After an “identity crisis,” Social Capital CEO Chamath Palihapitiya says he’s taught himself how to be happy againAfter a speech at Stanford University in late 2017, Chamath Palihapitiya says he realized that something in his life needed to change. “In Italian, there’s a beautiful word, basta, which is basically like your way of saying, ‘Enough!’” the Social Capital CEO said on the latest episode of Recode Decode. “And so I woke up one day and I was like, ‘Basta!’ Enough.” And over the next year, Palihapitiya’s declaration that he had had “enough” would ricochet around Silicon Valley, as his well-regarded, traditional venture capital firm lost several of its most prominent partners, angered its investors, and scaled back several of its most ambitious plans. [ Re/Code ] Peter Thiel-Backed Venture to Help Big Investors Bet on BitcoinBillionaire Peter Thiel’s venture-capital firm is backing a startup that aims to bring Wall Street electronic-trading expertise to the bitcoin market—a bet that cryptocurrencies will continue to gain mainstream popularity. [ WSJ ] Lyft warns it may never make any money“We have a history of net losses and we may not be able to achieve or maintain profitability in the future,” reads the second risk in Lyft’s March 1 prospectus for an initial public offering. In other words, Lyft has never made any money, and can’t promise that it ever will. Despite booking $2.2 billion worth of revenue on $8.1 billion worth of rides and other sales in 2018, Lyft also lost $911 million. That was up from 2017, when it recorded a net loss of $688 million, and from 2016, when its net loss came to $683 million. Adding that all up gives you a net loss of $2.3 billion over the past three years. That’s a lot of money! [ QZ ] An inside look at Lyft's IPO filingThe ridesharing race toward the highly coveted first IPO of the year is heating up as Lyftpublicly unveiled its S-1 filing on Friday. The San Francisco-based company will trade on the NASDAQ under the namesake ticker symbol LYFT. Co-founders Logan Green and John Zimmer were declared to have voting control despite each holding only 0.05% of the company's outstanding shares, confirming reports from February that the two would retain majority control through supervoting shares. [ Pitchbook ] Poshmark CEO Manish Chandra credits Marie Kondo and the social experience for his company’s boomManish Chandra’s social commerce platform Poshmark might be the most popular clothing reseller you haven’t heard of. But Poshmark is no longer quite so under the radar. It’s now the second-most-popular iPhone shopping app in the United States, and it has benefited from a growing consumer comfort with secondhand goods and cultural inflection points like Marie Kondo to build a user base of 40 million. And that’s all been somewhat surprising to Chandra, who has building Poshmark since 2011. [ Re/Code ] Go-Jek pulls in $100M more for its massive Series F roundU.S. ride-hailing giants Lyft and Uber are going public in the U.S. imminently, but in Southeast Asia, the two largest on-demand companies are still madly fueling up on investment capital. The latest update to that story today saw Go-Jek, the Indonesian ride-hailing firm aiming to go regional in Southeast Asia, announce that it has pulled in $100 million from conglomerate Astra, an existing investor, as part of the Series F round it is raising right now. We know Go-Jek is aiming to bring in at least $2 billion from that round — and that it has closed around half of that capital — so the addition from Astra is likely one of many that will take it toward that target. [ Tech Crunch ] The top 8 VC investors in European biotech startupsCuring disease is one of the more noble pursuits a startup can have. From revolutionizing cancer treatments to providing medical imaging services, these companies are on a mission to make the world a healthier place. But, like all businesses in their infancy and beyond, a common challenge is money and where to get it. For biotech companies in Europe, it appears this obstacle is shrinking as the industry rapidly gains traction. [ Pitchbook ] NEA Raising $3.6B In Its Most Massive Fund To DateProlific venture investor New Enterprise Associates (NEA) has filed paperworkwith the SEC indicating its intent to raise as much as $3.6 billion for a new investment fund. The fund would be its largest yet if it meets or exceeds the target, surpassing the $3.3 billion it raised in 2017. [ Crunchbase ] Controlled ChaosIn a hyperconnected, globalized world fueled by competition in AI, the pressure to scale startups is greater than ever. How can leaders take risks and move fast without losing sight of longer-term, unintended consequences? The LinkedIn co-founder and venture capital investor shares insights from his experiences building the professional social network and other notable companies. Meet Fifth Wall: The venture capital firm that's helping digital retailers open physical storesA wave of digital retailers is moving from the internet and into some of the empty mall space left vacant by companies in bankruptcy, like Sears and Payless ShoeSource, or trimming back their real estate, like Gap. [ CNBC ] Greg Rosen Joins VC Firm Bedrock Capital As Partner After Short Stint At BenchmarkGreg Rosen left New York’s tech scene to join one of Silicon Valley’s preeminent venture capital firms, Benchmark, last summer. But after just a few months, Rosen is moving on again—this time to become the first West Coast partner of another, younger New York VC shop. Bedrock Capital announced on Monday that Rosen is joining the firm as its third investment partner. Rosen is Bedrock’s first partner besides founders Geoff Lewis and Eric
