Layoffs at Brex, TikTok's plans to build product fulfillment centers in the U.S., and John Foley's margin calls 👀

Here's everything you missed at Meta Connect 2022, including the unveiling of the Meta Quest Pro: a $1,499 virtual reality headset that the company has been teasing this past year.

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Factorial, a six-year-old Barcelona startup that is building HR apps for small- to medium-size businesses, raised a $120 million Series C round led by Atomico; additional investors included GIC, Tiger Global, CRV, K-Fund, and Creandum. The company has raised a total of $220 million. TechCrunch has more here.

Homa, a four-year-old, Paris-based platform for creating and publishing mobile games,  has raised a $100 million in Series B funding co-led by Quadrille Capital and Headline. Other investors in the Series B include Northzone, Fabric Ventures, Bpifrance, Eurazeo and Singular. TechCrunch has more here.

LingoAce, a five-year-old Singapore startup that operates a remote language learning platform, is reportedly discussing a raise of $200 million at a $1 billion valuation, according to Bloomberg. Its previous investors include Sequoia Capital India, Owl Ventures, Shunwei Capital, and SWC Global. The company has raised a total of $180 million.  More here.

Neumora Therapeutics, a three-year-old startup based in Watertown, Ma., that's developing a pipeline of novel precision medicine candidates for neuropsychiatric disorders and neurodegenerative diseases, raised a $112 million Series B round from Abu Dhabi Growth Fund as well as previous investors Arch Venture Partners, Amgen, F-Prime Capital, and Invus. The company has raised a total of $650 million. FierceBiotech has more here.

Alkymi, a five-year-old New York startup that helps companies streamline their workflows by mining critical business data in emails and documents, raised a $21 million Series A round led by Intel Capital, with Canaan, Work-Bench, and SimCorp also taking part. The company has raised a total of $26 million. TechCrunch has more here.

ARTA Shipping, an eight-year-old, New York-based fulfillment tech company for high-value goods and collectibles (it says it helps merchants, marketplaces, and auction houses accelerate sales by automating everything from shipping to tracking and insurance), has raised $11 million in Series A financing. AXA Venture Partners led the round, joined by Corazon Capital, Coelius Capital, Pari Passu Venture Partners, and Mu Ventures. More here.

Brave Health, a five-year-old Miami startup that provides virtual therapy, psychiatry, and medication management for Medicaid patients with mental health concerns and substance use disorders, raised a $40 million Series C round led by Town Hall Ventures and including previous investors Union Square Ventures and City Light Capital. The company has raised a total of $60 million. MobiHealthNews has more here.

Chronograph, a six-year-old, Brooklyn, N.Y.-based private markets tech company, today announced a $20 million investment led by Summit Partners, with previous investors Carlyle Group and Nasdaq Ventures also participating. More here.

Foxglove, a one-year-old San Francisco-based robotics development platform, has raised $15 million in Series A led by Eclipse Ventures, with participation from Amplify Partners and angel investors, including Cruise co-founders Kyle Vogt and Daniel Kan and UC Berkeley's Pieter Abbeel also participating. TechCrunch has more here.

Insite AI, a three-year-old, Bentonville, Ar.,-based maker of revenue growth management software for bigger consumer brands (it helps them form decisions about products, placements, and pricing), has raise $19 million Series A funding round from NewRoad Capital and M12, Microsoft’s Venture Fund. More here. 

IronVest, a New York-headquartered cybersecurity startup rooted in biometrics, has raised $23 million in seed funding seed funding led by Accomplice, with participation from Trust Ventures, Ulysses, Joule Ventures, OurCrowd and a number of strategic angel investors. VentureBeat has more here.

Konvy, a ten-year-old Thai startup that has built an e-commerce beauty site that works with more than 1,000 brands, raised a $10 million Series A round. Insignia Ventures Partners was the deal lead. TechCrunch has more here.

Rye, a startup founded by Justin Kan that is building a new e-commerce API on the Solana blockchain, raised a $14 million round. Andreessen Horowitz was the deal lead, with additional funds provided by Solana Ventures, GOAT Capital, L Catterton, Electric Ant, Electric Feel Ventures, and basketball pros Andre Iguodala and Javale McGee. CoinDesk has more here.

