Bing's big boost, Meta makes its mark, and Tiger Global reportedly slashes its fundraising target again

We got a few things wrong with this company listing yesterday, apologies. According to the CEO, other outlets also got some of the details wrong -- it just raised a €5 million round. We blame a glitch in the system!

Also, we're realizing that more than 56% of you now read the newsletter every day; thank you, slight majority, for making StrictlyVC a part of your routine. 💗

According to Semafor, Microsoft’s Bing search engine is "poised to incorporate a faster and richer version of ChatGPT, known as GPT-4, into its product in the coming weeks." The latest software is expected to respond "much faster than the current version, and the replies sound more human and are more detailed," according to Semafor's sources. The outlet further reports that OpenAI is planning to launch a mobile ChatGPT app and test a new feature in its Dall-E image-generating software that would create videos. More here.

In related news: OpenAI today launched a new pilot subscription plan for ChatGPT. Called ChatGPT Plus and starting at $20 per month, the service delivers a number of benefits over the base-level ChatGPT, OpenAI says, including general access to ChatGPT even during peak times, faster response times and priority access to new features and improvements. TechCrunch has more here.

Meta Platforms CEO Mark Zuckerberg struck a new tone with investors today. He said the social media giant will be leaner (it's getting rid of some "layers of middle management," he said), more efficient (including using AI to improve the way Meta recommends content) and also somehow more decisive (we missed how). Shareholders ate it up, with the company's stock gaining more than 20% in late trading on fourth-quarter revenue that beat expectations. Bloomberg has more here.

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Enko, a six-year-old startup based in Mystic, Ct., that develops what it claims are safe and sustainable herbicides, raised an $80 million Series C round led by Eight Roads Ventures, Nufarm, Endeavor8, and Akroyd LLC. The company has raised a total of $150 million. CityBiz has more here.

Aluna, a seven-year-old San Francisco startup that provides an at-home spirometer and app that helps asthma, COPD, and cystic fibrosis sufferers manage attacks, raised a $15.3 million Series B round led by Matrix Partners, with Rho Ignition also chipping in. More here.

Bounce Infinity, a nearly five-year-old electric scooter and swappable-battery company in India, has raised $20 million from earlier backers, including Sequoia Capital, says the Economic Times, which adds that Bounce is in talks for a potentially larger fundraising round with external investors. The latest funding comes weeks after Bounce laid off 100 employees as part of business restructuring; the outfit has now raised $220 million altogether, says the ET, which describes the newest round as a "lifeline." More here.

Craft, a nine-year-old San Francisco startup that helps supply chain, procurement, and risk managers at corporations and government agencies to monitor their suppliers, raised a $32 million Series B round led by BAM Elevate, with Greycroft, Uncork Capital, High Alpha, Point Field Partners, and ServiceNow Ventures also pitching in. SiliconANGLE has more here.

The Exploration Company, a two-year-old Munich startup that is building commercial space vehicles, raised a $44 million Series A round co-led by EQT Ventures and Red River West, with additional participation from Promus Ventures, Cherry Ventures, Vsquared, Omnes Capital, July Fund, Partech, Possible Ventures, Habert Dassault Finance, Schlumberger, and Sista Fund. EU-Startups has more here.

Freemodel, a three-year-old startup based in Burlingame, Ca., that partners with real estate agents to design, manage, and pre-pay for their clients’ home renovations, raised a $19.5 million Series A round led by QED Investors, with additional funds provided by LL Funds, RWT Horizons, FJ Labs, 1984 Ventures, 1Sharpe Ventures, and Crossbeam Venture Partners. The company has raised a total of $23.4 million. More here.

Hnry, a six-year-old New Zealand startup that aims to be an all-in-one digital accountancy service for contractors, freelancers, and other self-employed people, raised a $35 million Series B round. Investors included AirTree Ventures, Athletic Ventures, and Left Lane Capital. The company has raised a total of $53 million. StartupDaily has more here.

Lulalend, an eight-year-old, Cape Town, South Africa-based digital lender catering to underserved small and medium-size businesses, has closed a $35 million Series B round led by Lightrock, with participation from new investors -- including the German development finance institution DEG, Triodos Investment Management, and Women's World Banking Asset Management -- along with earlier backers The International Finance Corporation and Quona Capital. TechCrunch has more here.

Moov, a six-year-old startup based in Cedar Falls, Ia., whose platform enables third-party digital banks and financial institutions to connect with legacy banks via APIs, raised a $45 million Series B round led by Commerce Ventures and including Andreessen Horowitz, Bain Capital Ventures, Visa, and Sorenson Ventures. PYMNTS has more here.

NT-Tao, a four-year-old Israeli startup that aims to generate clean energy from nuclear fusion in an efficient way, raised a $22 million Series A round. Delek US and NextGear Ventures were the co-leads, with additional investors including Honda, OurCrowd, and previous investor the Grantham Foundation. VentureBeat has more here.

