Shows
EquityFrom fintech to space tech: Robinhood co-founder Baiju Bhatt is betting on space solarAs the interest in both space and solar grows, one startup aims to merge the two industries. By tapping into the momentum of the commercial space industry and the increasing demand for renewable energy, Robinhood co-founder Baiju Bhatt is on a mission to make space-based solar power a reality with his latest startup: Aetherflux.Today on Equity, Rebecca Bellan caught up with Bhatt to talk about his transition from fintech to deep tech and why he believes now is the right time to scatter solar power-collecting satellites across the skies. Listen to the full episode t...
2025-07-0225 minEquityWhat founders need to know about tech’s growing influence in D.C.Today on TechCrunch’s Equity podcast, Rebecca Bellan caught up with Daniel Weiner, director of the Brennan Center’s Elections and Government Program, to break down what this means for startups, innovation, and democracy.
Listen to the full episode to hear more about:
How SpaceX, Palantir, and Anduril leveraged insider networks to win major defense deals.
Changing ethics safeguards, and why that matters for founders entering government spaces.
What this all means for fair competition and startups trying to break in.
Equity will be back Friday with our weekly news...
2025-05-2824 minEquityOpenAI goes all in with Jony Ive as Google plays AI catchupOpenAI just made its biggest acquisition yet, scooping up Jony Ive and Sam Altman’s secretive device startup, io, in a $6.5 billion all-equity deal. Ive, the legendary designer behind the iPhone and other iconic Apple products, will now lead creative and design work at OpenAI through his firm LoveFrom. The goal? To take AI “beyond the screen” and build a new generation of AI-powered consumer devices.
Beyond the tech, there’s a clear narrative play here. OpenAI is framing Altman as the Jobs-esque visionary and Ive as the design genius who makes it all real. Social media had a fi...
2025-05-2333 minEquityServe is betting that food delivery and access to public markets are the keys to scaling roboticsToday on Equity, Rebecca Bellan caught up with Ali Kashani, co-founder and CEO of Serve Robotics, to unpack how Serve is navigating public markets, scaling real-world robotics, and building what it hopes is the future of last-mile delivery.
Listen to the full episode to hear more about:
How Serve went from a lidar-focused startup to a publicly traded company via reverse merger in 2023
What it takes to scale a delivery fleet across cities like L.A., Miami, and Dallas
Why Kashani says Serve’s sidewalk bots collect four times more visual da...
2025-05-2130 minEquity$1 Billion a lot of money these days?Databricks just snatched up another AI company.
This week, data analytics giant announced a $1 billion acquisition of Neon, a startup building an open-source alternative to AWS Aurora Postgres. It’s the latest in a spree of high-profile buys, joining MosaicML and Tabular, as Databricks positions itself as the place to build, deploy, and scale AI-native applications.
Today, on TechCrunch’s Equity podcast, hosts Kirsten Korosec, Max Zeff, and Anthony Ha unpack the Databricks–Neon deal, where Neon’s serverless Postgres tech fits into the larger vision, and whether $1 billion still counts as “a lot of money” thes...
2025-05-1623 minEquityUnpacking Rippling vs Deel: corporate espionage and a $16B plot twistDespite courtroom chaos, Rippling is still going full steam ahead. The HR tech startup at the center of an increasingly dramatic legal battle with rival Deel just raised a fresh $450 million in funding at a $16.8 billion valuation, and launched a new “Startup Stack” to woo early-stage companies—winning over Y Combinator as both an investor and a client.
The funding lands amid the company’s high-profile legal fight with Deel, which Rippling accuses of movie-worthy corporate espionage, complete with secret crypto payments and decoy Slack channels. Deel has denied the claims and fired back with its own lawsuit...
2025-05-1422 minEquityMeta's speeding up the "Mad Men to Math Men" pipelineAt Stripe’s Sessions conference this week, Mark Zuckerberg pitched what he calls the “ultimate business machine”: a fully automated, end-to-end AI ad engine promising to replace agencies, creatives, and media buyers. You just need to connect your bank account first.
Zuckerberg claims this could be one of the most valuable AI systems ever built, generating thousands of image ads and testing them in real time, but it raises a bigger question: is this the future of advertising, or just another wave of AI slop flooding your feed?
Today, on TechCrunch’s Equity podcast, hosts Kirsten K...
2025-05-0931 minEquityStrictlyVC Download: Why Eric Slesinger, a former CIA officer, is now funding European defense techToday, we're bringing you an episode of our sister podcast, StrictlyVC Download.
StrictlyVC's Alex Gove caught up with Eric Slesinger from 201 Ventures, a venture capital firm focused on seed-stage defense tech startups in Europe. They discuss Eric's journey from CIA to investor and how he recognized the untapped potential in European defense tech while others were dismissive, and how he's working to overcome the cultural taboo that once made defense investments "bad manners" in European VC circles.
Equity will be back on Friday with our weekly news roundup, so stay tuned!
Equity is...
2025-05-0730 minEquityDamn, the Cluely ragebait got usWhat if cheating was just…the future of work? That’s the pitch behind Cluely, the viral AI startup that claims its stealthy browser overlay is “undetectable” and can help users bluff their way through everything from job interviews to exams. The company has raised $5.3 million and sparked a wave of backlash from startups building tools to catch cheaters. Cluely’s response? They’ll just build smart glasses or brain chips.
Today, on TechCrunch’s Equity podcast, hosts Kirsten Korosec, Max Zeff and Anthony Ha are getting into the week’s headlines, including whether Cluely’s viral strategy is genius...
2025-05-0229 minEquityThe rise of retail investors in secondaries, and why delayed IPOs will become the normRetail investors are increasingly shaping the secondary market. In Q4 2024, platforms like EquityZen reported that 86% of total transaction volume came from retail participants—an eye-catching shift as tools like Forge and EquityZen promise broader access to private shares.
But does more access mean more opportunity, or more risk? Today on Equity, Rebecca Bellan is joined by Jared Carmel of Manhattan Venture Partners to dig into what he calls a “once-in-a-generation opportunity” in secondaries, and why he sees this market as a “pressure relief valve” that could keep startups private well past their startup years.
Listen to the ful...
2025-04-3025 minEquityBig Tech’s antitrust cases are starting to feel like Groundhog DayToday on Equity, we're digging into the week’s headlines, from browsers and search to AI and social, and why Google and Meta's antitrust cases have us wondering if they’re really breaking up monopolies or just passing the baton to the next dominant player. Listen to the full episode to hear about:
Tesla’s massive 71% profit drop and how Elon Musk is doubling down on Tesla and AI
How Mati Carbon took home the grand prize from this year’s Xprize Carbon Removal competition
Vibe coding, Cursor, and which AI-powered coding tool OpenAI ha...
2025-04-2532 minEquityHow to survive and thrive as tariffs, AI, and politics unsettle the rules of businessTrump’s tariffs have upended global trade and created an environment of uncertainty. But this situation wasn’t created in a vacuum. The rules of business have been shifting for years as technology moves quicker than regulation, geopolitics descend into turmoil, and the law erodes and becomes weaponized. Businesses might be asking themselves, how are they meant to keep their heads above water? And what can they do to fight back? Hence AI co-founder Sean West has some answers. With a team spread across the U.K., Rwanda, the U.S., a...
2025-04-2327 minEquityIs the SPAC back?Today, on TechCrunch’s Equity podcast, hosts Kirsten Korosec, Max Zeff and Anthony Ha are unpacking the week’s news, including the possible return of the SPAC in an uncertain IPO market. It’s a curious moment for a public debut, as Kirsten points out, especially after so much chatter that 2025 would be the big comeback year for blockbuster IPOs, but some major players like Klarna and StubHub have already hit pause. And as investor Mark Goldberg put it on this week’s show, folks holding their breath for a fintech IPO wave this year “are going to be blue in th...
