Lee Fixel's newest big fund, Bill Gates's plans in China, and America's favorite beer (is no longer American)

Reddit CEO Steve Huffman said today that he wants to bring an end to a user-led protest that has made large parts of the popular site inaccessible this week. Huffman said in an interview with NBC News that he plans to institute rules changes that would allow Reddit users to vote out moderators who have overseen the protest, comparing them to a “landed gentry.” The protest took down thousands of message boards, known as subreddits, starting Monday, and some communities say they plan to continue the action indefinitely. As for the root of those protests --  Reddit's decision to charge for access to its previously free API -- he tells the Verge the pre-IPO company is not backing down, and that the free ride for third party developers is over. “That’s our business decision, and we’re not undoing that business decision.”

Research: the state of venture capital in 2023. While the slowdown began in 2022, the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank in early March shook the venture industry and shined a brighter-than-ever light on the space. To go beyond the headlines, Juniper Square surveyed nearly 100 venture capital investors about their concerns, plans, and focus areas for the rest of the year. See what they had to say about the state of the industry. Download The State of Venture Capital: 2023 Benchmark Survey now.

Bit2Me, a nine-year-old, Elche, Spain-based crypto exchange, has raised €14 million in fresh funding led by Investcorp, with participation from Telefónica Ventures, Stratminds VC, Adaverse, YGG fund and the cofounder and CEO of Yield Guild Games (YGG), Gabby Dizon. CoinDesk has more here.

Blackbird AI, a six-year-old, New York-based startup developing AI-powered software for risk intelligence, today announced that it raised $20 million in a Series B funding round led by Ten Eleven Ventures. TechCrunch has more here.

Deepchecks, a four-year-old, Tel Aviv-based continuous machine learning validation platform, has raised $14 million in seed funding led by Alpha Wave Ventures, with participation from Hetz Ventures and Grove Ventures. TechCrunch has more here.

Kanastra, an 18-month-old, São Paulo-based capital markets infrastructure startup, has raised $13 million in seed funding co-led by Valor Capital and Quona Capital, with added participation from QED Investors, Actyus, Collaborative, Crestone, Grão, Endeavor, Clocktower, Latitud and Norte. Forbes has more here.

Medivis, a seven-year-old, New York-based augmented reality surgery platform, has raised $20 million in Series A funding. Thrive Capital led the round, joined by Initialized Capital, Mayo Clinic, 35V, Bob Iger, and other angels. The WSJ takes a look here.

Nelly, a two-year-old, Berlin-based documentation and payment processing software platform for medical practices, has raised €15 million ($16.26 million) in Series A funding led by Lakestar, with b2venture and Motive Ventures also pitching in. Tech.eu has more here.

Paro, an eight-year-old, Chicago-based finance and accounting solutions marketplace, has raised $25 million in Series C funding led by Top Tier Capital Partners. Other backers in the round included Madrona Venture Group, Revolution Ventures, and Sierra Ventures. The outfit has now raised $67 million altogether. TechCrunch has more here.

SpotHopper, an eight-year-old, Milwaukee startup that makes automated sales and marketing software for restaurants, raised $12 million in Series B from earlier investor TVC Capital. The company has now raised $26 million altogether. Wisconsin Inno has more here.

Trust Lab, a four-year-old, Palo Alto-based startup that provides platforms and regulators analytics to safeguard against harmful content, raised $15 million in Series A funding co-led by U.S. Venture Partners and Foundation Capital. SiliconAngle has more here.

EdgeTier, an eight-year-old, Dublin, Ireland-based customer service startup, has raised €6 million in Series A funding led by Smedvig Capita, with participation from Episode 1 and Act VC. ​​More here. 

Eze, a three-year-old, Los Angeles-based secondhand electronics marketplace, has raised $3.7 million in a seed funding. Backers in the round include Y Combinator, Right Side Capital, C2 Ventures, Boro Capital, EVPI Investments, Itochu, Jack Greco, and other angel investors. TechCrunch has more here.

Meshcapade, a five-year-old, Tübingen, Germany-based startup that automates the creation of realistic digital 3D bodies of people (or 3D avatars) and which spun out of the Max-Planck Institute, has raised $6 million in seed funding led by Matrix. More here.

