Today 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 kn...
Sep 11, 2024•27 min•Ep. 884
Don’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 Frida...
Sep 09, 2024•3 min•Ep. 883
The Equity podcast crew is wrapping up another eventful week, with real estate, AI agents, gambling, and secondary markets — which are, of course, a form of legalized gambling. Mary Ann Azevedo , Becca Szkutak , and Devin Coldewey started off this Friday's episode with the acknowledgment that the X/Twitter ban situation in Brazil is possibly too complicated an issue to even have an opinion on. Let us cook on that for a bit. In the deals of the week, Devin first talked about You.com's $50 million...
Sep 06, 2024•30 min•Ep. 882
Today on Equity, we're throwing it back to when Mary Ann interviewed Roger Lee , an entrepreneur who’s spent the better part of a decade building tools for employees and employers alike. Lee is an angel investor as well the creator of Layoffs.FYI and co-founder of Comprehensive and Human Interest . Roger joined us on the show last year in the wake of 2022’s tech layoffs, but this week we’re focusing on the business of shutting down and why investors are lining up to back startups in the space, i...
Sep 04, 2024•28 min•Ep. 881
Today 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 servin...
Aug 30, 2024•31 min•Ep. 880
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 mono...
Aug 28, 2024•23 min•Ep. 879
In 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 Stor y, 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...
Aug 23, 2024•29 min•Ep. 878
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 re...
Aug 21, 2024•18 min•Ep. 877
This 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 s...
Aug 16, 2024•33 min•Ep. 876
Enterprise 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...
Aug 14, 2024•39 min•Ep. 875
In 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...
Aug 09, 2024•32 min•Ep. 874
In 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 r...
Aug 07, 2024•27 min•Ep. 873
On today's Friday news roundup, we just had to talk about AI hardware taking on a new shape with Friend’s $99 necklace . The pendant gives you an AI friend to talk to and…that’s about it. Friend’s pitch is that its wearable can help combat loneliness, but other AI hardware products that have come to market lately – like Humane’s Ai Pin and Rabbit’s r1 – have fallen short of expectations. Even OpenAI, the leader in the space, has come out later than expected with its hyper realistic AI assistant ...
Aug 02, 2024•31 min•Ep. 872
Global 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...
Jul 31, 2024•25 min•Ep. 871
Today’s episode is packed with M&A talk, how one YouTuber succeeded at the creator economy, why Twitch is still losing money and an autonomous vehicle company that is making a comeback. First up, Rebecca took a look at fintech giant Stripe’s acquisition of four-year-old competitor Lemon Squeezy. The buy will allow Stripe to beef up its merchant of record selling “in a big way,” according to Stripe CEO Patrick Collison. Deal terms weren’t disclosed, but Lemon Squeezy has a reputation for turn...
Jul 29, 2024•11 min•Ep. 870
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 d...
Jul 26, 2024•33 min•Ep. 869
Maven 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 lan...
Jul 24, 2024•27 min•Ep. 868
On today’s episode of Equity, Rebecca Bellan did a deep dive into the CrowdStrike outage that affected around 8.5 million Windows devices around the world, causing disruptions in air travel, banking, hospitals, media outlets, federal agencies and businesses of all kinds. The outage began when CrowdStrike, a cloud security giant, sent out a defective software update . While CrowdStrike quickly identified the issue and deployed a fix, the fallout continued over the weekend and will probably contin...
Jul 22, 2024•11 min•Ep. 867
To kick off this week's news roundup, Kirsten walked us through Elon Musk’s recent declaration of his intent to move both SpaceX and X’s headquarters out of California to Texas . Whether or not he’ll see those plans through remains to be seen, but of course, the Equity crew had thoughts. We then got into the deals of the week. First up, we talked about Sequoia Capital’s emailing LPs in funds raised between 2009 and 2011 with an offer to buy up to $861 million worth of shares in Stripe . The move...
Jul 19, 2024•33 min•Ep. 866
Renegade 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 f...
Jul 17, 2024•29 min•Ep. 865
On 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...
Jul 15, 2024•8 min•Ep. 864
Mary Ann was off this week, and Kirsten took the lead with Becca Szkutak and Rebecca Bellan in the co-host seats. This episode is packed with deals, antitrust musings, AI and more, so let's get into it! For our first deal of the week, one of the many lawsuits Musk faces after firing 6,000 Twitter employees after his 2022 takeover was dismissed . The result may be good news for Musk, but it doesn’t eliminate Musk’s legal troubles. Musk is facing at least one other lawsuit from CEO Parag Agrawal, ...
Jul 12, 2024•28 min•Ep. 863
Mike 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 ...
Jul 10, 2024•29 min•Ep. 862
On 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 co...
Jul 08, 2024•6 min•Ep. 861
What’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 ...
Jul 03, 2024•33 min•Ep. 860
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 ...
Jun 28, 2024•30 min•Ep. 859
Today, 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 regulati...
Jun 26, 2024•22 min•Ep. 858
In 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...
Jun 24, 2024•12 min•Ep. 857
This week, co-hosts Mary-Ann Azavedo and Haje Kamps were joined by the ever-insightful Kirsten Korosec to dive into the latest and greatest happenings in the startup world. Kicking things off, our trio of hosts break down three major deals of the week. First, there's Waabi, an autonomous trucking startup that just closed a whopping $200 million Series B round . Kirsten Korosec provides an inside look into how Waabi's AI-first approach is setting it apart in the crowded autonomous vehicle space a...
Jun 21, 2024•34 min•Ep. 856
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 sing...
Jun 19, 2024•20 min•Ep. 855