Optilogic, a five-year-old startup based in Ann Arbor, Mi., that helps enterprises model different supply chain design scenarios, raised a $13 million round led by MK Capital. The company has raised a total of $22 million. More here.

Prisms VR, a two-year-old startup that says it has found a way to improve math literacy using virtual reality headsets for visualization, just raised $12.5 million in funding led by Andreessen Horowitz. It says it is the first educational technology platform to leverage VR to accelerate math proficiency in U.S. schools. VentureBeat has more here.

Risilience, a two-year-old startup based in Cambridge, UK, whose SaaS-based analytics platform helps companies assess their climate risk and plan their transition toward net-zero carbon emissions, raised a $26 million Series B round led by Quantum Innovation Fund, with participation from IQ Capital and National Grid Partners. The company has raised a total of approximately $33 million. TechCrunch has more here.

Select Star, a three-year-old San Francisco startup that is developing data discovery, lineage, and governance tools, raised a $15 million Series A round led by Lightspeed Venture Partners, with Bowery Capital, Sozo Ventures, and Pebblebed also contributing. The company has raised a total of $20 million. TechCrunch has more here.

Sunstone Credit, a nearly two-year-old, Baltimore-based clean energy financing platform that says it helps businesses go solar, has raised $20 million in Series A funding led by an affiliated fund of Greenbacker Capital Management. More here.

Addressable, a digital fingerprinting startup that claims to be able to match anonymous crypto wallets with social media accounts (a controversial practice), has raised $7.5 million in seed funding from Viola Ventures, Fabric Ventures, Mensch Capital Partners and North Island Ventures. TechCrunch has more here.

Archimedes, a San Francisco crypto startup that plans to launch a decentralized finance lending and borrowing marketplace later this month, raised a $7.3 million led by Hack VC, with additional investment from Uncorrelated Venture, Psalion, Truffle Ventures, Cogitent Ventures, Haven VC, and Palsar. The company has raised a total of $7.3 million. CoinDesk has more here.

Cleary, a six-year-old San Francisco startup that is building intranet tools for SMBs, raised a $4.5 million seed round led by Moonshots Capital, with Liberty City Ventures, Crosslink Capital, Seachange Fund, and Quiet Capital also joining in. The company has raised a total of $7.5 million. TechCrunch has more here.

Diferente, a two-year-old Sao Paulo startup that operates an organic food delivery service, raised a $3 million round led by Caravela Capital; additional investors included Collaborative Fund, South Ventures, and Valor Siren Ventures. The company has raised a total of $12.2 million. TechCrunch has more here.

Fibery, a three-year-old Cyprus startup that has built a work and knowledge management platform aimed at startups, raised a $5.2 million Series A round this past September led by Tal Ventures, with existing investor Altair Capital following on. The company has raised a total of $8.3 million. Tech.eu has more here.

Jetpack.io, an Oakland startup that says it provides easy-to-use "building blocks" for building and scaling sophisticated cloud apps so developers don’t need to spend extra time building these abstractions, has raised $10 million in seed funding from Coatue and GV. Founder Daniel Loreto previously held senior engineering roles at Google, Twitter, Airbnb and then Virta Health; TechCrunch has more here.

Nexus, an Austin startup whose software allows developers to reward content creators that promote games to their audience, raised a $10 million round led by Griffin Gaming Partners, with Sony Innovation Fund, Valhalla Ventures, Pace Capital, and S3 Ventures also anteing up. VentureBeat has more here.

Passthrough, a two-year-old, New York-based maker of fund workflow automation software for investors, fund managers, and other fintechs, has raised $10 million in Series A funding. The round was led by Positive Sum, with participation from Motley Fool Ventures, Broadhaven Ventures, Company Ventures and Great Oaks VC. TechCrunch has more here.

Starling Medical, a four-year-old Houston startup that is rolling out a urinalysis device for home toilets, raised a $3.4 million seed round led by Rebel Fund, with additional participation from Y Combinator, Innospark Ventures, AI Basis, Capital Factory, Coho Deeptech, Magic Fund, Rogers Family Office, Hendricks Family Office, ReMy Ventures, Centauri Fund, Praxis SCI Institute, and Gaingels. TechCrunch has more here.

TrueBiz, a one-year-old New York startup that wants to reinvent how fintechs review the risks of the businesses they onboard in order to avoid allegedly fraudulent startups such as Frank, raised a $2.4 million seed round led by Flourish Ventures, with Homebrew, Y Combinator, and The Fintech Fund also pitching in. TechCrunch has more here.

Constellation, a nearly seven-year-old, New York-based SaaS enterprise tech platform that aims to help brands and Fortune 500 companies in different highly regulated industries to build, launch and manage targeted digital creative at scale, has raised an undisclosed amount of funding from the growth equity firm Newlight Partners. The company describes the stake as "significant." More here.

