Layoffs at Bolt, really big funds for a16z and NEA, and Twitter shareholders vote Egon Durban off the board

Andreessen Horowitz has closed on its latest crypto fund, and as expected, it's a whopper, notes TechCrunch. The new $4.5 billion fund doubles the size of the firm's last crypto fund, which closed with $2.2 billion in capital commitments less than a year ago. One third of the capital is being earmarked for seed deals, says the firm (to which the Twittersphere responds: that's a lot of seed deals). More here.

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Republican lawmakers are facing growing anger over the deadliest mass shooting at an American school in nearly a decade yesterday, with many of their constituents expressing frustration over their repeated votes against even modest gun control reforms.

Social media can’t solve the problem. Indigov, a three-year-old, 70-person New York-based startup, can’t solve it either, but the outfit, a service platform for public officials, can likely help. Its entire raison d’être is giving lawmakers and others a way to communicate with those who voted them into office, as well as provide more assurance to these constituents that their voices are heard — and that their emails and tweets and letters are being read by an actual human.

How does it work? We talked with Indigov’s founder, Alex Kouts, last week, ahead of yesterday’s tragedy, and he explained Indigov’s software-as-a-service offering as a kind of multichannel communication platform with three components, all of which work together to better empower public officials to “ingest, triage, and resolve any type of request or opinion or message that comes into their office.”

First, Indigov builds websites that Kouts says are far more responsive to voters than many you might find when looking up a public servant. The company declines to name its customers publicly, though we were pointed to a New York congressman’s website that immediately pushes a menu to visitors, asking if they’d like to request a meeting or sign up for a newsletter or help their community, among other options.

A second, behind-the scenes piece of Indigov’s offering is a workflow management system that receives inbound messages from email, websites, social media, and phone calls to which the company applies exact text-string matching in scouring their content, Kouts says.

Kouts — who worked briefly at Brigade, a since shuttered civic tech startup cofounded by famed founder Sean Parker — claims the tech is more accurate than natural language processing or machine learning, where error rates can range from 2% to 5%, which is just enough to be hugely problematic. 

“It could mean a constituent could receive a response that’s not appropriate and gets screenshotted and posted on Twitter and becomes a scandal,” says Kouts, adding of text-string matching that it has an error rate of “basically zero.” 

More here.

Airspace, a six-year-old, Carlsbad, Ca.-based time-critical logistics startup that originally broke into the market by handling shipments for organ transplants and life-saving medications, has raised $70 million in funding led by the impact investing firm DBL Partners. Telstra Ventures and HarbourVest also participated in the round, joined by earlier backers Scale Ventures, Defy Ventures, Qualcomm Ventures and Prologis Ventures. The company has now raised $138 million altogether. CNBC has more here.

Babel Finance, a four-year-old Hong Kong crypto bank that has evolved from a crypto lending business targeting miners and others into a comprehensive crypto asset manager for institutional investors, raised an $80 million Series B round at a $2 billion valuation. Investors included Jeneration Capital, 10T Holdings, and Circle Ventures as well as previous investors Dragonfly Capital and BAI Capital. The company has raised a total of $120 million. TechCrunch has more here.

Bibit, a three-year-old, Jakarta, Indonesia digital investment app, has raised $80 million in new funding led by GIC, with participation from Prosus Ventures and earlier investors. The company likens itself to the 'Acorns of Indonesia.' The company last raised $65 million in funding led by Sequoia Capital India one year ago. DealStreetAsia has more here.

Caribou, a six-year-old, Washington, D.C.-based auto-financing and car insurance company previously known as MotoRefi, has raised $115 million in Series C funding led by Goldman Sachs Asset Management. New investors Innovius Capital and Harmonic also participated in the round, alongside earlier investors Accomplice, CMFG Ventures, Curq Fund, Firebolt Ventures, Gaingels, Moderne Ventures and Motley Fool Ventures. The outfit has now raised $190 million altogether and is valued, it says, at $1.1 billion. More here.