Settlement, a six-year-old, Belgium-based company that describes itself as a high-performance, web3, low-code development platform, has raised €16 million in Series A funding co-led by London-based Molten Ventures and Europe-focused OTB Ventures. Other investors from the round include Fujitsu Ventures, Allusion, Bloccelerate, and earlier investor Medici Ventures. TechCrunch has more here.

Yardlink, a four-year-old London startup whose supply chain management platform enables contractors to gain access to tools, equipment, bulk materials, fuel, and waste management services, raised a $17.5 million Series A round led by Beringea, with additional participation from Amplifier and previous investors Speedinvest and FJ Labs. The company has raised a total of $19.9 million. TechCrunch has more here.

Clerkenwell Health, a two-year-old London startup that conducts research and clinical trials on psychedelic substances for companies and organizations, raised a $2.3 million seed round. Investors included Lionheart Ventures, Convergence Partners, and Exceptional Ventures. TechCrunch has more here.

Cloud Factory, a startup based in Tallinn, Estonia, that uses 3D printing technology to create fine jewelry, raised a $2.1 million seed round led by Change Ventures, with Superhero Capital also chipping in. EU-Startups has more here.

Kive, a four-year-old Stockholm startup whose cloud-based visual library helps creatives and creative teams through the entire creative process, from inspiration to presentation, raised a $7 million seed round led by Heartcore, with Creandum and EQT Ventures also contributing. The company has raised a total of $8.8 million. TFN has more here.

Ludenso, a four-year-old Oslo startup that embeds augmented reality experiences in school textbook pages, raised a $1 million seed round. FERD led the round, while Atomico Angel Fund and Kahoot! founders Johan Brand and Jamie Brooker also participated. TFN has more here.

Moon Mortgage, a Miami startup that allows investors to use their crypto as collateral for financing real estate investments, raised a $3.5 million seed round. CoinFund and Cadenza Ventures co-led the deal. CoinDesk has more here.

NocoDB, a London-based company that say it's building an open-source, no-code platform to turn any data store into a smart spreadsheet, has raised $10.5 million in seed funding led by Decibel Partners and OSS Capital, with participation from Uncorrelated Ventures, Together.Fund, Ram Shriram, Naval Ravikant, Jeff Hammerbacher, Spencer Kimball, Chad Hurley, and other prominent founders and investors. More here.

OatFi, a one-year-old New York startup that is building buy-now-pay-later tools for small- to medium-size businesses engaging in business-to-business payments, raised $8 million in in equity and $50 million in debt in a deal led by QED Investors. Other backers in the round included Cambrian Ventures, Portage Ventures, Picus Capital, Fin VC, Dash Fund, and Lorimer Ventures. The company has raised a total of 11.25 million. TechCrunch has more here.

Payable, a nine-month-old, London startup whose mission is to "streamline payment operations and automate business bank transfers for the internet economy," raised a $6 million seed round co-led by CRV and Earlybird Venture Capital, with Conversion Capital and Clocktower Ventures also taking part. EU-Startups has more here.

Ribbon, a London startup that helps businesses survey their customers, raised a $2.9 million seed round led by Octopus Ventures; MMC Ventures and Concept Ventures also participated. Tech.eu has more here.

Stears, a five-year-old Lagos startup that provides data and research about the Nigerian market regarding specific issues such as market entry, country analysis, and digital economy, raised a $3.3 million seed round led by MaC Venture Capital, with Serena Ventures, Omidyar Group’s Luminate Fund, Melo 7 Tech Partners, and Cascador also participating. The company has raised a total of $4 million. TechCrunch has more here.

Universal Hydrogen, a two-year-old, Los Angeles startup that is building a distribution network to deliver hydrogen capsules in way that avoids the need to build new refueling infrastructure at airports, raised an undisclosed amount from American Airlines. (The company previously has also received investment from the venture arm of JetBlue, the venture arm of aircraft maker Airbus, and GE Aviation.) The Fort Worth News has more here.