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Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group of Japan -- one of the world's largest financial groups -- has launched a $100 million finance-focused fund with the Indonesia-based Bank Danamon that will target Series B startups that specialize in lending, payment, SaaS, ESG, wealth management, and embedded finance marketplaces. Tech in Asia has more here.

Lotus Technology, the electric-car maker owned by China’s Zhejiang Geely Holding Group, has agreed to merge with a blank-check company in a transaction that values the combined entity at about $5.4 billion. L Catterton Asia Acquisition Corp. will combine with the EV making subsidiary of the British car-making group that Geely acquired back in 2017, the two said in a statement yesterday. According to Bloomberg, Lotus has been looking to go public since at least early last year; meanwhile, its management may have been emboldened by the successful IPO of Porsche AG back in September, notes the outlet.

Online retailer Shein has named former SoftBank Group Corp executive Marcelo Claure to help run its Latin American business, a "signature hire that could accelerate a global expansion by one of the world’s most valuable startups," notes Bloomberg. Claure, once a lieutenant to SoftBank founder Masayoshi Son, will lead the region’s operations, according to a statement Tuesday. The former SoftBank chief operating officer will also make a $100 million personal investment in the company.

Sarah Mears Kim has joined Centana Growth Partners, the growth equity firm, as a partner. Formerly, she was with Archipelago Analytics.

White Star Capital, a London-based investment firm, has promoted Eddie Lee to general partner. Lee joined the outfit in late 2018; previously, he spent more than four years as an associate with J.P. Morgan.

EV company Rivian plans to initiate another round of layoffs, the latest in the outfit's efforts to preserve cash as it confronts challenges scaling its business. In a note to employees sent today, CEO RJ Scaringe said Rivian plans to trim another 6% of its workforce, mirroring a cut of the same size made last summer. The WSJ has the story here.

Pinterest is laying off about 150 employees, the latest tech company to cut costs in a turbulent time. The move affected less than 5% of Pinterest’s total workers, reports Bloomberg. More here.

The use of the death penalty under the rule of Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman and his father, King Salman, has almost doubled annually since they rose to power, according to a new report seen by ABC News. The report, published yesterday by the non-profit European Saudi organization for Human Rights and the anti-death penalty charity Reprieve, says that the average number of executions has risen 82% under their rule, even as the country has projected a modernizing image to the outside world.

OpenAI has become a hunting ground for talent, observes The Information. Per its report, "Bigger companies have recruited away former OpenAI employees who’ve worked on those models. More than 20 former OpenAI employees work at Tesla and at least 16 at Google, according to a review of LinkedIn profiles, while Amazon, Meta and Microsoft each employ a handful of former OpenAI employees. Another top recruiter of OpenAI alumni is Anthropic, an AI startup founded in 2021 by former OpenAI vice presidents and siblings Dario and Daniela Amodei; 15 former OpenAI employees work there, according to LinkedIn." More here.

More large companies have filed for bankruptcy this month than in any January since 2010, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. It says there have been 20 large bankruptcy filings — those tied to at least $50 million of liabilities — in the U.S. this month. The cases range from heavily indebted enterprises that have struggled for years to a former blank-check company that ran low on cash not long after going public. More here.

Worth noting: Burry -- who was famously played by Christian Bale in "The Big Short" -- seems to have deleted his Twitter account since publishing this tweet, which marks the second time in the past two months he has done so. Burry also deleted his account for some period in November 2021. Bloomberg has more here.

Coinbase today won dismissal of a lawsuit by consumers alleging the cryptocurrency exchange facilitated the sale of unregistered securities on its platform. In a federal courtroom, the presiding judge said the terms of Coinbase’s user agreement “flatly contradict” allegations in the lawsuit that the company holds title to the digital assets that are bought and sold on the exchange. The judge also found that the platform didn’t actively solicit investments. Bloomberg has more here.

Tiger Global Management is scaling back its plans for a large venture-capital fund, reports the WSJ. It says Tiger has informed investors it is reducing the target size for its latest venture fund to $5 billion, down from a $6 billion target it set when it began fundraising last fall, which was itself well below Tiger’s early expectations that it would raise a roughly comparable fund to its last, which totaled $12.7 billion. More here.

Twitter will discontinue offering free access to the Twitter API starting February 9 and will launch a paid version, the Elon Musk-owned social network announced tonight. Roughly 10 days ago, Twitter had updated its developer rules to ban third-party clients after first blocking the apps’ access to its platform one week earlier without explaining why. TechCrunch has more here.

Three things to know about Black history month. 

Why our minds wander.

To all the women in bathroom lines who we've befriended before.

Society6 laptop sleeves.

The largest collection of James Bond memorabilia ever to hit the market will be sold later this month. 

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