly winning the deal, the Chinese government saying no to the whole affair, and the Chinese government only saying no to part of the deal? What is clear is that the deal is under pressure to happen and not to happen. We'll know more soon. Descartes Underwriting raised $18.5 million for its insurtech solution, while Xometry raised $75 million in a Series E for offshore manufacturing in factories with spare capacity. GoJek and Grab may merge. And, finally, the CBP is by Equity
9 min listen
No parties allowed at the Airbnb IPO: Here’s what Natasha and Danny and Alex got into this week: The public markets are afire these days with Apple reaching $2 trillion in market cap, and Tesla’s stock doing all sorts of odd things. In short, stocks have only gone up for a while and that means that there’s warm, nigh-stuffy temperatures around assets of all types. This is leading to a surge in liquidity, unsurprisingly, as asset managers of all types look to take advantage of the times. So, Asana is prepping a direct listing, Airbnb has filed privately, And ThredUp is eyeing an early-2021 IPO. Around the same time as Coinbase, we’d reckon. Airbnb banned parties as well, which wound up being the title of the show. And SPACs are still happening in rapid-fire fashion. The Equity crew is not super impressed about the whole affair, but I’ll say that with Paul “Fucking” Ryan involved, it’s probably a sign of the top. And capping the liquidity chat, Natasha ran us through by Equity
33 min listen
Equity Monday 07/20: Hello and welcome back to Equity, TechCrunch’s venture capital-focused podcast where we unpack the numbers behind the headlines. This is Equity Monday, our weekly kickoff that tracks the latest big news, chats about the coming week, digs into some recent funding rounds, and mulls over a larger theme or narrative from the private markets. You can follow the show on Twitter here, and myself here, and don’t forget to check out last Friday’s episode. by Equity
8 min listen
A faster, easier, cheaper way of going public: This is the fourth episode of the week, pushing our production calendar to the test. Happily we've managed to hold it together amidst the news deluge that the last few days have brought. It was a good week for our scheduling change, with the main episode of the show coming to you on Thursday afternoon versus Friday morning. Change is good. But unchanging this time around was our hosting lineup, with Natasha Mascarenhas and Danny Crichton and myself yammering with Chris Gates on the mix. Here's what we got into: The CEO of TikTok is out, bids are swirling, and whom will wind up owning a piece of all of TikTok's global operations is not clear. Walmart is in the mix, apparently, which feels very 2020. The New York Stock Exchange has gotten approval from the SEC for a new type of direct listing, one in which the company going public can sell a bloc of shares during the normal price discovery process. This means that all the banker-faff of s by Equity
30 min listen
Equity Monday 07/06: Hello and welcome back to Equity, TechCrunch’s venture capital-focused podcast where we unpack the numbers behind the headlines. This is Equity Monday, our week-starting primer in which we go over the latest news, dig into the week ahead, talk about some neat funding rounds, and dive into the latest big news from the startup world. (You can follow the show on Twitter here, and myself here, if you are so inclined! Don't forget to check out last Friday's episode as well. All the cool kids are doing it.) by Equity
9 min listen
Looking at how GenZ has changed fundraising: The TikTok saga continues: This week we spent a few minutes discussing why bankers are incentivized to make the proposed TikTok-Microsoft deal as competitive as possible. Or at least make it look as competitive as possible. And, there's some data from inside Microsoft about how the deal is being viewed. Airbnb could file to go public this month! It might go public before the year is out! That's way better than we expected. (Bloomberg got its Q2 finances.) Palantir could file for a direct listing next month! That's great. We wanted to know what Palantir really is, namely a consultancy or a tech company. And then we played valuation bingo so that we can look back later and mock ourselves. I was very excited about the Duck Creek IPO. Few of my friends joined me in being excited. The three of us also took a minute to riff on the latest Pinterest news, namely that it's poorly run and is sexist per its now-former COO. We'd love to stop coverin by Equity
