Benchmark-Backed Stitch Fix Said to Mull Initial Public OfferingStitch Fix Inc., the online personal-styling service backed by Benchmark, is considering an initial public offering, people with knowledge of the matter said. Executives have held early discussions with bankers about a potential deal, and the board plans to decide in the next month whether to pursue a public offering, said the people, asking not to be identified as the process is private. The company, which counts Benchmark and Lightspeed Venture Partners among its backers, also turned down late-stage money from several interested investors, one of the people said. A representative for San Francisco-based Stitch Fix didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment. [ Bloomberg ] NEW YORK’S MOST VALUABLE TECH START-UP JUST RAISED A MASSIVE NEW ROUNDNew York City’s most valuable start-up is getting even bigger. After raising billions in funding at a $16 billion valuation, WeWork, a buzzy real-estate start-up that leases office space to other start-ups, is reportedly closing another new round. The latest investor is something of a big deal himself: Masayoshi Son, the chief executive officer of Japanese investment firm SoftBank, who became President Donald Trump’s favorite tech investor after promising to invest billions in the United States. Son, The Wall Street Journal reports, personally invested $300 million in WeWork, with additional funding from SoftBank to come. [ Vanity Fair ] Ev Williams has lost his goddamn mindEv Williams is a brilliant man. His vision for online publishing offers up a near-utopian vision of what a democratized internet looks like in Medium. He also once ran a couple of other businesses you may have heard of: Twitter, which he co-founded, and Odeo, a popular podcast app that may have actually launched before the public was ready for it, and years prior to the new podcast boom. And then he lost his goddamn mind. The Top 25 Y Combinator Winter 2017 Demo Day StartupsY Combinator’s Demo Day for the Winter 2017 batch is taking place at the Computer History Museum in Mountain View, California. The startups will pitch to an audience of Venture Capitalists, Angel Investors, and decision makers at large tech companies, in hopes of closing their first (or next) round of funding. This batch of companies includes products and services ranging from a professional photographer booking system, “Goodreads for the Snapchat generation”, “Thumbtack for Korea”, a new-age supermarket, and conversation analytics for sales teams to an app for analyzing acne, portable box houses, a Fitbit for Dairy cows, and more. As of today, 103 companies have been publicly announced. [ Mattermark ] WELCOME TO THE BAY AREA. A portrait of young Indian techies in CaliforniaEveryone has a letter and a number attached to them. The H-4 housewives wear canvas shoes and take brisk walks around the green at the heart of North Park Apartments; the B-2 grandparents push their American-born grandchildren on little tricycles; the H-1B techies play volleyball and the B-1 consultants stroll. I am an F-1 OPT sitting next to a Chinese mom on a cement bench, watching all of this. All the picnic tables are occupied: an Indian man sits idly at one, six Indian women in sarees sit conversing in Tamil around another. Life beyond Silicon Valley: The 20 US cities that attract the most Bay Area investmentAlthough Bay Area-based VCs have long invested heavily in startups in their local geography, lately investors have increasingly ventured beyond, backing numerous companies in various other cities and states. The Most Active Investors In Sales Tech In One InfographicEveryone Knows Tech Workers Are Mostly White Men—Except Tech WorkersThe lack of diversity in the tech industry is pretty well understood by now—by everyone except those who work there, it would seem. According to a recent survey of 1,400 tech employees, 94 percent of American tech workers give the industry, their companies, and their teams a passing grade on diversity. That’s in a sector where 76 percent of technical jobs are held by men, and blacks and Latinos make up only 5 percent of the workforce. [ Bloomberg ] TECH TITAN CHRIS SACCA TO TRY HIS HAND AT ACTING IN ABC COMEDY PILOTChris Sacca, a heavyweight in the tech world as an early investor in major companies like Twitter, Uber, Instagram, Twilio, and Kickstarter, is going to try his hand at acting in a new comedy pilot for ABC formerly called Start Up, Deadline reports. |