Khosla's haul, Airbnb's acquisition, and a VC is ousted from his firm over Israel-Hamas-related rhetoric

We're really happy that so many of you (a) caught last week's mention of our first StrictlyVC event of 2024, happening January 24 and (b) reserved tickets already.:) We share your enthusiasm! 

On that front, we're thrilled to be sitting down with Worldcoin, cofounded by Alex Blania and Sam Altman. You've no doubt followed some of the coverage around this fascinating and controversial company that says it wants to prove humanness in a digital world where it's fast becoming harder to tell the difference between a unique person and a neural net. 

Worldcoin had a big 2023 -- it says more than 2.4 million people have lined up to have their irises scanned by its bowling-ball-size "orb" devices in exchange for a digital ID and free cryptocurrency. But the young outfit has also run headlong into widespread concerns that its database can be misused. Kenyan authorities were reportedly so nervous about the company's efforts to "harvest data from young people" that its Interior Ministry suspended the project in the African country and detained Blania at the Nairobi airport after he spoke to lawmakers there in September. (He was able to leave after the U.S. government intervened, per local reports.) 

We'll be talking with Blania about that episode and much more. (We're also hoping the company will bring an orb for us to check out, as the service isn't yet available in the Bay Area.)

If you'd like to join us in sponsoring this event, we'd love to hear from you. You can reply here or reach out directly to jessica.brunner@techcrunch.com. In the meantime, we'll have more announcements about the evening for you in the coming weeks. 

(Giant thanks again to Cloudflare for hosting all of us at its San Francisco space!)

A federal judge ruled today that Alphabet, Meta, ByteDance, and Snap must face charges that their respective social media platforms are addictive to young people. 

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Imprint, a three-year-old New York startup that partners with brands to design, launch, and manage co-branded credit card programs, raised a $75 million Series B round led by Ribbit Capital, with Thrive Capital, Kleiner Perkins, Lachy Groom, and Moore Specialty Credit also participating. The Irish Times has more here.

MBrace Therapeutics, a three-year-old San Diego startup that is developing cancer therapeutics, raised an $85 million Series B round led by TPG, with additional participation from Avidity Partners and Cowen Healthcare Investments as well as previous investors Venrock and Alta Partners. The company has raised a total of $110 million. More here.

Nouscom, an eight-year-old Swiss startup that is developing neoantigen cancer vaccines to address conditions such as colorectal cancer, raised a $73.4 million Series C round co-led by Andera Partners, Bpifrance, and M Ventures, with Revelation Partners, Indaco Venture Partners, Panakès Partners, X-Gen Ventures, 5AM Ventures, EQT Life Sciences, and Versant Ventures also taking part. Pharmaceutical Technology has more here.

etaily, a three-year-old Philippines startup that helps global brands enter Southeast Asia, raised a $17.8 million Series A round led by SKS Capital and Pavilion Capital, with SBI ICCP, Kaya Founders, Foxmont Capital, and JGDEV also pitching in. TechCrunch has more here.

Keychain, a New York startup that uses AI to help consumer packaged goods companies find manufacturing partners, raised an $18 million seed round. Lightspeed Venture Partners was the deal lead, with Box Group, Afore Capital, and SV Angel also contributing. TechCrunch has more here.

Radiant Security, a two-year-old San Francisco startup that has developed an AI agent to help analysts at security operations centers process all of the incoming signals they are receiving, raised a $15 million Series A round led by Next47, with General Advance and previous investors Lightspeed Venture Partners, Acrew Capital, Uncorrelated Ventures, and Jibe Ventures also stepping up. SiliconANGLE has more here.

Refine Intelligence, a one-year-old Tel Aviv startup that provides financial institutions with anti-money laundering software, raised a $13 million seed round co-led by Glilot Capital Partners and Fin Capital, with SYN Ventures, Valley Ventures, and Ground Up Ventures also contributing. CTech has more here.

Aether Biomedical, a six-year-old Chicago startup that is creating bionic upper limb prosthetics, raised a $5.8 million Series A round co-led by J2 Ventures and Story Ventures, with previous investor Chiratae Ventures also chipping in. More here.

Aikido Security, a one-year-old startup based in Ghent, Belgium, whose mission is to help SaaS companies identify critical security breaches and reduce false positives, raised a $5.4 million seed round. Notion Capital and Connect Ventures were the co-leads, with Precede Fund also anteing up. Tech.eu has more here.

