NVIDIA Backed Startup Raised $1.1 Billion Funding & Musk Fires Entire Team Running EV Supercharging Business

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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, fresh VC funds, and some cool tech – all in just 5 minutes! Today’s major updates include -

• Tesla has abruptly fired the entire team running its electric vehicle charging business.

• CoreWeave, a Roseland, NJ-based specialized cloud provider for AI, previously backed by NVIDIA raised $1.1 billion in new funding.

• Google paid Apple $20 billion in 2022 to be Safari’s default search engine.

• Hyde Park Venture Partners, a Chicago-based early-stage venture capital firm, has raised $98 million for its Fund IV.

• Featured Article : Sequoia Capital’s two simple methods that can help founders to find whether they have achieved Product-Market Fit (PMF).

• Essential Reads On Startups, Venture Capital, AI & Tech.

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STARTUP FUNDING UPDATES

CoreWeave, a Roseland, NJ-based specialized cloud provider for AI, previously backed by NVIDIA raised $1.1 billion in new funding. The round was led by Coatue, with participation from Magnetar who led the last primary round, as well as Altimeter Capital, Fidelity Management & Research Company, and Lykos Global Management. More Here

Innovaccer, a health tech startup that aggregates patient data across systems, is in advanced talks to raise up to $250 million in a new funding round, valuing the company between $2.5 billion and $3 billion. More Here

Aikido, a startup based in Ghent, Belgium, offers a no-nonsense, open-source, developer-facing security platform. It has raised $17 million in a Series A round led by Singular, a European venture capital firm, to further develop its product. More Here

Netskrt Systems, a Vancouver, BC-based content delivery network (CDN) provider focused on improving over-the-top (OTT) streaming video quality at the network edge, secured $10m CAD Series A equity financing. Backers included Yaletown Partners (leader), InBC Investment Corp, and Credit Mutual Equity. More Here

Remepy, a New York-based hybrid drugs developer, closed a $10M seed funding round, which, together with earlier funding, totalled $15M. The round was led by NFX, joined by Vine Ventures, PsyMed Ventures, Supernode Ventures and Firstime Ventures, joining previous pre-seed lead investor TechAviv as well as Fresh fund, Samsung Next, StageNext Fund and 97212 Ventures. More Here

Whitman Controls, LLC, a Bristol, UK-based industry leader in the custom design and manufacturing of pressure, vacuum, level, and temperature switches, secured a $4.5m investment led by impact investor Advantage Capital. More Here

StepSecurity, a Seattle, WA-based leader in protecting CI/CD pipelines and infrastructure, closed its $3m seed funding round. The round was led by Runtime Ventures, with participation from Inner Loop Capital, SaaS Ventures, DeVC, and several notable industry leaders as angel investors. More Here

Traceable AI, a San Francisco, CA-based API security company, raised $30m in funding. Backers included Citi Ventures – the venture arm of Citigroup, lead investor IVP, Geodesic Capital, Sorenson Capital, and Unusual Ventures. More Here

Baselayer, a NY-based B2B platform utilizing proprietary Graph AI technology to fight fraud and optimize business onboarding, emerged from stealth with a $6.5m seed funding round. Backers included Torch Capital, Afore Capital, Founder Collective, Picus Capital, Gilgamesh Ventures and financial industry executives Eric Woodward, former President of Early Warning Services, Jason Mikula, executives from Stripe, Brex, Valley Bank, Airbase, and 15 other fintech founders. More Here

Baxus, a NYC-based global marketplace for collectible spirits, raised $5M in seed funding. The round was led by Multicoin Capital, with participation from Solana Ventures, Narwhal Ventures, FJ Labs, and several high profile angel investors. More Here

Aura Power, a Bristol, UK-based developer of renewable energy projects, received £10M in Novuna Business Finance. More Here

Resonance Security, a NYC-based Web2 and Web3 cybersecurity provider, raised $1.5M in Pre-Seed funding. The round was led by Arca, Fabric VC, and Blockchain Founders Fund. More Here

