Startups

Week 2 of the Sam Bankman-Fried trial wraps up

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Image Credits: Yuki Iwamura/Bloomberg via Getty Images / Getty Images

Good morning! I’m Karyne Levy, managing editor of TechCrunch+, and I’m very excited to be here.

We’ve got quite a lineup for you today, beginning with some key moments from the Sam Bankman-Fried trial. Our reporter Jacquelyn Melinek has been at the courthouse every day; you can check out our coverage of the trial here.


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This week, Caroline Ellison, ex-CEO of Alameda Research and SBF’s former girlfriend, took the stand. She explained how she cooked the books to make Alameda’s finances look a lot cleaner than they actually were. “We were in a bad situation,” is how she aptly put it.

Thanks for reading!

Karyne

@karynelevy

Former Alameda CEO Caroline Ellison explains how FTX hid losses, sandbagged lenders

Ask Sophie: Can a bootstrapping solo founder get an O-1A?

lone figure at entrance to maze hedge that has an American flag at the center
Image Credits: Bryce Durbin/TechCrunch

I am a solo founder who is bootstrapping my startup to the point of traction before I even consider raising funding. It sounds like you need VC funding to get an O-1A — is that true? Is it even possible for me to consider getting an O-1A at this stage?

 — Bold Bootstrapper

Ask Sophie: Can a bootstrapping solo founder get an O-1A?

More money won’t fix your failing startup — here’s how to get investors to back a pivot

Pencil Cracked into Two Colors on Solid Color Block Background.
Image Credits: MirageC (opens in a new window) / Getty Images

If your startup isn’t seeing the kind of traction or growth that you expect, sometimes the best way forward is to actually take a detour and see if there’s some other need you can fulfill.

“If your company isn’t seeing strong growth with customers eager to use the product and share it with others, it might be time to pivot the company in a new direction,” says Sarah Leary, a venture partner at Unusual Ventures.

Leary’s advice is material, because she’s pulled off a successful pivot before: She co-founded Fanbase, a site for fans of different sports to congregate and share information over a network. But when that idea didn’t scale, the team quickly pivoted and started Nextdoor.

Leary lays out five actionable tips that can help founders considering a pivot to do it correctly, and get their investors on board with the new plan.

More money won’t fix your failing startup — here’s how to get investors to back a pivot

We asked 52 founders whether events are useful or a waste of time

events, founders, startups
Image Credits: BrianAJackson / Getty Images

Events can be a great resource for founders: You get to network, learn what’s going on in your industry, get a read of the market, find customers and so much more.

But are they really worth all the money and effort, not to mention the time you could otherwise be spending actually building your startup?

To find out, Rebecca Szkutak asked founders how they feel about founder-focused events, what they find useful about them and what they think makes them a colossal waste of time.

To attend or not to attend: We asked 52 founders whether events are useful or a waste of time

Deal Dive: The future of social media is vertical

social media, startups, community
Image Credits: We Are / Getty Images

Social media is very different today from what it was just five years ago. Leaving out what’s happened to X, formerly Twitter (no one could have predicted that), disinformation is now as common as memes, dialogue is more partisan than ever, and it’s hard to avoid recommendations (they’re actually ads) everywhere.

So it’s not surprising that people are flocking to more focused communities that cater to their interests or gives them a place to feel safe in an internet that’s increasingly hateful and divisive.

“Why would someone from a marginalized group scroll through irrelevant content, hate and bots to find their community when there’s already a dedicated space elsewhere?” writes Rebecca Szkutak.

“For social media investors, it’s likely the future riches will be in the niches.”

Deal Dive: The future of social media is vertical

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Zendesk emerges from last year’s turbulence with strong outlook

Illustration of women meditating, floating above her desk while work swirls around her.
Image Credits: BrownAlex / Getty Images

Zendesk didn’t look so hot at the end of 2022: It rejected a $17 billion takeover bid, and its own investors rejected a $4.1 billion offer to buy SurveyMonkey — all in the same month. But with a new CEO at the helm, the present (and the future) is looking better and better.

Zendesk emerges from last year’s turbulence with strong outlook

Bedrock Energy thinks the solution to decarbonizing skyscrapers is 1,500 feet underground

A cloud hangs over 432 Park Ave, New York City.
Image Credits: Yongyuan Dai / Getty Images

One of my favorite pieces of climate tech is a heat pump, which is at least three times more efficient than traditional heating. I don’t have one in my home, but after a year of big weather events in the Bay Area, and astronomical heating bills, heat pumps are looking better and better. But what about bigger buildings? Bedrock Energy is betting that underground heat pumps, known as geothermal heat pumps, could help decarbonize heating and cooling for large buildings around the country.

