What it feels like to work in AI right now

As it deals with pressure from chatbots such as ChatGPT, Google plans to add conversational AI features to its flagship search engine, CEO Sundar Pichai tells the WSJ. Dismissing the notion that chatbots posed a threat to Google’s search business, which accounts for more than half of revenue at parent Alphabet, he tells the Journal: “The opportunity space, if anything, is bigger than before."

In related news, Google published details about one of its AI supercomputers yesterday, saying it is faster and more efficient than competing Nvidia systems, as power-hungry machine learning models continue to be the hottest part of the tech industry. CNBC has more here.

Tesla just cut the prices of its Model S and X for the third time this year.

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The market is slowing down, but that’s not stopping Canaan, a 35-year-old early-stage venture firm that invests in both tech and healthcare. It just closed on $850 million in capital commitments across two new funds: a $650 million flagship fund — its 13th — and a separate $200 million fund to support its breakaway portfolio companies.

The amount is slightly more than the $800 million that Canaan gathered for its 12th flagship fund in October 2020 and brings the firm’s assets under management to $6.8 billion.

That Canaan closed an opportunity-style fund in the current market is somewhat counterintuitive. Some institutional investors privately grouse that they don’t like later-stage funds hosted by early-stage investors, as it complicates their ability to properly diversify their own investments.

A growing number of early-stage investors are also deciding to forgo dedicated late-stage funds owing to a market where exits are few and IPOs are even more rare. Lux Capital, for example, is raising a single fund after previously raising more than one fund at once; Felicis, another early-stage investor, recently made the same decision.

But Maha Ibrahim, a general partner at Canaan who joined the outfit 23 years ago, says there are numerous reasons for that second fund, including a broader pullback in later-stage funding.

More here.

Nuru, an eight-year-old Congo startup that is deploying solar-based mini-grids in sub-Saharan Africa, is reportedly in talks to raise a $60 million Series B round from IFC and Renewable Energy Performance Platform, according to Bloomberg, which has more here.

AMSilk, a 15-year-old German company that uses vegan silk proteins to create fully biodegradable and microplastic-free silk materials, raised a $27.3 million Series C extension round led by previous investor Anthos, with Novo Holdings, Cargill, and MIG Capital also chipping in. The company has raised a total of $69.5 million. Vegconomist has more here.

Chroma, a two-year-old Stockholm startup that is developing an open-source database specifically designed to power AI applications, raised an $18 million seed round. Quiet Capital was the deal lead. SiliconANGLE has more here.

Honeycomb, a seven-year-old San Francisco startup in the data observability space that helps engineering teams understand, debug, and improve production systems, raised a $50 million Series D round led by Headline, with additional participation from previous investors Insight Partners and Scale Venture Partners. The company has raised a total of $148.9 million. TechCrunch has more here.

M^ZERO Labs, a Berlin startup that is developing decentralized infrastructure to enable institutional investors to link assets in the global financial system with decentralized applications, raised a $22.5 million in round led by Pantera Capital, with Road Capital, AirTree, Standard Crypto, The SALT Fund, ParaFi Capital, Distributed Capital, Kraynos Capital, Mouro Capital, and Earlybird also piling on. Cointelegraph has more here.

OXOS Medical, a seven-year-old Atlanta startup that claims to have built the world’s first handheld x-ray for use in clinical and surgical care scenarios, raised a $23 million Series A round. Investors included Parkway Venture Capital and Intel Capital. The company has raised a total of $45 million. TechCrunch has more here.

Staytuned Digital, a four-year-old New York startup that is acquiring and building e-commerce apps primarily associated with the Shopify ecosystem, raised a $34 million equity and debt round led by TenOneTen Ventures, with Rembrandt Venture Partners, Hawke Ventures, DragonX Capital, and FJ Labs also taking part. TechCrunch has more here.

True Anomaly, a one-year-old Denver startup that aims to supply the U.S. armed forces with technology to protect American assets in space and monitor the movements of enemy spacecraft, raised a $17 million Series A round led by Eclipse and including Riot Ventures, Champion Hill Ventures, Space.VC, and Narya. TechCrunch has more here.

Alga Biosciences, a two-year-old San Francisco startup that is trying to reduce methane emissions from cattle burps(!), raised a $4 million round led by Collaborative Fund, with Y Combinator, Day One Ventures, Cool Climate Collective, Pioneer Fund, and Overview Capital also joining in. TechCrunch has more here.

Aqua Cultured Foods, a two-year-old Chicago startup that is creating whole-muscle cut seafood alternatives, including calamari, shrimp, scallops, and filets of tuna and whitefish, raised a $5.5 million seed round led by Stray Dog Capital, with additional funds provided by H Ventures, Aztec Capital Management, and Amplifica Capital. The company has raised a total of $7.8 million. TechCrunch has more here.

Finst, a one-year-old Amsterdam startup that is building a cryptocurrency exchange with what it claims to be the lowest trading fees in the Netherlands, raised a $4.4 million seed round. Deribit, a cryptocurrency derivatives exchange, led the investment through its parent company, Sentillia. Silicon Canals has more here.