2025-04-1829 minEquityWe've entered an era of Fintech Maximalism according to Mark GoldbergAfter nearly a decade at Index Ventures, where he backed standout fintech companies like Plaid, Persona, Lithic, and Pilot, Mark Goldberg left to launch Chemistry, an early-stage venture firm.Founded alongside Kristina Shen and Ethan Kurzweil, the $350 million fund is part of a growing trend in venture capital: seasoned investors breaking out from large platforms to build more focused, boutique outfits.Today on Equity, Mary Ann Azevedo caught up with Goldberg about what led him to make the move, what Chemistry is all about, and how the venture landscape has evolved over the past few...
2025-04-1628 minEquityMeta's Llama drama and how Trump's tariffs could hit moonshot projectsMeta dropped three new models over the weekend: Scout, Maverick, and the still-training Behemoth, billed as the next evolution of “open-ish” AI. But instead of excitement, the response was mostly shrugs. Critics called the release underwhelming, saying it lacked the edge expected in today’s breakneck AI race. Meta’s clear attempt to claw back some attention quickly turned messy. Accusations began circulating on X and Reddit around benchmark tampering, a mystery ex-employee, and large gaps between the models’ public and private performance.Today, on TechCrunch’s Equity podcast, hosts Kirsten Korosec, Max Zeff and Anthony...
2025-04-1132 minEquitySpy games in HR tech: Inside Rippling’s wild lawsuit against DeelRippling’s latest lawsuit reads less like a legal filing and more like the plot of a corporate espionage thriller, complete with secret crypto payments, an alleged mole, and a fake Slack channel trap.This week, the HR tech startup publicly named the employee at the center of its case against its rival Deel, claiming the company paid him thousands to spy from the inside. Deel, however, is not staying quiet. The company is denying the claims, calling it a dramatic distraction from Rippling’s own legal troubles.Today, on T...
2025-04-0425 minEquityStartup Battlefield winner Salva Health is changing the game in breast cancer detectionSix years ago, while researching for a college entrepreneurship competition, Valentina Agudelo identified a troubling gap in breast cancer survival rates between Latin America and the developed world, with women in her native Colombia and the rest of the continent dying at higher rates due to late detection. Today, Agudelo is the co-founder and CEO of Salva Health, and recently took home the top prize at TechCrunch’s Startup Battlefield. On the latest episode of Equity, she joins Rebecca Bellan to discuss how her company is using the Julieta device to revolutionize early breast cancer detection. But bef...
2025-04-0223 minEquityBradley Tusk says VC is dead. But the 'fixer' in him is just getting startedAccording to Bradley Tusk, co-founder and managing partner of Tusk Venture Partners, venture capital has been “effectively dead for the last four years." A self-proclaimed “Fixer,” Tusk recently made the decision not to raise a fourth fund. Instead, he decided to go back to his roots and launch an equity-for-services firm aimed at helping early stage startups navigate tech policy and regulation.Today on Equity, Rebecca Bellan sat down with Tusk to explore his pivot from traditional VC to equity-for-services, when it’s worth the risk to ask for forgiveness rather than permission, and why he’s...
2025-03-2634 minEquityOpenAI and Microsoft’s ‘frenemies relationship,’ and what you missed at SXSWThis week, OpenAI inked a five-year, $11.9 billion deal with CoreWeave, the GPU-heavy cloud provider, securing its own AI computing pipeline—and a $350 million equity stake in the company.With CoreWeave’s pending IPO and deep ties to Microsoft, OpenAI’s deal marks a significant shift in the AI cloud wars. Today, on TechCrunch’s Equity podcast, hosts Kirsten Korosec, Max Zeff, Anthony Ha, and Rebecca Bellan are diving into whether or not the deal is a power move against Microsoft or just an inevitable step in OpenAI’s bid for more compute, key deals of the week, and what y...
2025-03-1430 minEquityReimagining urban infrastructure with AI and AutodeskToday on Equity, we’re taking you to Austin, Texas, for South by Southwest, where Rebecca Bellan caught up with Dara Treseder, Chief Marketing Officer at Autodesk, and Mayor Matt Mahan of San Jose, to discuss how technology is transforming urban spaces and building the cities of the future.The panel dug into how cities today are using AI to improve traffic and safety, why digital twins can help make cities more resilient to climate disasters, and how cities can integrate data centers into the fabric of their urban landscapes, among other topics. It’s a timely disc...
2025-03-1335 minEquityThe California AI bill is back, and it lost its teethCalifornia’s most controversial AI safety bill of 2024 might be dead, but its author isn't backing down. State Senator Scott Weiner is back with SB 53, a new AI bill that strips away the most debated parts of last year’s failed legislation while keeping key whistleblower protections and a public cloud computing initiative called CalCompute.With the AI industry and even the federal government shifting away from AI safety regulation in favor of innovation, will the bill gain any traction? Today, on TechCrunch’s Equity podcast, hosts Kirsten Korosec, Max Zeff and Anthony Ha are unpacking the latest...
2025-03-0729 minEquityIs Silicon Valley still the best place for startups? Insight Partners’ Ryan Hinkle doesn’t think soToday on Equity, Julie Bort sits down with Ryan Hinkle a Managing Director at Insight Partners, the giant New York-based venture capital firm that invests in tech worldwide. It has $90 billion in assets under management and just raised a new $12.5 billion fund.The pair unpack the evolving landscape of startup ecosystems. They talk about the post-pandemic shift that saw many founders moving to cities like New York or Miami only for the rise of OpenAI and Cerebral Valley and the accompanying AI boom to reignite San Francisco and Silicon Valley in general. While some founders s...
2025-03-0528 minEquityEvery year, it seems like there's at least one big YC controversyToday, on TechCrunch’s Equity podcast, hosts Kirsten Korosec, Max Zeff and Anthony Ha are breaking down the week’s biggest stories, including the Optifye.ai controversy, the wider concerns about AI in labor, and why this demo could be a glimpse of what's coming next.Listen to the full episode to hear about:
Amazon’s Alexa unveiling this week in NYC, and why an AI-enabeled Alexa+ could make the competition sweat
Why the departure of Lucid Motors' CEO Peter Rawlinson is raising concerns about the company's future
Bridgetown Research’s $19 million raise to automa...
2025-02-2828 minEquityHow Gradient Ventures is Shaping the AI Startup Landscape with Eylul KayinToday on Equity, Mary Ann Azevedo sits down with Eylul Kayin, a partner at Gradient Ventures, to dive into the evolving AI startup landscape. The pair dig into what makes a successful AI startup, the importance of quality product offerings, and the fast-moving nature of AI innovation. Listen to the full episode to hear more about:
Key challenges founders face, from building strong customer relationships to navigating technical hurdles.
Gradient Ventures’ approach to funding and supporting AI startups, especially how to strike a balance between vertical expertise and rapid product development.
Eylul's experience as a judge for...
2025-02-2627 minEquityAI Wearables 1.0: Was Humane’s AI Pin too ambitious?Humane’s AI Pin, which promised to replace your smartphone with a sleek wearable device, is officially dead. After a rocky launch, negative reviews, and returns outpacing sales, the startup is shutting down and selling its assets to HP for $116 million – less than half of what it raised. But what’s next for Humane’s tech?On today's episode of Equity, hosts Kirsten Korosec, Max Zeff and Anthony Ha are breaking down the week’s tech and startup headlines, including what HP might do with Humane’s resources and talent and how, as Max put it, the AI Pin was c...