37 min listen
Equity shot: Airbnb's IPO is finally here: Today we have an Equity Shot for you about Airbnb's S-1 filing, as it looks to go public before the year is out. First we get into Airbnb's macro performance, which shows a stable picture historical revenue growth. There is a ton of numbers to get to so get ready for a quick dive into net revenue, gross margins, and losses. Then we discuss the dramatic drop in bookings, the promising comeback, and if short-term travel is Airbnb's future. There's a weird quarter of profitability that you should all know about, and a heads up on what to look for in Q4 numbers. Finally, we talk about the bullish and bearish case on Airbnb, which poetically filed the same day that Moderna announced a promising vaccine trial. by Equity
13 min listen
Equity Monday 08/24: What was on the docket this morning? All sorts of good stuff, though the Sumo Logic S-1 did drop just after we wrapped. Here's today's rundown: YC Demo day is this week, so make sure to stick around TechCrunch and Extra Crunch for all our coverage. SPACs continue, with more automotive companies looking at alt-routes to the public markets. This time it's Luminar. And, here's the Bill Gurley post that we promised to link to. E-commerce and on-demand are booming in China after we saw similar results via Uber and domestic e-commerce players. The Fortnite-Apple brouhaha continues with more filings and even Microsoft weighing in. At the same time TikTok v. The United States appears set to go to court. (Zuck is behind some anti-TikTok Washington sentiment, it appears.) The Palantir S-1 has gone missing. Where is it? Give it to us! Dataiku has raised $100 million for its enterprise AI platform. Forbes has more. Datasembly has raised $10.3 million in new capital for its IR by Equity
10 min listen
Give us your seed round and we will send back double: Hello and welcome back to Equity, TechCrunch’s venture capital-focused podcast, where we unpack the numbers behind the headlines. This week was full of news of all sorts, but as we recorded both Danny and Natasha were still locked out of their Twitter accounts after a proletariat revolution on the social platform saw the ruling Blue Checkmark Class forced into silence. That's not really what happened, but it sounds better than actually went down at Big Social. by Equity
34 min listen
The 3% gap in no-code: Hello and welcome back to Equity, TechCrunch’s venture capital-focused podcast (now on Twitter!), where we unpack the numbers behind the headlines. by Equity
32 min listen
Equity Shot: All about the Qualtrics IPO: Hello and welcome back to Equity, TechCrunch’s venture capital-focused podcast where we unpack the numbers behind the headlines. After the morning show went out, the Equity crew could not shut up about the Qualtrics-SAP deal, so we had no choice but to jump back into recording mode for an off-the-cuff Equity Shot. As always, Shots are short-form Equity episodes that focus on a single, news topic. by Equity
14 min listen
Equity Monday 06/29: Hello and welcome back to Equity, TechCrunch’s venture capital-focused podcast where we unpack the numbers behind the headlines. This is Equity Monday, our week-starting primer, in which we go over the latest, look to the week ahead, talk about some neat funding rounds, and dig into the latest on the health of the startup market. Don't forget that you can follow Equity on Twitter, and, as explained in the show, you can sign up for Alex's new TechCrunch newsletter "The Exchange" here. by Equity
8 min listen
A tale of two direct listings: Two direct listings in one day. Lots to talk about. Asana started trading just a bit after noon Eastern today, quickly zooming to roughly about $29 a share in early trading this afternoon. Meanwhile, Palantir is running like a herd of bulls straight out of the gate, jumping to almost $11 a share in the first trades — a first day jump of nearly 50%. by Equity
12 min listen
Equity Shot: Our favorite startups from YC Demo Day: Yep, it's another Equity Shot. We're back. And then we're going to be back on Friday. Because we can't stop talking about the biggest news week in the world of startups and venture capital in some time. Before we start, shoutout to the NBA for the growing, wildcat strike to protest racist police violence in America. Ok, back to our regularly scheduled programming. This time 'round Natasha and your humble servant were joined by Lucas Matney, a member of the TechCrunch reporting team and a first-timer on Equity. Where's he been all this time? Covering all sorts of things, including VR startups for the publication. He was also a big part of our coverage of both days of Demo Day, making him a perfect fit for this episode. Danny was given a break to sit at home, play board games, and iron his favorite sweatshirt. He's back Friday morning. In case you've missed the words, here's what we wrote this week on the subject: All the Day One by Equity
