- PIN'd
- Posts
- PIN'd
PIN'd
A newsletter for communities, investors, angels, and founders
Power in Numbers
January 12, 2024
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!
If you’re receiving this, it’s because you’ve signed up for our waitlist and/or for newsletter updates.
Got a friend that wants to learn more or stay up to date on angel investing/VC? Help us spread the word and forward this email to them ;)
Subscribe here.
📰 This week’s best news
After 7 years, Quora is back at raising funding. The Q&A website nabbed $75 million from Andreessen Horowitz (a16z), which will power the growth of Poe, Quora’s AI chat platform.
In October, Quora launched a creator monetization program for Poe, which allows people who create bots or prompts to generate revenue. Even developers who integrate bots with the Poe AI are eligible to earn money.
Zillow Group announced Tuesday that Bill Gurley, the famed Silicon Valley venture capitalist, is joining their board.
Gurley previously sat on the company’s board from 2005 to 2015, advising the real estate giant from its early years.
Gurley has also been a general partner at Benchmark for more than two decades, leading investments in budding startups that grew into behemoths such as Uber, OpenTable, StitchFix, Nextdoor, and others.
Keith Rabois, venture capitalist, operator, and entrepreneur, is returning to Khosla Ventures (“KV”), the place where he performed as a full-time VC before joining Founders Fund (“FF”) in 2019. The switch teams move has been quite a surprise for many industry watchers.
Just 72 hours after a prominent startup customer complained that Carta was misusing information, Carta decided to “prioritize trust” and exit the secondary trading business.
The company, which originally focused on cap table management software, aimed to become the transfer agent, brokerage and clearinghouse for all private stock transactions worldwide.
While the move made Carta more valuable for its venture backers, it will have a toll on its reputation after Finnish CEO Karri Saarinen accused Carta of using information about his company’s investor base.
A spokesperson said the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission’s X account was hacked. “The SEC’s @SECGov X/Twitter account has been compromised. The unauthorized tweet regarding bitcoin ETFs was not made by the SEC or its staff,” the spokesperson said. The post approving the highly anticipated spot bitcoin ETFs has since been deleted.
Twilio co-founder Jeff Lawson on Monday said he is stepping down as CEO of the enterprise communications software company. The move comes as Twilio grapples with two activist investors pushing for significant changes. Khozema Shipchandler, a longtime Twilio executive, will replace Lawson.
💰 Funding announcement highlights
Health in Her HUE, a five-year-old startup based in New York, has raised $3 million in a seed funding round led by Seae Ventures. Other investors participating in the round include Johnson & Johnson Impact Ventures, HBCU Founders Fund, Stanford Impact Fund, and Morgan Stanley Inclusive Ventures Labs. T
Intrinsic, a startup that helps safety teams prevent abusive behavior on their products, has raised $3.1 million in a seed funding round. Urban Innovation Fund, Y Combinator, 645 Ventures, and Okta are among the investors who participated in the round.
QuantHealth has raised $2 million in a Series A extension round led by Accenture Ventures. The company helps researchers maximize the success of their clinical trials.
An unnamed startup founded by former Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal has raised around $30 million in funding. The company is building software for developers of large language models. Khosla Ventures led the round, with participation from Index Ventures and First Round Capital.
Vortexa, a startup that provides data and analytics about the crude oil, refined products, LPG, and LNG industries, has raised $34 million in a Series C funding round. Morgan Stanley Expansion Capital led the round, with participation from Notion Capital, Monashees, Metaplanet, FJ Labs, and Communitas Capital.
📚 Interesting reads of the week
After experiencing some challenging years (hello 2020, 2021, and 2023), venture capitalists feel optimistic about 2024. While there are still some uncertainties, it’s likely that funding has already reached its lowest point, and the market for exits is improving.
This folder contains over 180 PDF decks from major brands, such as Klaviyo and Deloitte, covering trends for 2024. The reports are related to marketing, technology, Gen Z behavior, AI, and more.
According to Crunchbase data, the funding for European startups in 2023 reached $52 billion, a 39% decrease from the $86 billion invested in 2022. Despite this decline, Europe's share of the venture capital ecosystem has increased since 2021.
Review of the current status of products created through AI models followed by predictions regarding the future of this industry in 2024, focusing on products, markets, and people.
SVB Financial Group has reached a restructuring agreement with its major creditors and received support from a coalition of banks and investment funds, holding more than $2.3 billion in SVB Financial debt and preferred stock investments. These details were revealed in documents filed in Manhattan bankruptcy court.
💪 Tech Mafia of the week
Highlights:
💰 Most money raised: Socure
🤑 Total money raised by the IBM Mafia: $31 billion
Weekly tech mafia leaderboard
IBM’s alumni network has built some amazing companies, so we took a look at the top companies.
The IBM Mafia takes the 8th spot, with 1,353 companies founded in total and $31 billion raised.
PS: Are you an IBM 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
While funding was generally on a downward trend in 2023, there were still some massive funding rounds that took place, most of them in AI (surprise surprise).
Taking a look back at the 10 biggest funding rounds of 2023:
📌 1. OpenAI
Capital raised: $10 billion
Industry: AI… twitter.com/i/web/status/1…— PIN (@getpinxyz)
2:25 PM • Jan 9, 2024
💼 Who’s hiring in VC?
Looking to get into VC? Below are this week’s curated VC job openings.
American Express Ventures is looking for an Investment Analyst.
MACH49 is looking for a Principal.
Tola Capital is looking for an Executive Administrator.
Munich RE is looking for an Investment Associate.
📠 Fun fact of the week
Y Combinator has helped launch some of the biggest startups in the world. In its 16-year history, Y Combinator has helped launch more than 2,000 startups. Among them are DoorDash, Instacart, Coinbase, Cruise Automation, AirBnb, Stripe, Dropbox, Reddit, Twitch, and many others.
Want to learn more about investing in startups with your community through PIN’s platform? Simply reply to this email.
0