2025-02-2129 minEquityHow Slow Ventures is giving the creator economy a rebrandLast week, the team at early-stage VC firm Slow Ventures launched its new $60 million fund entirely focused on investing in content creators.Today on Equity, Rebecca Bellan sits down with Lightcap to dive into YouTube remains the dominant platform for serious creators,how niche community trust translates into scalable businesses, and what this new fund means for the creator economy.Listen to the full episode to hear more about:
How this new asset class has the potential to scale.
The firm’s success stories so far, including Marina Mogilko’s baby snack company and other ventures.
The...
2025-02-1923 minEquityElon Musk and Sam Altman are basically in a rap battleTensions are running high in the AI world this week after Elon Musk made a staggering $97.4 billion bid to buy OpenAI, a move that would mark one of the largest tech acquisitions in history – if it actually happens. Sam Altman shut the notion down fast, even going so far as to fire back with a post suggesting he’d buy X for a tenth of the price. But Musk’s bid itself does raise questions about potential roadblocks ahead for OpenAI.Today, on TechCrunch’s Equity podcast, hosts Kirsten Korosec, Max Zeff and Anthony Ha are breaking down the...
2025-02-1430 minEquitySheel Mohnot says the fintech market is ‘hot again’“The fintech market is hot again,” said Sheel Mohnot, fintech investor and founder of Better Tomorrow Ventures (BTV). “And we are going to see some more exits in the near future.” According to recent reports, fintech funding is on the rise, with global investment hitting $60 billion in the first half of the year alone, marking a significant rebound from the previous year’s dip. Mohnot – whose X account you’ve likely come across if you follow fintech – has invested in over 100 deals throughout the years, primarily in fintech, and co-founded the accelerator program The Mint. On today’s episode...
2025-02-1229 minEquityAre companies falling out of love with OpenAI?Humanoid robotics company Figure raised eyebrows this week when it announced it would be stepping away from a partnership with OpenAI in favor of building its own in-house AI models. Figure CEO Brett Adcock alluded to a “major breakthrough” in their own process and plans to unveil “something no one has ever seen on a humanoid” in the coming month. Figure isn’t the only company experimenting with non-OpenAI solutions either. Just last week, researchers from Stanford and the University of Washington demonstrated that it’s possible to train a highly capable “reasoning” model for under $50 in cloud compute cre...
2025-02-0729 minEquityDeepSeek: separating fact from hypeToday, we’re bringing you a bonus episode zeroing in on DeepSeek, the Chinese AI lab that’s recently taken over the news and the app stores, beating out OpenAI's ChatGPT. Max Zeff is talking about it all with Ion Stoica, Professor of Computer Science Division at UC Berkeley and the cofounder and executive chairman of software startup Databricks.Listen to the full episode to hear more about:
Why Stoica believes the future of AI lies in "doubling down on open source."
Microsoft's decision to host DeepSeek on Azure.
What the U.S. can do to fost...
2025-02-0125 minEquityDeepSeek lights a fire under Silicon ValleyDeepSeek, DeepSeek, DeepSeek. We couldn’t escape the headlines around the Chinese AI lab this week. The startup -- which claims to have built its models more efficiently and at a fraction of the cost of competitors -- lit a fire under Silicon Valley after releasing its R1 “reasoning” model and displacing ChatGPT as the App Store’s top app. Today, on TechCrunch’s Equity podcast, hosts Kirsten Korosec, Margaux MacColl and Max Zeff are digging into the latest news, including the reactions from both tech giants and the U.S. government, which is increasingly concerned that China is p...
2025-01-3129 minEquityForget ‘Founder Mode,’ what about Customer Mode?You might have noticed in your time online that a lot of the services and the websites that you’re using are kind of getting…worse. The good news, though, is that this means that there are different sectors that are ripe for disruption. On today’s episode of Equity, Rebecca's joined by Ed Zitron —CEO of EZPR, host of the Better Offline podcast, and author of Why Everything Stopped Working—to dig into why this shift is happening and what it means for startups.Listen to the full episode to hear the pair discuss:
Why it’s...
2025-01-2936 minEquityHow are founders positioning themselves for the next 4 years?Today, on TechCrunch’s Equity podcast, hosts Kirsten Korosec, Margaux MacColl and Anthony Ha are digging into the latest tech and startup news from inauguration week in the U.S., including the new administration’s approach to startups and the potential transparency challenges that come with it. Listen to the full episode to hear about:
TikTok’s rapid return and which apps are waiting in the wings – just in case.
What is Stargate, and why are OpenAI, SoftBank, Oracle and others committing $100 billion to the project?
Why some shareholders are walking away from Divvy Homes’ acquisition with nothin...
2025-01-2433 minEquityAI's $100 billion impact: 2024’s venture capital surge and the road ahead for startupsToday on Equity, Julie Bort sits down with Crunchbase News’ Senior Data Editor, Gené Teare, to dive deeper into the year’s slight growth in investment, which reached $314 billion, up from $304 billion in 2023. The pair explores how AI became a dominant force in the landscape. As Teare puts it, “Tech rides on bubbles. What bubbles tell you is that if everyone's putting dollars into a certain sector, it means there are very big outcomes coming.”Listen to the full episode to hear more about:
The surge of AI investment and what it signals for the future
The chall...
2025-01-2225 minEquity$200M woolly mammoths and a farewell to TikTokThe clock is set to run out on TikTok over the weekend, following the Supreme Court’s ruling to uphold the ban. So, what’s next for the video-sharing app’s 170 million U.S. users?On today’s episode of TechCrunch’s Equity podcast, hosts Kirsten Korosec, Margaux MacColl and Anthony Ha dive into the week’s biggest stories, including where all the ‘TikTok refugees’ are heading. Many are flocking to Chinese apps like RedNote and Lemon8, with some even turning to Duolingo to brush up on their Mandarin as they search for new digital homes.Listen to the...
2025-01-1732 minEquity$5B livestream shopping apps, Nvidia reveals, and the weirdest tech at CESAs CES 2025 comes to a close, TechCrunch’s Equity podcast hosts Kirsten Korosec, Margaux MacColl, Anthony Ha, and Max Zeff are back on the mic to discuss the week's top news, the tech that caught their eye, and the companies still figuring out AI.Listen to the full episode to hear:
What's driving Meta's push for “more speech, fewer mistakes” as it ends its third-party fact-checking program.
Livestream shopping app Whatnot's $265M raise, and which companies could be capitalizing on livestream shopping next.
Who is Peterson Conway, and why is he defense tech’s wildest power broker...
2025-01-1035 minEquityEmpathy-driven investing with Erin and Sara FosterToday, we’re bringing you a conversation TechCrunch senior reporter Dominic Madori-Davis had with Sara and Erin Foster along with their advisor at Oversubscribed Ventures, Phil Schwarz. Across their careers, the Foster sisters have co-founded the clothing line Favorite Daughter, co-led creative for Bumble Bizz and Bumble BFF, and currently co-host their own podcastListen to the full episode to hear:
How the Foster sisters made their pivot to VC.
Which investments excites Oversubscribed Ventures the most.
How they balance all of the different facets of their careers.
Equity is TechCrunch’s flag...
2024-12-2620 minEquityAre AI companies just defense tech now?This week, the Equity pod gang — which included newcomer Max Zeff, Margaux MacColl, and Kirsten Korosec — noticed an emerging trend: the worlds of AI and defense tech are colliding. Listen to the full episode to hear about:
A new fund is in town. And surprise, surprise, Humba Ventures' $40 million fund is focused on deep tech and defense.