24 min listen
The rules of VC are being broken: Hello and welcome back to Equity, TechCrunch’s venture capital-focused podcast (now on Twitter!), where we unpack the numbers behind the headlines. As ever I was joined by TechCrunch managing editor Danny Crichton and our early-stage venture capital reporter Natasha Mascarenhas. We had Chris on the dials and a pile of news to get through, so we were pretty hype heading into the show. by Equity
36 min listen
Equity Monday: Vaccine news scrambles the stock market, shakes up startups: here's what's on today's show: Joe Biden was elected President and the stock market is not mad about divided government. Positive vaccine news sent many stocks sharply higher this morning, but not all. Some pandemic-favored tech companies instantly dropped double-digit percentage points of value. Esign raised $151 million, showing strength in the Chinese startup market, and the esignature space. And this neat Series B for Cellwize caught our attention this morning. Finally, a warning. The stuff that is changing lately may begin to change a bit less. We've lived in the pandemic economy long enough now that it's hard to recall what life was like before. But, we'd best start remembering as there's a lot that is going to change in the next few quarters. This has been a wild to start the week, but with good news. I suppose a vaccine was always going to eventually make it to this step, but, that said, the United S by Equity
8 min listen
Equity Monday 10/05: Starting the day American stocks are set to rise despite the country's president spending the weekend in a military hospital to combat his COVID-19 infection. The weekend itself was marked with national turmoil as information was incomplete, and shifting when it came to the health of the current administration. by Equity
8 min listen
Edtech is the new SaaS: The whole crew was back, with Natasha Mascarenhas and Danny Crichton and myself chattering with Chris Gates behind the scenes making it all work. An extra shoutout to Natasha this week as we spent a lot of time talking about edtech, a category that she spearheads for us and has brought to the show. It's a big deal! We're on YouTube now, don't forget, and with that, let's get into the news: Climax Foods raised $7.5 million to help fuel its work to develop alt-foods that are not animal-based. The Equity crew votes that this is a tasty deal. And, Capchase has raised $4.6 million to help cash-out SaaS contracts ahead of their real revenue accrual. Our read is that more financing options for SaaS companies will lead to lower costs of capital for those startups that want it. And, the Envision Accelerator made it through batch one and is on to batch two. Then we chatted about edtech, with Natasha talking us through Owl Ventures raising huge new funds, Course Hero ext by Equity
38 min listen
The iron rule of founder compensation is dead: Hello and welcome back to Equity, TechCrunch’s venture capital-focused podcast (now on Twitter!), where we unpack the numbers behind the headlines. by Equity
35 min listen
Equity Monday 07/13: Hello and welcome back to Equity, TechCrunch’s venture capital-focused podcast where we unpack the numbers behind the headlines. by Equity
11 min listen
Equity Monday 08/31: This weekend was a welcome reprieve from last week's insane news cycle inside the world of technology and money. If you are still catching your breath from the Great IPO Wave of last Monday, we feel you. Here's what we got into this morning: The TikTok sale could be in trouble, this time due to China changing its rules on sales of tech firms that have certain algorithms. TikTok parent company Bytedance intends to comply with the rules, but what impact the news could have the sale of the social service is unclear as of yet, though the developments are not good if you were in favor of a deal. American tech shares are set to rise once again after setting records last week. Equity is back on YouTube, hell yeah! From the weekend: Medium's growth in both traffic (pageviews) and income (paying subscribers) is super impressive according to its latest reporting. And the publishing platform and media company is doubling-down on product to fend off upstarts like the popular by Equity
