GitHub Rival GitLab explores Sale & Anthropic Launches $100 Million AI fund With Menlo Ventures

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☕Hey there, Welcome to today's quick rundown in the Venture Daily Digest Newsletter. We've got the scoop on startup fundraising, VC funds, and some cool tech – all in just 5 minutes!

Top News

Figma Inc., a San Francisco-based design startup, has been valued at $12.5 billion in a recent investment deal led by Coatue Management, Alkeon Capital Management, and General Catalyst Partners.

Sam Altman, along with JP Morgan Payments, Y Combinator, Jack Altman, and Saga Ventures,has invested $252 Million in Slope, a B2B payments platform startup.

Other Major News

• Menlo Ventures and Anthropic have partnered to launch the $100 million Anthology Fund, aimed at investing in early-stage AI companies. (Scroll To VC News)

• Microsoft laid off an internal team focused on diversity, equity, and inclusion, (DEI). (Scroll To Layoff News)

• French AI startup Mistral has launched two new AI models for code generation and for math-related reasoning. (Scroll To Tech News)

• VCs' 5-Question Framework to Create an Elevator Pitch for Startups. (Scroll To Featured Article)

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Startup Funding Updates

Pindrop, an Atlanta-based startup, develops deepfake-combating and multi-factor authentication products for businesses in banking, finance, and related industries. The company has raised $234.77 million in venture capital to date and recently secured a $100 million, five-year loan from Hercules Capital. Notable investors include Vitruvian Partners, CapitalG, IVP, and Andreessen Horowitz. More Here

Shaped.ai, a NYC-based provider of an AI recommendation and search platform for marketplaces, e-commerce, and content companies, raised $8M in Series a funding. The round was led by Madrona Ventures with participation from Y-Combinator and executives and founders from Clickhouse, DocuSign, Okta, Rippling, and StitchFix. More Here

Tribe AI, a Brooklyn-based AI talent and services company, helps businesses build AI products and implement AI strategies using a network of over 500 contractors. Founded in 2019 by Jaclyn Rice Nelson and Noah Gale, Tribe AI has been bootstrapped until recently raising a $3.25 million seed round. The seed round was led by Bryce Roberts of Indie VC, with participation from members of Tribe's AI network, customers, and angel investors. More Here

CytoReason, a Tel Aviv, Israel-based company which specializes in developing computational disease models for predictive insights, raised an aggregated $80M. The amount was led by OurCrowd, NVIDIA (Nasdaq: NVDA), Pfizer (NYSE: PFE), and Thermo Fisher Scientific (NYSE: TMO). More Here

Didero, an early-stage startup (location not specified), develops an AI-powered supply chain management tool for mid-market companies. The company has raised $7 million in seed funding. The round was led by First Round Capital, with participation from Construct Capital, AI Grant, Box Group, Company Ventures, and Conviction, along with industry angels. More Here

Stax Engineering, a Long Beach, CA-based maritime emissions capture and control company, raised $40M in funding. The round was led by Upper90. More Here

Cart.com, a Houston, TX-based provider of unified commerce and logistics solutions for merchants, raised $105M in debt facility. The facility was provided by funds and accounts managed by BlackRock. More Here

Lumos Technologies, a Wilmington, NC-based data analytics company, raised an undisclosed multimillion-dollar investment in Seed funding. Backers were not disclosed. More Here

aiXplain, a San Jose, CA-based provider of essential infrastructure for accelerated AI development, raised $6.5M in Series A funding. The round, which brought the total amount to $16.5M, was led by Wa’ed Ventures.Osama Elkady and Kane Minkus also participated. More Here

GovPort, a Fairfax, VA-based provider of a SaaS subcontractor management portal, raised $2.8M in funding. The round, which brought the total amount to $5.3M, was led by PruVen Capital and Fin Capital. Existing investors included QED Investors, Humba Ventures, Cambrian Ventures, and NextGen Venture Partners. More Here

Novocuff, a Mountain View, CA-based medical device company, raised $26M in Series A funding. The round was led by AXA IM Alts with participation from Laerdal Million Lives Fund, and continued support from existing investors and new investors Laborie, RH Capital, Avestria Ventures and March of Dimes. More Here