How enterprise AI startup Cohere is unlike all the other AI startups out there, and why they've been so quiet. Particularly in this new deal with Palantir.
Dig into the great philosophical question of 2024: is it dumb to IPO in an...
2024-12-2031 minEquityIt's the end of the road for Cruise, and Bluesky is still taking offToday, on TechCrunch’s Equity podcast, hosts Kirsten Korosec, Anthony Ha and Margaux MacColl are unpacking the week’s news, including GM’s decision to give up on self-driving startup Cruise. The choice initially came as a shock considering the $10 billion GM pumped into the company over the years, but it became clearer when examining Cruise’s tumultuous 2023 and 2024. Listen to the full episode to hear about:
Freysa.ai’s public challenge and what’s motivating users to make the AI chat bot fall in love with them.
Why VCs are lining up to back Lumen Orbit’s moons...
2024-12-1336 minEquityWho knew you could get a $500 million valuation without launching a product?AI agent startup /dev/agents announced a massive $56M seed round, putting the company’s valuation at a whopping $500 million. The amount is impressive given the company won’t have a first version of its product available until at least early next year. The reason behind investors’ trust, however, becomes a bit clearer when you consider the founders’ pedigree: /dev/agents’ co-founders were both on Google’s Android team during the early days of the smartphone era.The round, as well as whether or not to include “slash” when pronouncing the company’s name, was the first of ma...
2024-12-0629 minEquityAerospace Corp's CEO talks literal moonshots and Space Agenda 2025At this year's TechCrunch Disrupt in San Francisco, President and CEO of the Aerospace Corporation Steve Isakowitz and Agency Chief Technologist at NASA A.C. Charanya Charania took the stage to discuss a literal moonshot: how to build a thriving lunar ecosystem. Today on Equity, we’re taking you behind the scenes of TechCrunch Disrupt once again, this time with Devin Coldewey at the helm. For those keeping track, Devin’s kept the Equity podcast crew up to date on space startups over the past few months, including Starfish Space’s $29 million round and, more recently, SpaceX’s second c...
2024-11-2712 minEquityThe AI industry's 'next big bet,' and should we just buy Chrome?Today, on TechCrunch’s Equity podcast, hosts Kirsten Korosec, Devin Coldewey and Margaux MacColl dig into the week’s tech and startup news, including what a new scaling method could mean for AI startups if it works and for chip providers if it fails.Listen to the full episode to hear about:
The DOJ’s latest proposal for Google: it should divest its Chrome browser. While we wait for a break in the monopoly case and a better search alternative to arise, the Equity crew thinks that Wiz might’ve been on to something when they said no...
2024-11-2230 minEquityBuilding trust in crypto with Jonathan Levin of ChainalysisLate last week, U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission chair Gary Gensler said that he was “proud to serve” the agency, which some are taking as a hint at an upcoming resignation. Gensler has faced heavy criticism for his crackdown on crypto, including a recent lawsuit from 18 states, and is likely to be replaced under President-Elect Donald Trump who has vowed to oust Gensler. On Tuesday, the Wall Street Journal reported that Trump is meeting with Brian Armstrong, the CEO of crypto exchange Coinbase, to discuss potential personnel appointments. Today on Equity, we're bringing you an interview betwe...
2024-11-2019 minEquityBen Horowitz’s cozy relationship with the LVMPD - and why it mattersOver the last few years, VC Ben Horowitz has donated at least $7.6 million to fund police department purchases - including the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department’s new drones from a16z-backed Skydio. Skydio is not the first of a16z’s portfolio companies to benefit from these donations, either.Today, on TechCrunch’s Equity podcast, hosts Kirsten Korosec, Devin Coldewey and Margaux MacColl dug into the implications of Horowitz’s approach and why others in the VC world should maybe hold off on praising the controversial move.Listen to the full episode to hear about:
2024-11-1526 minEquityMarc Benioff says it’s ‘crazy talk’ that AI will hurt SalesforceToday on Equity, TechCrunch Editor Julie Bort is sitting down with Marc Benioff, the CEO of Salesforce and one of the tech industry’s biggest hype men, about his latest work with Time Ventures and Salesforce Ventures, and why he thinks AI agents are the next big thing for enterprise software. Listen to the full episode to hear about:
The impact of AI on customer experience
The application of AI agents in the healthcare space - and what it could mean for data privacy
Marc's thoughts on Salesforce competitor Microsoft's Copilot
The range of gadgets that have...
2024-11-1334 minEquityTrump's election throws tech regulation a curveballA tech regulation shakeup is on the way with President-elect Donald Trump set to take office in January. Trump has made it clear that he plans to dismantle Biden’s AI policies on "day one," aligning himself with those who’ve pushed back against regulation. Today on TechCrunch’s Equity podcast, hosts Kirsten Korosec, Devin Coldewey and Margaux MacColl dove into what Trump’s win could mean for AI policy and innovation moving forward.While AI is always on the mind these days, there was so much more startup and venture news for the Equity crew to get into...
2024-11-0830 minEquityHow startups can get a foot in the door of government contracts, according to Dcode CapitalToday on Equity, we’re taking you backstage at TechCrunch Disrupt. Rebecca Bellan caught up with Rebecca Gevalt, Managing Partner at Dcode Capital following their onstage discussion about the boom in national interest startups. Also on the panel was Topher Haddad, CEO of satellite imagery startup Albedo, and Kai Klepfer, CEO of biometric gun startup Biofire. Tune in to hear Bellan and Gevalt dive deeper into how startups can get a foot in the door of government contracts. Check out the full onstage conversation here, and Equity will be back on Friday!Equity is TechCrunch’s flag...
2024-11-0621 minEquityRocket Lab Founder Peter Beck's vision for the space industry's futureAs the founder and CEO of Rocket Lab, Peter Beck is a familiar face to anyone in the space industry. But the company's ambitions go far beyond its popular Electron launch vehicle.Today, we're bringing you an interview from TechCrunch Disrupt when Devin Coldewey sat down with Beck to discuss his belief that to thrive, perhaps even to survive, space companies will have to become fully integrated one-stop shops.Equity is TechCrunch’s flagship podcast, produced by Theresa Loconsolo, and posts every Wednesday and Friday. Subscribe to us on Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify and...
2024-11-0124 minEquityEquity Live: Bret Taylor’s $4.5 billion startup and Waymo’s $5.6 billion roundThe Equity crew was live at TechCrunch Disrupt 2024! Hosts Kirsten Korosec, Devin Coldewey and Margaux MacColl took over the Builders Stage to kick off day 2 of Disrupt with no shortage of conference highlights, startups deals and venture news to chew through.Listen to the full episode to hear about:
Devin’s plans to go to space thanks to his chat with Rocket Lab Founder Peter Beck.
What Sierra, the AI startup co-founded by Bret Taylor, plans to do with its fresh $175 million funds.
Waymo’s who’s who of Silicon Valley round, and why Kirsten’s routing...
2024-10-3029 minEquityStripe's biggest acquisition yet, and what's a16z doing with all of those Nvidia GPUs?It’s no secret that Stripe has doubled down on its crypto offerings, enabling crypto purchases in the EU back in July and announcing a Pay with Crypto feature earlier this month. This week, the fintech giant made its dedication to crypto even clearer with its largest deal to date: its acquisition of stablecoin platform Bridge for an eye-popping $1.1 billion. Today on TechCrunch’s Equity podcast, hosts Kirsten Korosec, Anthony Ha and Devin Coldewey kicked off the show with their thoughts on the deal – mainly how surprising it is to see anyone spending over $1 billion on crypto in 2024.But...
