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Welcome to PIN’d - our weekly newsletter where we pin (lol, bear with us) the most important tech/startup news of the week for aspiring angels, vc’s, startup investors, founders, etc. Expect a new weekly roundup from us every Friday morning!

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📰 This week’s best news

Early-stage hard tech firm Countdown Capital is shutting down

Countdown Capital, an early-stage venture capital firm focused on hard tech industrial startups, will shut down by the end of March and return uninvested capital. The decision came after the firm realized it could not achieve excess returns consistently based on capital limitations and swelling competition from large incumbents.

The three-year-old firm’s sudden closure suggests stronger headwinds for early-stage hard tech funds.

Intel spins out a new enterprise-focused GenAI software company

Intel, intent on making bigger moves in the market for AI-powered enterprise software, is spinning out a new platform company with the backing of Boca Raton, Florida–based asset manager and investor DigitalBridge. Called Articul8 AI (an awkward abbreviation of “Articulate AI”), the new entity builds off a proof-of-concept from an Intel collaboration with Boston Consulting Group (BCG) early last May.

Former Anthemis partner soft-launches new fintech-focused venture firm

Ruth Foxe Blader has left her role as partner at Anthemis Group after nearly seven years to start her own venture firm, Foxe Capital. 

Over the years, Blader has led investments in over 50 fintech startups, including Lemonade, Branch, Elevate, Flock, Mesh, and Amplify. That’s why the desire to invest independently was the main driver behind her decision to leave London-based Anthemis. Foxe Capital will continue investing on behalf of Anthemis, serving as a sub-advisor for the firm and essentially managing the vehicle she was hired to run in 2017.

Canva nears $1 billion stock sale for employees and investors

Canva is nearing a deal that lets longtime employees and investors at the company sell more than $1 billion in stock to new investors, less than six months after the private Australian firm arranged a similar, though smaller, transaction.

Canva won’t raise any money for itself in the deal, which values the startup at $26 billion, about the same price at which investors sold shares last year. That would make it one of the largest deals held by private tech firms lately, including artificial intelligence startup OpenAI and cloud-server provider CoreWeave, as well as Elon Musk’s rocket company, SpaceX.

OpenAI raked in over $1.6 billion in revenue this year amid CEO Sam Altman's drama

According to The Information, OpenAI raked $1.6 billion in annualized income in 2023. The figure, up from $1.3 billion in October, comes amid the dramatic ouster and return of the company's CEO, Sam Altman. The company credits much of its revenue to its massively popular ChatGPT, a large language model. Though questions remain about why he was ousted in the first place, the board made vague allegations that he had not been candid about OpenAI's work.

Chinese billionaire Jack Ma cedes control of fintech giant Ant Group

Jack Ma is giving up Ant Group Co.'s controlling rights and will retreat from his online empire following China’s unprecedented tech crackdown. 

According to an announcement on Saturday, the company is offering ten individuals, including the founder, management, and staff, voting rights independently, effectively removing Ma’s control of Ant. The adjustment will not change the economic interests of any shareholders.

💰 Funding announcement highlights

Aqua Security, a cloud-native cybersecurity startup, raised $60 million in funding, extending its previously announced $135 million Series E round of funding to $195 million. The round was led by Evolution Equity Partners, with participation from Lightspeed Venture Partners, Insight Partners, and StepStone Group.

Escrowpay, a digital escrow services leader, raised $6 million in an extended Series A round with backing from AngelList, Zenith Global Group, We Founder Circle, JB Ventures, and others.

Perplexity AI, an AI-powered search engine, raised $73.6 million at a valuation of $520 million. The Series B round was led by IVP with additional investments from NEA, Databricks Ventures, former Twitter VP Elad Gil, Shopify CEO Tobi Lutke, ex-GitHub CEO Nat Friedman and Vercel founder Guillermo Rauch. Other participants in the round included Nvidia and — notably — Jeff Bezos.

Moonwalk Biosciences, a genomic medicine company pioneering precision epigenetic medicines, announced the completion of $57 million in seed and Series A financing from Alpha Wave Ventures, ARCH Venture Partners, Future Ventures, GV, Khosla Ventures and YK Bioventures.

Swap Energy, an EV battery startup, raised $22 million in a Series A round led by Qiming Venture Partners, with GGV Capital and existing investor Ondine Capital also participating.

📚 Interesting reads of the week

Five predictions for the 2024 creator economy

In this post, VC Fred Wilson reflects on what he missed in his predictions for 2023 and why he believes it’s a year that helped set up an exciting new period in tech.

2024 may be a year of reckoning for Apple’s $85 billion services business

Apple faces significant legal and regulatory actions this year in the US and the EU market, representing the biggest threat to the company’s business in years. The biggest hit could come from a US antitrust trial against Google. If Google loses the case, it could be forced to stop making regular payments to Apple, which are estimated to be worth a quarter of annual revenues earned by Apple’s services arm.

A decade of discontent is coming

In this post, Joan Westenberg explores the growing dissatisfaction and opposition to the technological, economic, and social elite.

The year’s ten biggest VC funding rounds: OpenAI, Stripe, and Anthropic top the list for biggest raises in 2023

In this year-end wrap-up, Crunchbase reviews the ten biggest VC funding rounds.

💪 Tech Mafia of the week

The Yammer Mafia

Highlights:

💰 Most money raised: Eaze

🤑 Total money raised by the Yammer Mafia: $3 billion

Weekly tech mafia leaderboard

Yammer’s alumni network has built some amazing companies, so we took a look at the top companies.

The Yammer Mafia takes the 25th spot, with 51 companies founded in total and $3 billion raised.

PS: Are you a Yammer employee/alum interested in getting your community together to invest in the community (and earn carry/other benefits along the way)? Or are you a member of another community that you think would make for an amazing startup investment community? 😉

Learn more about us and sign up for the waitlist here.

📌 PIN tweet of the week

💼 Who’s hiring in VC?

Looking to get into VC? Below are this week’s curated VC job openings.

TDK Ventures is looking for an Investment Analyst.

Capital Factory is looking for an Investor Relations Coordinator.

Hivemind Capital is looking for an Investment Principal.

Alpha Partners is looking for a Growth Equity Investment Associate.

📠 Fun fact of the week

Saudi Aramco is the largest IPO in history. The company went public in December 2019 and began trading on the Saudi Stock Exchange. It initially raised $25.6 billion by selling 3 billion shares. That primary figure was raised to $29.4 billion after the company reportedly sold an additional 450 million shares. It knocked Alibaba out of the top spot, making it the largest IPO in global history.

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