Peregrine, a San Francisco, CA-based provider of a data integration platform, raised $30M in Series B funding. The round was led by Friends & Family Capital and Fifth Down Capital with participation from existing investors Goldcrest Capital, Craft Ventures, Godfrey Capital, and other committed partners. More Here

Zing, a London, UK-based Twilio consulting partner, raised £1.25M in funding. Backers included Maven Capital Partners. More Here

RunReveal, an Austin, TX-based provider of a SIEM built to detect threats, raised $2.5M in Seed funding. The round was led by Costanoa Ventures. More Here

Oasis Security, a Tel Aviv, Israel-based provider of Non-human Identity Management (NHIM) solutions, raised $35M in Series A extension funding. The round, which brought the total amount to $75M, was led by Accel, Cyberstarts and Sequoia Capital. More Here

Cogtive, a São Paulo, Brazil-based startup that enhances the productivity of manufacturing industries through IoT technologies, digital twins, and artificial intelligence, receives a R$ 10M investment from Indicator Capital. More Here

GFAL, a Barcelona, Spain-based Web3 video games startup, raised $3.2M in Seed funding. The round was led by Supercell Ltd and Mitch Lasky, with participation from Heinrich Zetlmayer, Bonduc Bioscience SL, BCNBCNLVC, and David Fernandez, Bonsai Partners, Nekko Consulting and Inveready, among others. More Here

Infinitopes Precision Immunomics, an Oxford, UK-based integrated cancer biotech company, raised £12.8M in Seed funding. The round was led by Octopus Ventures with participation from Cancer Research Horizons, Cancer Research Institute, CRIS Cancer Foundation, Kindred Capital, Manta Ray, Martlet Capital, Meltwind Advisory, Saras Capital, Wilbe Capital, and expert angel investors. More Here

PlaqueTec, a Cambridge, UK-based company identifying endotype-specific biomarkers to advance precision medicine for coronary artery disease (CAD), raised £6.4M in funding. The round was led by Lord Moynihan of Chelsea alongside the Future Fund, with support from existing investors. More Here

Screenverse, a NYC-based provider of programmatic advertising solutions to DOOH (digital-out-of-home) media owners, raised $10.5M in funding. The round was led by Volition Capital. More Here

Kutt, a NYC-based provider of a social betting platform, raised over $1M in funding. The round was led by Lightning Capital. More Here

Noggin HQ, a Newcastle upon Tyne, UK-based fintech company, raised £710K in Pre-Seed funding. The round was led by Oxford Capital, and supported by Bethnal Green Ventures, SyndicateRoom and several domain-specific angels. More Here

Vivalyx, a Aachen, Germany-based organ vitality tech company, raised €5.4M in Seed funding. The round was led by BVP and TechVision Fonds. More Here

VENTURE CAPITAL UPDATES

Hyde Park Venture Partners, a Chicago-based early-stage venture capital firm, has raised $98 million for its Fund IV. The firm focuses on investing in founders primarily in the Midwest and Toronto regions. With this new fund, Hyde Park Venture Partners now has total assets under management of approximately $320 million. The fund was backed by institutional investors, family offices, and ultra-high-net-worth individuals, including new partners like NVNG and Cintrifuse Capital. More Here

Haun Ventures, the $1.5 billion crypto-focused venture firm founded by Katie Haun in 2021, is accelerating its investment pace after a cautious period during the crypto downturn. The firm has now made 48 investments across its early and later-stage funds, with the latest being a $5 million seed round in Agora, an app that streamlines voting and governance for decentralized autonomous organizations (DAOs). More Here

FEATURED ARTICLE

Sequoia Capital’s two simple methods that can help founders to find whether they have achieved Product-Market Fit (PMF)

The First is "Retention Curve" -

"The retention curve is what percentage of your users keep coming back over some time while using your product/service."