2024-10-2531 minEquityThe race isn’t over for European AI startups, according to Accel Parther Philippe Botteri“It's a bit too early to say that the race is over,” said Philippe Botteri when asked about European startups’ AI progress. “I think we're just at the very early innings of this race.” Botteri is a partner at early-stage investment firm Accel with over 13 years under his belt at the firm, leading investments in DocuSign, UiPath and more recently Snyk and Chainalysis. Today on TechCrunch’s Equity podcast, host Rebecca Bellan caught up Botteri to dive deep into Accel’s Euroscape 2024 Report. Tapping into Botteri’s experience in Cloud, SaaS security, and enterprise sectors, the pair discuss AI's risi...
2024-10-2326 minEquityInvestor FOMO is back, and what's happening with WordPress and WP Engine?Today on Equity, Devin, Margaux and Anthony Ha are rounding up the week's startup and venture news, kicking things off with a look at the $400 million raised by Lightmatter, and the importance of fast networking within the fast growing datacenter industry today — not just in years to come — makes the impressive round a little more understandable.Our Deals of the Week continue with Paladin's drone play for first responders and police, and Abel aiming to reduce the substantial paperwork backlog that officers accrue in their everyday duties. Abel Founder Daniel Francis brings a chaotic energy (having landed a Tw...
2024-10-1836 minEquityTesla’s bot non-disclosure and why humanoid robots are taking offAt Tesla’s robotaxi reveal event last week, several Optimus humanoid robots mingled with guests, pouring drinks and cracking jokes. Impressive technology, but the vocals and some of the gesticulations appear to have been remotely controlled by humans, something Tesla did not disclose. Today on Equity, Rebecca Bellan chatted with TechCrunch’s hardware editor Brian Heater about Tesla’s Optimus bots, the market opportunity for humanoid robots, and other companies that are leading the charge in this industry. We'll dive into:
A CBInsights report which found that funding in 2024 already reached new highs for humanoid...
2024-10-1627 minEquityAI ‘no one wants’ and Google’s potential breakupDid OpenAI really ask its investors to avoid backing rivals like Anthropic and xAI? That’s what hosts Devin Coldewey, Margaux MacColl and special guest Anthony Ha wanted to know on today’s episode of TechCrunch’s Equity podcast. The team kicked off the show with a look at OpenAI's $6.6 billion round, which is being called the ‘largest VC round of all time’. Devin broke down what the funding could mean for the company’s path to profitability, and debunked some of the rumors floating around post-announcement - especially given how unusual those investor restrictions would be in later-stage funding.
2024-10-1130 minEquityInvestors are betting on user-generated content, and Gamebeast's founder explains whyToday on Equity, Rebecca Bellan sat down with Zander Brumbaugh, the 22-year-old founder of Gamebeast, a startup that offers Roblox developers tools like A/B testing and LiveOps to modify games without needing to release a new version or interrupt a user’s ongoing game. Gamebeast recently raised a $3.7 million pre-seed round, led by J2 Ventures with participation from a16z’s Speedrun accelerator, which Brumbaugh graduated from in March. Brumbaugh said everything from his experience consulting for entertainment studios like Netflix, and writing a best-selling book on Roblox development, to chats with investors tell him that the f...
2024-10-0927 minEquityYC takes a bite out of PearAI, and French startups have a new homeKirsten Korosec, Devin Coldewey, and Margaux MacColl are unpacking another busy week in the tech world, kicking things off with Governor Newsom’s veto of SB 1047, the controversial AI bill aimed at stopping real-world disasters caused by AI systems before they happen. This may not be the last we'll see of the bill, however, as its author has plans to return with a revamped SB 1047 next year.What else went down this week, you ask? Kirsten had us looking to the skies with Joby Aviation’s $500 million investment from Toyota. While Toyota seems to believe that the elec...
2024-10-0431 minEquityGreen flags for defense tech and Silicon Valley's longevity obsessionEquity is closing out the week as always with a round up of the week's top startup and venture news. Kirsten, Devin and return guest host Margaux McColl had no shortage of themes to cover: VC karaoke, the SpaceX economy, no moats for AI, OpenAI versus open source.To kick things off, we weighed in on Caroline Ellison's sentencing and deals of the week from Reflect Orbital and Pyka. Of course, we had to dive deep into Y Combinator's Summer 2024 Demo Day cohort from there - including a highlight of a few non-AI and AI startups that...
2024-09-2729 minEquityThe hydrogen plateau and IRA funding crutch with Toyota Ventures' Lisa CocaToday on Equity, Rebecca Bellan sits down with Lisa Coca from Toyota Ventures during Climate Week NYC to discuss a key part of Toyota Ventures' $800 million portfolio - their Climate Fund. The fund's $300 million is laser-focused on climate innovation, but Coca says it casts a wide net beyond just mobility, backing startups from seed to Series A. So far, they’ve invested in companies like AM Batteries, which is cutting battery manufacturing costs by 40%, and Ecoletro, pioneers in green hydrogen production using hydropower.Together, Bellan and Coca are shedding light on the significant challenges in hyd...
2024-09-2521 minEquity'Super weird' is the best way to describe this startup's pivotThis week on Equity, the podcast crew discusses several weird things and at least one cool thing.Kirsten Korosec, Devin Coldewey, and Rebecca Bellan first talked about the least weird thing of the week, how nice it is that Cohere co-founder Nick Frosst has a band that people really like.Then we get weird. First the good weird: a helmet that squeezes your head, but for a really good reason. It prevents hair loss from chemotherapy. Devin covered Luminate’s latest fundraise and news, and everyone was pleased that money was going to a startup th...
2024-09-2025 minEquityJP Morgan's head of startup banking says 'Founder Mode' won't get you a unicornToday on Equity, Kirsten Korosec is joined by J.P. Morgan’s Head of Startup Banking, Ashraf Hebela. Prior to joining J.P. Morgan, Hebela spent 13 years at Silicon Valley Bank, a bulk of those years dedicated to serving as SVB's head of banking. With over a decade in the startup world, he’s got some serious insights to share.Following the recent release of J.P. Morgan’s Startup Insights report, Kirsten wanted to dive into what it really takes to build a unicorn in 2024, and what parts of the startup ecosystem are seeing success beyond AI and...
2024-09-1832 minEquityAI's tween years, who's taking over climate tech, and the latest for Fearless FundWhat could be more frightening than Friday the 13th? How about a realization that AI is in its awkward tween stage? At least, it was for the TC Equity pod crew, which this week included hosts Devin Coldewey and Kirsten Korosec along with TC reporters Tim de Chant and Dominic Madori Davis.AI is often a topic over here at Equity Pod; and this week was no different. It seems to be everywhere — and nowhere — all at once. Take Apple, for instance. As Coldewey noted on the show Apple has punted on AI. The tech giant is tout...
2024-09-1334 minEquityAI illusions and navigating The Money Trap with Alok SamaToday on Equity, Former SoftBank Group International President Alok Sama joins Rebecca Bellan ahead of the launch of his new book THE MONEY TRAP: Lost Illusions Inside the Tech Bubble. Here's what the pair got into:
What Apple's AI announcements could mean for startup innovation and companies like ARM and Nvidia
Concerns about the circularity of investments and unusual follow-on rounds led by VCs.
IPO alternatives in a slow public market
High valuations, the risk of over-investment and how to know when a bubble is going to pop.