Stromberg. [ Forbes ] Have smartphones really destroyed a generation? We don’t know.Teens in the United States are coming of age at a time when digital technology is truly ubiquitous, where smartphones are all of our “constant companions.”These youth are also, according to national surveys, increasingly in crisis. Here are some of the most troubling statistics. Between 2009 and 2017, the number of high schoolers who contemplated suicide increased 25 percent. The number of teens diagnosed with clinical depression grew 37 percent between 2005 and 2014. It could be that more teens are willing to admit they’re struggling and are seeking help. But deaths by suicide among teens have increased as well. [ VOX ] This eco-friendly startup will give your old crappy clothes a second lifeI have good news for you: I’ve found a wonderful place for your old clothes to go when you’re done with them. For Days, an innovative eco-friendly startup, will take all of your garments–no matter what the brand, or even how gross they are from years of wear. The company will even give you $4 for every item you send in, up to $50, to use on its website. [ Fast Company ] An eco-friendly footwear startup is turning plastic bottles into beautiful sneakers — each pair diverts 17 plastic bottles from landfills and rolls up to the size of a pair of socksAt the heart of the barefoot shoe movement is a belief that nature, ultimately, knows best. The argument commonly includes the sentiment that there is no machine as elegant nor as intelligent as the human body — a mechanism we've spent much of our collective history trying to understand, whilst enjoying the considerable benefits of its near-incomprehensible complexity. [ Business Insider ] Reflecting on My Failure to Build a Billion-Dollar CompanyIn 2011, I left my job as the second employee at Pinterest — before I vested any of my stock — to work on what I thought would be my life’s work. [ Medium ] The science and data behind the subscription box crazeThe subscription box service may someday become an icon of 2010s nostalgia, much like what America Online was to the '90s and gelatin-enveloped tuna was to the '60s. Announcing our Investment in ScytaleWe’re excited to share news of our investment in Scytale, along with Bain Capital Ventures, Bessemer Venture Partners, and TechOperators. Phrases signaling the ineffectiveness of perimeter security have been in circulation for quite some time. I was fortunate to work at Forrester with John Kindervag, who was the early pioneer in reversing the age-old concept of “trust, but verify” with Zero Trust, and spent a number of years advising large enterprises on implementing Zero Trust as their security strategy. Since then, it’s been great to see the continued influence Zero Trust has had on the security community with many vendors aligning themselves with the philosophy. [ Medium ] Jupiter raises $23 million to tell businesses and governments how climate change will destroy themWhether it’s by flood, fire, or the fury of a storm, climate-related catastrophes are now impacting most cities and towns across the country. As these natural disasters increase in frequency and severity, cities and the businesses that reside in them are mobilizing to understand how best to prepare for the climatological challenges they’re going to face — and increasingly they’re turning to companies like Jupiter Intelligencefor information. [ Tech Crunch ] How We Boot-Strapped Our Way to a Multi-Million Dollar Business
When Courtney and I decided to launch Socialfly in May of 2011, we knew we were taking a big risk. Neither of us had attended business school, neither of us had launched a company before, and we didn’t have a presence in the NYC entrepreneur bubble. [ swaay ] Shift Technology raises $60 million to detect insurance fraudParis-based Shift Technology has raised another $60 million funding round. Bessemer Venture Partners is leading the round and existing investors Accel, General Catalyst, Iris Capital and Elaia Partners are also participating. [ Tech Crunch ] GOJEK-backed Indonesian healthcare platform Halodoc raises $65m led by UOB unit Halodoc, an Indonesia-based healthcare startup backed by ride-hailing giant GOJEK, on Monday announced that it has raised $65 million in Series B funding led by new investor UOB Venture Management. The funding round, the second major financing for Halodoc since its establishment in April 2016, was also joined by existing backers, including GOJEK, and new investors including Singtel Innov8, Korea Investment Partners, and WuXi AppTec. The lead investor is a wholly owned subsidiary of United Overseas Bank Limited. [ Dealstreet Asia] |