Venture Daily Digest - 11/12/2023

🗞️ TODAY’S MAJOR UPDATES

• Mistral AI, founded by former Meta and Google researchers raised funding at $2B Valuations

• 3200 VC Backed Startups Shut-Down this year - total raised $27.2Billions

• Google’s Admit that Gemini’s Video Was Faked

• Featured Tweet: Naval’s Advice For Startup Investors In the Current Environment!

• What Do You Think: If you were to choose one sector to invest in startups in 2024, which would it be?

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💰 MASSIVE FUNDING UPDATES

Mistral AI, Paris start-up, founded by former Meta and Google researchers, has raised €385 million (about $415 million) in a funding round led by Andreessen Horowitz and Lightspeed Venture Partners. The company, valued at $2 billion, focuses on developing open-source AI technology for chatbots, search engines, and online tutors, challenging the closed-source approach of giants like OpenAI and Google. More Here

Leav, a cutting-edge startup in the mobile self-checkout industry, is proud to announce it has successfully raised $2.3M in seed funding, led by Exo10.vc, a venture capital fund steered by renowned serial entrepreneur & investor Nicolas Bouchard, known for founding DuProprio in 1997. More Here

SumUp, A Germany based fintech startup that provides payments and related services to some 4 million small businesses in Europe, the Americas and Australia, has raised €285 million (just under $307 million). Sixth Street Growth is leading this round, with previous backers Bain Capital Tech Opportunities, Fin Capital, and Liquidity Group also participating. More Here

Koho Financial, a nine-year-old Toronto neobank that offers free spending and savings accounts with instant cash back, raised a $63.2 million Series D extension round at a $588.7 million valuation. Investors included Drive Capital, Eldridge Industries, HOOPP, Portage, Round13, BDC, and TTV. More Here

Scalable Capital, a Munich startup that aims to make investing in financial markets accessible to a wider range of consumers, is putting more fuel in its tank to drive deeper into Europe. The company has raised €60 million in equity ($65 million ). A round led by Tencent, with BlackRock, HV and Tengelmann participating. More Here

Air Space Intelligence, a five-year-old San Francisco startup that has developed machine learning-powered software to help optimize aircraft flight operations, raised a $34 million Series B round led by Andreessen Horowitz, with additional participation from previous investors Bloomberg Beta, Renegade Partners, and Spark Capital. More Here

AutogenAI, a one-year-old London startup that uses AI to automate the RFP process, raised a $39.5 million Series B round co-led by Salesforce Ventures and Spark Capital, with Blossom Capital also pitching in. The company has raised a total of $65.3 million. More Here

Atla AI, a startup that is building technology to improve the truthfulness and reliability of generative AI models, raised a $5 million round led by Creandum, with Y Combinator and Rebel Fund also investing. More Here

DataCebo, a three-year-old Boston startup that claims it can build, deploy, and manage generative AI models for enterprise-grade applications when real data is limited or unavailable, raised an $8.5 million seed round co-led by Link Ventures and Zetta Venture Partners, with Uncorrelated Ventures also chipping in. More Here

Gacha Monsters, a Tokyo startup that publishes a web3 game called Poglin, raised a $3 million seed round from Animoca Brands, Infinity Ventures Crypto, FBG, and Big Time Games. More Here

InpharmD, a five-year-old Atlanta startup that assists hospitals and clinicians with literature searches, raised a $6 million seed round led by 645 Ventures, with additional investors including Atlanta Ventures, Y Combinator, Qlarant Capital, and SF ELC. More Here

Mulberri, a two-year-old startup based in Sunnyvale, Ca., that provides insurance products for SMBs, raised a $6.8 million Series A round led by Eos Venture Partners, with previous investors Hanover Technology Management, MS&AD Ventures, and Altamont Capital Partners also stepping up. More Here

Sindri, a one-year-old Denver startup that helps developers build and deploy zero-knowledge applications, raised a $5 million seed round led by CoinFund. More Here

Solvento, a two-year-old startup based in Santa Fe, Mexico, that helps businesses in the trucking industry automate and speed up their collections and payments, raised a $3.5 million seed extension led by Quona Capital and joined by Dynamo Ventures, Ironspring Ventures, Proeza Ventures, and Zenda VC. More Here

Bureo, an Oxnard, CA-based B Corp focused on providing fishermen with an end-of-life solution for discarded fishing nets, closed its Series B funding. The round was led by Toyota Tsusho Corporation and supported by Mirova, Ocean 14 Capital, Conservation International Ventures and Susquehanna Foundation. More Here