GaeaStar, a 10-month-old San Francisco and Berlin-based technology company creating ultra-thin clay containers to break consumers' dependency on single-use plastic, says it has raised $6.5 million in seed funding. Its backer include Morningside Technology Ventures, At Inc. Ventures, Dart Labs Ventures, Sand Hill Angels, VSC Ventures and Climate Capital Ventures. The Spoon has more here.

Helical Fusion, a two-year-old Tokyo startup that is attempting to develop a helical fusion reactor, raised a $6 million round. SBI Investment led the transaction. More here.

InvestNext, a seven-year-old Detroit startup whose investment management platform helps private equity real estate and REITs automate their back-office and streamline investor accounting and relations, raised an $8.25 million Series A round led by Whitecap Venture Partners, with participation from Detroit Venture Partners, Hyde Park Venture Partners, Grand Ventures, and ID Ventures. More here.

LightMetrics, an eight-year-old Indian startup that provides video telematics to over 2500 commercial vehicle fleets, raised a $8.5 million round. Sequoia Capital India was the deal lead. Entrackr has more here.

Native AI, a five-year-old New York startup that is using generative AI to enable brands to clone their customers for market research purposes, raised a $3.5 million seed round co-led by JumpStart Ventures and Ivy Ventures, with 11 Tribes Ventures and Connetic Ventures also pitching in. SiliconANGLE has more here.

Roboto.ai, a one-year-old Seattle startup that is building a data platform that allows robotics developers to easily search across different types of data using natural language queries, raised a $4.8 million seed round led by Unusual Ventures, with the Allen Institute for Artificial Intelligence (AI2) and FUSE Ventures also taking part. The Robot Report has more here.

Tally Health, a two-year-old New York startup that provides supplements and personalized recommendations to combat the effects of aging, raised a $10 million seed round led by Forerunner Ventures, with L Catterton, G9 Ventures, and Second Sight Ventures also contributing. Fast Company has more here.

Velos Motors, an East Coast-based drone helicopter startup that began in Xylokastro, Greece and that features a patented twin-engine design that the company says can transport a 13-pound payload for 60 minutes with a 35-mile-per-hour cruise speed, has raised $2 million. Marathon Venture Capital, based in Athens, provided the funding. Tech.eu has more here.

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Venture capital firm SR One, spun out of GlaxoSmithKline in 2020, has closed a new fund with $600 million in capital commitments from endowments, foundations, and pharmaceutical companies, among other limited partners, says the outfit. SR One is now managing $1.5 billion altogether. MedCity News has more here.

Yfood, one of the direct-to-consumer food tech startups that has emerged over the last decade around the concept of meal replacement drinks, has sold 49.95% of its business to Nestlé, the food and drink behemoth, which has the option to buy Yfood’s outstanding shares over the next few years. The financial terms of the deal are not being disclosed by the companies, but TechCrunch sources say Nestlé’s acquisition values Yfood at €430 million ($469 million), meaning the investment that Nestlé is making here is valued at €215 million. More here.

ARCH Venture Partners has appointed life sciences industry veteran Brian Cuneo as senior partner. Cuneo was previously a partner of Latham & Watkins, serving as Global Chair of the firm's Life Sciences and Healthcare Industry Group. More here.

A senior lawyer at Twitter submitted his resignation today, says the New York Times, becoming the latest in a string of executives to leave the company since Elon Musk took it over nearly six months ago. Christian Dowell reportedly rose to the top of Twitter’s legal department in recent months after Twitter's legal leaders resigned or were fired by Musk. He was intimately involved in Twitter’s recent negotiations with the Federal Trade Commission, too, says the Times. More here.

At Anthony Scaramucci's SkyBridge Capital, "clients are rebelling, assets are dwindling, and most employees are gone" following some bad crypto bets and a reputational hit from its partnership with Sam Bankman-Fried. Bloomberg has the story.

JB Straubel could return to Tesla – as a board member this time. The company said in a regulatory filing today that Straubel, the company's former CTO who is now running his own company, Redwood Materials, would take over the spot vacated by Hiromichi Mizuno, the former chief investment officer of Japan’s $1.5 trillion pension fund, if elected by shareholders. Mizuno joined the board and its audit committee in 2020 and will not stand for re-election, reports TechCrunch.

The 25 richest people in the world, according to Forbes. (And here's who fell off the billionaires list this year.)

Hampton's home prices are falling for the first time since 2019.

Anthropic's four-year plan to take on OpenAI.

Twitter’s API shutdown and botpocalypse has begun.

Meta's two rounds of layoffs are affecting the company's already poor customer service for users, influencers, communities and businesses, reports CNBC.

What it feels like to work in AI right now.

The history of lipstick. 💋

36 hours in Tokyo.

Every Ben Affleck role, ranked.

The "world's strongest water gun," should you have a battle on the calendar.

Land Rover Classic Defender 90. Lego edition.

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