Meta announces initiative to promote responsible AI, Robinhood launches crypto trading in EU

Top News

Meta announces Purple Llama, an initiative to promote responsible AI development by offering tools and evaluations for safely building open generative AI models. - Link

Amazon tests a $9.99/month grocery subscription service for Prime members, offering unlimited Whole Foods and Amazon Fresh grocery delivery on orders over $35. - Link

PitchBook estimates that at least ~3,200 private venture-backed US startups, which had raised a combined $27.2B in VC funding, have gone out of business in 2023. - Link

Former OpenAI board member Helen Toner says the “goal in firing Sam Altman was to strengthen OpenAI” but declines to say why she and others voted to fire him. - Link

Robinhood launches a commission-free crypto trading app, supporting 25+ cryptocurrencies, in the EU, a week after the company launched stock trading in the UK. - Link

• Robinhood is a Jason/LAUNCH portfolio company.

Founder University is a 12-week pre-accelerator program run by Jason/LAUNCH for builder founders. We're investing $25k in 20-30 companies from Cohort 7. Apply at founder.university/letsbuild.

Startup Funding

Klook Travel, a start-up that provides online travel booking services such as food-themed excursions and adventure expeditions, raised a $210M Series E+ led by Bessemer Venture Partners. Its total funding is now $900M+ after turning cash flow positive in mid-2023. - Link

Air Space Intelligence, whose Waze-like tool Flyways helps flight dispatchers pick routes for planes, raised $34M led by a16z, at a ~$300M valuation. - Link

ContactMonkey, which offers an internal communications tool that integrates with Outlook, Gmail, and more, raised a $55M Series A led by Updata. The company was founded in 2011 by Scott Pielsticker. - Link

Pontera is a NYC-based startup that builds software for managing retirement accounts. The company raised $60M at a $550M+ valuation led by investment firm ICONIQ Growth, taking its total funding to $160M. - Link

Product Demo & Launches

Strut is an all-in-one AI workspace designed for writers. Capture projects, notes, drafts, and more in collaborative workspaces. - Link

VEED Captions lets you create engaging short-form videos from your phone. Add instant captions and animations, translations, and audio fine-tuning. - Link

Mangools is a tool to supercharge your SEO. The tool allows you to perform keyword research, backlink analysis, check competitors’ website authority, and more. - Link

Advice of the Day

Finding Talent

Julie Zhuo, ex-VP of Design at Meta/Facebook suggests the best way to find great talent is to look at the products you admire and figure out who built them. That’s how they hired some of the earliest designers at Facebook. - Link

When your business is ready to make that next hire, find the right person with LinkedIn Jobs. Post your open roles and easily target, prioritize, and manage qualified candidates. Visit LinkedIn.com/TWIST to post a job for free.   Ad

This Week in Startups

E1859: Jason welcomes Michael Putz, CEO of Blackshark.ai, to discuss lessons from video game creation, the vision behind a digital twin of the planet, and Blackshark's programming methods. The conversation covers modern data training, In-Q-Tel's investment, a live demo of Orca Huntr, satellite imagery updates, remote work perspectives, and how Blackshark's team uses AI for efficiency. - Watch

E1858: Anne Wojcicki of 23andMe discusses the transformative journey of genome sequencing, highlighting the dramatic cost reduction to $99 and its impact on proactive health management. The conversation delves into pivotal moments in health understanding, strategies for healthcare integration, and the need for policy shifts, concluding with reflections on Wojcicki's 17-year journey and her vision for the future of health and genetics. - Watch

E1857: Sunny Madra joins Jason to showcase Figma's FigJam, a collaborative whiteboard tool. The discussion covers AI-generated images, company copyright challenges, and FigJam feedback. Sunny also demonstrates Fal, an AI tool for photo transformation, and showcases the Real-Time Latent Consistency Model. The session concludes with a demo of Alibaba's Animate Anyone. ****- Watch

E1856: David Heinemeier Hansson discusses the launch of his new project, Once.com, which offers a unique alternative to traditional SaaS by charging a one-time fee instead of a recurring subscription, and shares his views on various topics, including copyright, the changing nature of remote work, internal culture challenges at Basecamp, the pace of AI development, and the importance of embracing hardship to build resilience and grit. - Watch

E1855: This episode dives into the rapid evolution of AI and the prospect of achieving Artificial General Intelligence (AGI), featuring insights from Adept CEO David Luan. It's a must-watch for understanding how AI shapes our future and data's role in this transformation. - Watch

This Week in Startups Paid Partnerships

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