9 min listen
Equity Monday 10/12: So, what was on our minds this morning? Headlines: The Twilio-Segment deal is real, happening, and is priced about where we expected. Big names in the ex-China Internet want to make encryption worse. And, how the United States government would break up Google is becoming clearer by the week. On the Twilio Segment deal, as TechCrunch and Forbes anticipated, the transaction came in around $3.2 billion, forming something of a API monster from their combined form. As we noted on the show, a lot of investors made a mint from the transaction. Airkit has raised $28 million while in stealth since 2017. What does it do? Per Forbes, it's a "low-code platform" that wants to "improve customer engagement." That's notably similar to what Segment does. Flash Express raised $200 million, as the on-demand and delivery spaces stay hot. And Razorpay raised $100 million at a valuation of $1 billion, meaning that we have just witnessed the birth of yet another fintech unicorn. And, fin by Equity
8 min listen
Quibi’s shortform life: The fall of Quibi, and who lost money in the mix. TechCrunch has a bit more on the video service's downfall here. The Netflix quarter, and why its shares lost ground after its report. The Quibi-Netflix stories show that it's not smooth sailing in the market for online video. If Netflix stumbled, Snap soared with stronger-than-expected growth. The company still loses lots of money, but it's getting closer to reasonable results, and has lots of cash. Then we turned to a few media startups that raised, including $4 million for Stir and $2.5 million for Quake. Quake the podcasting company, mind, not the excellent FPS. Next was a handful of housing rounds, including the very neat Abodu and the somewhat controversial RVshare, which split the three of us about whether or not it was going to work out. Then we had some great reporting from Natasha to parse through, including her piece on startup hacker houses, and her report on a new women-focused accelerator class. by Equity
36 min listen
Schools are closing their doors, but OpenDoor isn’t: This week Natasha Mascarenhas, Danny Crichton and myself hosted a live taping at Disrupt for a digital reception. It was good fun, though of course we're looking forward to bringing the live show back to the conference next year, vaccine allowing. Thankfully we had Chris Gates behind the scenes tweaking the dials, Alexandra Ames fitting us into the program, and some folks to watch live. What did we talk about? All of this (and some very, very bad jokes): by Equity
30 min listen
Equity Monday 08/17: This morning we had a bit of a detour, wandering into the world of BigTech to wonder what is going on with those megacorps. Too big for their own good, or too big to be good, here's what's up with the incumbents: Germany is taking on Amazon at the very same time that Canada is taking on Amazon, meaning that the Seattle giant is taking shots from two key markets at the same time. Google is having a war of words with Australia, after a ruling in the country didn't go its way. Walled gardens are seeing their walls come under heavy fire, which means that Apple and Google are fighting both sides of their marketplaces (producers, consumers) at once at the moment, which isn't great. And Microsoft might buy TikTok. All told it seems that the biggest tech companies are busy defending their market position instead of re-earning it with great products. A good time for startups? I think so. When incumbents are busy fighting with governments, themselves, and each other, it's by Equity
8 min listen

More Episodes from Equity

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Musk’s xAI shows there’s more money on the sidelines for AI startups: We’re off to an AI-heavy start to the week. OpenAI has a new deal with the Financial Times that caught our eye. Sure, it’s another content licensing deal, but there appears to be a bit more in the tie-up than just content flowing one way, and money the other. On this early-week episode of Equity, we also dug into the xAI news that TechCrunch broke recently; namely that Musk’s AI enterprise is not looking to raise $3 billion on a $15 billion valuation. No, it’s now looking for $6 billion at an $18 billion valuation. That’s a lot of capital. But there was even more to chat about, including the EU handing Apple even more bad news in the form of placing iPadOS under its DMA rules that should force third-party app stores on the tablet line in time. And Tesla got some good news in China, though just how impactful it will prove is not 100% certain at this juncture. And to close out, the Times has a fascinating look at pa by Equity
