This week Mary Ann , Natasha and Alex celebrated one final episode as a three, and here's what we got into: Deals of the Week: Alex wanted to talk about the slowing of growth amongst tech companies , Natasha had notes on a brace of new Mayfield funds , while Mary Ann brought Wellthy to the table . Next we discussed pessimism in fintech , if it is near its peak, and how companies like Petal are still forging ahead regardless of market chop. From there we dug into AI, how it will impact certain cr...
May 12, 2023•42 min•Ep. 674
This week, Natasha spoke to Kristen Anderson , the co-founder and CEO of Catch, an app to provide payroll benefits for people who are self employed, that recently announced it would be shutting down . We're talking about vulnerability, shut downs, building in public and on ramps and off ramps that come with the wild choice to be an entrepreneur. Here's what we got into: Venture capital's role in how a founder builds Making the difficult decision to shut down, and why Catch chose to do so publicl...
May 10, 2023•33 min•Ep. 672
Alex is back with the latest in tech news from the weekend and what’s making headlines early in the week. Today, we are talking about meme coins, unicorns and the latest from India! The global stock market started the week on pretty good footing. Also, the crypto world is suffering modest indigestion thanks to a new meme coin. On the regulatory front, it appears Coinbase is going to stick with the U.S . Elsewhere in Industry Land, Qualcomm is going shopping , Alibaba's logistics IPO is targeting...
May 08, 2023•10 min•Ep. 671
This week Mary Ann , Natasha and Alex got right into it with: An update on a startup banking partner collapse that wasn't the First, and probably won't be the Last A section dedicated to sunsetting Poparazzi and a Databricks acquisition (points to whoever can guess how we transitioned from one deal to the next) Next up, we spoke about Finix's latest announcement to go head to head with Stripe , before talking more about the rise of down rounds We ended with BlueSky. Although some of us feel grey...
May 05, 2023•36 min•Ep. 670
This week, Natasha Mascarenhas interviewed Sam Chaudhary , the founder of ClassDojo , and Chris Farmer , the founder and CEO of SignalFire , a venture firm that recently announced a $900 million fund to back tech startups. This interview is structured a bit differently as it was actually recorded as a TechCrunch Live session, our weekly show that focuses on helping people start better venture backed businesses. We'll hear from the trio about: What an outsider advantage looks like in startups, pe...
May 03, 2023•30 min•Ep. 667
Alex is back on the mic for your Monday rundown and digging into OpenAI, earnings, First Republic Bank, and ARM. Oh, and startups as well! It's another big earnings week, and we're excited to see how Uber, Coinbase, Apple and Hubspot have performed! First Republic Bank is no more . It wasn't shocking to see JPMorgan swooping it up, but we are once again seeing a small bank shutting shop and a big bank getting bigger. Not good! OpenAI is now even richer thanks to a $300 million investment from ve...
May 01, 2023•9 min•Ep. 669
This week Mary Ann , Natasha and Alex were especially chattery as they waded through a busy week in tech and startups. We're talking AI. We're talking layoffs. And we're talking coffee. Here's what we got into: Three deals of the week from copyright requests around "-GPT" to Ansa, a wallet ready to make you even more loyal to your local cafes to First Republic Bank's tanking share price and all the thoughts that feel all too reminiscent of our reporting just six weeks ago. Fintech venture layoff...
Apr 28, 2023•31 min•Ep. 668
This week, Natasha interviewed Ankur Nagpal , the entrepreneur behind Teachable , Ocho , and Vibe Capital - Ankur's $70 million venture fund, raised last year from over 200 investors. Today, we're talking about: The future of Solo GPs and Ankur's choice to shrink Vibe Capital's fund size How Ankur built, sold, pivoted and launched in public The upside of building in public vs building in private The importance of brand and succession Of course, we ended with a lightning round of questions - incl...
Apr 26, 2023•29 min•Ep. 661
Today Alex Wilhelm is talking about Twitter Blue, Lyft, a few startup rounds, and what could kick off the next crypto supercycle. Several major tech companies are reporting earnings this week, strap in for some big news and perhaps even bigger share price movements. The Twitter Blue saga took new turns this weekend , with Musk's personal social network staying in the news once again. If the overall result of said news for the company is good or not remains to be seen. Alex had a few thoughts on ...
Apr 24, 2023•10 min•Ep. 666
This week we recorded at Early Stage , TechCrunch's event for founders who are building startups from the ground up. Sadly, our dear friend Natasha Mascarenhas took ill, and we had to lean on Alex for the episode. Happily, though, Darrell from the TechCrunch team was sitting next to us on the show floor so we tagged him in for some rocket knowledge. Anyhoo, here's the run of show! All things Early Stage: Notes from the show floor, what we can infer about attendance and a vibe check. Elon's new, ...
