Sheryl Sandberg leaves Meta, FTX's US president steps down, and how much U.S. office buildings stand to lose

Thinking of our East Coast readers and hoping for the best . . .

Eisai Co. and partner Biogen said today that their drug significantly slowed Alzheimer’s disease, making it the first medicine to blunt progression of the most common dementia in a definitive, large-scale trial. Bloomberg has more here.

Oracle has settled with the SEC after it was charged with violating the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act for a second time, the SEC announced today. The SEC said Oracle violated provisions of the act between 2016 and 2019 when its subsidiaries in India, Turkey and the United Arab Emirates created slush funds used to bribe foreign officials and to pay foreign officials to attend technology conferences. The company did not admit to or deny the SEC’s findings, and it will pay more than $23 million to settle the charges, reports CNBC. Oracle was charged with violating the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act in 2012, too.

Elon Musk's own data scientists couldn't find many bots on Twitter, and he hid that crucial information, the company says. Business Insider has more here.

Venture capital firms face a number of threats and challenges in today’s environment. From SEC investigations to mismanagement lawsuits, how do you identify all of the major risks for your firm and portfolio companies? And how should you implement strategies to mitigate these risks? Find out in Founder Shield’s VC Risk Management Guide.

Cloudflare, the security, performance and reliability company that went public three years ago, said this morning that it will help connect startups that use its serverless computing platform to dozens of venture firms that have collectively offered to invest up to $1.25 billion in the companies out of their existing funds.

It’s a smart, splashy incentive to entice more startups to use the now five-year-old product, which, according to Cloudflare, enables developers to build or augment apps without configuring or maintaining infrastructure. Cloudflare notes in a related press release that startups can scale so fast using the platform that Cloudflare acquired one last year: Zaraz, a startup that promises to speed up website performance with a single line of code. (Cloudflare isn’t promising to acquire other startups, but the suggestion is in the air.)

Indeed, this funding program, as far as we can tell, is really about Cloudflare taking aim at hugely lucrative products like AWS, Azure and Google Cloud. Toward that end, we asked Cloudflare CEO Matthew Prince over the weekend why Cloudflare thinks it can steal market share from these much bigger companies.

“I wouldn’t characterize it as ‘stealing’ market share from anyone,” he said. “It’s a matter of earning market share, and the way you earn market share is by providing a better product at a more affordable price.”

More here.

Flatfile, a four-year-old Denver startup that says its platform automatically learns how imported data should be structured and cleaned, raised a $50 million Series B round led by Tiger Global, with additional investment from Gradient Ventures, Scale Ventures, Workday Ventures, Afore Capital, and Two Sigma Ventures. The company has raised a total of $94.7 million. TechCrunch has more here.

Line Man Wongnai, a two-year-old Bangkok startup that operates a food and parcel delivery app, raised a $265 million Series B round at a valuation of more than $1 billion. The financing was led by GIC, with Taiwan Mobile Co., BRV Capital Management, and PTT Oil & Retail Business also chipping in. The Business Times has more here.

Strike, a three-year-old startup that operates a bitcoin payment app for merchants and consumers based on the Lightning network, raised a $80 million Series B round led by Ten31, with additional participation from Washington University in St. Louis and the University of Wyoming. CoinDesk has more here.

Unravel Data, a nine-year-old Palo Alto startup whose software platform aims to give developer teams visibility across data stacks, troubleshoot and optimize data workloads, and define guardrails to govern costs, raised a $50 million Series D round led by Third Point Ventures, with Bridge Bank, Menlo Ventures, Point 72, GGV Capital, and Harmony Capital also piling on. The company has raised a total of $107.2 million. TechCrunch has more here.

Wasabi, a seven-year-old Boston startup that offers services competitive with Amazon’s Simple Storage Service (S3), raised a $125 million Series D round at a valuation exceeding $1.1 billion. The lead investor was L2 Point Management, while Cedar Pine, Fidelity, and Forestay Capital also participated. TechCrunch has more here.

