Apple Discontinue 'buy now, pay later' service In US & You.com Raising $50 Million

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👋 Hey, Sahil here! Welcome to today's quick rundown in the Venture Daily Digest Newsletter. I've got the scoop on startup fundraising, VC funds, and some cool tech – all in just 5 minutes ☕! Today’s major updates include -

• You.com, the AI-powered search engine, is raising $50 million in fresh capital.

• OpenAI CEO Sam Altman told shareholders that the company may change its structure to a for-profit benefit corporation. This would pave the way for an IPO.

• Apple's U.S. - Buy Now Pay Later feature has been discontinued just two years after its announcement at WWDC.

• Google has released its dedicated AI mobile app Gemini in India, supporting nine Indian languages alongside English.

• Microsoft's Xbox marketing chief, Jerret West, is leaving the company to join Roblox as their chief marketing officer.

• Featured Article : Understand Your Most-Engaged Users with the Power User Curve.

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Startup Funding Updates

You.com, the AI-powered search engine, is raising $50 million in fresh capital at a valuation of $700-$900 million.

Despite initial interest from ChatGPT's launch, its user traffic and app downloads have declined recently. It aims to differentiate itself as an AI assistant focused on productivity tasks and coding, with a $15 monthly subscription. More Here

Valuebase, an Austin, TX-based provider of data-driven property valuations, raised $6.3M in Seed funding. The round was led by Narya Capital. Additional investors included Sam Altman, Nat Friedman, Mythos Ventures and Julian Weisser. More Here

Finbourne, a London-based startup, has built a platform to help financial companies organize and use more of their data in AI and other models. The company has raised £55 million ($70 million) in a Series B funding round co-led by Highland Europe and AXA's venture arm AVP, valuing the company at £280 million ($356 million) post-money. More Here

Finaloop, a Brooklyn, NY- and Tel Aviv, Israel-based real-time e-commerce accounting platform, raised $35m in Series A funding. The round was led by Lightspeed Venture Partners with participation from Vesey Ventures, Commerce Ventures, and existing investors, Accel and Aleph. More Here

Gracia AI, a Wilmington, Delaware, USA — based AI-powered technology designed for professional creators and media companies to create photorealistic volumetric videos for Spatial Computing, raised $1.2m in seed funding. Backers included The Venture Reality Fund, Triptyq Capital, LVL1 Group, and Future Fund. More Here

Princeton NuEnergy (PNE), a Princeton, NJ-based leader in lithium-ion battery direct recycling, closed a USD30m Series A funding. Backers included a strategic investment from Samsung Venture Investment Corporation, Samsung’s corporate venture arm, and Helium-3, which joined the round’s previous investors, including Honda Motor Co. Ltd., LKQ Corporation, SCG Group, Traxys Group, and Wistron Corporation. More Here

Tender, a Somerville, MA-based food technology startup, raised $11M in Series A funding. The round was led by Rhapsody Venture Partners, with participation from existing investors Lowercarbon Capital and Safar Partners and new investors Claridge Partners and Nor’easter Ventures. More Here

Constructor, a San Francisco, CA-based provider of an AI-powered product discovery and search platform for enterprise ecommerce companies, raised $25M in Series B funding, bringing the company’s valuation to $550M. The round was led by Sapphire Ventures with participation from existing investor Silversmith Capital Partners. More Here

Elion Therapeutics, a NYC-based biotechnology company dedicated to advancing the treatment of life-threatening invasive fungal infections (IFIs), closed a $81M Series B funding. The round was led by Deerfield Management and the AMR Action Fund. Additional investors included Illinois Ventures. More Here

Autify, a San Francisco, CA- and Tokyo, Japan-based provider of an AI platform for quality engineering, raised $13M in Series B funding. The round was led by Globis Capital Partners and LG Technology Ventures. Existing investors WiL (World Innovation Lab), Salesforce Ventures, Archetype Ventures, and Uncorrelated Ventures also participated. More Here

Hona, a Lehi, UT-based company which specializes in client engagement software for law firms, raised $9.5M in Series A funding. The round was led by Costanoa Ventures with participation from Ludlow Ventures, Soma Capital and Y Combinator. More Here