Finn, a three-year-old startup based in Munich, Germany, that operates a car subscription service, raised a $110 million Series B round. The lead was Korelya Capital; Keen Venture Partners, Climb Ventures, Greentrail Capital, Waterfall Asset Management, White Star Capital, HV Capital, Heartcore Capital, UVC Partners, and Picus Capital also participated. TechCrunch has more here.

Firework, a five-year-old startup based in San Mateo, Ca., that creates livestream video shopping events for retailers, raised a $150 million Series B round led by SoftBank. The company has raised a total of $269.3 million. PYMNTS has more here.

Inspiration Mobility, a 1.5-year-old, Washington, D.C.-based EV fleet management and investment startup, raised $215 million in fresh funds co-led by Macquarie Asset Management and Ferrovial, with participation from ArcLight Capital Partners. Axios has more here.

StarkWare Industries, a four-year-old startup based in Netanya, Israel, that aims to enhance security and speed up transactions by reducing the amount of information sent to the Ethereum blockchain, raised a $100 million Series C round at an $8 billion valuation. The co-leads were Greenoaks Capital and Coatue, with Tiger Global also participating. This new capital comes just six months after StarkWare closed a $50 million Series C at a $2 billion valuation. The company has raised a total of $273 million to date. TechCrunch has more here.

TripActions, a seven-year-old startup based in Palo Alto, Ca., that helps its clients manage travel spend as well as other office expenses, is raising a new round at a $9 billion valuation, Bloomberg claims. Just this past October, the company raised $275 million at a $7.25 billion, thanks to lead Greenoaks Capital. To date, TripActions has raised $1.5 billion. Axios has more here.

Circles, a one-year-old New York startup that says it provides group therapy combining professional, guided attention with peer support, raised a $16.5 million Series A led by Zeev Ventures, with additional capital provided by Lior Ron, NFX, Flint Capital, and Ronald Cohen. The company has raised a total of $17.8 million. Geektime has more here.

Galley Solutions, a five-year-old San Diego startup whose platform provides restaurants with clean recipe data, predictive purchasing, smart inventory, and accurate food production planning, raised a $14.2 million Series A led by Astanor Ventures, with additional funds provided by Zetta Venture Partners. The company has raised a total of $17.8 million. TechCrunch has more here.

MetaKing Studios, a New York startup that is building a blockchain-based massively multiplayer online game called "Blocklords," raised a $15 million seed round co-led by Makers Fund and BitKraft Ventures, with additional participation from Delphi Digital, Animoca Brands, Shima Capital, WW Ventures, Spartan Group, and Huobi Ventures. VentureBeat has more here.

Miga Health, a one-year-old San Francisco startup that is building a consumer brand focused around preventing heart attacks, raised a $12 million seed round led by Quiet Capital; Asymmetric Capital Partners, Floating Point, VamosVentures, Alumni Ventures, Adapt Ventures, Lux Capital, and law firm Wilson Sonsini also pitched in. Cheddar has more here.

Neara, a six-year-old startup based in Redfern, Australia, that enables utilities to create virtual models of their networks in order to analyze potential risks, raised a $14 million Series B led by Skip Capital, with additional funds contributed by previous investor Square Peg Capital. The company has raised a total of $19.6 million. StartupDaily has more here.

Nisos, a seven-year-old startup based in Alexandria, Va., that helps its clients combat cyberattacks, disinformation, and abuse of digital platforms, raised a $15 million Series B round led by Paladin Capital Group, with additional participation from previous investors Columbia Capital and Skylab Capital. The company has raised a total of $21 million. More here.

Point2 Technology, a six-year-old startup based in San Jose, Ca., that designs and manufactures low-power, high-speed, point-to-point interconnect solutions designed to meet the multi-terabit bandwidth requirements of 5G infrastructure and cloud-based data centers, raised a $22 million Series B round. GU Equity Partners led the transaction, while Molex Ventures, Samsung Securities, Shinhan Capital, Tigris Investment, K2 Investments, and Korea Omega Investment as well as previous investors GU Equity Partners, Timefolio Investment, Nautilus Venture Partners, Quantum Ventures Korea, and Walden International participated. More here.

