StubHub delays its IPO, CapCut tells users to pay up, and new TWiST500 companies

Top News

• StubHub pushes IPO back: After filing privately to go public, ticket marketplace StubHub is pushing back its start to September, the WSJ reports. The delay means that investors will get to see StubHub’s full Q2 results when it does release its S-1 filing publicly. For tech shops looking to list, the delay is the opposite of good news.

• CapCut says show me the money: Fans of Bytedance’s app CapCut will need to shell out for storage starting this August, after the video editing service announced that it is ending free storage in just a few weeks. Videos are big, video editing can be computationally intensive, so the move makes sense. Users, of course, are less than thrilled.

• Boston VCs cheer demise of Google-HubSpot deal: Shareholders of HubSpot might have hoped for a big payday from the search giant, but local venture investors view the continued independence of the local martech giant as a win for their local ecosystem. Boston is one of the United States’ critical venture markets, though it has lost the spotlight in recent decades to the Bay Area and New York City.

TWiST500

A big thanks to the community for sending in a huge number of housing and construction tech companies for us to dig through on the show today. There were more companies and more total capital invested than I expected when we put out the call for suggestions.

Thematically, there are two main buckets of startups for us to consider: Those dealing with construction itself and those building software for the construction industry. Inside the building things group, startups are working on:

• ADUs (Cover, Housable, Zomes, Samara)

• Prefab construction (BOXABL, Plant Prefab, Zenni)

• 3D printing (Mighty Buildings, Azure Printed Homes, Icon)

• Robotic construction (Dusty Robotics, Cuby, Monumental, Agorus, Advanced Construction Robots, PaintJet)

And in the software is eating the world group, startups are working on:

• Digital design software, often with a collaborative twist (Augrade, Rayon, Snaptrude, PalazzoAI)

• Marketplaces to connect buyers and sellers of critical construction goods (Kojo, Buildstock)

• Visual notetaking via cameras and cloud storage (OpenSpace, CompanyCam)

• Vertical SaaS for construction (Built Technologies, HighArc, Propy, DataForm Lab, PermitFlow, Hammr, Shepherd, Fieldwire, BuildingSwell)

What about AI? Many companies mentioned it, making lots of noise in their pitches about how they use AI today to automate work, ingest data, or help robots execute tasks that humans once had to do by hand. In short, if you want to avoid AI, construction and housing tech startups are not for you.

Given the number of venture-backed startups in this space, we will have a tough time cutting down to our favorites. But hey, tune in live today for the debate!

A message from DevSquad:

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This Week in Startups

E1978: Jason sat down with Anand Nandakumar, the CEO of Halo Car to chat about the startup’s approach to driving autonomy. While many major tech companies are pursuing self-driving cars, Halo Car is more focused on teleoperation to get rental vehicles to customers. As self-driving remains a future product instead of — mostly — a present reality, it’s a timely conversation and a neat startup to boot.

E1977: Jason and Alex kicked off the week digging into the news that a16z has built a GPU cluster that it then rents to portfolio companies. How far will VCs go to secure deal flow? That far, it turns out. The pair also dug into Q2 venture capital trends, and added a host of robotics companies to the TWiST500.

E1976: AI with Sunny returns, featuring data concerning the current venture capital fundraising market and what to make of ‘AI native” workers. On the demo side of the fence, Sunny and Jason looked at Luna Labs, Kling, Qwen, Cartesia AI, and more. This is a must-watch if you want to keep tabs on the latest from the world of artificial intelligence.

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