3Commas, a five-year-old Estonian startup that has created a crypto trading platform, raised a $37 million Series B round. Target Global, Alameda Research, and Jump Crypto co-led the transaction. The company has raised a total of $40 million. CoinDesk has more here.

Arthur.ai, a three-year-old, New York-based AI performance company that works with enterprise teams to monitor, measure, and (hopefully) improve their machine learning models, has raised $42 million in Series B funding led by Acrew Capital and Greycroft. TechCrunch has more here.

Form Bio, a startup whose mission is to help biologists manage large datasets, visualize results, and collaborate with their peers, raised a $30 million Series A round, led by JAZZ Venture Partners. The company is a a spinoff from Colossal Biosciences, which is dedicated to unraveling the reasons for the extinction of such species as the woolly mammoth. VentureBeat has more here.

FourKites, an eight-year-old Chicago startup that tracks international shipments for its customers, raised a $10 million strategic investment from Mitsui & Co. The company has raised in excess of $240 million. More here.

GlossGenius, a six-year-old New York startup that has built a tech platform to help spa, studio, and salon industry owners manage their operations, raised a $35 million Series B round co-led by Imaginary Ventures and previous investor Bessemer Venture Partners, with Left Lane Capital also pitching in. The company has raised a total of $44.2 million. TechCrunch has more here.

Kumo, a one-year-old San Francisco-based AI platform that says it makes predictive tasks as easy as analytics tasks, has raised an $18 million Series B round. Sequoia Capital was the deal lead, with additional funds provided by A Capital and SV Angel. The company has raised a total of $36.5 million. TechCrunch has more here.

Sanity Group, a Berlin startup that is developing cannabis-based pharmaceuticals and consumer products for the European market, raised a $37.6 million Series B round led by BAT Group; Redalpine and Casa Verde Capital also participated. The company has raised over $100 million. MJBizDaily has more here.

Signzy, a seven-year-old Bengaluru, India-based startup that aims to help financial institutions automate risk and compliance processes, raised a $26 million round. Investors in the deal included Gaja Capital, Vertex Ventures, Arkam Ventures, Mastercard, Kalaari Capital, and Stellaris Venture Partners. The company has raised a total of $38.4 million. PYMNTS has more here.

Stockly, a 4.5-year-old, Paris-based startup that (virtually) pools together the inventory of several e-commerce websites so when a retailer is out-of-stock on a popular item, it can still accept the order and process the order through a different retailer’s inventory, is raising $12 million in Series A funding from Eurazeo, Daphni and several business angels. TechCrunch has more here.

Tactic, a one-year-old New York startup that is building software to handle accounting for crypto assets, raised an $11 million round led by FTX Ventures; additional investors included Lux Capital, Exponent Founders Capital, Definition Capital, Coinbase Ventures, Founders Fund, Ramp, Dylan Field, Elad Gil, and Sabrina Hahn. TechCrunch has more here.

Tray.io, a ten-year-old San Francisco startup that claims its a low-code automation platform can turn business processes into repeatable and scalable workflows, raised a $40 million Series C extension. CPP Investments was the deal lead, while previous investors True Ventures, GGV Capital, Spark Capital, Meritech Capital Partners, and Stepstone Group also anted up. ZDNet has more here.

Woltair, a four-year-old Prague startup that connects consumers who want to install heat pumps and solar panels with installation and maintenance technicians, raised a $16.3 million Series A round led by ArcTern Ventures, with additional participation from Westly Group, Aternus, Kaya VC, Inven Capital, and Movens Capital. The company has raised a total of $20.4 million. Sifted has more here.

Cake, a Los Angeles startup that sells sexual wellness products in chains such as CVS, Target, and Walmart, raised an $8 million Series A round led by Silas Capital, with Lerer Hippeau, Bullish, Selva Ventures, and Finn Capital Partners also ponying up. The company has raised a total of $16 million. BeautyIndependent has more here.

