New York-based digital media startup Semafor is accessing its options to buy out FTX’s founder Sam Bankman-Fried’s (SBF) stake in their organization. SBF reportedly invested $10M in the startup’s $25M seed round before its launch in Oct. 2022, making him the single largest outside investor. The startup is planning to buy out his ownership by placing a portion of the funds it is raising from a new funding round into a separate account and wait for further instructions from the federal authorities regarding the transfer. More: - Putting the money aside would mean forfeiting the funding the business could have used for its initial expansion.
- But the business is in a good position, with the co-founder and CEO Justin Smith expecting $15M in revenue this year.
- The move comes as companies that SBF invested in start to distance themselves from the founder of the fallen crypto exchange FTX.
- Vox Media and ProPublica announced shortly after his arrest that they were planning to return the capital invested by him.
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"Passion economy" platforms like Patreon and Substack delay potentially risky investments to focus on stable revenue sources. Andreessen Horowitz coined the term "passion economy" to refer to those companies that help creators make money from subscriptions to their podcasts or newsletters. More: - Patreon is postponing plans to go public until the tech sector recuperates.
- Substack has decided to delay fundraising rounds.
- Over the past years, interest in these companies' rapid growth has dwindled.
- After investments originally increased from $1.4B in 2020 to $3.3B in 2021, investments then dropped 75% to $801M in 2022.
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Private equity investor FLEX Capital closed its second fund of €300 million (~$326M). The capital will support the merging of German startups to increase their global reach and prepare them for exit opportunities. More: - FLEX will focus on entrepreneurs looking for a partner that helps them develop their software companies.
- The private equity investor usually buys more than 51% of a company and combines them with two or three competitors.
- Most of their purchases are small software startups with €15M (~$16M) in revenue.
- The merges FLEX supports help startups prepare for exit opportunities like an IPO.
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Sequoia Capital India and Southeast Asia have launched the second cohort of their women-focused accelerator program dubbed Sequoia Spark Fellowship. The initiative was formed to encourage women to become entrepreneurs. The second cohort consists of 12 women entrepreneurs running startups in climate tech, health tech, SaaS, Web3, and D2C sectors. More: - Eight of the women are from India, with the remaining four from various regions across Southeast Asia.
- The program grants $100,000 as an equity-free grant to participating startups.
- Notable participating startups include Zerocircle, a firm helping organizations reduce their single-use plastic dependence; Hoop, a health and wellness platform for youngsters; and Plodo, a startup that helps brands launch operations in India.
Zoom out: - Sequoia India highlights that the first batch of the cohort consisted of 15 startups and has raised cumulative funding of $51M.
- One of the portfolio startups was acquired by Wipro.
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Copilot raised $10M to build a Shopify-like app store specifically for the service sector. The Series A funding round was led by YC Continuity and Lachy Groom. More: - Copilot is now valued at $100M.
- Most of the startups' clients are marketing agencies, accounting firms, and law firms.
- Copilot focuses on giving their clients a streamlined user experience because service companies usually do not have the technical expertise to build their own client-facing products.
- The startup helps its clients set up a portal to send messages, make payments, sign contracts, and access custom apps.
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The metaverse real-estate platform Metahood announced its raised $3M Seed. 1confirmation led the round, with participation from Volt Capital, Flamingo DAO, and Neon DAO. The startup plans to use the funds to grow its team and further develop the product. More: - The startup has drawn interest from several angel investors, such as The Sandbox co-founder Sébastien Borget and SuperRare co-founder John Crain.
- The NFT marketplace allows interested landowners to discover land parcels across metaverses, including Dencentraland, The Sandbox, Somnium Space, and Otherside.
- The company plans to support new metaverses as they develop.
- The map-based platform affords buyers important insight into their purchases, contextualizing the parcel by highlighting nearby landmarks, sales trends, neighboring plots, and more.
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- Grok Ventures has extended a $45M (AUD 65M) loan with a six-month interest-free period to renewable energy startup Sun Cable, which entered voluntary administration last week.
- Singaporean fashion tech startup Zilingo has entered liquidation. Co-founder and CEO Ankita Bose was dismissed last May after complaints of financial irregularities.
- Former FTX U.S. president Brett Harrison has raised $5M for his new crypto software startup Architect, against the initial target of raising $10M at a $100M valuation. Harrison had trouble raising the funding due to his association with FTX and the spiraling crypto markets.
- Canadian AI startup Klue has acquired DoubleCheck Research for an undisclosed amount.
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Upcoming Events: - January 23 - Inside Coffee Break (Register Here)
- January 24 - Inside Coffee Break (Register Here)
- January 25 - Amanda Natividad speaks on zero-click content, how to measure it, and other trends to keep tabs on in 2023. (Register Here) *
- January 26 - Growth Experimentation Workshop: From Strategy to Process by GrowthHackers.com (Register Here)
- January 29 - Inside Interview with Lacework - 4 Common Attack Paths in Cloud Security (Register Here)
- January 31 - AMA with LinearB - Improving workflow for developers w/ Ori Keren (Watch On Demand)
- January 31 - AMA with Gun.io - Building and managing software development teams w/ Deividi Silva (Watch On Demand)
- April 18 - Human Resources Summit'23 (Register Here)
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 |  | Karan Chafekar is a Management Consultant, Business enthusiast, and Licensed Pilot.
Courtney Rawlings is an Inside Research Analyst living in Los Angeles, California. She has returned to her hometown of LA after spending several years working at Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia, where she is completing a Ph.D. in Art and Architectural History.
Martin Ruiz-Cantu is a Business Researcher at Inside.com. He has a Master's in Global Business and Finance from Georgetown University. He previously worked at HSBC and the World Bank. He is passionate about finance, startups and tech.
| | | | Editor | Vibha Chapparike is a Freelance Writer & Editor at Inside.com. With her post-graduation in Management and Finance completed, Vibha is expanding her knowledge in venture capital, business, startups, and technology. She has had a career in public relations and communications. An ardent reader and writer currently residing in Singapore, you can follow Vibha on Twitter @VChapparike. | |
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