Freshpaint, a San Francisco, CA-based provider of a healthcare privacy platform, raised $30M in Series B funding. The round, which brought the total amount to $41.8M, was led by Threshold with additional participation from new investor SignalFire and existing investors Intel Capital, Y Combinator and Zero Prime. More Here

Arvo Tech, a Columbus, OH-based creator of a tax strategy solution for small businesses, raised $2.5M in Series A funding. The round was led by Bandon Partners with support from existing investors. More Here

Slope, a San Francisco, CA-based provider of a B2B payments platform, raised $65M in funding. The round was led by J.P. Morgan Payments, with participation from Y Combinator, Jack Altman, and Max Altman’s new fund, Saga. As part of the funding, J.P. Morgan will also provide a debt facility. More Here

Cloverleaf Infrastructure, a Houston, TX- and Seattle, WA-based provider of a platform focused on developing clean-powered, ready-to-build sites for the largest electric loads, raised $300M in capital commitments. Backers included private equity investors NGP and Sandbrook Capital, alongside contributions from its management team. More Here

Peak Energy, a Denver, CO-based company developing low-cost, giga-scale energy storage technology for the grid, raised $55M in Series A funding. The round was led by Xora Innovation, with participation from existing investor Eclipse, TDK Ventures, and new investors Lachy Groom, Tishman Speyer, TechEnergy Ventures, Doral Energy-Tech Ventures and DETV-Scania Invest. More Here

Escala, a Miami Beach, FL-based provider of CRM for Marketing and Sales for SMBs in Latin America and the US Hispanic market, raised $12M in funding. The round was led by IGNIA and Alaya Capital, with participation from High Alpha and other investors. More Here

ReliON, a Montreal and Ottawa, Canada-based provider of Operation & Maintenance (O&M) solutions for EV charging infrastructure, raised CAD $3M in funding. The round was led by Diagram Ventures, with participation from MaRS Investment Accelerator Fund (IAF), AQC Capital, Anges Québec and Cycle Momentum. More Here

ACEL Power, a Vancouver, BC, Canada-based company which specializes in marine electric innovation, raised $10M in Series A funding. The round was led by Tau Capital. Brad Allen of Tau also joined ACEL as a board director. More Here

Earthshot Labs, a Mill Valley, CA-based provider of a carbon development platform, raised $5.5M in Series A funding. The round was led by Acorn Pacific Ventures with participation from Earth Foundry, Future Ventures, Resilient Earth Capital, One Small Planet, Parameter Ventures, Sand Hill Angels, and Orca Capital. More here

Leya, a Stockholm, Sweden-based AI-driven legal technology company, raised $25M in Series A funding. The round was led by Redpoint Ventures, with participation from existing investors Benchmark, Y Combinator, and Wayfinder Ventures, with the new addition of Alt Capital. More Here

Truvian Health, a San Diego, CA-based provider of a blood testing platform, raised $74M in funding. The round was led by Wittington Ventures and Great Point Ventures, with participation from existing investors, including DNS Capital, Medical Excellence Capital, Tao Capital, TYH Capital, and 7wireVentures. As a part of the round, Shoppers Drug Mart, Canada’s largest pharmacy, joined Truvian as a commercial partner. More Here

Kandji, a San Francisco, CA-based provider of an Apple endpoint management and security platform, raised $100M in funding, at $850M valuation. General Catalyst made the investment, with $50M allocated to equity financing for its Series D, and $50M for go-to-market investment. Deep Nishar from General Catalyst will join the company’s Board of Directors. More Here

Lemonado, a Stockholm, Sweden-based no-code platform that enables people to build custom business apps, raised $1.4M in Seed funding. The round was led by node.vc with participation from Alexander Aghassipour. More Here

Again, a Copenhagen, Denmark-based carbon utilization company, raised $43M in Series A funding. The round was led by GV and HV Capital, with participation from Kompas VC, EIFO – Denmark’s Export and Investment Fund, ACME Capital, and Atlantic Labs. More Here

Briefly Bio, a London, UK-based techbio startup providing a tool to make lab work reproducible, raised $1.2M in funding. The round was led by Compound VC, with participation from NP Hard, and Tiny VC. More Here