Apr 21, 2023•8 min•Ep. 665
Alex invited Janelle Teng from Bessemer Venture Partners on the program to riff with us on the state of the cloud. That's also the title of Bessemer's latest data dump concerning cloud stocks, startups, AI, and more. Teng, a co-author on the report, walked through some of key bits with us to better explain her firm's perspective, and to answer our critical commentary regarding Figma and why startups should always kill Goliath, instead of joining him for a round of grapes and lounging. You can fi...
Apr 19, 2023•36 min•Ep. 664
Today we are talking about space, birds and startups! Here’s what Alex got into: Earnings season is coming back! That means Netflix and Tesla this week, and a huge number of big tech companies next week. Data cometh. We were very excited about the launch of SpaceX's massive rocket . It got scrubbed after we recorded, but you can still enjoy our hype about the potential event. We'll have more on the matter when the rocket actually does go up. Rovio is selling to Sega . Yeah, we had to digest that...
Apr 17, 2023•11 min•Ep. 663
This week Mary Ann , Natasha and Alex enjoyed the warming climate and the fact that there are some positive vibes in the venture market as well. Hell, we even had a nine-figure round to chew on! Here's the show rundown: Alex wanted to discuss the latest FTX docs and the recent X.com (formally known as Twitter) news . Natasha brought a new edtech venture fund to the table. Mary Ann wanted to talk about Clear Street's impressive fundraise . From there, we discussed that while the pace at which uni...
Apr 14, 2023•33 min•Ep. 662
This week, Natasha spoke with a founder, a psychiatrist and a venture capitalist about founder mental health, a topic that has been a conversation in Silicon Valley for as long as we can remember. The theme has gained renewed momentum due to the startup and venture downturn in general, and exacerbated by a bank failure that still has some folks reeling. It's time for a check-in. Here's who we spoke with for today's show: Pioneer Mind's Naveed Lalani gave us the founder perspective on how to "hus...
Apr 12, 2023•42 min•Ep. 660
Today, we are talking about crypto, Uber, and how to be petty at scale. Here's what Alex got into: Around the world of capital, we're most confused at certain bits of price stability in the cryptocurrency markets. It feels a bit faux, if that makes sense. Where prices are less steady is the world of YC startups , where, once again, there's complaints amongst venture investors about the valuations that some of the earliest-stage tech companies out there are commanding. Perhaps a greater discount ...
Apr 10, 2023•9 min•Ep. 659
This was Y Combinator week in a sense, with the well-known accelerator showing off hundreds of startups over a two-day period. We had some thoughts about that. But! There was a lot more for Mary Ann , Natasha and Alex to dig into, so we have a little something for everyone today. Here's the show notes, enjoy: First, support our sibling podcasts Found and Chain Reaction in the Webbys ! They deserve it, and we're voting for them too. For our Deals of the Week, we had: Monument and Tempest shared p...
Apr 07, 2023•38 min•Ep. 658
Alex filled in for Natasha as host this week, and to celebrate the end of Q1 2023 and the start of another earnings cycle, we invited PitchBook Senior Analyst Kyle Stanford onto the show. Stanford and his company are key providers of data concerning the domestic and global venture capital markets making him a perfect guest to help kickstart our look at recent venture results, and trends. We had a lot to talk about: Where early-2023 venture aggregates are trending, including a chat about differen...
Apr 06, 2023•29 min•Ep. 657
Alex is back with the first episode of our Q2 run. Welcome to the new tranch of 2023! On the show today we riffed through the stock market and crypto sector. The gist? Shares are mixed here in the United States while major crypto tokens are not doing too much. In startup news, Paris is cracking down on e-scooters after a vote , Zamp Finance raised nearly $22 million for a neat way to keep startup cash safe and yield-friendly, and Fourthline reminded us that applied AI is a sentence that we are g...
Apr 03, 2023•9 min•Ep. 656
AI? Crypto? Equity crowdfunding and former startup founders trying to bribe China? We had it all this week, friends, so please strap in and get ready for another catchup with your besties Mary Ann , Natasha and Alex . Here's the show rundown in case you want to play along as you listen: Deals of the Week: How Seed Checks could disrupt early-stage fundraising, notes on StellarFi's latest capital raise , and the end of the Lyft founders' operational saga . All about Substack and its equity crowdfu...
Mar 31, 2023•36 min•Ep. 655
This week, Natasha interviewed a Jack of all trades in the AI world with a focus on governance: Navrina Singh. Navrina is the founder and CEO of CredoAI , a governance platform helping organizations monitor, measure and manage AI-introduced risks. We're talking about: Navrina's wedge into the world of AI, and when governance went from a lonely conversation to a global focus. Her experience with Microsoft, observing how the EU AI Act's legislation is coming together, and her work as a member of t...