13 min listen
Good news for Rubrik, bad news for TikTok, and encouraging news for Early Stage startups: This week, Rubrik’s strong IPO pricing and warm reception by the public markets after its listing add more weight to the perspective that the public markets are not as closed to tech startups as some thought, but that's not all we had to cover this week. Mary Ann let us know about "send-now-pay-later" startup Pomelo's latest raise, and then we dove in to all things TikTok, its timeline and impact. And to close, Early Stage. TechCrunch held its annual early-stage focused even this year, and it was a banger. Not to toot our own horn, but it was the second year in a row that our shindig in Boston was packed, useful, and lots of fun. The coffee was even good. At a tech conference. Alex had notes, so stay through to the end for that! by Equity
27 min listen
The TikTok ban clears key hurdle while Perplexity AI continues to shake up search: Today on Equity, we have som bad news for TikTok fans in the U.S.: A bill that would force a sale of TikTok or ban it in the United States passed the Senate. And the President is expected to sign it. Given that China has made noise that it will not allow a sale of the social media company that is headquartered in Singapore, but is owned by Chinese company Bytedance, it’s not looking good for TikTok in the States. But if that has you bummed out, don’t worry, we have lots of pretty positive news to discuss as well. News like two AI startups in Europe that are making a bit of noise that caught our attention. There’s a lot more AI in Europe than just Mistral, of course. And we had to discuss the latest from Perplexity AI, which just raised money and is shaking up its operating plans by raising even more money. It’s a good time to be an AI startup. Not that that is the only thing going on. The Framework la by Equity
13 min listen
Salesforce's silly deal dies as we keep our eyes on Ibotta and Rubrik: Today we dug into the latest markets news, including upcoming earnings, IPOs, and what impact — if any — the recent bitcoin halving had on its value. But the money news did not stop there. We also had two new venture capital funds to discuss, including a new vehicle from Seraphim focused on space, and TLcom Capital’s new Africa-focused fund. From there, it was time to chat EVs and what impact recent price cuts are having on the value of EV companies. To close out, we dug into the emerging startup cluster in vector databases and search. by Equity
14 min listen
Notable Capital's Hans Tung on the state of VC and the upside to down rounds: This week, Mary Ann talked to Hans Tung, managing partner of Notable Capital (formerly GGV Capital), which is focused on investing in the US as well as in Europe, Israel and Latin America. Hans, whose portfolio includes the likes of Airbnb, StockX and Slack, discussed why he still believes in down rounds, the importance of long-term thinking and the current state of startup investment. We also dug into why Hans is so bullish on fintech and the sectors within fintech that especially have him psyched, the recent changes at his own firm, and why there have been so many personnel changes at VC firms as of late. by Equity
26 min listen
Tesla’s busy week, and is fintech having a moment?: It’s been more than a minute since Tesla went public, but the EV company was inescapable on TechCrunch this week. From layoffs to pricing changes and more, it was a week dyed deeply in Tesla colors, so we had to chat through the latest. But that was just one element of what we got into on Equity this week. We also dug into Mary Ann’s reporting about Ramp’s latest round — and up valuation — that fit neatly next to Rippling’s own impending fundraise. If you are handling money, it’s a good time to be a startup. The team also dug into Cherub, which wants to connect investors and founders, Maven Ventures’ consumer investing push, and touched on what Mercury is up to. All told, we were fortunate to have Kirsten Korosec along with us this week given the sheer volume, and diversity of news to chew through. by Equity
32 min listen
