Welcome to Startups Weekly. A nuanced take on his news and trends in this week’s startup from Senior Reporter and Equity co-host. Natasha Mascarenhas. Subscribe to receive this in your inbox here.
One of the quieter conversations in venture capital has only gotten louder in my DMs and interviews over the past few months. scene.
Everyone has a story, but they all sound a bit similar: A female VC is launching a fund. She is compared to all other female VCs with funds and is either expected to invest exclusively in female founders or expected in terms of diversity, equity and inclusion. As a core paper. Even with the always homogenous group of LPs and founders who see female VCs as monolithic, some female VCs have completely rebranded their companies to be seen across genders.
Read my full opinion on this topic with Rebecca Szkutak on TC+. “For female VCs, bias is a branding issue.”
The rest of this newsletter covers Upfront Summit 2023 and some amazing better deals.As always you can follow me twitter Or continue the conversation on Instagram.
VC confab brings surprises and AI
All the top venture journalists attended the Upfront Summit 2023 this week. This is his two-day invite-only event that brings together industry insiders and celebrities to discuss the future of capital. We interviewed security guards past and present at Kapor Capital. Shaking hands with Jamie Lee Curtis, stealing interview tips from Kara Swisher. And Al Gore tried to mobilize the entire audience to take the fight against climate change more seriously.
All in all, the meeting basically inspired my story plan for the next month, so stay tuned for lots of follow-up angles…and some scoops, too. Start with a summary of AI conversations across stages.
Important reasons are: For me, AI was an ubiquitous celebrity at Upfront. Not surprising. Hyped technology often attracts a lot of interest. But the atmosphere is different in 2021, when investors were pouring billions into his 15-minute grocery delivery company and web3. Venture dry powder is locked, deals are lagging, and some investors are still licking the wounds of previous recessions.
Image credit: Clark Studio
follow up
A colleague of mine took the mic at Equity this week to talk about the latest and greatest headlines. The whole show was frenetic. What was unexpected was the return of Better.com. Earlier this week, news broke that Amazon was allowing employees to use shares to finance a home purchase or second home.
Important reasons are: This is both a creative and surprising partnership. According to a statement, Better said he has been an Amazon Web Services customer since 2015, and the company’s loan origination system is entirely software-powered. Still, Better has gone through its fair share of hardships that have cast its future into question.
Image credit: Bryce Durbin / TechCrunch
etc
Saw it on TechCrunch
Salesforce counterattack
Everything Elon Musk and management shared (and skipped) at Tesla Investor Day
Chamath Palihapitiya: It could take three years for the market to ‘correctly’ revalue late-stage cos
OpenAI launches API for ChatGPT and dedicated capacity for enterprise customers
Gamers are fixing video games ‘hijacked’ by hackers
Seen on TechCrunch+
Substack could probably grow just fine without venture capital
Pitch Deck Teardown: Gable’s $12 Million Series A Deck
Does web3 need a venture bailout now that AI has all the hype?
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