Cartwheel Care, a Boston startup that provides mental health care services to schools in Massachusetts (with plans to expand), raised a $3.9 million seed round. General Catalyst, BoxGroup, Able Partners, and Workshop Venture Partners all invested in the deal. Digital Health has more here.

Employee Cycle, a Philadelphia startup that automates HR reporting, raised a $2.5 million seed round led by Impellent Ventures, with Collab Capital and Converge VC also joining in. More here.

Halo, a three-year-old Chicago startup that is building an R&D collaboration platform where companies and scientists join forces to solve hard problems and bring new innovations to market, raised a $2.6 million seed round led by Asymmetric Capital Partners. More here.

Kopperfield, an 11-month-old, Bend, Ore.-based startup that aims to create a platform that makes installing a charger as easy for homeowners as ordering new furniture, has raised $5 million in seed funding. General Catalyst and investor Lachy Groom co-led the round, joined by Giant Ventures, MCJ Collective, Shopify founder Tobi Lutke, and Coinbase board member Gokul Rajaram, among others. TechCrunch has more here.

Quilo, a two-year-old Staten Island, NY, startup that says it provides financial institutions with the ability to quickly syndicate loans, raised a $5 million Series A round. Investors included FinCapital, StudioVC, and Venture Center. Fortune has more here.

Yonder, a Dublin, Ireland, startup that aims to make it simple for businesses to provide benefits such as health insurance and pensions regardless of where employees are based, raised a $2.6 million pre-seed round. Northzone and Frontline Ventures were the co-leads; Cocoa, Broadstone, and Uncommon Projects also participated. The Irish Times has more here.

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Saudi Arabia’s powerful crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman, has been named prime minister, a post traditionally held by the king, in a government shuffle announced today. The New York Times has more here.

Brett Harrison, the U.S. president of the crypto exchange FTX, announced his resignation today, though it's not crystal clear why. Harrison said on Twitter that he will be moving into an advisory role at the company and said he plans to remain in the industry. CNBC has more here.

Celsius Network CEO Alex Mashinsky submitted a letter of resignation today, months after the crypto company filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. As of May, notes CNBC, Celsius was one of the largest players in the crypto lending space with more than $8 billion in loans to clients and almost $12 billion in assets under management. The firm would lend customers’ crypto out to counterparties willing to pay sky-high interest rates to borrow it, and Celsius would then split some of that revenue with users. The structure came crashing down during an industry wide liquidity crunch, observes the outlet. More here.

The FT attempts to appraise Vivek Ramaswamy, "the self-styled scourge of ‘woke’ boardrooms." (Some of you met him in person at a StrictlyVC event here in San Francisco; at the time, he was still building the biotech holding company from which he has since resigned: Roivant). More here.

It was Sheryl Sandberg's last day at Meta Platforms today.

Some of the layoffs that Goldman Sachs has reportedly been preparing for are beginning to take place. Some pink slip recipients last week included senior associates and vice presidents working for the technology, media, and telecommunications team in New York and San Francisco, says Business Insider.

Divvy Homes, a property tech startup backed by Andreessen Horowitz and Tiger Global Management, laid off about 12% of its staff today, reports The Information. The layoffs affected roughly 40 employees at the five-year-old firm, which gained momentum as the home-buying market picked up steam and, like a lot of real estate startups, is now getting battered as the market cools owing to rising interest rates. 

$456 billion: That's the value that U.S. office buildings stand to lose due to lower tenant demand, according to a study by Columbia University and New York University.

U.S. regulators reached settlements with a dozen banks in a sprawling probe into how global financial firms failed to monitor employees’ communications on unauthorized messaging apps, bringing total penalties in the matter to more than $2 billion.

Why Wall Street is snapping up family homes.

El Alto, one of the most anticipated restaurants in Silicon Valley this year, has abruptly closed.

The last, painful days of Anthony Bourdain.

Is Cruise getting screwed?

Why quitting is underrated.

The tallest penthouse on New Year's Upper East Side is asking for $33 million.

The beer koozie-like shoe that is selling out across America, despite being seen as “strikingly ugly” and “an eye assault."

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