Instagram layoffs, rodent invasions, and Artifact is history 📖

Gah, we love Fridays.

Before you go(!), we have news about our StrictlyVC L.A. event on February 29: Meredith Whittaker, the president of messaging app Signal, who has some very specific thoughts about the true dangers of AI, is now joining us. If you know Whittaker, you likely know that she's a highly compelling speaker; we're thrilled she is joining us, along with Waymo co-CEO Tekedra Mawakana. (We'll have to ask Mawakana how she feels about Waymo being dubbed the "grandma of robotaxis.")

We'll have more announcements to come. In the meantime, enormous thanks to the team at Lightspeed Venture Partners for co-hosting this one with us in Hollywood. 

A quick reminder that it's Martin Luther King Jr. day on Monday, which we will be observing, though we're right now going to spend the next 17 hours trying to figure out how to watch the Chiefs-Dolphins game without buying a subscription to Peacock. (The temperature at game time is supposed to be minus 30 degrees with windchill, putting the Swift-Kelce relationship to the test. Is Taylor the real deal or just a fair weather fan?)

More Tuesday.:)

Artifact, the news aggregator-turned social network from Instagram’s founders, is shutting down, it announced today via a blog post. The team says the market opportunity wasn’t big enough to warrant continued investment. TechCrunch has more here.

Security researchers sat they warned Apple as early as 2019 about vulnerabilities in its AirDrop wireless sharing function that Chinese authorities claim they recently used to track down users of the feature. CNN has the story here.

2023 was volatile. And its twists and turns left many investors reeling. But as signs indicate that change might be on the way, it’s time to take stock. Join Affinity on January 23 to hear VC predictions for 2024 from 3 tops VCs from Foxe Capital, SaaS Ventures, and Intel Ignite. Plus, find out how your firm should adapt its strategies to capitalize on opportunities ahead! Register today.

Arena Bioworks, a Boston startup founded last year that aims to hire the world's best scientists to develop new drugs to fight cancer and brain disease, has raised $500 million from Michael Dell, founder of Dell Computer; Jim Breyer of Breyer Capital; Stephen Pagliuca, the Boston Celtics owner; and Elisabeth DeLuca, the widow of a founder of the Subway sandwich chain. The New York Times has more here. 

Prometeo, a six-year-old Uruguayan startup that is working to introduce open banking in Latin America, raised a $13 million round led by Antler Elevate, with PayPal Ventures, Samsung Next, DN Capital, Cometa, and Magma Partners also anteing up. TechCrunch has more here.

Rainbow, a two-year-old San Francisco startup that claims its platform can develop tailored insurance programs for small businesses such as restaurants, raised a $12 million seed round from Altai Ventures, Arch Capital Group, Buckley Ventures, Caffeinated Capital, 8VC, Habitat Partners, and Zigg Capital. Life Insurance International has more here.

Sway, a three-year-old Los Angeles startup that helps businesses improve the way they handle deliveries and returns for their customers, raised a $19.5 million Series A round led by 7GC, with additional participation from Blackhorn Ventures, Lightshed Ventures, and Rise of the Rest Revolution. PYMNTS has more here.

Avante, a Seattle stealth startup founded last year that appears to be focused on improving employee well-being through advanced analytics and behavior change, raised a $10 million seed round led by Fuse Venture Partners, with Ascend.vc and HighSage Ventures also chipping in. GeekWire has more here.

Eesee, a Dubai startup that provides sellers of digital assets, tokens, and RWAs with a gamified marketplace that they can use to sell their wares, raised a $2.85 million round from SevenX Ventures, Maven Capital, MetaBros, Contango Digital Assets, and BasementDAO. More here.

GolfForever, a seven-year-old startup based in Snowmass, Co., that creates and sells training programs and products designed for golfers, raised a $10 million Series A round. Clerisy led the transaction. More here.

Korr, a three-year-old New York startup that provides tools that help insurance businesses manage their operations more efficiently and effectively using the latest technology, raised a $3.2 million seed round led by Motive Ventures, with Tokio Marine Future Fund also pitching in Fintech Finance has more here.

Overmoon, a three-year-old startup based in San Rafael, Ca., that rents out vacation homes that it owns à la Airbnb, announced that it raised a $10 million seed round in 2021. Investors included NFX, Khosla Ventures, Camber Creek, 1Sharpe, and Sunsar Capital. It also revealed that it has raised $30 million in financing and $40 million in debt. TechCrunch has more here.

Pontem, a seven-year-old Singapore startup whose platform enables developers to build and test applications for blockchains like Aptos and Sui, raised a $6 million seed round. Investors included Lightspeed Venture Partners, Pantera Capital, Aptos Foundation, Wintermute, Altonomy, Shima Capital, and Kraken Ventures. NFTgators has more here.

Rivero, a five-year-old Zürich startup that provides tools and technology that make it easier for companies to handle transactions like invoicing, collecting payments, and managing financial records, raised a $7 million Series A round co-led by 6 Degrees Capital and Inference Partners, with Kraken Ventures, Seed X Liechtenstein, and PostFinance also contributing. PYMNTS has more here.

Exclusive for StrictlyVC: Treble is launching an Artificial Intelligence Practice Group. Details to come. We’ve built up years of experience elevating AI startups and enterprises across a myriad of vertical industries. From FinTech to ClimateTech to HealthTech, artificial intelligence startups are shaping the future — and we are driving the earned media coverage that empowers them to scale. Our 30-day Funding Accelerator Program to publicly launch funding rounds and new funds has opened up availability in Cohort 4. Learn more here.

Nasdaq CEO Adena Friedman told Barrons yesterday that approximately 100 companies have filed confidentially with the SEC to go public on Nasdaq.

Slack CTO and cofounder Cal Henderson is being replaced by Salesforce CTO and cofounder Parker Harris. Although Salesforce maintains that there's nothing to see here, a remark by Slack founding CEO Stewart Butterfield last January seems prescient. “The problem has been there’s no incorporation of the Slack culture into the Salesforce culture,” he said.

Y Combinator head Garry Tan, who moved his organization from Mountain View to San Francisco last year, tells Fortune that "you sort of have to be in San Francisco” because of all of the city's AI talent.

OpenAI cofounder and CEO Sam Altman confesses to Microsoft cofounder and former CEO Bill Gates that his favorite app is not ChatGPT. 

The Times profiles anti-aging entreprenur Bryan Johnson's "almost Trumpian ability to stay in the news." Johnson tells the paper that he doesn't care what people think of him. “I’m more interested in what people of the 25th century think of me,” he says.

Meta's Instagram is laying off an entire management layer - the sixty folks who hold the title of "technical program manager" - in an apparent nod to Mark Zuckerberg’s March 2023 blog post about how Meta should aspire to achieve a “Year of Efficiency” by improving its financial performance and reducing headcount.

WhatsApp is finally catching on in the U.S. growing 9% among consumers in 2023 and 80% among daily business users. 

A test that tells how likely it is that a young driver will crash.

Why do rats find modern cars so tasty?

You may wonder why people pay over $150,000 for a Mercedes G-Wagon. Now, you know.

Bitconned, a new Netflix documentary on crypto scammers, shows just how easy it is to con investors when nobody bothers to double-check anything. 

All of a sudden, Formula E is giving Formula One a run for its money.

The Dial-Up Modem Song.

Sellers on Amazon are using ChatGPT to come up with product names, and it's not going so well. One product name? "I Cannot Fulfill This Request It Goes Against OpenAI Use Policy."

At last, a keyboard for your iPhone.

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