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Perplexity Looking to Raise At $8B Valuation & Former OpenAI CTO Seeks $100M for New AI Startup

Perplexity Looking to Raise At $8B Valuation & Former OpenAI CTO Seeks $100M for New AI Startup

Venture Daily Digest - 21/10/2024

Venture Daily Digest
October 21, 2024

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☕Good Monday morning. Welcome to today's quick rundown in the Venture Daily Digest Newsletter.

Scroll down to find out why Perplexity's $8B valuation is turning heads, OpenAI's ex-CTO's ambitious new venture, and how a once-$5B startup crashed to zero! Also, Microsoft-OpenAI's power play and Amazon's bold office ultimatum that's shaking up tech.

Plus, unlock exclusive deep dives: Sequoia's crystal ball on AI's future, marketplace evolution in 2024, unicorn birth rate analysis, a16z's crypto revelations, and the VC world's critical pivot to opportunity funds.

Bonus: European VC's surprising comeback story and premium job opportunities you can't miss!

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🗞️ Startup Funding Updates

Perplexity is in fundraising talks to raise $500 million at an $8 billion valuation, doubling its $3 billion valuation from a summer SoftBank round. The AI search engine handles 15 million daily queries and generates $50 million in annualized revenue. Despite legal disputes, CEO Aravind Srinivas aims to work with publishers.

Dottxt, a U.S.-based startup, helps developers guide AI models like ChatGPT through structured generation. The company has raised $11.9M, backed by Elaia and EQT Ventures.

FutureMoney, a Boston, MA-based provider of a digital platform designed to help families invest for their children and create generational wealth, raised $2.5m in pre-seed funding. Backers included Serac Ventures, Hustle Fund, Telegraph Hill Capital, Capacity Capital, Harvest Ventures, RTL Capital, Next Wave, Mistral, Brian Payne & Aaron Hashim, Founders of Furnished Finder, and the Pitch Fund, started by the founders of The Pitch.

SuppCo, a New York based startup that helps people find health supplements, manage routines, and track health, reportedly raised $5.5m in seed funding. The round was co-led by Union Square Ventures and True Ventures, with participation from Box Group and Compound.

TenNor Therapeutics, a Suzhou, China-based clinical stage company dedicated to developing new therapies for infectious diseases, raised over RMB300M in Series E funding. Backers included AMR Action Fund, Zhongshan Venture Capital and other existing investors.

Iconic Arts, a Los Angeles, CA-based entertainment venture studio, received an investment from Suntory Holdings. The amount of the deal was not disclosed.

MyFO, a Vancouver, Canada-based provider of a platform for family offices and the wealth management professionals who service them, raised $3.5M in Seed funding. The round was led by Rhino Ventures.

Tour24, a Boston, MA-based self-guided tour company for the multifamily property industry, received an investment from Mirasol Capital. The amount of the deal was not disclosed.

Eruditus, India-based company which specializes in making education accessible and affordable to individuals, companies, and governments around the world, raised $150M in Series F funding. The round was led by TPG’s The Rise Fund, with participation from existing investors Softbank Vision Fund 2, Leeds Illuminate, Accel, CPP Investments and the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative.

Biological Lattice Industries, a Boston, MA-based company which specializes in biofabrication and life sciences R&D, raised $1.8M in Pre-Seed funding. The round was led by Greek venture capital firm Uni.Fund.

Perry Weather, a Dallas, TX-based provider of a technology platform for weather safety and operations, raised $15M in Series B funding. The round was led by Arthur Ventures, which also led the company’s Series A round.

Altuzarra, a NYC-based fashion brand, received an investment from P180. The amount of the deal was not disclosed.

Splitero, a San Diego, CA-based financial technology company for homeowners, received a $300M investment from Antarctica Capital.

Red Nucleus, a Yardley, PA-based provider of strategic services across research and development, medical affairs, market access, and learning and development, medical affairs, market access, and learning and development, received a majority investment from THL Partners.

Bitnominal, a Chicago, IL-based digital asset derivatives exchange company, raised $25M in funding. The round was led by Ripple, with participation from new and existing investors. Ripple CEO Brad Garlinghouse will be joining Bitnomial’s board.

Equilibrium Energy, a San Francisco, CA-based technology company helping companies through clean power solutions for companies, raised $39M in Series B funding. The round was led by DCVC and included participation from Breakthrough Energy Ventures and Valo Ventures.

📰 Venture Capital Updates

Acrew Capital, a San Francisco-based VC firm, has raised $700M to invest in data, security, healthcare, and fintech companies. This brings its assets under management to $1.7B. The firm, founded in 2019, invests in early-stage and later-stage companies, with notable exits including Divvy and Superpeer. Its portfolio includes At-Bay and Pie Insurance.

