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| Here’s a look at today’s Startups briefing. - 🦄 French accounting startup Pennylane cemented its unicorn status with €40M funding round.
- ⚖️ Startup equity distribution remained skewed in 2023.
- 🛰️ Stealth space startup Interlune is raising $17.7M in equity funding.
Thank you. Karan
p/karan-chafekar | |
| 1 | | OpenAI is reportedly developing a software solution dubbed "Agent" that automates tasks, sources told The Information. The AI startup wants to turn its popular chatbot tool ChatGPT into a "supersmart personal assistant for work," CEO Sam Altman supposedly told a few developers. More: - The tool will be able to perform tasks that require text typing, cursor movements, or interaction with different apps.
- A few use cases for the tool include collating public data sets, creating itineraries, or booking flight tickets.
- Business Insider believes the new tool could cause some friction with major investor Microsoft, which already has AI agents for its workplace apps.
Zoom out: - Google's AI division DeepMind's co-founder and CEO of Inflection AI, Mustafa Suleyman, envisions that AI will enable everyone to have their own personal assistant within the next five years.
- Suleyman adds, "It will be able to reason over your day, help you prioritize your time, help you invent, be much more creative."
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| 2 | | Equity distribution in startups remained skewed in 2023, especially for women and underrepresented employees, per a new report published by Carta. 
What the numbers say: Women received only 24% of the startup equity issued to employees between 2019 and 2023 despite constituting 35% of the workforce. A similar unequal distribution trend can be found when viewing the startup equity data from ethnicity and race factors. The amount of equity offered to underrepresented employees between 2019 and 2023 barely budged from 2014 to 2018. About 75% of all startup equity distributions went to white workers. What happened: The root cause of this inequity lies in the lack of diversity in hiring practices, particularly in higher-ranking positions within startups, per Carta. SignalFire's partner Heather Doshay thinks, "If you just hire people from underrepresented identities into the roles where equity benchmarks are higher, you're going to see more equalization in equity than you do right now." | | | |
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| 3 | | French accounting solutions startup Pennylane entered the unicorn club with a €40M ($43M) Series C funding round. Pennylane was able to double its valuation from the last round. More: - Existing backers DST Global and Sequoia Global doubled down on the startup by participating in the recent round.
- Founded in 2020, the firm provides a SaaS accounting platform that centralizes invoicing, tax return filing, financial statements, and real-time financial reporting into a single platform.
- In the last two years, the firm has witnessed a 40x growth in its user base.
- Pennylane's software is currently used by about 2,000 accounting firms and over 120,000 SMEs.
- The firm has raised €138.5M ($149M) in total funding to date, including a €50M ($57M) Series B round in 2022 and a €30M ($32.3M) funding in 2023.
- The firm aims to become profitable over the next 12 to 18 months.
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| 4 | | Interlune, a stealth space startup co-founded by former Blue Origin president Rob Meyerson, is reportedly planning to raise $17.7M in equity funding, per SEC filings seen by GeekWire. As of date, the firm has already raised $15.6M from 18 undisclosed investors. More: - Interlune has operated in stealth mode since its founding in 2020.
- Co-founder Gary Lai provided a glimpse into the company's vision during a brief discussion at Seattle's Museum of Flight, stating, "We aim to be the first company that harvests natural resources from the moon to use here on Earth."
- The firm previously received a $246,000 grant from the National Science Foundation to develop a machine capable of sorting moon dirt by particle size.
- The company's executive team includes industry stalwarts such as Apollo 17 mission astronaut Harrison Schmitt, former Rocket Lab USA executive Indra Hornsby, and Seven Seven Six's founding partner Katelin Holloway.
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| 5 | | Climate tech startup Twelve fired up its first commercial-scale carbon transformation unit. The CO2 electrochemical reactor, dubbed OPUS, will be the key machine that will turn carbon dioxide and water into synthetic aviation fuel (SAF) using electrolysis at its production facility in Moses Lake, Washington. The facility is currently under construction and is expected to be completed by the end of this year. More: - The key advantage of Twelve's electrochemical reactor technology is its ability to run at lower temperatures than conventional units.
- Additionally, the reactor can be quickly brought up to its optimum operating conditions, eliminating the need to keep it running 24x7, thereby lowering operating costs.
- Alaska Air Group will procure SAF from Twelve, which will blend with traditional jet fuel.
- In addition, Twelve will also offer carbon credits to Microsoft and Shopify to offset their business travel-related emissions.
Zoom out: - The European Union has mandated that 2% of all aviation fuel used by the nations in the region must be SAF by 2025, with the figure rising to 70% by 2050.
- There is still a long way to go, as SAF accounted for 0.1% of the world's aviation fuel supply in 2022, according to BloombergNEF.
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| 6 | | Finnish HR tech startup Workfellow is shutting down operations and filing for bankruptcy. CEO Kustaa Kivelä attributes the decision to the challenges encountered by the company throughout 2023. More: - Kivelä said, "As our final discussions about finding a new home for our team and product went sideways earlier this week, we had to file for bankruptcy today."
- The firm was founded in 2019, and last raised $3M in a seed round led by OpenOcean in late 2021.
- Other notable backers of the firm include Icebreaker.vc and angel investors Kedar Dani and Kelpreet Singh.
- The firm had 18 team members.
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- John Paul DeJoria co-founded Vendidit, a startup that leverages AI to help retailers sell returned products in secondary markets. Vendidit spun out from asset recovery and reverse supply chain Renew Logic and is led by Renew Logic's CEO, Gary Stephens.
- Filtration giant Brita acquired smart water bottle maker Larq for an undisclosed sum.
- Contractor+, a B2B SaaS solution for home improvement contractors, launched a crowdfunding campaign to raise a seed round. The firm has an annual recurring revenue of $360,000, with a 12% MoM growth rate. The firm is offering convertible notes with a 9.75% interest rate on a valuation of $8.1M.
- Autonomous vehicle startup Project 3 Mobility closed its Series A funding round at €100M ($107M). TASARU Mobility Investments, South Korean automaker Kia, and EV firm Rimac Group provided the funding.
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 | Analyst | | Karan Chafekar is a Management Consultant, Business enthusiast, and Licensed Pilot. | | This newsletter was edited by Vibha Chapparike | |
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