An $11B bonanza for space startups, and where is all that a16z money going?: Today’s Equity episode is focused on all things startups, which means we got to chat through NASA's $11 billion opportunity for space startups, Two Chairs’ recent and massive Series C, Quilt’s heat pump work and fundraise, and several IPO updates. Here’s hoping that after Ibotta and Rubrik get out the door, more IPOs follow. Also on the show today was a grip of venture capital news. Bay Bridge Ventures is raising a $200 million climate fund — it has lots of good company there, given rising LP interest in climatetech more generally — and a SpaceX alum is building a new VC firm that we covered. To close, the massive, gobsmackingly big $7.2 billion worth of new funds from a16z. We dug into their breakdown on the podcast, but the short version is that it appears that the venture slowdown has not managed to impede the venture firm’s golden touch when it comes to fundraising. Hit play, let’s have some fun! by Equity
10 min listen
OpenAI plans new Tokyo office as Tesla layoffs arrive: Equity is back with two critical headlines this morning. First, OpenAI is going to Japan with plans for an office in Tokyo and a new GPT-4 model for the Japanese language. Given that the US, the EU, and China are all racing for leadership in AI, OpenAI’s expansion into the Japanese market could expand the list of leading blocs and nations. The second critical piece of news this morning comes from Tesla, which is cutting more than 10% of its total global staffing. The company told employees the cuts were due to role duplication, but with the company also cutting prices and seeing its growth ebb, demand concerns are being discussed as a partial driver for the cost cutting. And there’s lots more going on: The upcoming Rubrik IPO is leaking early pricing ranges, ShareChat’s valuation is taking hits, and global smartphone sales are picking up. To work! by Equity
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Beeper acquired by Automattic, fintech's decline and YC's lack of LatAm founders: Today, the Equity crew dug into Automattic buying Beeper for $125 million. Recall that the WordPress parent company bought Texts.com last year for $50 million. Elsewhere in deal-land, Proton bought Standard Notes, and we recently discussed the Wonderschool-Early Day purchase. More, please! In the Deals of the Week column, Mary Ann chose Payjoy’s massive new run rate, while Alex wanted to riff on the Proxima Fusion round that could help bring the next energy revolution a little bit closer to reality. And to close out, we looked at Anna Heim’s latest on Y Combinator’s evaporating number of participating startups from Latin America, which we posit could have something to do with fintech falling out of favor with investors — and fintech being the startup category that we most associated with Latin America founder activity. by Equity
31 min listen
A $60M venture fund with a twist, and more startup-on-startup acquisitions: Today on Equity’s startup-focused Wednesday show, we dug into the Multiverse's acquisition of Searchlight, a deal that reminded us of the Wonderschool-Early Day transaction that we covered on the show a few weeks back. We also dug into the latest Guesty round, which was both large and interesting from a financial perspective, the Monad Labs transaction that led us to try and explain the difference between L1 and L2 blockchains, and Cyera’s recent megaround. Stick with us through the end to hear about a new venture capital fund targeting growth-rounds in Africa! by Equity
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Spotify’s new AI playlists, the US’s latest chip deal, and a shot at data privacy: Now that we are finally past Y Combinator’s demo day — though our Friday show is worth listening if you haven’t had a chance yet — we can dive into the latest news. So, this morning on Equity Monday we got into the chance that the United States might pass a real data privacy law. There’s movement to report, but we’re still very, very far from anything becoming law. Elsewhere, the U.S. and TSMC have a new deal, there’s gaming news to consider (and a venture tie-in), and Spotify’s latest AI plans, which I am sure will delight some and annoy others. Hit play, and let’s talk about the news! by Equity
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What we've learned from the women behind the AI revolution: Today on Equity, Alex is joined by TechCrunch's Dominic-Madori Davis and Kyle Wiggers to discuss their ongoing Women in AI interview series. The pair set out to interview the women working in AI to learn more about their work, how they got into the world of artificial intelligence, and more. Thus far they have interviewed folks like Irene Solaiman, head of global policy at Hugging Face, Sarah Kreps, professor of government at Cornell, and Heidy Khlaaf, safety engineering director at Trail of Bits. by Equity
