SoftBank's Masayoshi Son is reportedly now looking to raise $100 billion for a new AI chip venture to rival Nvidia

Bloomberg is reporting that SoftBank founder Masayoshi Son is looking to raise $100 billion for a new AI chip venture to rival Nvidia.

OpenAI has completed a tender offer led by Thrive Capital that values the company at $80 billion, triple its valuation from just ten months ago. (Now to see if its newly-rich employees stick around.)

Crypto venture investing in Q4 increased 2.5% from the previous quarter according to Pitchbook, the first time it has risen in almost two years.

The FTC is proposing a new rule that would penalize companies if they know their software is being used to harm consumers through impersonating others and do nothing about it. 

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Almost a year ago, Alphabet’s growth stage venture arm, CapitalG, named partner Laela Sturdy as its new head, just as the unit's founder, David Lawee, stepped down.

Few were surprised Sturdy was promoted to the post. She joined Google in 2007 in a marketing role, was pulled into a number of departments in the following years, and when CapitalG was launched in 2013, she was recruited by Lawlee, who told CNBC in 2021, "I kind of made it a point to know who all the stars were inside of Google, and Laela’s name came up a lot.”

Of course, for many investors, the last year has been among the toughest in their career. We wondered if the same is true for Sturdy, a former college basketball star who is quick to note that 60% of her team comes from diverse or underrepresented backgrounds. To find out more, we reached her earlier this week at CapitalG's bright, airy office in San Francisco's Ferry Building; excerpts of our chat are edited lightly for length and clarity below.

Belated congratulations on taking over the helm. How does your management style differ from that of your predecessor, David?

I'm still leading investments and still on a bunch of boards, but I've loved being able to also put increasing attention on the team and figure out how we can continue to build out the firm. There's [now] many more incredible investors that we have at CapitalG.

You have around 50 people on your team; how many of these are investors versus otherwise?

Our model is to find ways that Google and Alphabet can help our portfolio companies, so not only the individuals on this team, but to give you an idea [of what I mean], over the last couple of years, we've had over 3500 different senior advisors inside of Alphabet help partner with our portfolio companies [to help with] pricing analysis, scaling infrastructure, marketing and setting up sales incentives. There are all these different technical and business questions that come up for growth-stage companies, which is where we specialize.

Access to 3500 different senior advisors! How does that work?

An example is over the last couple of years, we’ve partnered with the Google training team who does AI and ML training for Google engineers. We said ‘Hey, this training is really effective and gets really high ratings internally.’ And we have a lot of our portfolio companies asking us, ‘How can we up level the talent of our engineering and our organizations and get them ready to fully take advantage of the trends in AI?’ So we partnered with the training team and got our portfolio companies access to the exact same training, and we’ve now had hundreds of engineers inside our portfolio go through that training. I worked at Google for a long time before I came to CapitalG, and one of the amazing things about the culture of Google from the beginning is a real culture of knowledge sharing.

The market for AI talent is so competitive. What can you tell portfolio companies that might feel nervous about the information that's going into and out of Alphabet through you?

More here.

Firefly Bio, a startup based in Burlingame, Ca., that is developing targeted cancer treatments by combining antibody drug conjugates with selective protein degraders, raised a $94 million round co-led by Versant Ventures and MPM BioImpact, with additional participation from Decheng Capital and Eli Lilly. BioPharma Dive has more here.

Higharc, a six-year-old startup based in Durham, N.C., that provides tools for designing homes, automating estimating and purchasing processes, enhancing sales through interactive showrooms, and generating construction documents, raised a $53 million Series B round co-led by Spark Capital and Pillar VC, with SE Ventures, Fifth Wall, Starwood Capital, Standard Investments, Home Depot, Ferguson, Simpson Strong-Tie, Mulhern+Kulp Engineering, Suffolk Technologies, RXR Realty, PSP Growth, Metaprop, and SC Masterfund also piling on. More here.

Kairos Aerospace, a 10-year-old startup based in Sunnyvale, Ca., whose hardware and software can detect methane leaks for the oil and gas companies, raised a $52 million round led by BlackRock, with Hartree Partners as well as previous investors DCVC, Climate Investment, and Energy Innovation Capital also taking part. More here.

Orienspace, a four-year-old Beijing startup that builds and launches rockets designed for commercial space missions, raised a $83.5 million Series B round. Investors included Liangxi Science and Technology Innovation Industry Fund of Funds, Hongtai Fund, Xin Ding Capital, CMBC International Holdings, Shanhang Capital, and Shenyin & Wanguo Investment. Space Impulse has more here.

Revel, a Brooklyn startup that operates a rideshare service in urban areas utilizing electric moped, electric bikes, and scooters, is in the market to raise a $200 million round, according to Bloomberg, which has more here.

