Hacker Stole $112M Crypto From Ripple's Founder Account & Judge Cancels Elon Musk's $56B Tesla Pay Deal

👋 Hey, Sahil here! Welcome to today’s Venture Daily Digest Newsletter. Every day I share updates on startup funding, new VC funds launched and tech to read in 5 mins! Today we have major updates on -

• A Delaware judge voided Tesla CEO Elon Musk's $56 billion pay package, deeming the board failed to prove its fairness.

• Hackers stole approximately $112 million worth of XRP from Ripple’s Founder Personal Account.

• Speedinvest , Vienna-based early-stage VC has closed its fourth early-stage fund, Speedinvest 4, at €350 million

• Featured Article : Never express your ‘Use of Funds’ slide as percentages, why?

🤝 Are You Looking to Break Into VC?

Join our VC Enthusiast Community - VC Crafters To Learn, Network And Craft Path To Venture Capital!

As A Member You Will Get Access To: Community Access, VC Daily Job Updates, VC Weekly Events, Networking Sessions, Sessions on Learning VC Concepts - fund modelling, startup building, evaluating startups, funding news updates, CV & Interview Preparation & More!

🤝 Partnership With US!

Want to promote your startup to our community of 21,500+ entrepreneurs and investors? Fill out the form, our team will reach out to you.

🎉Get A Discount of 20% For Multiple Ads

💰 MASSIVE FUNDING UPDATES

Synergy Spine Solutions, a Louisville, CO-based medical device developer, raised $30M in funding. The round was led by Amzak Health, with participation from other investors. More Here

Metronome, a San Francisco, CA-based provider of usage-based billing solutions for companies, raised $43M in Series B funding. The round was led by NEA, with participation from prior backers Andreessen Horowitz and General Catalyst. More Here

Hivello, a Toronto, Canada-based blockchain payment solution provider, raised an additional USD$1.5M in funding. The round, which brought the total amount to USD$2.5M raised during the last month, included participation from Blockchange, Cypher Capital, MH Ventures, Primal Capital, Contango Digital Assets, and Candaq, joining NGC, Blockchain Founders Fund, IDG, and others from the prior pre-seed investment round. More Here

Twin Labs, a Paris-based startup that wants to build an automation product for repetitive tasks, has raised $3 million in pre-seed funding from Betaworks, Motier Ventures and many angel investors, such as Florian Douetteau (Dataiku), Thomas Wolf (Hugging Face), Charles Gorintin (Alan), Mehdi Ghissassi (DeepMind). More Here

Nile, a San Francisco, CA-based provider of serverless Postgres designed for modern SaaS applications, raised $11.6m in seed funding round. The round was led by Benchmark’s Eric Vishria. More Here

Finvest, US based startup aims to help investors to invest in US treasury bills has raised $2.7 million in funding from an investor group that includes Bayhouse Capital, Unpopular Ventures, Y Combinator, Olive Tree Capital, Pioneer Fund, Fractal Ventures and a group of angel investors, including former Airbnb executive Oliver Jung. More Here

Joyned, a Jerusalem, Israel-based travel tech startup, raised $8M in Series A funding. The round was led by Reach Markets, with participation from Sentor Investments, Velocity Ventures, and Lucerne Investment Partners. More Here

Incognia, a San Jose, CA-based company which specializes in location identity solutions, raised $31M in Series B funding. The round was led by Bessemer Venture Partners, with participation from FJ Labs and existing investors, including Point72, Prosus, and Valor Capital. More Here

Splash, a Denver, CO-based independent provider of peer-to-peer sports strategy games in the US, raised $14.1M in Series A2 funding. Backers included Boston Seed, Velvet Sea Ventures, K5, Elysian Park, Acies Investments, Accomplice, Counterview. More Here

StreamAlive, a NYC-based provider of an audience engagement platform for live sessions, raised $1.58M in Pre-Seed funding. The round saw participation from Speciale Invest, with participation from Venkat Viswanathan, Shar Dubey, and Foster Ventures. More Here

Oasis Security, a Tel Aviv, Israel-based provider of non-human Identity Management (NIM) solutions, raised a total of $40m in funding. The round led by Sequoia Capital, alongside Accel, Cyberstarts and Maple Capital. More Here