Atlas, a two-year-old Vienna startup whose 3D generative AI platform helps game developers and brands build virtual worlds, raised a $6 million in two seed rounds (one $1.5 million and the other $4.5 million) led by Collab+Currency and 6thMan Ventures, respectively. TechCrunch has more here.

Augmentus, a four-year-old Singapore startup that has developed a no-code robot programming platform for industrial automation for clients such as Hyundai and Johnson & Johnson, raised a $5 million Series A round led by Sierra Ventures and including previous investor Cocoon Capital. Tech in Asia has more here.

Baton, a Brooklyn startup that helps musicians keep track of how their songs are reused or repurposed without their knowledge, raised a $4.2 million round led by Bitkraft Ventures, with Techstars, Dorm Room Fund, NYU's Innovation Venture Fund, the Berkley Center for Entrepreneurship, Dark Arts, Franklin Templeton, and Harmonic Future also piling on. TechCrunch has more here.

Bloom, a one-year-old London startup that has developed a career coaching app, raised a $10 million seed round. Octopus Ventures and MMC Ventures were the co-leads. Silicon Canals has more here.

BrightGo, a startup founded this year based in San Bruno, CA, whose software helps janitorial companies manage their workforce, raised a $3 million seed round. Costanoa Ventures and Index Ventures co-led the deal. More here.

Civitai, a startup platform that invites members to post their own Stable Diffusion-based AI image models for others to discover, as well as the output of their work (AI photos) for consumers to browse and enjoy, tells TechCrunch it quietly raised $5.1 million in funding back in June. Andreessen Horowitz was the deal lead. More here.

CoverSelf, a two-year-old San Francisco startup that aims to enable insurers to in-source their payments processing work in order to reduce their dependence on third parties and improve their relationship with providers and patients, raised an $8.2 million seed extension round co-led by BEENEXT and 3one4 Capital. Forbes has more here.

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The Wall Street Journal is reporting that Khosla Ventures is in the final stages of raising a $500 million seed fund, a $1.6 billion venture fund, and a $900 million growth fund. The firm has a hot hand given it was the first outside investor in OpenAI.

Anu Hariharan, the former head of Y Combinator's YC Continuity program, is reportedly raising a $350 million fund. Her new firm, Avra, which some have dubbed  "YC for growth," plans to run an eight-week program for approximately a dozen post-Series A startups each quarter. TechCrunch has the scoop here.

Airbridge Equity Partners, an Amsterdam-based fund that typically invests €1-5 million in European B2B or B2C startups that have demonstrated commercial success and are starting to scale, raised a $63 million fund, its second. More here.

Airbnb has snapped up GamePlanner.AI, a stealth startup about which little is known other than both of its founders worked on Siri. (In fact, GamePlanner.AI's cofounder, Adam Cheyer, also co-founded Siri.) CNBC is reporting that Airbnb paid $200 million for its prize. TechCrunch has more here. 

Tech heads are "scrambling" to get in on Chinese President Xi Jinping's exclusive dinner for top execs during this week's APEC summit in San Francisco.

Venture capitalist Kenneth Ballenegger has been suspended from the U.S. investment firm he cofounded, Oyster Ventures, after making offensive remarks on X on the Israel-Hamas conflict.

Online pet retailer Chewy has laid off over 200 employees. According to CEO Sumit Singh, inflation has led consumers to buy lower-priced items such as dry dog food instead of more expensive products such as wet food and pet treats.

The Mormon Church disclosed the top ten holdings in its $47 billion stock portfolio as of September 30th, and the list is a virtual who's who of tech stocks.

Evan Spiegel is on a mission at Snap, and his employees had better be, too.

X is not removing anti-Semitic or Islamophobic posts, instead leaving them up to fester.

A security expert is saying that ChatGPT has opened up a can of worms by introducing a new file upload feature. "Good opportunity to raise awareness around prompt injection and data exfiltration issues," he sniped.

A night in the Sphere. (Enjoy the experience while you can: the company that operates the Sphere just reported a $98.4 million quarterly loss, and the CFO resigned.) 

Auto-reply emails for hybrid workers. 

Point Dume dream home.

A Napa Valley estate owned by the former longtime CEO of Restoration Hardware (now RH). 

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