💰 VENTURE CAPITAL UPDATES

Hedge funds are packing up and leaving VC: Hedge funds that entered venture capital during the pandemic are now selling startups in secondary markets as market conditions decline. The shift is driven by the challenge of exiting private investments quickly, leading to distressed selling and a drop in VC deal activity among prominent hedge funds. With interest rates high, these funds are likely to reduce their venture participation further in 2024 and beyond, favoring other asset classes. More Here

3,200 VC-Backed Companies Go Under in ‘Difficult Year’ for Startups: Data from PitchBook shows about 3,200 venture-backed U.S. firms have gone out of business, raising $27.2 billion. Carta reports 87 firms on its platform, raising at least $10 million, shut down in 2023, double the 2022 figure. Startups face a challenging environment, emphasizing the need to prioritize profitable revenue over mere revenue growth. More Here

Harpoon Ventures, a five-year-old venture firm that invests in so-called dual use technologies — commercial products that can also be sold to federal agencies -- has garnered $125 million in capital commitments for its fourth fund, including from Andreessen Horowitz veteran Peter Levine and former Olympic swimmer Michael Phelps. The outfit's last fund closed in 2021 with $122.5 million. More Here

Tola Capital, Thirteen-year-old  which invests in in AI-enabled enterprise software, is the latest venture capital firm to announce its new fund, securing $230 million in capital commitments for its third vehicle -- its largest fund to date. More Here

𝕏 FEATURED: TODAY’S FEATURED TWEET

Naval’s Advice For Startup Investors In the Current Environment!

Recently on a podcast with AngelList’s CEO, Naval Ravikant (Founder of AngelList) shared his advice to all the startup investors saying that - “ Ignore all macro events in startup investing.. focus on.. Read More Here

→ Follow us on twitter - to get daily tactical advice from the greatest founders & Investors.

💡 STARTUP’S LATEST BUZZ

The newly minted fintech unicorns In 2024: The first unicorn is predicted to be a fintech company. Financial services dominated new unicorns in November 2023, with three fintechs—Tabby, Enable, and inCred—joining the ranks. Factors contributing to fintech success include rising interest rates, available mega-round investments, positive performance in public markets, ongoing investor interest, and innovation in areas like AI and buy now, pay later. More Here

People

Ex-Jacksonville Jaguars employee accused of stealing more than $22 million from team: A former Jacksonville Jaguars employee, Amit Patel, is facing federal charges for allegedly embezzling over $22 million from the team. Patel, who was fired in February 2023, exploited his role in financial planning, using fraudulent transactions, including purchases of a condo, Tesla, and a $95,000 watch. The Jaguars confirm no other team employees were involved in or aware of his criminal activity. More Here

OpenAI taps former Twitter India head to kickstart in the country: OpenAI is collaborating with former Twitter India head Rishi Jaitly as a senior advisor to facilitate discussions on AI policy with the Indian government. Jaitly is assisting in establishing local connections for OpenAI, which is reportedly considering India as a key market. The move reflects OpenAI's interest in the Indian market and engagement in regulatory efforts. More Here

The Washington Post, complaints from senior employees that OpenAI cofounder and CEO Sam Altman created "pockets of chaos" played a major role in the board's decision to fire him. More Here

Shutdown

Near Intelligence, a Pasadena, Ca.-based, publicly traded software firm that provides data insights to major companies including Wendy’s Co. and Ford Motor Co., filed for bankruptcy today with plans to sell itself. The outfit, which went public less than a year ago through a SPAC, listed estimated assets of at least $50 million and liabilities of $100 million. More Here

🤖 LATEST IN EMERGING TECH

Google Admits It Faked Gemini AI Demo: Google's new multimodal AI, Gemini, aimed at competing with OpenAI's GPT-4, was showcased in a demo video that reportedly misrepresented its capabilities. The video, displaying real-time conversation and object recognition, was staged with slowed-down output, and Gemini's responses were generated from still frames and text prompts, raising concerns about transparency in AI presentations. More Here

The E.U. has agreed on a new law that will require more transparency from the makers of AI chatbots and other forms of artificial intelligence. Still, the law will not take effect for at least a year, and many doubt whether it will be able to keep pace with the technology's rapid pace of growth. More Here

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

• Why it's Better To Raise Less Capital In The First Funding Round? Read More (Startups & Fundraising)

• YC Strategy 'Cash In, Cash Out, Milestones Achieved' To Raise Funding Read More (Startups)

• Jensen Huang Shared His Fundraising Experience For NVIDIA Read More (Startup)

• Startup = Growth By Paul Graham Read More (Startup)

🤔 WHAT DO YOU THINK?

Previous Poll: 52.63% readers think that - Crypto won’t be bounce back! And me too :).

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

✍️Written By Sahil R | Venture Crew Team

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