Mar 29, 2023•30 min•Ep. 654
Alex had a lot of ground to cover from the weekend, so let's get started. Here's the rundown: The global stock market is mixed today, if leaning positive. Some concerns about global banks appear to be settling. In contrast, things are quiet on the crypto front. Salesforce is getting a reprieve from certain activist pressure after it took a cleaver to its staffing . The Silicon Valley Bank crisis is slowly coming to a close. TechCrunch has the latest on the sale of the former startup-friendly ban...
Mar 27, 2023•9 min•Ep. 653
What did Mary Ann and Natasha and Alex dive into? Here's the rundown: A quick update on TikTok: The CEO of the popular social media service went before Congress today . It was a pretty darn hostile meeting. Alex caught a chunk of it live, and also has a few thoughts on the matter . From there it was time for our 'deals of the week' section, which today included Duolingo's new music product , a new DAO fund , and the latest eToro investment . Then it was time to talk payroll. We started with the ...
Mar 24, 2023•36 min•Ep. 652
Natasha interviewed one of venture's most iconic duos: Mitch Kapor and Freada Kapor Klein of Kapor Capital . The investors recently published a book, "Closing the Equity Gap: Creating Wealth and Fostering Justice in Startup Investing," connecting scrappy stories of entrepreneurs to their investment thesis to the returns that other venture capitalists are clamoring to land. In today's episode, we're talking about: Their book and why the pair chose to do it now Mitch and Freada's broader thoughts ...
Mar 22, 2023•39 min•Ep. 640
Alex is here to do our Monday show, a kickoff for the week that covers startup news, tech news and a little bit of the money that powers both. After a hectic few weeks, are we done with banking news? No, but there's some good news in the offing, at least. Banking stocks are whipsawing this morning, in the wake of the UBS-Credit Suisse deal , and First Republic's continued woes . The crypto markets have had a good few weeks, leading to asset price appreciation that has reignited crypto-Twitter. N...
Mar 20, 2023•9 min•Ep. 651
This week, Alex and Natasha took the mic to talk about the slowest news cycle we've had since the beginning of the grocery delivery wars and WeWork. Just kidding. Here's what we got into: The M&A spree that includes updates from Qualtrics , Cvent , and Mint Mobile . We're happy to see some M&A, even if we'd rather see more startup deals and IPOs. GPT-4. GPT-4. GPT-4. What's in a name and more from the world of AI, including where we're seeing companies race to build the new tech into the...
Mar 17, 2023•31 min•Ep. 650
This week, Natasha interviewed Series CEO Brexton Pham , who has been building a full-stack enterprise platform for institutions and enterprises since March 2021. Brexton was pushed out of stealth this week in the wake of Silicon Valley Bank's crash, which of course was the main topic of our conversation. What else did you expect? Here's what we got into: How much trust do our banks deserve today, and how much has reasonable trust fallen in recent weeks? How startups can (and should) start diver...
Mar 15, 2023•22 min•Ep. 649
This is Alex and we are here to do our Monday show, a kickoff for the week that covers startup news, tech news and a little bit of the money that powers both. Given how bonkers the last few days have been, this is not a normal show. Sure, we're talking money up top, but I also dragooned Natasha into running us through her amazing reporting from over the weekend on all things SVB. (Please excuse the Friends joke in the headline, we are very tired!) Here's what we got into: The stock market is suf...
Mar 13, 2023•15 min•Ep. 648
This week Mary Ann Azevedo , Natasha Mascarenhas and Alex Wilhelm gathered to riff through the week’s biggest startup and venture news: At the top of the show, we riffed about the situation at Silicon Valley Bank - which, of course, kicked off a little more after we wrapped our recording. So, more to come there. But we had other stories to get into: Deals of the Week: Roami (taking on Airbnb), Qualtrics (will it finally find its forever home?), the latest on the VC-AI affair (Upfront Summit reca...
Mar 10, 2023•38 min•Ep. 647
This week, Natasha interviewed Lizzie Matusov , the co-founder and CEO of Quotient, which wants to fix the "leaky pipeline problem" in tech onboarding that doesn't set up engineers for success. Yes, that's right, this week we're talking about the work needs, habits and aspirations of developers. Here's a few topics we get into: The stereotype of a coder, and where collectivism contrasts with those characteristics. How Quotient is using research, not just aspiration, to fuel its onboarding proces...
Mar 08, 2023•32 min•Ep. 646
Alex is here to do our Monday show, a kickoff for the week that covers startup news, tech news, and a little bit of the money that powers both. Sound good? Here's what we have for you this morning: Money: Stocks are mixed around the world, and the crypto world is muted after some price swings last week. IPO news: ARM, the chip design concern, may go public in the United States this year , raising $8 billion in the process. Given the importance of chips these days -- you may have heard! -- the co...
Mar 06, 2023•9 min•Ep. 645