Essentially, there are 3 kinds of retention curves, and you should plot this curve by day, week, or month, once you launch your product.

1. Declining Curve (dark grey line), let's say you’ve launched a consumer internet app on day 0, and every week your retention rate declines by 10%, which essentially means that by the end of 3rd month, all your initial users would have churned, then that's a declining curve, which indicates that you don’t have a product-market fit.

2. Flattening Curve (orange line) is actually good, although it kind of varies depending upon the category (Health-Tech, EdTech, etc.,) but generically speaking if the retention curve flattens between 20%-40% that could be quite good.

3. Finally the best one is the Smiling Retention Curve (green line), which means that retention drops but then as time goes on you keep reactivating users, which indicates that you're getting close to your product-market fit.

Another question that founder should think is -

Do Customers Love Product?

Net Promoter Score (NPS) is a metric that organizations use to measure customer loyalty toward their brand, product or service.

NPS works by asking your customers a single question: "How likely are you to recommend our products/services to others?"

NPS = % Promoters (score 9-10) - % Detractors (score 0-6); If the magic score is = 70% or more, then you have an amazing product-market fit.

But if the number declines to 40% or below, then you don’t have it. It's that simple!

(We have shared this writeup in our Venture Curator Newsletter)

STARTUP’S LATEST BUZZ

ACQUISITION & EXITS

Climavision, a Louisville, KY-based company which specializes in advanced weather modeling and forecasting technology, acquired Intersphere, a Fort Collins, CO-based innovator specializing in subseasonal-to-seasonal (S2S) forecasting – predicting weather up to a year in advance. More Here

LAYOFFS & BANKRUPTCY

Peloton's CEO Barry McCarthy steps down after announcing another round of layoffs affecting 15% of its workforce or around 400 employees. This is the fifth round of layoffs as the company struggles to align its expenses with revenue. Karen Boone and Chris Bruzzo will serve as interim co-CEOs as Peloton continues its restructuring efforts. More Here

STARTUPS & PEOPLE

The U.S. Federal Communications Commission fined the four major wireless carriers (AT&T, Verizon, T-Mobile, and Sprint) around $200 million in total for illegally selling customers' real-time location data to third-party companies without their consent. More Here

Roger Ver, a noted crypto figure known as "Bitcoin Jesus," has been charged with mail fraud and evading taxes to the tune of $50 million. More Here

LATEST IN EMERGING TECH

Tesla has abruptly fired the entire team running its electric vehicle charging business.

Raising doubts about the future of one of the largest US charging networks with over 40,000 Supercharger stalls that other automakers like General Motors and Ford had committed to utilizing. Several former Tesla employees confirmed the layoffs on social meddia, with one stating "Tesla has let our entire charging org go." Tesla's extensive Supercharger network, which could previously only be used by Tesla vehicles, has long been a major selling point. However, this move comes after virtually every major US automaker had agreed to make their EVs compatible with Tesla's North American Charging Standard (NACS), following an invitation from CEO Elon Musk. More Here

Google paid Apple $20 billion in 2022 to be Safari’s default search engine.That’s according to Apple’s Eddy Cue in court documents filed ahead of closing arguments in the DoJ’s antitrust case against Google. It’s the first time the number has been confirmed, and marks an increase from the $18 billion reportedly paid in 2021. The filing also shows that Google’s 2020 payments were 17.5 percent of the Apple’s operating income.

Anthropic, a generative AI startup with $7.6 billion in funding, is launching a paid "Team" plan for enterprises with higher usage limits, admin controls, and upcoming collaboration features. It is also releasing an iOS app providing access to its AI models, including Claude 3. More Here

MORE READS

• An Unsuccessful Video Game Turned Into a $26 Billion Startup. More Here

• The Capex Conquest in the Cloud By Tomasz Tugunz. More Here

• Sequoia Capital’s Product-Market-Fit Framework! More Here

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

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