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Traditional banks are least likely to meet the needs of SMEs

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• Stability AI recently cited 'fair use' as a justification for using material that is under copyright in response to comments by the US Copyright Office. 
• A blurry legal area, fair use protects people using copyrighted content as long as the content is changed in a meaningful way — and is "transformative".
• Stability AI's CEO Emad Mostaque has always argued that the output of GenAI models is transformative, but Newton-Rex disagrees. 
• He says the content that AI is developing from copyrighted work may end up competing with that work and, as such, he can “only support generative AI that doesn’t exploit creators by training models  —  which may replace them —  on their work without permission”.

🍲 Norwegian food delivery scaleup Oda has merged with Swedish counterpart Mathem. By joining forces, the two companies will combine Mathem's customer base and Oda's tech, and overcome a slump that has seen both their valuations drop more than 50% since 2021. 

• Startups wishing to apply to the Large AI Grand Challenge must make sure their model is of a minimum size and is trained from scratch. The deadline for applications is January 16, 2024.
• AI startups are also now welcome to take part in the EU AI Pact, a voluntary commitment for companies wishing to start implementing the requirements in the EU AI Act ahead of it coming into force, Breton said. The Commission will provide more information on what participating companies will need to do in the first half of 2024.

Startup founders aren't the only people who can't raise money right now — VCs are struggling too. 

European VCs raised €13.9bn in the first nine months of 2023, putting them on track to raise significantly less than the €27.6bn raised in 2022.

Part of the problem is that the people that VCs get their money from, LPs, are less willing to part with it right now. 

If there is one great hope for VCs though, it is family offices: 95% of respondents to a recent Sifted survey have them as LPs already, double the amount that have corporate or fund of funds as LPs. 

📉 The carbon accounting market is ripe for M&A. VCs piled cash into the sector last year, with European carbon accounting startups raising $860m. There are now 34 startups in the sector in Europe, with 11 founded in the last three years — it's crowded, which means consolidation could be round the corner. 

👩‍⚖️ 10 legal tech startups to watch, according to VCs from Outward VC, Molten Ventures, Ventech and Cavalry Ventures.

🇦🇹 How Austria is competing in the chips race — and what this has to do with startups (Sponsored by Austrian Business Agency)

🎧 This week on Startup Europe — The Sifted Podcast, we dig into the $800k salaries flying around the crazy AI talent market, and chat to grocery delivery startup CEO Tom Peeters about how his startup has bucked the sector's doom and gloom and raised a chunky €35m Series C this week.

Today Sifted's Daphné Leprince-Ringuet will be at ai-PULSE in Paris, and Cristina Gallardo is at the 4th AI Alliance Assembly in Madrid. Are you there? Say hi! 

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• UK-based crypto exchange Blockchain.com has concluded a $110m Series E led by Kingsway Capital.

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• Dutch payment-processing platform Silverflow has raised €15m led by Global PayTech Ventures, along with Picus Capital, Coatue, Crane Venture Partners and Inkef.

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• France-based cybersecurity startup Qevlar AI, which utilises AI to examine cyber hacks and identify potential threats to businesses, has raised a $5m seed round led by EQT Ventures.
• Estonian energy conversion startup Efenco has raised €4.5m. This includes €3.2m in grant funding from the European Innovation Council and Estonia's Archimedes Foundation.
• Italian carbon capture startup CarpeCarbon has raised €1.7m in pre-seed funding from CDP Venture Capital and 360 Capital.
• US app growth startup SplitMetrics has purchased App Radar, an Austrian marketing and analytics platform app, in a seven-figure cash deal.

If you’d like to submit a deal, get in touch.

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