21 min listen
From YC to IPO: Winter 2024 Demo Day, Rubrik and Ibotta: What a week, everyone. Two full days of Y Combinator demo day activity kept us busy, but the latest accelerator cohort’s launch was far from the only big story in startup-land. Today on the Equity’s Friday news roundup, Mary Ann, Becca, and Alex gathered to dig into favorites from the hundreds of new YC companies that pitched, and a new venture capital fund that wants to become “the investment and innovation arm of the autism community.” Becca wanted to talk about Seso and its fascinating fintech play in the agricultural space, while Alex brought Home From College and its recent Seed round to the mix. Then to close out, we chatted through the impending Ibotta and Rubrik IPOs. The latter deal could provide a fascinating heat-check for unprofitable unicorns that need to find some sort of exit, and quickly. by Equity
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Nvidia might be clouding the funding climate for AI chip startups, but Hailo is still fighting: On the podcast this morning we have BlaBlaCar's new credit facility and how it managed to land it, how PipeDreams could be onto a new model of startup construction, GoStudent's rebound and profitability, Hailo's chip business and massive new funding round, and the two new brands that GGV calls home as it divides up its operations on both sides of the Pacific Ocean. by Equity
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Ads on Discord, AT&T passcode resets, and podcast changes for Android users: Equity has what you need to know to kick off Q2! Alex is talking through the latest in stocks and crypto, Discord's new ad push and AT&T's passcode resets. We'll also take a look at a big shift impacting fans of Google Podcasts, a startup round concerning trucking and more. by Equity
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SBF's sentencing, Databricks' GPT rival, and who's investing in the "underdog" founders: As the week comes to a close, we're also shutting the book on the trial of former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried, the erstwhile crypto baron who is heading to prison for 25 years. But while the SBF news was a big deal, there was so very much more to cover on today's news roundup episode of Equity. With Kirsten Korosec, Mary Ann Azevedo, and Alex Wilhelm aboard this week, the crew dug into Robinhood's new credit card and what it can tell us about the strategy of major tech companies, Fisker's latest woes, and even Databricks' new AI model that it spent $10 million to spin up. We also dug into two companies building startups focused around kids. One wants to help tots learn how to produce music, while the other is working to reduce waste and help parents care for their kids on a budget. Then, to wrap up, a look at just who unicorn founders really are, and a new $100 million fund that to back climate tec by Equity
32 min listen
Why a16z-backed Wonderschool is acquiring EarlyDay: This is our interview show, where we sit down with guests, think about their work, and unpack the rest. This week, Wonderschool, a startup that works with individuals and local governments to spin up more childcare businesses by providing software and other support, has acquired EarlyDay. EarlyDay, another venture-backed startup, operates a early childhood educator marketplace. Alex caught up with EarlyDay’s two former CEOs, Emma Harris and Melissa Tran, and their new boss, Chris Bennett at Wonderschool, to chat through the deal, what’s ahead for their sector, and more. by Equity
33 min listen
Spotify throws its hat in the edtech ring: Today on Equity, Alex is catching you up on stocks around the world, crypto prices, and the weekend's biggest news. We're talking about the exit of Stability AI's CEO, the EU's Digital Markets Act, Spotify's edtech push, why Liquid Death is crushing it, and more. by Equity
11 min listen
A $700M SAFE, more IPOs, and how one venture fund is transcending borders: The Equity crew is closing out the week with a look at Onyx's pivot to B2B, a climate incubator set up by the former co-founder of Casper, Wonder's $700 million raise and how Ethos Fund is fostering cross-border investing. We were also curious about Saudi Arabia's AI investment push and how some VCs are holding back an IPO rush. by Equity