Benepass, a NYC-based flexible benefits platform for people-first companies, raised $20m in additional funding. The round was led by Portage and Clocktower Technology Ventures. More Here

Spiden, a Pfäffikon, Switzerland-based company which specializes in non-invasive biomarker monitoring technology, raised $15M in additional funding. The round saw participation from undisclosed existing investors and Board members, as well as new investors. More Here

Myosotis (“myo”), a Berlin, Germany-based digital healthcare startup, raised €8M in Series A funding. The round saw participation from TVM Capital with participation from Twip. More Here

Accompany Health, a Bethesda, MD-based social care provider for low-income patients, raised $56M in Series A funding. Backers included Venrock, ARCH Venture Partners, IVP, Granite Capital Management, and Evidenced. More Here

Kafene, a NYC-based provider of a point-of-sale platform that helps retailers offer flexible purchase options through lease-to-own (LTO) agreements, raised $15M in Growth capital. Trinity Capital (Nasdaq: TRIN) provided the financing. More Here

Crux, a NYC-based sustainable finance technology company, raised $18.2M in Series A funding. The round, which brought the total amount to over $27M, was led by Andreessen Horowitz. More Here

Indemn, a NYC-based provider of an AI-powered conversational insurance platform, raised $1.9M in Pre-Seed funding. The round was led by Markd, with participation from Afterwork Ventures, Everywhere Ventures, and others. More Here

Zum, a Redwood City, CA-based provider of student transportation solutions, raised $140M in Series E funding, at $1.3 Billion valuation. The round, which brought the total amount to $350M, was led by GIC. More Here

Aim Security, a Tel Aviv, Israel-based cybersecurity startup offering enterprises a GenAI security platform, raised $10M in Seed funding. The round was led by YL Ventures, with participation from CCL (Cyber Club London), the founders of WIZ and angel investors from Google, Proofpoint and Palo Alto Networks. More Here

BlueLayer, a Berlin, Germany-based provider of a carbon project development platform, raised €9.2m in seed and pre-seed funding rounds. The round was led by Point Nine. More Here

Evaro, a London, UK-based digital health startup providing AI-powered clinical and drug prescription services for minor conditions, raised $1.5M in Seed funding. The round was led by Cornerstone VC and Exceptional Ventures. More Here

BlokID, a Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam-based developer of blockchain-powered privacy protection solutions for the digital advertising industry, closed US$1.25m seed round of financing. The round was led by Ascend Vietnam Ventures and AppWorks. More Here

LoanStar Technologies, a Swarthmore, PA-based financial technology company focused on embedded lending, raised $28M in funding. Backers included Sageview Capital, Launch Credit Union, TruMark Financial Credit Union, Ben Franklin Technology Partners and Monarch Strategic Advisors. More Here

ProcurePro, a Brisbane, Australia-based provideer of a platform that enables construction firms to take control of their supply chain, raised $6.15M in funding. The round was led by AirTree Ventures and Saniel Ventures. More Here

💰 VENTURE CAPITAL UPDATES

Speedinvest , Vienna-based early-stage VC has closed its fourth early-stage fund, Speedinvest 4, at €350 million (around $380 million at today’s exchange rate), surpassing the initial goal of €300 million ($325 million). This follows the final €50 million close supported by several new institutional investors, including Aviva, PwC Germany, Bitburger, ODDO BHF and Abeille Assurances Ventures. More Here

Venture capitalist Peter Thiel has invested in Enhanced Games, a startup reimagining the Olympic Games without drug testing, celebrating scientific innovation in sports performance. The company plans to focus on sports like track and field, swimming, gymnastics, weightlifting, and combat sports. While acknowledging potential health risks, Enhanced Games aims to conduct thorough medical checks before events. More Here

𝕏 FEATURED: TODAY’S FEATURED ARTICLE

Venture Capital Fund Metrics Cheat Sheet: Use these tools to Evaluate VC Fund Performance....

You’re raising for milestones, not for percentages or runway......

If you are a founder, investors or fund manager this cheat sheet will help you to answer following questions:

• When should you use multiple calculations versus IRR calculations? What are the differences?

