Wonder Ventures secures $102M in funding, Rivian reveals its next-gen electric SUV

Top News

Pre-seed investor Wonder Ventures, who have backed unicorns including Honey and Whatnot, secures $102M, including a new later-stage fund. - Link

Rivian will reveal its next-generation vehicle — a smaller, cheaper electric SUV known as R2 — on March 7. - Link

Microsoft, Google, Meta, and Amazon added ~$10B to collective profits in the past two years by cutting depreciation costs due to extended server life estimates. - Link

Thoma Bravo takes critical event management software company Everbridge private in a $1.5B all-cash deal; Everbridge had a market cap of $6.4B in 2021. - Link

How social media is forcing writers and artists to build personal brands and become influencers, making many artists uncomfortable and feel like sellouts. - Link

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Advice of the Day

The Advantage of Youth

Daniel Ek, founder of Spotify, shares insights on the advantages of youth in entrepreneurship. Reflecting on his own journey of starting a company at 14 and founding Spotify at 23, Ek acknowledges his naivety as a strength, allowing him to focus on solutions rather than obstacles. He believes while ideas are important, 95% of success comes from execution, encouraging young entrepreneurs to persist and adapt despite their inexperience. - Link

Startup Demo of the Day:

Typeframes is a video-making tool that enables teams to create product videos for YouTube, Instagram, and TikTok by giving the tool a text prompt. Its AI will transform the prompt into a video in minutes, saving teams time and money.

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.

This Week in Startups

E1891: Jason gives an update on the late-stage VC market and then Sahand Dilmaghani talks about founding Terra Kaffe and the benefits of the Terra Kaffe machines over pod machines. He explains what makes a super-automatic machine produce good coffee and discusses expanding the product's use in offices, schools, and homes. - Watch

E1890: Michael Kim and Jason discuss Fund of Funds, investor attraction in pre-seed and seed startups, and the rise of "micro VCs." The conversation covers alpha, beta, and quality indices, investor networks, current market trends, and the shift where seed is the new series-A. The episode ends with insights into founder demographics seeking investment. - Watch

E1889: Jake Gutstein joins Jason to discuss the creation of Zest, from the initial concept to product development. They explore Zest's transition to full-time operations, fundraising, and insights from user research. The episode also covers the product launch, fundraising approach, and experiences with the Launch Accelerator program. It concludes with a glimpse into Zest's future plans and goals. - Watch

E1888: Sunny joins Jason for the 100th demo on the show. The episode includes demos of MultiOn, Paid Leave, Consensus, and Depth Anything. Sunny also showcases AI advancements posted by Barsee on X. This episode is dedicated to the memory of Aaron Swartz. - Watch

E1887: Aileen Lee talks with Jason about her journey in the male-dominated tech world and overcoming challenges as a woman. They discuss her role in popularizing the term "unicorns" for successful startups. The conversation covers the effects of the ZIRP era on the Unicorn Club, changes in VC trends, and insights into US unicorn founders. They explore key traits of successful startup founders and predict future unicorn status. - Watch

E1886: David Weisburd, Elizabeth Yin, Zach Coelius, and Jason Calacanis explore the current state of venture funds. Despite a slow market, venture funds are growing in size. The conversation touches on the performance comparison between smaller and larger funds, focusing on Hustle Fund's quantitative approach to evaluating startups. The group also discusses the resurgence of the Bay Area and the increase in the number of unicorns, although liquidity has decreased. The session concludes with a rapid-fire segment highlighting top recent investments. - Watch

This Week in Startups Paid Partnerships

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