Rael, a five-year-old, Los Angeles-based women's brand that sells everything from skin creams to feminine care products, has raised $35 million in Series B funding led by Colopl Next, the venture arm of the Japan-based games company Colopl, and Signite Partners, the corporate venture arm of Shinsegae Group, one of the largest conglomerates in Korea. More here.

ShardSecure, a three-year-old New York startup that protects cloud data by rendering it unintelligible to attackers, raised a $11 million Series A round. The deal lead was Grotech Ventures; additional investors included Gula Tech Adventures, KPMG, Tom Noonan, EPIC Ventures, and Industrifonden. The company has raised a total of $15.6 million. More here.

Zip, a two-year-old San Francisco startup that has built a a no-code interface for building procurement workflows within enterprises, raised a $43 million Series B round at a $1.2 billion valuation. The lead investor was YC Continuity; Tiger Global and CRV also pitched in. TechCrunch has more here.

Aklivity, a one-year-old startup based in Palo Alto, Ca., that says it decreases latency and simplifies the development of immersive end-customer experiences for streaming providers, raised a $4.1 million seed round. 468 Capital was the deal lead; Pear VC and Alumni Ventures also chipped in. More here.

​​Alithea Genomics, a two-year-old startup based in Lausanne, Switzerland, that ​​has developed a proprietary technology that enables the preparation of hundreds of RNA samples for sequencing in a single tube, raised a $1 million seed round led by the Novalis Biotech Acceleration fund. EU-Startups has more here.

Altan Insights, a two-year-old New York startup that allows investors to discover new assets, research category performance, and track their entire portfolio across fractional alternative asset marketplaces, raised a $4 million seed round led by Slow Ventures, with additional participation from Courtside VC, Operator Partners, Alexis Ohanian, and Good Friends. Private Equity Wire has more here.

buywith, a four-year-old New York startup whose e-commerce site enables consumers to consult with their friends and family within the site while they shop, raised a $9.5 million seed round. igniteXL Ventures led the funding, while Fab Co-Creation Studio Ventures, Regah Ventures, Irani CVC, and True Global Ventures also pitched in. The company has raised a total of $11.5 million. TechCrunch has more here.

Flexa Careers, a three-year-old London startup that says it allows job candidates to gain a clear understanding of a company's work environment, policies and benefits, raised a $2.9 million seed round led by Ada Ventures; HERmesa and Auxxo Female Catalyst Fund also participated. The company has raised a total of $3.9 million. More here.

Learnfully, a two-year-old startup based in Redwood City, Ca., that has developed a personalized learning platform for children, raised a $2 million seed round; investors included Learn Capital, Goodwater Capital, Divergent Investments, Incite.org, and Figure 8 Investments. More here.

LimaCharlie, a four-year-old startup based in Walnut, Ca., that provides an ecosystem of cloud-native tools and infrastructure used for cybersecurity operations, raised a $5.45 million seed round led by Susa Ventures. Additional backers included Xerox Ventures, CoFound Partners, Long Journey Ventures, Sands Capital, StoneMill Ventures, and Lytical Ventures. The company has raised a total of $6 million. SecurityWeek has more here.

Natrion, a four-year-old startup based in Binghamton, NY, that makes a polymer-ceramic component for lithium-ion batteries that it claims improves charging speed and longevity, raised a $2 million seed round led by TechNexus Venture Collaborative. Additional investors included Mark Cuban and Tamarack Global. Axios has more here.

Red Access, a year-old Tel Aviv startup that is developing technology for its corporate clients to secure every web session across any browser, app, and device, raised a $6 million seed round co-led by led by Elron Ventures and Ten Eleven Ventures. SecurityWeek has more here.

XONA, a five-year-old startup based in Annapolis, Md., that helps authenticate users through multi-factor authentication and zero trust principles, raised a $7.2 million Series A round led by DataTribe and joined by TFX Capital. The company has raised a total of $9.2 million. SecurityWeek has more here.

