Good day. Last week, automaker General Motors Co. announced a $650 million investment into Lithium Americas Corp., which will help support the Canadian mining company's effort to build a lithium mine in Nevada.

That’s the latest display of the rush to acquire materials used to make batteries for powering the many electric vehicles planned for production.

The metal is in high demand these days as legacy automakers scramble to secure batteries for mass production of EVs and startups are springing up to fill the demand.

Take Our Next Energy Inc., a Michigan-based battery startup that last week said it raised $300 million of equity financing. The Series B funding round led by Fifth Wall and Franklin Templeton values ONE, as the company is known, at $1.2 billion. ONE said that part of the capital will help the company build a factory that could manufacture enough battery cells for about 200,000 EVs annually.

ONE Chief Executive and founder Mujeeb Ijaz said he began the fundraising process in June of last year and wrapped up the final close in January. Last year’s slower market reduced the number of investors willing to go in on the deal, but left ONE with investors who had faith in the battery sector and ONE’s business, he added.

Keep an eye out for more startups that are receiving investor interest as the hunt for battery materials heats up.

And now on to the news...

Challenges for junior VCs. Many venture investors early in their careers must figure out how to prove themselves in a declining market, WSJ Pro’s Yuliya Chernova reports.

• “It’s a pressure-cooker environment for emerging VCs,” said Adam Dawkins, founder of the Emerging Venture Capitalists Association, a nonprofit with about 1,350 members, who mostly hold titles such as analyst, associate, vice president and principal at venture firms.
   
• The push to contribute to a firm’s success by sourcing and closing deals is especially high now, he said, as firms re-evaluate team sizes due to worries about fundraising. But getting new deals done is harder.
   
• What’s more, the percentage of early-stage deals raising follow-on financings is likely declining across the industry, said Abir Liben, a principal at Primary Venture Partners in New York. “That metric isn’t going anywhere; there’s a calibration around what is considered great,” Ms. Liben said.

The artificial-intelligence chatbot ChatGPT has shaken educators since its November release. New York City public schools have banned it from their networks and school devices, and professors are revamping syllabi to prevent students from using it to complete their homework. The chatbot’s creator, OpenAI, even unveiled a tool to detect text generated by artificial intelligence to prevent abuse from cheaters, spammers and others, The Wall Street Journal reports. There is, perhaps surprisingly, one subject area that doesn’t seem threatened. It turns out ChatGPT is quite bad at math. “I’m not hearing math instructors express concern about it,” said Paul von Hippel, a professor at the University of Texas who studies data science and statistics and has written an essay about ChatGPT’s mathematical limitations. “I’m not sure it’s useful for math at all, which feels strange because mathematics was the first-use case for computing devices.”

Shamrock Capital Advisors, a Los Angeles-based investment firm that grew out of the family office of the late Roy Disney, a longtime Walt Disney Co. executive, has raised more than $600 million to spend on entertainment content and media rights. The firm, which long ago severed ties with the Disney family, said its latest fund, called Shamrock Capital Content Fund III LP, is more than double the size of its first such vehicle, which closed on about $250 million in 2016. Shamrock’s content strategy, which includes a debt fund, is to invest in film, television, music, sports and videogame products and distribution rights. WSJ Pro Private Equity spoke to Patrick Russo, a Shamrock partner, about investing in the entertainment market and how his team of 11 seeks out opportunities.

Funds

Healthcare-focused Hatteras Venture Partners is slightly more than halfway toward raising a $250 million seventh fund, according to a regulatory filing. The Durham, N.C.-based firm recently participated in a funding round for cardiovascular disease early detection startup Cardiosense Inc.

People

Data startup Observe Inc. promoted Keith Butler to president and chief revenue officer. He was previously at Aveksa and Perfecto. Last year, Observe raised $70 million in Series A2 funding from Sutter Hill Ventures, Capital One Ventures and Madrona.