Varm, a Berlin, Germany-based insulation startup, raised €5.7M ($6.1M) in Seed funding. The round was led by Emerge and Pale Blue Dot, with participation from noa (formerly A/O), Foundamental, and previous angel investors. More Here

One Data, a Munich, Germany-based data management software company, raised EUR32M in Series B extension funding. Backers included Vsquared Ventures, Molten Ventures and HV Capital. More Here

Venture Capital Updates

Menlo Ventures and Anthropic have partnered to launch the $100 million Anthology Fund, aimed at investing in early-stage AI companies. The initiative will provide funding starting at $100,000 and $25,000 in Anthropic model credits to selected startups. Menlo Ventures, which recently led a $750+ million funding round in Anthropic, sees this as an opportunity to identify promising AI startups and potentially back them in future rounds.

Featured Article

VCs' 5-Question Framework to Create an Elevator Pitch for Startups

Every founder dreams of that perfect elevator pitch - a 30-second ride that ends with millions in funding. While this movie scenario is unlikely, crafting a compelling elevator pitch is crucial. It's often your startup's first impression on potential investors, setting the stage for future conversations. A well-honed pitch can open doors, even if it doesn't immediately open wallets. So polish that pitch - you never know when you'll need it.

There are lots of articles surfing on the internet but still, many founders struggle to create elevator pitches for their startups. So in today’s writeup, I am going to share a “5 Question framework” that can help you to create an elevator pitch.

Also, many founders believe that they just need to have one elevator pitch and they can impress anyone.

But this is not true, I believe you need to have multiple versions of an elevator pitch like - The emotional benefit version, the Success story version, the pressing call to action version and the version where you reference competitors. I will share more ideas on how to create each version of an elevator pitch. So let’s deep dive into this:

Read in detailed in our venture curator newsletter…

Startup’s Latest Buzz

Acquisition & Going Public

Squirro, a Zurich, Switzerland-based provider of a SaaS platform specializing in enterprise-ready generative AI, search, and business insights, acquired Synaptica, a US-based SaaS provider of enterprise taxonomy management and knowledge graph systems. More Here

EXA Capital, a Dallas, TX-based company focused on buy and hold strategy for enterprise software companies, acquired Nomos One, a Dunedin, New Zealand-based provider of a business-critical lease management and lease accounting SaaS platform. More Here

Census, a San Francisco, CA-based provider of a data activation and reverse ETL platform, acquired Fulcrum, a provider of an AI-led growth platform for business teams. More Here

InMobi, an adtech startup founded in 2007, is planning an IPO in India next year, aiming for a $10 billion valuation. The company, which offers a comprehensive advertising platform and owns the Glance lockscreen platform, expects to generate over $700 million in annual revenue by March.

Layoffs & Bankruptcy

Microsoft laid off an internal team focused on diversity, equity, and inclusion, (DEI) prompting criticism from a team leader about the company's lack of investment in these efforts. The team was eliminated due to "changing business needs" as of July 1, despite previous commitments to improve diversity.

Startups & People

Marc Andreessen, co-founder of a major VC firm, is supporting Trump over Biden in the 2024 presidential race, citing Trump's more favorable policies for tech and startups. Andreessen and his partner Ben Horowitz believe tech prowess is crucial for America's future, alongside economic and military strength. They criticize Biden's administration for overregulation and potential taxation that could stifle innovation, particularly in AI and crypto sectors.

GitLab, supported by Google, is exploring a potential sale, but no deal is imminent or guaranteed, according to confidential sources. GitLab, with a widely-used platform for development teams and 30 million users, has its shares down 16% this year, lagging the S&P 500 Application Software index. The sale has drawn interest from peers like Datadog, but any deal is still weeks away and not guaranteed, with sources requesting anonymity due to the confidential nature of the matter.

Latest In Emerging Tech

French AI startup Mistral has launched two new AI models,Codestral Mamba 7B for code generation and Mathstral 7B for math-related reasoning, both offering significant performance improvements and available under an open-source Apache 2.0 license. Codestral Mamba 7B, based on the new Mamba architecture, delivers faster response times and handles longer input texts efficiently, outperforming rival models in HumanEval tests. Mistral, which has raised $640 million in series B funding, continues to compete with major AI developers by providing powerful open-source models accessible through platforms like GitHub and HuggingFace.

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