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VC giant New Enterprise Associates has raised more than $5.1 billion for a pair of new funds, according to federal securities filings flagged yesterday by Axios. According to a WSJ report from October, that number may swell. At least, at the time, NEA was said to be raising a total of roughly $7 billion for a pair of funds -- one for early-stage startup deals and another for later-stage rounds. 

Dallas Venture Capital, a two-year-old cross-border venture outfit with one office in Irving, Texas and another in Hyderabad, India, says it has closed on $80 million in capital commitments for its second fund. Dallas Innovates has more here.

Synthesis Capital, the one-year-old London-based food technology and alternative protein investor, has closed its first fund with more than $300 million in capital commitments. The firm is led by former CPT Capital investors Costa Yiannoulis and Rosie Wardle, who have invested in the sector since 2014, along with biologist David Welch. TechCrunch has more here.

Paddle, which provides payment systems for subscription software companies, has acquired ProfitWell, a Boston-based company that specializes in subscription metrics and retention automation software, in a deal valued at $200 million. ProfitWell appears to be bootstrapped, says TechCrunch. Paddle, based in London, has meanwhile raised $293 million from investors.

Ripple, a crypto startup that is currently facing a lawsuit with the SEC over allegations that it sold unregistered securities, will explore an IPO after its lawsuit has ended, CEO Brad Garlinghouse tells CNBC in apparent earnestness.

Bolt, the one-click checkout startup that has been on a roller coaster ride throughout 2022, has laid off at least 100 employees across go-to-market, sales and recruiting roles, sources tell TechCrunch. CEO Maju Kuruvilla, who assumed the reins in January from founder CEO Ryan Breslow, confirmed the workforce reduction in a blog post without specifying how many people are being impacted or what roles were targeted.

Haun Ventures says it has hired Breck Stodghill, a crypto engineer and angel investor, as its newest investment associate. Stodghill was most recently an engineer at Zora, a decentralized auction protocol for NFTs on Ethereum. He also spent two years as a product engineer at Coinbase.

Former Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey stepped down today from Twitter’s board of directors at the company's annual shareholder meeting, a plan that was set in place when he resigned from the company late last year.

Egon Durban, co-CEO of private-equity firm Silver Lake and a Twitter board member since 2020, failed to win a majority of shareholder support for a new term in a preliminary tally of votes at this same shareholder gathering. This apparently came as a surprise. A Twitter spokesperson tells the WSJ that Durban has since tendered his resignation and that the board’s nominating committee will now consider whether to recommend that the board accept it.

Getir, the Turkish instant delivery startup whose $38 million Series A in 2020 was led by the personal investment vehicle of Michael Moritz and which has subsequently raised $768 million altogether (it was valued at a whopping $11.8 billion just two months ago), plans to axe 14% of its staff globally and cut its aggressive expansion plans. TechCrunch has more here.

"I felt like I was going to die," says a cryptocurrency streamer who was arrested after knocking on the door of Terraform Labs founder Do Kwon. "I lost a lot of money in a short period of time . . . I wanted to ask him about his plans for Luna. I suffered a huge loss and wanted to talk to him directly," the streamer tells the BBC.

The age of light vehicles in the United States is now 12.2 years on average, up almost two months from last year’s figure, according to S&P Global Mobility. That’s a record high and marks the fifth straight year of increases, observes Bloomberg.

A new filing reveals that Elon Musk plans to front $33.5 billion in his bid to take over Twitter. Musk is reportedly in talks with Twitter founder and former CEO Jack Dorsey and others to help finance, or roll their shares over, to complete the deal. In a letter to investors backing the holding company that Musk is forming to take Twitter private, he expressed his commitment to completing the deal despite tweeting earlier this month that the deal was "on hold" while he researches the proportion of fake and spam accounts on the platform. The market reacted positively to the news.

Facebook is actively killing Instagram as it's known today in order to beat TikTok -- and it might not even work.

The best walking tours in Amsterdam.

The Great Lakes Gatsby.

Where the most expensive nannies in the world train.

Will "Hacks" get a season three? 🤞🤞

An unburnable copy of Atwood’s best-selling novel, "The Handmaid's Tale."

"The Conjuring" house summons an intrepid buyer. 👻

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