32 min listen
Astera Labs going public and the Inflection-Microsoft AI saga: On today's episode, Astera Labs is going public after pricing above-range, and Microsoft scoops up Inflection AI talent. We'll also dig into mega rounds from TigerEye and Pocket FM, as well as why one pension fund’s move to lower its venture allocation isn’t as worrying as it might sound. by Equity
14 min listen
LinkedIn wants a piece of Wordle’s success: Here’s what we got into this morning: Apple may tap Google for AI: Sure, Apple is working on its own AI tech, but Google’s Gemini model could be headed for an iPhone near you. Bloomberg broke the news. Grok goes open source: As promised, xAI’s LLM Grok is out for people to play with. Most importantly, startup founders seem excited. Reddit’s IPO makes progress: Oversubscription is always a good signal, but is also no promise of IPO riches to come. Gumroad says ‘no thanks’ to NSFW content: Another year, another platform booting adult creators. It’s a tale as old as time! Gaming is coming to LinkedIn: Look I don’t know what to tell you other than that all platforms eventually become one. by Equity
13 min listen
How to avoid all the IPO work without annoying investors: It's Equity Friday! Today our beloved Mary Ann was off on well-deserved break, so our friend and fellow-podcaster Rebecca Szkutak was kind enough to bring her insight and humor to the podcast. We got into the progress being made on the possible TikTok ban, audio-focused AI-startups, why so many late-stage startups are seemingly avoiding the IPO. by Equity
31 min listen
Startups are hiring fewer workers and paying out less in equity comp: Equity is back with your mid-week startup check-in! We have new data from Carta on how startup compensation is changing, raises from Empathy & Bear Robotics, and more from Bluesky, Brave, and Chamath Palihapitiya’s VC Firm. by Equity
12 min listen
Musk’s Grok goes open-source and Reddit updates its IPO filing: Today on Equity, we're kicking off another week with a look at Reddit's new IPO filing, the potential impact of Grok being open sourced, and why Bobby Kotick wants to buy TikTok. by Equity
12 min listen
How many startups shut down last year compared to the year before? A lot.: This week, Mary Ann interviewed Roger Lee, an entrepreneur who’s spent the better part of a decade building tools for employees and employers alike. Lee is an angel investor as well the creator of Layoffs.FYI and co-founder of Comprehensive and Human Interest. Roger joined us on the show last year in the wake of 2022’s tech layoffs, but this week we’re focusing on the business of shutting down and why investors are lining up to back startups in the space, including Roger. by Equity
28 min listen
What's the Deel with Remofirst, and why are VCs playing musical chairs?: Today on Equity, Alex and Mary Ann are highlighting deals of the week including Mews' massive new round and how a South Korean startup aims to take on Carta. Also this week, Deel is snapping up more companies while Remofirst takes steps to become more competitive, and VCs are exploring other avenues. by Equity
32 min listen
OpenAI fires back at Musk, and Monzo raises a megaround: Alex hopped back on the mic this morning to talk about OpenAI bringing receipts to its tussle with Musk and what's happening with OpenView. Equity is also digging into Monzo's big fundraise, a big startup deal in the AI space, and new climate regulations. by Equity
11 min listen
Apple’s €1.84B fine, new AI rules in India, and the latest pre-IPO round: This is our Monday show, in which we take a look back at the weekend and what’s ahead in the week. This time, Apple is hit by a massive fine in the EU, India has new rules when it comes to AI, Waymo reaches more markets, and Salla raises a huge pre-IPO round. by Equity
11 min listen
The tourist VCs in LatAm have gone home: This week, Mary Ann talked to David Vélez, the co-founder and CEO of Nubank. The pair dove deep into why some investors are sticking it out in LatAm, why it’s a great place to still put venture dollars, which startups in LatAm have been the most resilient and what other regions can learn from them. by Equity
20 min listen
Will we reach AGI before Stripe goes public?: Alex and Mary Ann are sending you off into the weekend with news on Stripe's recovered valuation, Fervo Energy's $200M round, why VCs are investing in startups that shut down companies, and what happens when AI goes up agains the law. by Equity
33 min listen

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