• How is your particular investment performing right now.

There are nine venture capital metrics that used to determine fund health and performance are separated into multiple calculations and internal rate of return (IRR) calculations. … Read More Here

💡 SARTUP’S LATEST BUZZ

Acquisition & Exits

Fabric, a NYC-based health tech company, acquired Gyant, a San Francisco, California-based conversational AI care assistant and patient engagement suite, enabling health organizations to automate patient navigation and scheduling. More Here

Protect AI, a Seattle, WA-based artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) security company, acquired Laiyer AI, a Berlin, Germany-based provider of a security solution enhancing the security of LLM interactions. More Here

Nexthink, a Boston, MA-, and Lausanne, Switzerland-based provider of digital employee experience management software, acquired AppLearn, a Manchester, UK-based provider of a learning and digital adoption guidance for employees. More Here

Layoffs & Shutdown

PayPal is axing 2,500 employees or 9% of its workforce in an effort to "right-size," according to CEO Alex Chriss. More Here

Proofpoint, a security giant company is laying off about 6% of its global workforce, or 280 employees. More Here

Google One nears 100 million subscribers, with plans for AI features, says CEO Sundar Pichai. The overall subscription business, including YouTube and Google One, exceeds $15 billion in annual revenues, a 5x increase since 2019. Google's $65.5 billion ad revenue, though up 11% YoY, falls short of the expected $65.8 billion, leading to a 4% stock dip. Pichai hints at additional 1000 job cuts following recent layoffs. More Here

Startups & People

Hackers stole approximately $112 million worth of XRP, the cryptocurrency associated with Ripple, from Ripple's co-founder Chris Larsen's personal accounts. Larsen quickly detected the unauthorized access, freezing affected addresses and involving law enforcement. More Here

During a Senate hearing on kids' online safety, X CEO Linda Yaccarino revealed that less than 1% of the platform's 90 million U.S. users are aged 13 to 17. Yaccarino mentioned discussions on enhancing child protection measures and introducing parental controls for X. In contrast, Snap CEO Evan Spiegel shared that Snapchat has 20 million U.S. teenage users, with about 400,000 teens linked to parents' accounts using Family Center supervision controls. More Here

A Delaware judge voided Tesla CEO Elon Musk's $56 billion pay package, deeming the board failed to prove its fairness. Tesla shares dipped 3%, with the judge stating Musk, as a "Superstar CEO," controlled compensation negotiations, and the process was deeply flawed. The court directed Musk to return the compensation; he can appeal, prompting Musk to tweet, "Never incorporate your company in the state of Delaware," and initiating a poll on whether Tesla should change its state of incorporation to Texas. More Here

Going Public

Raspberry Pi, a favorite of geek hobbyists the world over for the programmable computers that it makes, is planning an IPO on the London Stock Exchange. In November, the company was valued at approximately $500 million. More Here

🤖 LATEST IN EMERGING TECH

Apple swiftly released a security patch, visionOS 1.0.2, for its Vision Pro mixed reality headset, addressing a WebKit vulnerability that could be exploited by hackers. The same bug was recently patched in iOS 17.3, covering iPhones, iPads, Macs, and Apple TV. While it's unclear if the vulnerability was specifically targeted on the Vision Pro, the update aims to prevent potential exploitation. More Here

📰 TODAY’S MUST READ ON: STARTUP, TECH & VC

• ​Experience as a Status Symbol By Tomasz Tunguz. Read Here

• Make a Product a Few Love, Not Many Like, At The Start By Peter Thiel. Read Here

• YC Partner: Avoid These Tempting Startup Ideas - Tarpit Ideas. Read Here

• 5 Mistakes That Founders Make in Investor Meetings That Kills Chances of Success. Read Here

📬 Newsletter That You Might Be Interested

• Transacted: Get the latest trends and transactions with the Street’s most informative M&A update.

• The Flyover: Get the most important and interesting stories of the day, delivered to your inbox every weekday.

That’s It For Today! Will Meet You Tomorrow!
Happy Thursday! 🥂

  Advertise || Investor Database || Break Into VC

✍️Written By Sahil R | Venture Crew Team