Startups
Tech startup news that breaks down the funding, growth, and long-term trajectory of companies across every stage and industry. Startup coverage includes climate, crypto, fintech, SaaS, transportation, and consumer tech.
Rainforest lands $20M to challenge Stripe with embedded payments for SaaS providers
Rainforest, a startup that embeds payment processing into other software platforms, has raised $20 million in Series A funding — less than a year after announcing the close of its…
Samsara Eco is working to replace plastic packaging with fossil fuel-free alternatives
Samsara Eco makes and sells fossil-free polymer resins. These resins can be integrated into supply chains and potentially replace plastic packaging and textile products with more sustainable alternatives. The Australian…
Creatio raises $200M at a $1.2B valuation for its no-code CRM and workflow platform
Creatio CEO Katherine Kostereva argues that what sets her company apart is that it was always architected to work at an enterprise scale.
In a push to bolster profits, more airlines are turning to controversial dynamic pricing tech, which prices fares and amenities variably based on a traveler’s willingness to pay for them.
Sensi.AI grabs $31M Series B from Insight, Zeev to monitor seniors 24/7
Older adults increasingly want to age in their homes rather than nursing facilities. A study by the AARP (American Association of Retired Persons) found that nearly 90% of people over…
10 of the most exciting digital health startups of 2024, according to VCs
In the post-COVID world, VCs say it’s not as easy to get excited about investing in digital health. Deal activity in healthcare IT was relatively flat in Q1 2024 at…
Fearless Fund’s founder has resigned, and it’s a sad reflection on the VC world for Black women
Fearless Fund’s co-founder and COO Ayana Parsons has announced that she was stepping down. The firm is being sued by a politically conservative group.
It’s unclear where Stability goes from here.
Popular productivity tool Notion has long allowed its users to make any of their pages public. Now, the company is expanding on this with the launch of Notion Sites, which…
Payabli is building payment management tools for software startups
Payabli builds the infrastructure that allows companies, specifically software companies, to embed and facilitate payments through APIs.
Tengo untangles the messy world of public sector procurement with AI
Tengo uses AI to find, evaluate and respond to public tenders. It’s a software-as-a-service tool that helps companies handle public tenders at scale — a bit like Govly in the…
Smashing, from Goodreads’ co-founder, curates the best of the web using AI and human recommendations
Smashing is an AI and community-powered content recommendation app, now launching into an invite-only beta.
Boeing’s Wisk Aero buys Verocel to boost software safety for its self-flying eVTOL
Wisk Aero, a subsidiary of Boeing, has acquired Verocel, a software verification and validation company that’s served the aerospace industry for 25 years.
Coder’s open-source software has around 1.2 million monthly active users, and Dropbox, Discord and Skydio are among the company’s paying customers.
k-ID wins $45M to help game devs speedrun the child safety compliance puzzle
k-ID’s platform makes it easy for game devs to comply with child safety and data privacy regulations.
EvolutionaryScale, backed by Amazon and Nvidia, raises $142M for protein-generating AI
A startup called EvolutionaryScale, founded by ex-Meta researchers, has raised $142 million for its AI-powered protein-generating tech.
General Catalyst leads $40M round for Local Kitchens, a different kind of restaurant kitchen startup
Don’t call this company a “ghost kitchen.” Since its Series A in 2021, Local Kitchens grew 5x and achieved unit-level profitability.
Foray Bioscience is breaking down the barriers of bringing biomanufacturing to plants
Ashley Beckwith spent years of her academic and professional career focused on the intersection of biology, materials and manufacturing to build medical solutions more efficiently. When she realized the tech…
TestParty raises $4M to help automate the coding for accessible websites
As of today, nearly all of the world’s most popular website homepages are not compliant with the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines.
Rocketlane snags $24M to bring AI-led experiences for professional services teams
Rocketlane initially aimed to support customer onboarding. However, it has broadened its scope and doubled down on addressing the needs of professional services teams.
Chift lets SaaS companies integrate with dozens of financial tools with a unified API
Pennylane, Qonto, Agicap, Pleo and Mollie have one thing in common. They all use Chift in one way or another to manage integrations with other services. And this relatively young…
India’s Zyod raises $18M to expand its tech-enabled fashion manufacturing to more countries
The Gurugram-based startup works with Indian factories to help them manufacture fashion wear for global brands.
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A comprehensive list of 2024 tech layoffs
The tech layoff wave is still going strong in 2024. Following significant workforce reductions in 2022 and 2023, this year has already seen 60,000 job cuts across 254 companies, according to independent layoffs tracker Layoffs.fyi. Companies like Tesla, Amazon, Google, TikTok, Snap and Microsoft have conducted sizable layoffs in the…
Emergence on Monday emerged from stealth with $97.2 million in funding.
The Multi deal seems to fit into OpenAI’s broader recent strategy of investing heavily in enterprise solutions.
Apple has been named the first of tech’s so-called “gatekeepers” to be charged for violating the EU’s Digital Markets Act. In a press release this…
Matt Rogers, Nest and Mill co-founder, talks mastering consumer tech at Disrupt 2024
Consumer technology is hard, but few people have mastered it as well as Matt Rogers, co-founder of Nest and now Mill, his new startup that promises to turn your table…
Prosus, the largest external investor in Byju’s, has written off its 9.6% stake in Indian edtech firm.
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Silicon Valley leaders are once again declaring ‘DEI’ bad and ‘meritocracy’ good — but they’re wrong
Scale AI founder Alexandr Wang set off another debate with an anti-DEI post. It revealed a lot about the current state of DEI in tech.
How 2 high school teens raised a $500K seed round for their API startup (yes, it’s AI)
18-year-olds Christopher Fitzgerald and Nicholas Van Landschoot have founded APIGen, a platform to build custom APIs from natural language prompts.