Equity will be back on Friday, so stay tuned!
2024-09-1126 minEquityEquity Shot: Here's what you missed at Apple's 'Glowtime' eventDon’t have an hour and forty minutes to devote to watching the replay of Apple’s 'Glowtime' event? As expected, the show was packed with AI announcements, from new chips to creative features. TechCrunch Minute's Amanda Silberling is taking over to catch you up in just a few minutes. Equity will be back with a deeper dive on how startups can compete with Apple's latest move, so stay tuned!Equity is TechCrunch’s flagship podcast, produced by Theresa Loconsolo, and posts every Wednesday and Friday. Subscribe to us on Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify and all the cas...
2024-09-1003 minEquityTelegram founder's arrest, and who's using acqui-hires to tip-toe around antitrustToday on Equity, Devin Coldeway kicked off our Deals of the Week rundown with Piramidal, a startup which offers a foundational model for analyzing brain scan data that just raised $6 million, as his deal of the week. The premise behind the company is a fascinating one in that its technology aims to help complement the work of nurses and doctors in neural ICUs by helping identify signs of things like an epileptic episode, or a stroke.Mary Ann Azevedo wanted to talk about Comun, a neobank serving Latino immigrants in the U.S. with financial services and b...
2024-08-3031 minEquityAre Google's monopoly cases 5 years too late or 2 years too early?When US District Court Judge Amit Mehta found that Google had acted illegally to maintain its monopoly in online search, it was seen as a major defeat for Google. The decision could alter the way the tech giant does business, shake up opportunities for search startups, and even change the structure of the internet. While Google plans to appeal either way, there's another antitrust case coming up the pipeline: the DOJ and eight states are accusing Google of creating an advertising technology monopoly that squashes competition, forces publishers and advertisers to use Google's ad tech products. On t...
2024-08-2822 minEquityAI talent managers, technocapitalist college towns, and a rise in defense tech acquisitionsIn this Friday’s episode of TechCrunch’s Equity podcast Mary Ann Azevedo, Devin Coldewey, and Equity's newest voice Margaux MacColl are here to discuss three major deals of the week. First up is the $80 million round for Story, which is trying to apply that ol' web3 magic to AI and talent management. Next, Mary Ann attempts to untangle the knotty, weird term sheet for Bolt: $450 million. But is that real money or "marketing credits"? And the Margaux explained Balaji Srinivasan's private island "technocapitalist college town" where "those with a fondness for the current world order need not apply."
2024-08-2329 minEquityIs there a right way to regulate AI? (w. Helen Toner)What is the right way to regulate AI? There appears to be as many different answers to that as there are regulators. On today's episode of Equity, we're bringing you a live interview from TechCrunch's recent Strictly VC event. Equity co-host Becca Szkutak sat down with Helen Toner, the director of strategy and foundational research grants from the Center of Security and Emerging Technology and a former board member of OpenAI. The pair discussed companies' ability to self-regulate, what impact regulation could have on startup innovation and so much more. Equity is TechCrunch’s flagship podcast, produced by...
2024-08-2118 minEquityAI for landlords, Grok-2 unleashed, and the latest attempt at AI regulationThis week on Equity Kirsten Korosec and Mary Ann Azevedo were joined by one of TechCrunch’s resident AI experts, Devin Coldewey. They broke down their deals of the week: WeRide, a Chinese autonomous vehicle startup, seeking an initial public offering in the United States at a $5 billion valuation, EliseAI, the company offering AI solutions to landlords, raised $75 million and became a unicorn, and Grok-2 is now available on X but it will cost you.Then the team got into a couple recent startup shutdowns: Tally and Score. Tally was a nine-year-old fintech that helped consumers manage an...
2024-08-1632 minEquityFound: Getting realistic about AI’s potential with Nick Frosst from CohereEnterprise AI is booming so it’s no wonder that, as companies figure out how to implement it, the industry of AI infrastructure is emerging. This week, Equity is bringing you an episode of our sister show, Found. Becca and Dom talk to Nick Frosst from Cohere, the AI company building natural language models for enterprise customers. They discuss why Frosst thinks the AI boom isn’t built on a bubble, whether or not AI companies are building toward a “digital god”, and how AI regulation could be a good thing. Equity is TechCrunch’s flagship podcast, produced by...
2024-08-1438 minEquityMaybe it's a good thing that we're not seeing too many AI unicornsIn this Friday’s episode of TechCrunch’s Equity podcast, Kirsten Korosec, Mary Ann Azevedo and Becca Szkutak kick off the show dissecting a bill which aims to regulate AI at the model level. Naturally, some VCs and founders as well as students and professors are in an uproar about it. But we have to ask, is regulation in the name of safety such a bad thing? Short answer: It depends.Then the trio got into the deals of the week, including OpenAI’s potential new investment in webcam maker Opal. We also discussed some major changes at the...
2024-08-0931 minEquityFlourish Ventures on repeat founders, emerging markets, and when not to hop on the AI bandwagonIn today’s episode of Equity Podcast, Mary Ann Azevedo talked to Flourish Ventures co-founders Tilman Ehrbeck, Emmalyn Shaw and Arjuna Costa about a variety of topics, including how their investment themes have evolved in the past 5 years and what trends they’re most excited about today. We also got their opinion on M&A deals in fintech, AI and founder wellness, among other things.The trio founded Flourish Ventures in 2019 and now the evergreen firm has $850 million under management, last raising a $350 million fund in October of 2023. Flourish invests all over the world, backing fintech startups in t...
2024-08-0726 minEquityGlobal startup funding is picking up with AI still in the spotlightGlobal startup funding was up 16% in the second quarter, according to Crunchbase data, led by an uptick in mega-rounds. That increase was led, unsurprisingly, by the AI sector. Funding to companies in AI made up 30% of all dollars invested and actually doubled quarter over quarter to $24 billion.On today's episode of TechCrunch's Equity podcast, Mary Ann was joined by Gené Teare, a Senior Data Editor at Crunchbase and Crunchbase News, to talk through the numbers. Teare is a well-known analyst of the global venture capital market, and was instrumental to Crunchbase’s early life and remains one of...
2024-07-3125 minEquityAlphabet is clearly looking to buy, so who's selling, and why did Wiz say no?This week felt like two weeks rolled into one. To kick things off, Mary Ann Azevedo walked everyone through Clio’s huge fundraise. The Canadian legal tech company raised $900 million at a $3 billion valuation — a very large sum anytime, but especially in this market. Impressively, the company is still growing rapidly, which isn't easy to do when you’re at such a late stage. We talked about the drivers behind that growth and how Clio differs from other legal tech startups raising capital these days.Next up, Mary Ann and Rebecca Szkutak discussed Alphabet’s announcement this week tha...
2024-07-2633 minEquityCracking the AI and consumer code with early Zoom-backer Maven VenturesMaven Ventures General Partner Sara Deshpande has been investing in the consumer tech space for a decade.Over time, the seed-stage venture firm has backed the likes of Zoom, Cruise, Hello Heart, Perplexity and x.AI and has grown to over $200 million in assets under management.Now, with a new $60 million fund — and plans to write six to eight checks of up to $1.5 million each year — Deshpande joined TechCrunch senior reporter Mary Ann Azevedo on Equity to discuss the changes in the consumer landscape, how her firm is doubling down on artificial intelligence and what make...