Reask, a Sydney-based risk data startup applying AI to interpret and forecast global extreme weather conditions, has raised $4.6 million in seed funding co-led by Mastry Ventures and Collaborative Fund, with participation from Macdoch Ventures, Tencent, SV Angel and Hawktail. The outfit has now raised $6.55 million altogether. More here.

Refuel.ai, a two-year-old platform that automates dataset creation and labeling for every business and use case using LLMs, has raised $5.2 million in seed funding led by General Catalyst and XYZ Ventures. VentureBeat has more here.

SpareTech, a five-year-old, Stuttgart, Germany-based SaaS platform that helps manufacturing companies digitize their inventories of spare parts, calculate their real demand, compare parts from different suppliers and source the appropriate part outside or within their production network, just raised €10 million ($10.83 million) in funding. Insight Partners, Headline, and others invested in the round. Silicon Canals has more here.

STAT Health, a three-year-old, Boston-based in-ear wearable company whose devices measures blood flow to the head so when users stand up, they can track changes in their heart rate, blood pressure trend and blood flow (useful information for those who commonly experience dizziness and fainting spells), has raised $5.2 million in seed funding. J2 Ventures, BonAngels Venture Partners, and other angels invested in the round. CNBC has more here.

Uncaged Innovations, a nearly three-year-old, New York-based sustainable leather alternatives company, has raised $2 million in pre-seed funding. Backers in the round include InMotion Ventures (the venture arm of Jaguar Land Rover), VegInvest, Stray Dog Capital, Alwyn Capital, Hack Capital, and GlassWalls Syndicate. Business Insider has more here.

Versed, a Scotland-based startup that wants to help storytellers create video games using generative AI, has raised €1.6 million ($1.73 million) in pre-seed funding led by Gradient Ventures, with additional participation from Cherry Ventures. TechCrunch has more here.

Worknet.ai, a 19-month-old, Tel Aviv-based startup that aims to enables sellers to closely collaborate with their prospects and customers in Slack or Microsoft Teams, has raised $5 million across its pre-seed and seed rounds from Founders’ Co-Op and Act One Ventures. More here.

TeraWatt Technology, a Milpitas, Ca.-based outfit that produces lightweight, high-power, and safe lithium-ion batteries, has raised an undisclosed amount in pre-C funding from a long list of investors. Among them is the Development Bank of Japan, INPEX Corporation, JIC Venture Growth Investments, Rakuten Capital, Mori Trust, GLIN Impact Capital, and other individual investors. Earlier backers in the company, including Temasek, Khosla Ventures, and JAFCO, participated again in this round, as well. More here.

The unicorn landscape has changed dramatically since the start of the decade. Affinity's latest infographic looks at worldwide trends and reveals the areas of opportunity that still exist across geography and industry.

Marcelo Claure is getting the band back together. Per Bloomberg, the former COO of SoftBank Group who left over a payment dispute, is taking the wraps off his own new venture firm,  Bicycle Capital. The firm is targeting $500 million for its inaugural fund and has amassed $440 million in commitments toward that end. It also brings together the same team of people who were helping Claure lead SoftBank into a range of deals in Latin America. Indeed, his cofounder in the firm is Shu Nyatta, formerly a SoftBank Group International managing partner. The two have also brought in three other former SoftBank colleagues to join as partners in São Paulo and Miami: Felipe Fujiwara, Ezequiel Piantoni and Matthew Pieterse. They tell Bloomberg the new fund will focus on Series B and later rounds, writing checks of about $20 million to $50 million, and that it will invest in about 10 to 15 companies altogether. More here.

Discover has launched a $36 million venture fund to focus on personal financial wellness startups. The Discover Financial Health Improvement Fund will back companies in particular that aim to help low- and moderate-income people, communities and small businesses in the mid-Atlantic region. Pymnts has more here.

Lee Fixel’s Addition is targeting $1.5 billion in capital commitments for its fifth fund, per SEC filings. The former Tiger Global executive closed Addition's fourth fund less than a year ago. All of Addition's funds to date have been $1.3 billion in size or larger. The New York-based firm's bets include Stripe, Lyra, Snyk, Navan, Alchemy Insights, Chainalysis and Hugging Face. TechCrunch has the story here.

