This feels like a SoftBank deal from 4 years ago

Hello and welcome back to Equity, TechCrunch’s venture capital-focused podcast, where we unpack the numbers behind the headlines.

Equity is back in the saddle this week, with Mary Ann and Alex and Grace powering through a busy week’s news. And while much of the news in startup land is a bit lacking these days — you may have noticed a sentiment shift on Twitter! — we did find some good tidings as well.

Here’s the rundown:

• Sesame, which operates an online medical care marketplace, raised $27 million to help people without insurance or those with high deductibles get affordable healthcare. Interestingly, its lead investor also previously put money in another startup in the space.
• Marc Lore’s food creation and delivery startup Wonder raised a huge stack of cash. We had mixed views on this particular deal. On one hand, we hate cooking. On the other, will the economics ever work? Investors really seem to think so. We’re now waiting for the service to launch where we live so we can give it a try.
• Startups may be in better shape than you thought! That’s the take that Index’s Mike Volpi wrote in a letter that TechCrunch published. Alex dug into the matter as well. There are even more positive signs out there if you look.
• The real estate sector has taken a hit as of late, which led to Redfin and Compass laying off hundreds of employees. Yet one other proptech startup managed to raise capital and acquire a company this week.
• And to close, the crypto mess. Here’s some layoff news. And here are some new problems. Finally, an attempt to find some understanding of what’s going on.

And that is a wrap! We will chat you all next week!