Investing and banking app Stash named Liza Landsman as the company’s new chief executive. Ms. Landsman joins Stash from New Enterprise Associates, where she was a general partner. Stash is backed by investors including Eldridge, Owl Ventures, Goodwater Capital and Entrée Capital.

Supply chain technology provider Stord appointed Stephanie Fielding as chief financial officer and Sara Feulner as chief people officer. Ms. Fielding was most recently at Butterfly Network. Prior to Stord, Ms. Feulner held leadership roles at Bumble and ARM. Atlanta-based Stord counts Kleiner Perkins, BOND, Founders Fund, Lux Capital, D1 Capital, Salesforce Ventures and Susa Ventures as investors.

Security and compliance automation platform Vanta appointed David Eckstein to the post of chief financial officer. He was most recently CFO at Menlo Security Inc. Last year, Vanta raised $150 million in funding at a nearly $1.7 billion valuation from investors including Craft Ventures, Sequoia Capital and Y Combinator.

Sunstone Credit Inc., a Baltimore-based clean energy financing platform, raised $20 million in Series A funding. Led by an affiliated fund of Greenbacker Capital Management, the round included participation from Earthshot Ventures, Grotech Ventures, Cross River Digital Ventures and Forbright Bank. Grotech Managing Partner Lawson DeVries will join the company’s board. Sunstone Credit offers loan financing to businesses making the transition to solar energy.

Ziflow, a creative workflow platform, closed a $20 million Series A round led by Riverside Acceleration Capital and Companyon Ventures.

ION Mobility, a provider of smart electric motorbikes and energy charging and storage technology, secured $18.7 million in Series A financing from investors including TVS Motor Co., TNB Aura, Quest Ventures, Monk's Hill Ventures, Village Global, GDP Venture and Seeds Capital. Founded in 2019, ION Mobility currently serves Indonesia, with plans to expand across Southeast Asia.

Gradient, a San Francisco-based maker of a hybrid cooling and heating system, completed an $18 million Series A round. Sustainable Future Ventures and Ajax Strategies co-led the investment, which included contributions from Safar Partners, Climate Tech Circle, Shared Future Fund, At One Ventures, Impact Science Ventures and others. Gradient’s first product is a replacement for the window air conditioner that uses a climate-friendly refrigerant.

Coverflex, a Portugal-based compensation platform, landed €15 million in Series A funding. Lead investor SCOR Ventures was joined by Breega, BiG Start Ventures, Armilar Venture Partners and others in the round.

Constellation, a New York-based marketing compliance technology startup, scored a $15 million investment from Newlight Partners.

Samooha, a secure data collaboration platform, picked up a $12.5 million investment from Altimeter Capital, Snowflake Ventures and others.

New School Foods, a Toronto-based plant-based seafood alternatives producer, was seeded with a $12 million investment from Lever VC, Blue Horizon, Hatch, Good Startup, Alwyn Capital, Joyance Partners and others. The company makes a plant-based salmon filet alternative using its proprietary muscle fiber and scaffolding technologies.

Gem Security, a New York- and Israel-based cloud threat detection, investigation and response platform, emerged from stealth with $11 million in seed funding led by Team8.

Lavender, a New York-based sales email coaching platform, collected an $11 million Series A round. Led by Norwest Venture Partners, the funding included additional support by Signia Venture Partners.

• Elon Musk found not liable in trial over tweets proposing to take Tesla private
   
• FTC prepares possible antitrust suit against Amazon
   
• Sports Illustrated publisher taps AI to generate articles, story ideas
   
• More EVs to qualify for tax credit following treasury changes

This newsletter was compiled by Marc Vartabedian and Zachary Cole.

WSJ Pro Venture Capital is a premium service of The Wall Street Journal. We cover venture capital and the global startup ecosystem. Share your tips, comments and questions: vcnews@wsj.com

The Team: Matthew Strozier, Yuliya Chernova, Brian Gormley, Angus Loten, and Marc Vartabedian.

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