Recharge Capital, a four-year-old, New York- and Singapore-based venture firm that plans to focus on creating and funding women’s health and fertility care ecosystems in Southeast Asia, Latin America, Europe and the Middle East, says it has held a first close on a fund that it hopes will eventually garner $200 million in capital commitments. Limited partners in the effort include Peter Thiel, the Olayan Group, Blue Lion Group, the Al Rashid family of the Salmira Investment Fund, and the Disney family’s Shamrock Holdings, among others. TechCrunch has more here.

As reported in WWD, Fanatics is expanding its reach in Latin America. The digital sports platform and licensed sports merchandise company earlier this week completed its acquisition of Fexpro, a Panama-based wholesaler of licensed sports and branded apparel in Latin America. Terms were not disclosed. Fexpro is a licensee for several major U.S. sports leagues in Latin America, including the NFL, NBA and MLB. It also works with top international soccer clubs including Paris Saint-Germain, Real Madrid and FC Barcelona, as well as sportswear brand Umbro. 

Wargraphs, a one-man-band startup behind a popular companion app for League of Legends called Porofessor, which helps players track and improve their playing stats, is getting acquired for up to €50 million ($54 million) -- half up front and half based on meeting certain earnings and growth targets. MOBA Networks, a company founded out of Sweden that buys, grows and runs online gaming communities, is buying the startup and its existing products. TechCrunch has more here.

Intel is reportedly in talks with SoftBank Group's Arm to be an anchor investor in the chipmaker's IPO, Reuters reported earlier this week. Arm plans to sell its shares on Nasdaq later this year, seeking to raise $8 billion to $10 billion, Reuters reported earlier in April.

Shares of the Mediterranean restaurant chain Cava soared as much as 117% in its market debut today; many are hoping it's a sign that public market investors are once again hungry for new offerings.

Government lawyers say they're withdrawing five of 13 legal claims they've made against FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried, including a bank fraud count and an allegation that Bankman-Fried bribed a foreign government, and are seeking to schedule a second trial for those charges. It's a procedural necessity, the attorneys say. The NYTimes has more here.

Bill Gates is set to meet Chinese President Xi Jinping tomorrow during his visit to China, reports Reuters. The meeting will mark Xi's first meeting with a foreign private entrepreneur in recent years. More here.

Amy Wu, who led FTX Ventures until the crypto exchange's collapse, has joined Menlo Ventures as a partner focused on consumer startups. Axios has more here.

Alphabet is cautioning employees about how they use chatbots, including its own Bard, at the same time as it markets the program around the world, Reuters reported earlier today. Per its sources, Alphabet has also advised employees not to enter its confidential materials into AI chatbots, citing long-standing policy on safeguarding information. More here.

Bloomberg dives more deeply into how exactly Microsoft + OpenAI leapfrogged Google, Baidu and others to become the most dominant force in AI. From the story: "Microsoft had never outsourced development of a major new piece of technology to a third party, and the money [OpenAI CEO Sam] Altman wanted was enormous—$1 billion for a tiny lab. [Microsoft CTO Kevin] Scott says what turned him around was the startup’s use of 'transfer learning,' a promising approach that hadn’t yet been incorporated into a commercial product. At the time, most AI startups tried to teach a computer a specific task (identifying grocery items at a glance, say) using specialized data (a bunch of pictures of groceries, checked and labeled by humans). The idea with transfer learning was that you could create a model to do one thing, such as summarize a paragraph, then apply that information to learning new tasks, like how to compose a song or plan a trip. 'You train a broad model, and it just happens to be good at all of these tasks,' Scott says. The upshot was that instead of giving an AI model specialized data, you simply collect as much data as possible. Such as, for example: the entire internet." More here.

Meta wants other companies to freely use and profit from new AI software it's developing, and it's working on ways to make the next version of its open-source large-language model available for commercial use, says The Information. The outlet notes that the move could prompt a feeding frenzy among AI developers who want  alternatives to proprietary software sold by rivals Google and OpenAI.

An NFT artwork with a history sells for $6.2 million at Sotheby's.

Lip readers decode celebrity whispers.

America's new favorite beer.

Gustav Klimt’s last portrait hits the auction block in about 10 days. Note that you may need $80 million to take it home.

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