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Quick Hits
4k in each eye: Rumors swirl that Apple’s AR mixed-reality headset will have an expansive 4k display that puts others to shame.
‘Ai’ in brain: Neuralink Corp., Elon Musk’s brain implant company, got FDA approval for human trials.
Cheap Lyfts: Minnesota’s governor vetoes gig worker pay bill to keep cheap Lyft and Uber rides.
AI everywhere: Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai’s “AI everywhere” prediction, back in 2016, is coming true.
Patent infringement: San Francisco jury makes Google pay $32.5M in damages to Sonos for smart speaker patent infringement.
Headed to jail: Elizabeth Holmes reports to prison soon for scamming investors with Theranos.
Want to beat AI? Be creative, emotional
As AI gets smarter, the premium on ingenuity will become greater, says Po-Shen Loh, a professor at Carnegie Mellon University and U.S. team coach for the International Mathematical Olympiad. He’s touring 65 cities and giving over 100 lectures to tell math nerds everywhere to focus on what distinguishes people from machines: things like creativity and emotion.
'A perfect year to graduate'
California-based chip maker Nvidia is riding high on the popularity of Chat GPT, which runs on its tech, and excitement around generative AI. With the company’s stock soaring, CEO Jensen Huang told graduates of National Taiwan University in Taipei that it’s “a perfect year to graduate” because of AI—just like 1984 and the introduction of the Mac computer. “While some worry that AI may take their jobs, someone who’s expert with AI will” he said.
$600M+ dry powder for generative AI investments
Corporate VCs are wooing AI founders with promises of tech ecosystems just as they did with cloud computing before. “This is a fundamental technology shift, like what the cloud did for computing, or what mobile did,” an OpenAI exec told Axios. OpenAI, Salesforce, and Workday say they’ll invest hundreds of millions to acquire generative AI startups. Solana created an accelerator program and with a $10M fund for teams building generative AI applications.
AI founders: ‘We need fuel!’
The chip shortage that’s throttling Nvidia’s stock price is causing a panic for founders and VCs. They’re desperate for the digital kindling to fuel the generative AI revolution: advanced graphics chips, or GPUs. OpenAI founder Sam Altman told Congress it would be better if fewer people used ChatGPT because of the processor bottleneck. “GPUs at this point are considerably harder to get than drugs,” Elon Musk told a conference of CEOs. AI founder Sharon Zhou likened it to finding toilet paper in a pandemic. “It’s about who you know,” she said.
Flipping the VC pitch
Rewind AI CEO Dan Siroker found a creative way to conduct his most recent Series A funding. He made his pitch deck public and added a form for investors to pitch him. He reportedly got 170 official offers and over a thousand investors expressed interest.
'Rigorous hurdle-jumping'
TechStar early stage startup investor Kerty Levy described the funding environment to an audience of founders at a TechCrunch conference: “In 2021, you would go through this list of things to think about. Traction: check. Founder/market fit: check. ... This time around, what we’re seeing is real, really rigorous, hurdle-jumping to get through the diligence and even through a few meetings with investors.”
The Weekly Pulse
Corporate recruiters first on chopping block
The exact number of tech recruiter layoffs in tech is unknown. Tech platform Interviewing.io estimates that tech companies that cut jobs have, on average, slashed about half of their recruiting staff—compared to about 10% of software engineers.
Pods of the week
- How I Built This: Cultivating a creative community with Tina Roth Eisenberg
- Think Fast Talk Smart: No Regrets: How to take risks in your communication, relationships, and career
- The Happiness Lab: Stop looking for the perfect job, a good enough job is just fine
What We’re Reading
- A.I. Poses ‘Risk of Extinction,’ Industry Leaders Warn NY Times
- Unlikely Venture Star Bags 35% Returns Mining Science Papers Bloomberg
- Japan Startup Raises $30 Million to Build Space Robot Workforce Bloomberg
- The tech trade is back, driven by A.I. craze and prospect of a less aggressive Fed CNBC
- Solving problems is better than fearmongering TechCrunch
- Deal Dive: Why this startup chose to sell itself over raising a Series A TechCrunch
Companies in the News
San Francisco-based SafelyYou, a remote care platform for seniors, received a $30M venture loan facility from Horizon Technology Finance Corporation. They’re hiring implementation managers.
Toronto-based BenchSci, which arms scientists with biomedical AI to run experiments, raised $70M in Series D led by Generation Investment Management. They’re hiring engineering managers, full stack engineers, and software engineers.
Kansas City-based Genetica, a startup harnessing machine learning to help people pick their ideal cannabis strain, raised $500k in seed funding led by Ens-emble. They’re hiring product development directors.
New Delhi-based Thena, a customer management platform, raised $5M in seed funding led by Lightspeed. They’re hiring full stack developers.
New York-based fintech OpenFin, which helps banks connect with financial apps, raised a $35M Series D led by Bank of America. They’re hiring sales development representatives and full stack developers.
Recruiter Corner: Top hiring trends of 2023 at startups
Finding the right talent is critical for the success of startups. Fortunately, the hiring landscape is evolving rapidly especially with the growing adoption of AI recruiting. In this post, we'll explore the top hiring trends of 2023 at startups.
Read more: Explore Top Hiring Trends
Hiring now
- Kunai: Digital product agency | 11 open roles
- Rejigg: Marketplace for buying and selling SMBs | 2 open roles
- HOMMA: AI based software and service company for connected homes | 2 open roles