2024-07-2426 minEquityIf the music stops, what startup gets a chair? Renegade Partners' co-founders are finding outRenegade Partners co-founders Renata Quintini and Roseanne Wincek have seen it all in their careers — notably over the past four years when they launched their first fund as the COVID pandemic took hold and navigated the economic roller coaster that followed. Now, with a second $128 million fund — and a plan to write checks of up to $10 million into 20 startups — Quintini and Wincek join TechCrunch editor Kirsten Korosec on Equity to discuss those early days of their first fund, what they look for in a startup and what’s driving the shift away from megafunds.Equity is TechCr...
2024-07-1729 minEquityGoogle’s talks to buy Wiz, and the gap between AI spending and AI revenueOn today’s episode of Equity, Rebecca Bellan explored Google’s reported talks to acquire Wiz, a cloud security company, for around $23 billion. Wiz provides an “all-in-one approach to cloud security,” pulling data from Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure, Google Cloud and others, then scanning it all for security risk factors – something that Google might see as a good way to fortify its own cloud business, which grew 28% to $9.57 billion in Q1 this year. We also discussed a letter from OpenAI whistleblowers who say the AI company has placed illegal restrictions on how employees can communicate with government...
2024-07-1508 minEquityFloodgate's Mike Maples says startups that people 'don't like' may be the best ones to backMike Maples Jr. is a prolific angel investor and co-founder of early-stage venture firm Floodgate. Over the years, he’s taken a lot of bets. Some have paid off handsomely (Twitter, Twitch, Lyft and Bazaarvoice, for example). Others have not.On today's episode of Equity, Mary Ann sat down with Mike to dig into a number of topics, including some of his most memorable investments, the one that got away, what he looks for when evaluating startups that pitch him - and what Godzilla has to do with it. We also talked a bit about his new bo...
2024-07-1029 minEquityA new trend for Seed VCs, and the scariest part about OpenAI's data breachOn today's episode of Equity, we're taking a look at news you might've missed over the holiday weekend here in the U.S., starting with the recent OpenAI security breach. While it doesn't seem that people have to be too worried about what the hackers actually accessed, the fact that it happened is worth paying attention to. TechCrunch's Devin Coldeway argues that AI companies are treasure troves of data and will likely become more of a target for hackers. Companies that work with the large AI companies should pay attention. We also had an update on Fisker’s s...
2024-07-0806 minEquityJon McNeill on VC 2.0 and creating startups in houseWhat’s the common thread between Tesla, building startups, General Motors, venture capital and Lyft? Jon McNeill, co-founder and partner of DVx Ventures, joins TechCrunch editor Kirsten Korosec on Equity to discuss how Elon Musk’s pay package has influenced founders, when it makes sense to go light on cash and heavy on equity, and his firm’s unique approach to investing that eschews the traditional management fee structure. McNeill describes DVx as VC 2.0. The firm comes up with business ideas and builds them into a startup within the firm before it goes out to find the...
2024-07-0332 minEquityAI-powered drug development, VW teams up with Rivian, and DEI is 'bad'Mary Ann, Haje and Kirsten are back on the mic for this week's episode, which was is jam-packed with deals, hot topics, and the latest dramaaaaaa in the tech world. For Deals of the Week, Haje wanted to chat about Formation Bio, an AI-focused drug development startup that just raised a whopping $372 million in Series D funding, led by Andreessen Horowitz. Next, Kirsten broke down the surprising partnership between Volkswagen Group and Rivian and how its initial $1 billion investment could grow up to $5 billion. To wrap up our deals, Mary-Ann highlighted Nubank’s acquisition of Hyperplane, an AI...
2024-06-2829 minEquityY Combinator sets its sights on D.C. with Luther LoweToday, we’re bringing you a conversation from TechCrunch's StrictlyVC event in DC earlier this month, where TechCrunch Editor in Chief & General Manager Connie Loizos sat down with Luther Lowe, who serves as Y Combinator’s Head of Public Policy. Lowe joined the accelerator last fall from Yelp, where he was SVP of Public Policy.Connie and Luther touched on antitrust efforts to reign in big tech, Y Combinator’s impact, leadership and access to talent, and what competition, policy and regulation look like in the AI era. It’s a super interesting conversation, so press play and list...
2024-06-2621 minEquityThe EU's DMA is coming for Apple, and X bots are on the looseIn a press release this morning, the European Commission named Apple as the first of tech’s so-called “gatekeepers” to be charged for violating the EU’s Digital Markets Act. Apple is one of six tech giants named by the European Commission as “gatekeepers” last year, alongside Alphabet, Amazon, ByteDance, Meta and Microsoft. While we continue to keep our eyes on the EU’s attempts to ensure a competitive marketplace, that’s not all we got into on the Equity podcast this morning. Rebecca Bellan led the show this morning and reported that X still has a Verified bot problem, but thi...
2024-06-2412 minEquityDo co-CEOs make sense?Last week, Brex announced that it would be ditching its co-CEO model, and that got Equity hosts Haje Kamps and Mary Ann Azevedo wondering about co-CEO teams and the effectiveness of the structure overall.Brex, founded in 2017 by Pedro Franceschi and Henrique Dubugras, initially thrived under the co-CEO structure, with Pedro focusing on internal operations and Enrique handling external relations. However, as the company grew, this setup began to slow decision-making, prompting a shift to a single CEO model. Pedro will now lead as the sole CEO, while Enrique transitions to Chairman of the Board....
2024-06-1919 minEquityBlack founders are tailoring the ChatGPT experience, and crypto makes a comebackThis week on Equity, we discussed some big news that really matters: How Black founders are addressing the diversity gap in AI chatbots. We’ve all noticed how OpenAI’s ChatGPT and other AI chatbot tools struggle with cultural nuance, often coming up with answers that reflect a largely Euro-centric worldview. Now, a handful of Black-owned chatbots and ChatGPT versions – like Latimer.AI, ChatBlackGPT and Spark Plug – have cropped up to ensure Black POVs are included in the AI conversation, and that Black founders get a cut of this trillion-dollar industry.That’s not all Rebecca talked about on M...
2024-06-1713 minEquityMusk v. OpenAI, and how can startups compete with Apple Intelligence?Welcome back to Friday Equity!In today’s episode Equity podcast, Mary Ann, Haje and Becca dug into three very different but all super interesting deals of the week. Haje wanted to discuss Raspberry Pi’s debut on the public market, and we all agreed that what this profitable company has managed to build – a tiny affordable computer that fits into the palm of your hand – is very neat. Mary Ann then wanted to talk about InScope, a fintech which just raised a $4.3 million seed round of funding led by Lightspeed Venture Partners to automate financial...
2024-06-1428 minEquityNEA’s Vanessa Larco says generative AI will change the SaaS pricing model - and that’s a good thingVanessa Larco, partner at New Enterprise Associates (NEA), believes that Generative AI’s impact on the world of SaaS could be huge.The investor joined Mary Ann Azevedo on Equity to talk through, among other topics, her theories about how GenAI could alter the pricing models SaaS businesses use when charging customers.“I think where [SaaS] people aspire to get to is value-based pricing. This is really, really hard,” she said. But “I think it's a North Star for a lot of different SaaS products.”Larco also touched on how incumbents’ AI strategies may impact th...
2024-06-1227 minEquityByju's valuation shakeup and what's ahead for WWDCApple’s WWDC is just hours away, and we’re gearing up for big announcements on – you guessed it – AI. We're kicking off today’s episode of Equity with a list of what we can (and can't) expect from the highly anticipated developer conference. But that's not all we talked about this morning. Becca Szkutak also took a look at Byju’s alarming valuation drop. The Indian edtech giant, once valued at $22 billion, might now be worth nothing according to BlackRock. The news may not come as a surprise given the rocky year Byju’s has had, but as Manish Si...