Bedrock Energy thinks the solution to decarbonizing skyscrapers is 1,500 feet underground

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The European venture capital firm raised its fourth fund as fund as climate tech “comes of age.”

ETF Partners raises €284M for climate startups that will be effective quickly—not 20 years down the road

Copilot, Microsoft’s brand of generative AI, will soon be far more deeply integrated into the Windows 11 experience.

Microsoft wants to make Windows an AI operating system, launches Copilot+ PCs

“When I heard the released demo, I was shocked, angered and in disbelief that Mr. Altman would pursue a voice that sounded so eerily similar to mine.”

Scarlett Johansson says that OpenAI approached her to use her voice

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The top vehicle safety regulator in the U.S. has launched a formal probe into an April crash involving the all-electric VinFast VF8 SUV that claimed the lives of a family…

VinFast crash that killed family of four now under federal investigation

When putting a video portal in a public park in the middle of New York City, some inappropriate behavior will likely occur. The Portal, the vision of Lithuanian artist and…

NYC-Dublin real-time video portal reopens with some fixes to prevent inappropriate behavior

Longtime New York-based seed investor, Contour Venture Partners, is making progress on its latest flagship fund after lowering its target. The firm closed on $42 million, raised from 64 backers,…

Contour Venture Partners, an early investor in Datadog and Movable Ink, lowers the target for its fifth fund

Meta’s Oversight Board has now extended its scope to include the company’s newest platform, Instagram Threads, and has begun hearing cases from Threads.

Meta’s Oversight Board takes its first Threads case

The company says it’s refocusing and prioritizing fewer initiatives that will have the biggest impact on customers and add value to the business.

SeekOut, a recruiting startup last valued at $1.2 billion, lays off 30% of its workforce

The U.K.’s self-proclaimed “world-leading” regulations for self-driving cars are now official, after the Automated Vehicles (AV) Act received royal assent — the final rubber stamp any legislation must go through…

UK’s autonomous vehicle legislation becomes law, paving the way for first driverless cars by 2026

ChatGPT, OpenAI’s text-generating AI chatbot, has taken the world by storm. What started as a tool to hyper-charge productivity through writing essays and code with short text prompts has evolved…

ChatGPT: Everything you need to know about the AI-powered chatbot

SoLo Funds CEO Travis Holoway: “Regulators seem driven by press releases when they should be motivated by true consumer protection and empowering equitable solutions.”

Fintech lender SoLo Funds is being sued again by the government over its lending practices

Hard tech startups generate a lot of buzz, but there’s a growing cohort of companies building digital tools squarely focused on making hard tech development faster, more efficient and —…

Rollup wants to be the hardware engineer’s workhorse

TechCrunch Disrupt 2024 is not just about groundbreaking innovations, insightful panels, and visionary speakers — it’s also about listening to YOU, the audience, and what you feel is top of…

Disrupt Audience Choice vote closes Friday

Google says the new SDK would help Google expand on its core mission of connecting the right audience to the right content at the right time.

Google is launching a new Android feature to drive users back into their installed apps

Jolla has taken the official wraps off the first version of its personal server-based AI assistant in the making. The reborn startup is building a privacy-focused AI device — aka…

Jolla debuts privacy-focused AI hardware

The ChatGPT mobile app’s net revenue first jumped 22% on the day of the GPT-4o launch and continued to grow in the following days.

ChatGPT’s mobile app revenue saw its biggest spike yet following GPT-4o launch

Dating app maker Bumble has acquired Geneva, an online platform built around forming real-world groups and clubs. The company said that the deal is designed to help it expand its…

Bumble buys community building app Geneva to expand further into friendships

CyberArk — one of the army of larger security companies founded out of Israel — is acquiring Venafi, a specialist in machine identity, for $1.54 billion. 

CyberArk snaps up Venafi for $1.54B to ramp up in machine-to-machine security

Founder-market fit is one of the most crucial factors in a startup’s success, and operators (someone involved in the day-to-day operations of a startup) turned founders have an almost unfair advantage…

OpenseedVC, which backs operators in Africa and Europe starting their companies, reaches first close of $10M fund

A Singapore High Court has effectively approved Pine Labs’ request to shift its operations to India.

Pine Labs gets Singapore court approval to shift base to India

The AI Safety Institute, a U.K. body that aims to assess and address risks in AI platforms, has said it will open a second location in San Francisco. 

UK opens office in San Francisco to tackle AI risk

Companies are always looking for an edge, and searching for ways to encourage their employees to innovate. One way to do that is by running an internal hackathon around a…

Why companies are turning to internal hackathons

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