Biden Admin split on AI, Fidelity marks down Twitter stake, App Store generated $1.1T in total billings in 2022

Bloomberg sources: The Biden admin is split on AI regulation, with some supporting an EU-style approach and others arguing for fewer restrictions to help the US compete globally - Link

Fidelity marked down the value of its stake in Twitter, representing a ~66% decrease in valuation from the ~$44B price tag - Link

Apple says its App Store platform generated $1.1T in developer billings and sales last year, ~90% of which was commission-free; breakdown: $910B from physical goods, $109B from in-app ads, $104B for digital goods - Link

Hostaway, a Toronto-based startup building vacation rental management software, raised $175M led by PSG Equity; ~100K properties across 100 counties are managed through Hostaway's platform - Link

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Jack Krawczyk, the head Google's Bard team, chats with Jason about Bard's capabilities and Google's plan for monetization. Following a few demonstrations of the AI chatbot (43:32), Jason wraps the episode with some thoughts on the series finale of HBO's Succession (1:01:45) - Link

Twitter launched Community Notes for images, which enables crowdsourced moderation of visual content, in the wake of AI-generated images getting more realistic - Link

NomuPay, a Dublin-based fintech startup built from the assets of Wirecard and other businesses, announced $53.6M in funding to date, which it calls a Series A - Link

Strive Health, a startup offering value-based care for patients with kidney disease, raised a $166M Series C led by NEA and five other new investors; Strive serves 80K patients in 30 states - Link

Magic, a startup building an SDK for white-labeled crypto wallets, raised $52M led by PayPal Ventures at a valuation of just under $500M - Link

This Week in Startups

E1752: Breaking down Bard with Google’s Jack Krawczyk

E1751: Understanding the UAE startup opportunity with Brad Gerstner and Ibrahim Ajami

E1750: ChatGPT vs Hollywood writers and the WGA strike with Lon Harris

E1749: Text-to-UI demo with Galileo AI Co-founder Arnaud Benard + How to design loved products

E1748: Startup pitch competition: Jason invests $25K

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