Venture capital

The Top Performing Investment Themes of 2023 ➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿ 🔝This bar graphic shows the top performing investment themes in 2023. While the S&P 500 rebounded over 24% in 2023, many investment themes soared even higher. In many ways, the year was defined by breakthrough announcements in AI and the resurgence of Bitcoin. At the same time, investors looked to nuclear energy ETFs thanks to nuclear’s growing role as a low carbon energy source. ⬆️This graphic shows the best performing investment themes...

Global VC Funding Settles Around $20B In February But AI Share Increases ➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿ 🔴Global venture capital funding reached $21.5 billion in February 2024 — flat month over month and slightly up from February 2023, Crunchbase data shows. ➡️Globally, more than $2 billion was invested in seed-stage companies last month. Close to $10 billion was invested in early-stage companies. And venture investors spent $9.3 billion at late-stage, including technology growth companie...

⭐️How Long it Took U.S. Companies to Reach a $1 Trillion Valuation ➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿ On Aug. 28, 2024, Berkshire Hathaway made history by becoming the eighth U.S. company to reach a $1 trillion market valuation. This happened early in the day, as Berkshire’s Class A shares (BRK.A) touched $699,699. 📈Berkshire has a dual-class share structure, in which Class A shares are the original stock offering which began trading in 1980. Class B shares were issued in 1996 and offer a smaller stake...

Climate investor Bay Bridge Ventures is raising a new $200 million fund, TechCrunch has exclusively learned. ➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿ 🔥Bay Bridge filed paperwork Monday for the new climate fund with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. The raise comes at a time when venture investors are increasingly bullish on climate tech. Though the last few years have been marked by a downturn in the general venture market, a number of firms have raised eye-popping sums to back climate tech founders. SOSV a...

VCs will get liquidity in 2024 from the secondary market, not IPOs ➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿ 📌In 2023, many VCs thought 2024 would see the IPO market bounce back, according to TechCrunch. Yet, with Q1 almost done, there's hardly a major IPO in sight except Reddit. Speculation about potential IPOs, like Shein and Turo, continues with little action. Despite hopes, a Reddit IPO might not kickstart a wider trend, with big names like Databricks, Stripe, and Plaid steering clear of going public this year. High in...

Mobile game market Zynga is getting acquired for 12.7 billions💸 ➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿ ➡️Zynga, the gaming giant responsible for FarmVille, Words With Friends, Zynga Poker, Mafia Wars and many others is getting bought for $12.7 billion by Take-Two Interactive, the publisher behind Grand Theft Auto and the 2K sports series, in one of the biggest video game deals ever. ➡️From its founding in 2004, until it hit one billion active users in 2012, the early years of Facebook presented an enormous opportuni...

According to sources, Lacework, which was last valued at $8.3 billion, is negotiating a sale for $150-200 million. ➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿ Lacework, a cloud security startup, is in talks to acquire Wiz for $150-200 million. 💰 ➡️The two companies have already signed a letter of intent, but the deal is not yet finalized. Competition between Lacework and Wiz is relatively low, and the deal may be based on technologies, talent, and customer acquisition. Wiz is actively engaged in discussions abo...

Musk’s xAI shows there’s more money on the sidelines for AI startups ➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿ 🔴We’re off to an AI-heavy start to the week. OpenAI has a new deal with the Financial Times that caught our eye. Sure, it’s another content licensing deal, but there appears to be a bit more in the tie-up than just content flowing one way and money the other. ➡️We also dug into the xAI news that TechCrunch broke recently: Musk’s AI enterprise is not looking to raise $3 billion on a $15 billion valuation....

European VC Atomico closes $1.24B across two funds for early- and growth-stage startups ➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿ Atomico, a prominent European venture capital firm, has raised $1.24 billion across two funds, marking its largest fundraising effort to date.✅ 👉The amounts include $485 million for "Atomico Venture VI," primarily targeting Series A-stage companies, with some allocated for seed funding, and $754 million for "Atomico Growth VI," aimed at Series B to pre-IPO stages. This separa...

Alpha Partners raises $153M third fund for pro-rata investments ➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿➿ Alpha Partners, founded by Steve Brotman in 2014, has announced a $153 million third fund, significantly larger than its previous $52 million fund from 2017.📈 The firm's unique approach involves investing alongside early-stage VCs to help them maintain ownership in promising companies as they progress into later funding rounds. This strategy has gained relevance as opportunity funds lose favor and many S...