🤖 Latest In Tech

Mira Murati, former OpenAI CTO, is raising over $100M for her new AI startup focused on proprietary models, according to Reuters. She left OpenAI to explore her own ventures after leading significant AI advancements. Murati joins a wave of executive departures following OpenAI’s historic $6.6B funding round.

Microsoft and OpenAI are in talks regarding Microsoft's stake as OpenAI transitions to a for-profit model, with the AI company's valuation reaching $157 billion. The negotiations follow Microsoft's $13.75 billion investment since 2019 and come as OpenAI seeks to attract more investors. Recent events, including CEO Sam Altman's brief dismissal, have prompted discussions about expanding Microsoft's governance rights in the company.

Meta announced the release of new AI models, including a "Self-Taught Evaluator" that may reduce human involvement in AI development. This model relies on the "chain of thought" technique to improve accuracy in complex subjects like science, coding, and math, using entirely AI-generated data for training. Researchers believe this could lead to autonomous AI agents capable of learning from their mistakes, ultimately achieving a super-human level of intelligence.

Nvidia improves Meta's Llama model with new training approach, introducing Llama-3.1-Nemotron-70B-Instruct, optimized for helpful responses using combined training methods. The model, trained on self-generated datasets HelpSteer2 and HelpSteer2-Preference, outperformed top models like GPT-4 and Claude 3.5 Sonnet in key alignment benchmarks. Llama-3.1-Nemotron-70B-Instruct is now freely available through HuggingChat or Nvidia, showcasing significant advancements in large language model capabilities.

🪄 Other News

Byju’s, once India’s most valuable startup, is now effectively worth "zero," according to founder Byju Raveendran, who admitted to market missteps and overestimated growth. Till now it raised $5 Billion from investors like BlackRock, UBS, Lightspeed, QIA, Bond, Silver Lake, Sofina, Verlinvest, Tencent, Canada Pension Plan Investment Board, General Atlantic, Tiger Global, Owl Ventures, and World Bank’s IFC. Aggressive acquisitions and investor pullback following the 2022 market downturn led to the company's insolvency. Despite losing control, Raveendran remains hopeful for a comeback.

Amazon's AWS CEO Matt Garman defended the new five-day-per-week in-office policy, stating that those who don't support it can leave for another company. Garman said 9 out of 10 workers he spoke with back the change, emphasizing that innovation happens best in-person. Despite employee concerns about commuting, Garman highlighted that the company's goals weren't achieved under the current three-day policy.

🧐 In-Depth Insights

Sequoia on Generative AI's Next Act Sequoia Capital explores the next wave of generative AI innovations and the impact these advancements are set to have on industries across the globe.

The Future of Marketplaces An in-depth analysis of how marketplaces are evolving and what founders can learn to build successful, scalable marketplace models in the coming years.

38 Startups Have Become Unicorns in 2024 TechCrunch provides a comprehensive list of startups that have achieved unicorn status in 2024, highlighting key sectors and growth trajectories.
a16z’ 2024 Crypto Report: New data on swing states, stablecoins, AI. a16z just released their 2024 State of the Crypto report with tons of bullish and tech news!

Higher valuations and fewer IPOs are forcing VCs For Opportunity Fund. There’s been a major shift in opportunity funds as VCs adapt to frozen IPO markets and overcapitalized startups. The new playbook focuses on selective follow-on investments, secondaries, and AI-driven sectors.

5 charts: European VC dealmaking drops again, but exits offer hope. Venture capital dealmaking in Europe is pacing below last year’s numbers, but the latest data on exit and fundraising offer signs of recovery for the region’s ecosystem. These five charts from PitchBook’s Q3 2024 European Venture Report highlighting key data points tracking Europe’s recovery.

📬 Venture Daily Digest Picks

Investors looks for market opportunity and not size: How to pitch? (Read)
The Truth of Modern Y-Combinator Startups. (Read)
How To Raise Money? Advice From a Founder Who Raised $1 Billion For Startups. (Read)
Understanding LLMs from scratch using middle school math. (Read)
Valuing Pre-revenue Companies. (Read)
Don’t Say These Things During a VC Pitch. (Read)
How I Studied LLMs in Two Weeks: A Comprehensive Roadmap. (Read)
Why Do Investors Care About Team Slide Position In Your Deck? (Read)
How to make something people want. (Read)
How much should I budget for ads & marketing to seed my app with its initial users? (Read)

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