Startups Weekly: Different paths on the road to liquidity

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This week was engaged for startups: While determination were nary IPOs of note, determination were different exits and adjacent antithetic liquidity events, arsenic good arsenic a important fig of backing rounds of assorted sizes and stages.

Most absorbing startup stories from the week

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This week brought america M&As from serial buyers, an exit enactment that whitethorn beryllium reassuring for founders inactive struggling with lawsuit retention and backing headwinds.

Scooped up: San Jose, California-based startup Mainstreet.com became the latest fintech to get acquired by workforce absorption institution Employer.com, which is present valued astatine conscionable northbound of $700 million. 

Short connected cash: Despite precocious hitting a cardinal improvement milestone, General Fusion laid disconnected astatine slightest 25% of its employees, with CEO Greg Twinney explaining that the Canadian fusion powerfulness institution was moving retired of money. 

By Datadog: Datadog bought Eppo, a feature-flagging and experimentation level that volition present run nether the marque “Eppo by Datadog.” This comes soon aft it acquired AI-powered observability startup Metaplane. 

Retention issues: 11x co-founder Hasan Sukkar stepped down arsenic CEO and was replaced by CTO Prabhav Jain. The AI startup came nether scrutiny earlier this twelvemonth for showing logos of companies that were not progressive customers, amid claims it was struggling with lawsuit retention. 

Build oregon invest: Carta acquired SimpleClosure, a startup branding itself arsenic “the TurboTax of shutting down.” The equity absorption startup antecedently discontinued a akin offering, called Carta Conclusions.

Small world: Two months aft buying Moveworks, ServiceNow acquired Data.World, which had raised more than $130 cardinal successful task financing for its cloud-native information catalog and information governance platform.

With conditions: A radical of investors is considering injecting another $30 million into ailing Indian ride-hailing startup BluSmart — arsenic agelong arsenic co-founder Anmol Singh Jaggi agrees to resign.

Liquidity: Sales automation startup Clay took the antithetic measurement of allowing employees with astatine slightest 1 twelvemonth of tenure to sell shares to existing backer Sequoia. The cognition values the institution astatine $1.5 billion.

Most absorbing VC and backing quality this week

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Rounds this week confirmed that AI isn’t the lone happening that tin pull VCs: The committedness of a longer, healthier beingness — some for radical and for batteries — can, too.

No limit: NewLimit, the longevity startup founded by Coinbase CEO Brian Armstrong, raised a $130 cardinal Series B led by Kleiner Perkins to make age-reversing therapies.

Qonto rival: Finom, a neobank serving SMBs successful respective European countries, raised astir $105 million from General Catalyst to boost its growth. 

Boosted by defense: Orca AI, whose autonomous navigation level for shipping has defence applications, raised a $72.5 cardinal Series A, bringing its full backing to implicit $111 million.

Scanning: Ox Security, which scans for vulnerabilities successful code, secured a $60 cardinal Series B led by DTCP that it volition usage for maturation and expansion.

Crafty: Recraft, whose stealth representation exemplary bushed OpenAI’s DALL-E and Midjourney connected a fashionable benchmark past year, raised a $30 cardinal Series B led by Accel.

Bye, concern cards: Australian startup Blinq raised a $25 cardinal Series A to marque concern cards obsolete and regenerate them with integer alternatives with CRM integrations.

Wisdom truth: WisdomAI, an AI startup hoping to assistance debar hallucinations erstwhile delivering concern insights, raised $23 cardinal successful an unusually ample effect round.

More power: Breathe Battery Technologies, whose bundle helps optimize and foretell artillery performance, raised a $21 cardinal Series B led by Kinnevik Online AB.

Coding context: Unblocked, a institution down an AI-powered adjunct that answers contextual questions astir lines of code, raised a $20 cardinal Series A from B Capital and Radical Ventures.

Positive energy: Bosch Ventures, the task limb of Bosch, volition support connected investing successful heavy tech done its new $270 cardinal fund, but with accrued absorption connected North American startups. 

Last but not least

Image Credits:Costas Baltas/Anadolu / Getty Images

As Athens-based VC steadfast Marathon Venture Capital closed its newest money with astir $84 cardinal successful superior commitments, TechCrunch caught up with spouse Panos Papadopoulos to sermon however Greek startups are serving planetary markets, and more.