2024-06-1005 minEquityRobinhood's crypto bet, AI-powered healthcare, and more on the fall of FiskerAs always, there was a lot happening in startup land this week, and the Equity team had so much fun breaking it down for you.On today’s episode of TechCrunch’s Equity podcast, Mary Ann and Rebecca discussed Robinhood’s plans to buy European crypto exchange Bitstamp for $200 million in cash and why they weren’t really surprised by the news.The duo then dug into not just one but two exciting health-care related deals. Rebecca wanted to riff on Sword Health’s innovative AI-powered virtual physical therapy tech and recent fundraise and corresponding cool valua...
2024-06-0736 minEquityEvery startup has AI in their pitch deck and they should according to Forerunner Ventures' Eurie KimConsumer startups have taken a hit when it comes to venture funding. But according to Eurie Kim, partner at Forerunner Ventures and founding member of All Raise, consumer is where it’s at.The investor joined Mary Ann Azevedo on Equity to talk through the intricacies of the space. She pointed out that last year, just 7% of seed capital went to consumer startups. Yet, research shows that consumer company performance has outpaced enterprise, Kim contends. Forerunner itself has backed the likes of Oura, Chime and Prose, among others. Kim also talked about the advantages of bei...
2024-06-0532 minEquityPeering into the 'Series A chasm' with Everywhere Ventures' Jenny FieldingIt’s no secret that the bar for startups to land a Series A has risen, but has it risen too high? According to Jenny Fielding, a co-founder and Managing Partner at Everywhere Ventures, startups are facing what she calls “The Series A Chasm.” In a post on X this month, Fielding said, “there’s a huge backlog of seed stage companies with nice traction – just not $3m ARR + 30% MOM growth kinda traction.” The post sparked a conversation online, and Fielding joined Haje Kamps on Equity to talk through it all. Looking beyond Fielding’s portfolio, we can see that the...
2024-05-2925 minEquityMusk’s xAI raises fresh capital while Synapse’s bankruptcy could impact millionsWe’re kicking off the short week with news about Elon Musk, and no, it’s not about X or Tesla. Instead, we’re talking about Musk’s other other company, xAI. In a blog post this weekend, xAI announced it raised $6 billion in Series B funding, confirming earlier reports that the AI startup was looking to raise at a pre-money valuation of $18 billion. With Andreessen Horowitz, Sequoia Capital and Valor among its backers, it looks like Musk is taking steps to catch up and compete with the likes of OpenAI, Microsoft and Alphabet.The ongoing AI race was...
2024-05-2809 minEquityThe new Equity crew on a proposed AI 'kill switch' and why it's rough out there for VCsSay hi to the new Equity crew! To kick off today's show, Mary Ann invited her new co-hosts - Becca Szkutak, Rebecca Bellan, and Haje Kamps - to introduce themselves and shared a bit more about what they do here at TC. The team then jumped right into the news, starting with Techstars CEO Maëlle Gavet announcing she is leaving the company, just weeks after TechCrunch reporter Dominic Madori-Davis published an in-depth investigative article on what’s been going on behind the scenes at the accelerator in recent years. (You can listen to Dom talk more about it here...
2024-05-2429 minEquityMaven takes the clout-chasing out of social media as Reddit teams up with OpenAILast week was a big one for AI news, and one thing that stood out to us was OpenAI's deal with Reddit. Per the terms of the deal, OpenAI will get to use content from Reddit like posts and replies to train its AI, and Reddit will get access to some unspecified AI tools. Reddit's stock soared 11% in extended trading following the news.That's not all we talked about on today's episode of Equity. This morning, Rebecca Bellan also walked us through a new social media platform called Maven that wants to do away with likes, followers...
2024-05-2011 minEquityAI's busy week, and why the heck are so many VCs leaving their firms?This week, Mary Ann, Becca and Haje dug into three funding deals, proving that bigger is not always better (or more interesting).Becca wanted to talk about Spoor, an Oslo, Norway-based startup using AI to help wind farms mitigate its impact on birds (how cool is that?) while Haje wanted to discuss how fintech Layer is looking to take on QuickBooks in the SMB accounting space. Mary Ann, meanwhile, was excited to look into one Kentucky-based startup’s decision to raise $27.5 million in venture capital after being bootstrapped for six years and achieving profitability.We th...
2024-05-1733 minEquityNewchip's bankruptcy is a cautionary tale for foundersFor months, TechCrunch Senior Reporters Mary Ann Azevedo and Christine Hall have been following the story of Newchip's bankruptcy and its impact on founders and today on Equity, they're joined by Haje Kamps to dig deep into how the accelerator’s fall from grace threatened the cap tables of thousands of startups. In some cases, companies suddenly were so high risk to banks and investors that they had to shut down.The trio also discussed the broader accelerator landscape as a whole, considering what also recently took place at Techstars. It's a lively and hopefully helpful discussion yo...
2024-05-1522 minEquityOpenAI gears up for a big announcement, and Apple Store workers authorize a strikeLast week was a busy one for some Apple Store employees. Over the weekend, workers at Apple’s Townson, Maryland store — the first Apple retail store to have a formally recognized union — voted to authorize a strike. While the date of the strike is still being determined, the union has been negotiating with Apple since January 2023 over work-life balance, unpredictable scheduling, and wages, among other issues.But that wasn't all we discussed on today’s episode of Equity. This morning, Rebecca Szkutak also broke down what we can and can’t expect from OpenAI’s livestream event later today...
2024-05-1311 minEquityAcquisitions are heating up, and Mercury eyes the fintech crownFinally, some good news! This week, we were pleasantly surprised to see that FTX victims would be getting some money back – even if it’s not as much as they might have hoped.That wasn’t all, though: Mary Ann Azevedo, Kirsten Korosec, and Alex Wilhelm had plenty else to talk about this week on Equity.We discussed why investors are drawn to the fact that Amae Health is building an in-person approach to mental healthcare in an increasingly digital space and also how one North Carolina startup that started out by building drones to clean...
2024-05-1031 minEquityThe Equity crew predicts we'll see a lot less VCs in 2024It's time to brush the dust off of an Equity tradition that stretches back into the years: our predictions episode.As we try to do every year, we brought in a number of voices to ensure that we covered a good amount of ground. And, we went back and vetted our predictions from last year as well, in case you wanted to see how off we were!Who took part? Alex Wilhelm, Mary Ann Azevedo, Kirsten Korosec, and Becca Szkutak. The voices you heard the most on the podcast this year! (A big thanks to Th...
2023-12-2926 minEquityWill the OpenAI chaos boost open-source models?We’re discussing the recent turmoil in the AI market today. OpenAI has kept the journalistic corps busy, but we also need to consider what the latest twists and turns in the l’affaire Altman may bring for startup founders.So, I rallied TechCrunch’s own Kyle Wiggers, and Supervised founder and former Equity host Matthew Lynley to help me dig into the latest. Here’s the show rundown:
What has happened to OpenAI since Monday morning when we last recorded the podcast?
What do the two experts think will happen to OpenAI’s staff in the coming...
2023-11-2131 minEquityDoes venture capital need a shot in the arm?Hello and welcome back to Equity, a podcast about the business of startups, where we unpack the numbers and nuance behind the headlines.This week Alex was back with Grace and our new producer Theresa Loconsolo to kick off the week. This Monday morning we recorded right before Garry Tan announced that he was heading back to Y Combinator as its President. Dang.But we still had a good sheaf of things to talk about!
Stocks are not having a good day around the world, after having a pretty tough last Friday. It's hardly bulli...
2022-08-2907 min