Aim Security, a Tel Aviv, Israel-based company enabling the secure adoption and use of AI across enterprise organizations, raised $18M in Series A funding. The round, which brought the total amount to $28M, was led by Canaan Partners, with participation from YL Ventures. More Here

Tinybrid, a Madrid, Spain- and NYC-based provider of a real-time data platform for data and engineering teams, raised $30M in Series B funding. The round was led by Balderton Capital, with participation from existing investors including CRV and Singular Ventures. More Here

RBW EV, a London, UK-based EV manufacturer of new, hand-crafted British classic sports cars, received £10M investment from Meson Capital Partners. More Here

CampusAI, a Warsaw, Poland-based AI learning skills startup, raised $10M in pre-seed funding. Backers included angel investor Maciej Zientara. More Here

Layer3, a developer of an identity and distribution protocol, raised $15M in Series A funding. The round, which brought the total amount to $21.2M, was led by ParaFi & Greenfield Capital, with participation from Electric Capital, King River, Immutable, Lattice, Tioga, LeadBlock Bitpanda Ventures, Amber, Stateless, and GD1. More Here

DataMesh, a Singapore-based provider of industrial metaverse platforms, raised an undisclosed amount in New funding. Backers included KDDI Open Innovation Fund 3, and Singtel Innov8. More Here

Princeton Medspa Partners (PMP), a Princeton, NJ-based national medspa acquisition platform in medical aesthetics market, closed $120M in Growth financing. BC Partners, an alternative assets investor with approximately $40 billion of assets under management, provided the growth capital. More Here

Venture Capital Updates

The NATO Innovation Fund has confirmed the first batch of companies awarded funding as part of its one billion euro ($1.1 billion) innovation fund. Among the recipients are -

• Fractile AI, a London-based chipmaker aiming to accelerate large language models, and

• ARX Robotics, a German company designing unmanned robots for tasks like heavy-lifting and surveillance. The fund also invested in iCOMAT, a British manufacturer of lightweight materials for vehicles, and Space Forge, a Welsh company that builds semiconductors in space conditions. Additionally, the fund has partnered with several venture capital firms to support further investment in deep tech across Europe.

Featured Article

Understand Your Most-Engaged Users with the Power User Curve.

When founders want to see how engaged their users are, they look at the (Daily Active Users) / (Monthly Active Users) ratio metric. While it only gives a single, blended average. It doesn't show where users fall across the activity spectrum.

By looking at the Power User Curve, a 30-day histogram graphing the number of days per month users were active, provides a more detailed breakdown of user engagement to identify and understand power users.

1. When The Curve Smiles 

A curve that looks like a smile - with high bars on the left and right - it shows that users are highly engaged and returning to the app daily. 

As the product can create more power users, the curve will shift further towards the right side of the smile. Facebook has a very right-leaning smile curve, with more than 60% of its MAUs coming back daily.

2. A Left-weighted Curve 

When the curve is left-weighted, most users only have activity one day a month. By this activity metric, the product has very few power users. That's okay, not every product is built on daily returning users. 

An investing product like a professional network like LinkedIn is bound to have a more left-weighted Curve. Low engagement simply means the company must extract more value from each engagement and create revenue with a business model that isn't tied to daily usage.

3. Trends & Cohorts 

Seeing how the curve changes over time will show if a product getting more engaging and why. 

A positive shift towards the right means a cohort of users is finding value in the product. This can illustrate how a new release or feature is bringing users back more often. 

Likewise, products like Uber or Thumbtack would want to look at cohort trends by geographic location to see how their product is developing in different areas and building network effects.

4. Customizing Your Curve 

To get the most from your curve, customize it to your business. It doesn't need to be viewed on the 30-day scale. A SaaS/productivity product focused on the workweek and weekly active users might want to look at their power users on a 7-day histogram, and the activity doesn't need to be app opens or logins.

The curve can look beyond visits by using a deeper action that is more likely to show users getting or creating value. A publishing platform might want to look at “posted content” activity to identify its small contingent of power users. This is how YouTube could look at its creators, or eBay at its sellers.