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NextView Ventures, the now 12-year-old, U.S. venture firm, has closed on $200 million in capital commitments split across two funds: a $135 million early-stage fund, and a $65 million opportunity vehicle that should enable the firm to invest more money in its breakout portfolio companies. TechCrunch has more here.

From the FT: Brookfield Renewable Partners, one of the world’s largest clean energy investors, and Cameco, a supplier of uranium fuel, are buying the company in a bet that climate and energy security concerns will revive the nuclear sector’s fortunes. They will purchase the group, which makes technology used in about half the world’s roughly 440 nuclear reactors, from a separate division of Brookfield Asset Management that runs its private equity investments. More here.

Thoma Bravo is buying ForgeRock, a 12-year-old identity verification company originally founded in Norway, for $2.3 billion. The per-share price for the deal, $23.25, was 53% above where ForgeRock's shares closed yesterday. (The outfit went public through a traditional IPO a year ago.) It's the third identify company that Thoma Bravo has acquired this year, observes TechCrunch. More here.

Corporate spend management startup Brex has laid off 136 people, or 11% of its staff, across all departments as part of a restructuring, the company told TechCrunch today. After the layoffs, Brex has just over 1,150 employees. The company has also been losing C-level execs of late. Its CFO is leaving to join Parker Conrad's Rippling, TC reported today; over the summer, Brex's chief revenue officer led to become an investor at Founders Fund. More here.

John Foley, the co-founder and former CEO of Peloton, faced repeated margin calls on money he borrowed against his Peloton holdings before he left the fitness company’s board last month, according to the WSJ. It reports that Goldman Sachs asked Foley several times to provide fresh funds or additional collateral for personal loans the bank had extended to him. More here.

Noom, a health coaching platform valued at $3.7 billion last year, is laying off a portion of staff for the second time in a matter of months, TechCrunch is reporting tonight. Noom has laid off 10% of its staff, or around 500 people, a reduction that mostly impacts its coaching team. It’s the second layoff impacting Noom’s coaching team in a matter of months. More here.

Stephanie Palmeri, who left the early-stage, Bay Area-based venture firm Uncork Capital early last year after roughly a decade with the outfit, has taken a role as partner with the venture firm NextView Ventures, she tweeted today. More here.

Crypto startup funding has fallen off a cliff. Globally, VC firms invested $4.44 billion in crypto startups in the quarter, a 37% decline from the same period in 2021, PitchBook numbers show. The funding drop is even more severe compared with the highs of the first quarter, when venture capitalists poured a record $8.83 billion into crypto and blockchain companies. Bloomberg has more here.

The Nasdaq Composite today slipped into a bear market, its second of the year. The S&P 500 and the Dow are already in bear markets, defined in Wall Street parlance as a decline of 20% or more from a recent peak. The WSJ has more here.

Intel is reportedly planning thousands of job cuts as early as this month to cope with a sputtering PC market.

JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon says don’t be surprised if the S&P 500 loses another one-fifth of its value. [Breathes deeply. Throws up.] In brighter news, judged by valuation and its impact on long-term returns, Dimon's “easy 20%” tumble, mentioned in a CNBC interview yesterday, would result in a bear market that is in many regards normal, writes Bloomberg.

TikTok is planning to build its own product fulfillment centers in the U.S., creating an e-commerce supply chain system that could directly challenge Amazon, as indicated by more than a dozen new job openings posted in the past two weeks to LinkedIn. Axios has the story here.

The strange social calendar of Elon Musk.

Bedtime stories for grown-ups.

How to apply "no makeup" makeup; a guide for mature women.

Birkenstock Boston clogs, unless you're a total ⬜ (and also you better hurry, evidently).

The Voodoo e-bike racer.

Cytonics develops novel therapies to help those living with inflammatory diseases. The biopharma pioneer has raised over $18M to date. In its current round with SeedInvest, Cytonics pursues FDA approval on a leading therapeutic drug for osteoarthritis. This round closes soon. View important disclosures and risks associated with Equity Crowdfunding Investing by clicking here.