There's no silver bullet for how to look at user engagement, However, the Power User Curve visualizes user activity distribution, helping identify power users and understand how to monetize the product around them, rather than relying solely on blended average metrics

Read detailed article in our Venture Curator newsletter.

Startup’s Latest Buzz

Acquisition & Going Public

Online comics platform Webtoon Entertainment said on Monday it is targeting a valuation of up to $2.67 billion in its initial public offering in the United States. More Here

Digits, a San Francisco, CA-based creator of an automated bookkeeping solution for startups, acquired Basis Finance, a San Francisco, California-based provider of a budgeting and forecasting platform. More Here

NetSPI, a Minneapolis, MN-based provider of security solutions, acquired Hubble Technology Inc., a Northern Virginia-based provider of a cyber asset attack surface management (CAASM) and cybersecurity posture management solution. More Here

Qualus, an Orlando, FL-based power services firm, acquired ASSET Engineering, a Jackson, MS-based differentiated power engineering and consulting firm. More Here

Evercoast, a NYC-based provider of end-to-end 3D spatial video software, acquired Depthkit, a NYC-based company which specializes in volumetric capture. More Here

Layoffs & Bankruptcy

Loop, a car insurance startup co-founded by John Henry, has laid off staff due to fundraising struggles after an investor pulled out at the last minute. The company had been attempting to raise additional capital for 20 months without success. Despite raising over $32 million in previous rounds, Loop was forced to reduce headcount across various teams as a last resort to navigate financial difficulties. More Here

Schibsted, the Norwegian online classified ads group, is set to cut around 250 jobs in the Nordic region as part of a restructuring plan aimed at reducing costs and boosting efficiency. More Here

Startups & People

OpenAI discusses a for-profit future that could give Microsoft more control

• OpenAI CEO Sam Altman told shareholders that the company may change its structure to a for-profit benefit corporation. This would pave the way for an IPO and allow Altman to acquire shares in the company.

• The restructuring is still under discussion, but is intended to maintain a link to the original nonprofit organization. Competitors such as Anthropic and xAI have already adopted a similar structure.

• Microsoft, which has invested heavily in OpenAI, could gain more influence, such as a board seat and shareholder voting rights.

Microsoft's Xbox marketing chief, Jerret West, is leaving the company to join Roblox as their chief marketing officer. This move is part of a broader marketing shakeup at Xbox, which includes restructuring various marketing teams and forming a central gaming marketing team. More Here

Amidst ongoing controversy about handling media articles and original reporting, AI-powered search startup Perplexity has started displaying direct results for factual queries like weather, time, currency conversion, and simple math through cards to prevent users from visiting other search engines. The move aims to provide quick and visually appealing information without linking to external sources, aligning with the company's efforts to explore revenue-sharing deals with publications. More Here

The U.S. government has sued Adobe, accusing the software company of concealing hefty termination fees and making it difficult to cancel subscriptions for its popular plans like Photoshop and Acrobat. The Federal Trade Commission alleges that Adobe buries the termination fees, which can reach hundreds of dollars, in fine print and forces subscribers to navigate through numerous pages or endure resistance from representatives to cancel online or by phone. More Here

Latest In Emerging Tech

Google has released its dedicated AI mobile app Gemini in India, supporting nine Indian languages alongside English.

The app offers the option to access the paid Gemini Advanced experience, which includes a larger context window and language support. Over the next few weeks, iPhone users in India will also gain access to Gemini through the Google app. More Here

Apple's U.S.-only Pay Later feature has been discontinued just two years after its announcement at WWDC. Instead, users across the globe will soon be able to access installment loans offered through credit and debit cards, as well as lenders like Affirm, when checking out with Apple Pay. This move aligns with Apple's focus on providing easy, secure, and private payment options globally, in collaboration with Apple Pay-enabled banks and lenders. More Here

YouTube is introducing an experimental feature called "Notes" that allows viewers to add context and information under videos, similar to Community Notes on Twitter. The feature aims to minimize the spread of misinformation on the platform, especially during the pivotal U.S. election year. More Here

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