Scribe, a five-year-old San Francisco startup that captures processes you complete on your computer or the internet and automatically turns them into visual guides, raised a $25 million Series B round led by Redpoint Ventures, with New York Life Ventures and previous investors Amplify Partners, Tiger Global, and XYZ Ventures also contributing. TechCrunch has more here.

Alembic, a six-year-old San Francisco startup that uses AI to analyze marketing data and help companies understand how their marketing efforts affect revenue, raised a $14 million Series A round led by WndrCo, with additional funds provided by MXV Capital and Liquid 2 Ventures. VentureBeat has more here.

Clarity, a Tel Aviv startup that is working on technology to detect and combat deepfakes in videos, images, and audio, raised a $16 million seed round co-led by Walden Catalyst Ventures and Bessemer Venture Partners, with Secret Chord Ventures, Ascend Ventures, Fusion VC, and Flying Fish Partners also investing. TechCrunch has more here.

Duetti, a two-year-old New York startup that offers a platform for artists to get paid upfront for their music tracks, including through purchasing music catalogues, raised a $15 million round. Nyca Partners was the deal lead. It also secured $75 million in debt. Music Ally has more here.

Flower Labs, a one-year-old Hamburg startup that enables developers to implement federated learning in their machine learning projects, raised a $20 million Series A round led by Felicis, with First Spark Ventures, Factorial Capital, Beta Works, Y Combinator, Pioneer Fund, and Mozilla Ventures also pitching in. More here.

Go Autonomous, a four-year-old Copenhagen startup that automates sales and document workflows through AI, specifically focusing on email communication, raised a $10.3 million Series A round co-led by Octopus Ventures and Ridge Ventures, with EIFO and 42Cap also anteing up. ArcticStartup has more here.

Knock, a three-year-old New York startup that provides a platform for developers to create and manage notifications for their applications, raised a $12 million Series A round led by Craft Ventures, with previous investors Afore Capital, Preface Capital, Worklife, Expa Ventures, CoFound Partners, and Tokyo Black also joining in. TechCrunch has more here.

Monumental, a four-year-old Amsterdam startup that has developed robots to automate bricklaying on construction sites, raised a $25 million round co-led by Plural and Hummingbird and including Northzone, Fundamental, and NP-Hard Ventures. More here.

Arch, a San Francisco startup that helps HVAC contractors analyze homes and design HVAC systems before visits, enabling them to create accurate proposals quickly and increase sales conversions, raised a $6.2 million seed round. Investors included Coatue, Floodgate, Gigascale Capital, MCJ Collective, and ReGen Ventures. TechCrunch has more here.

Celadyne, a five-year-old Chicago startup that is focused on making hydrogen a viable fuel for heavy-duty and industrial sectors by enhancing fuel cell durability and electrolyzer efficiency, raised a $4.5 million seed round co-led by Maniv and Dynamo Ventures, with EPS Ventures also opting in. TechCrunch has more here.

Explurger, a three-year-old Delhi startup that uses AI to enable users to share their travel experiences, track the places they've visited, and create a bucket list of future destinations, raised a $4.5 million Series A round led by Affle at a $40 million pre-money valuation. The Economic Times has more here.

Getmobil, a six-year-old Istanbul startup that sells refurbished electronics like smartphones, raised a $4 million seed round led by Dutch Founder Fund, with 212, İşbank, TechOne, and Logo Ventures also participating. Tech Funding News has more here.

Guardrails AI, a one-year-old San Francisco startup that focuses on ensuring a company's AI applications are secure, reliable, and aligned with company policies, raised a $7.5 million seed round led by Zetta Venture Partners, with Bloomberg Beta, Pear VC, Factory, and GitHub Fund also stepping up. TechCrunch has more here.

Helika, a two-year-old Toronto startup that provides analytics and tools for Web3 gaming companies, helping them understand player behavior, optimize game development, and improve marketing strategies, raised a $8 million Series A round led by Pantera Capital, with Sparkle Ventures, Diagram Ventures, Sfermion, Scopely, and SciPlay also chipping in. More here.

Pacifico Biolabs, a three-year-old Berlin startup whose aim is to create sustainable seafood alternatives using fermentation technology, raised a $3.3 million pre-seed round co-led by Simon Capital and FoodLabs and including Exceptional Ventures and Sprout & About Ventures. TechCrunch has more here.

Ribbon, a one-year-old San Francisco startup whose technology enables financial institutions to speed up the process of transferring inherited accounts to successors, raised a $2.7 million pre-seed round. One Way Ventures and Haymaker Ventures co-led the deal, with additional participation from Bungalow Capital and Lynett Capital. More here.

Simplyblock, a two-year-old Berlin startup that says it is developing low-latency, high performance cloud storage for database applications, raised a $2.7 million seed round led by 42CAP, with Antler and Begin Capital also joining in. Silicon Canals has more here.

SocialCrowd, a two-year-old Los Angeles startup whose platform is designed to improve employee performance through gamified incentives, raised a $1.6 million round led by Bread and Butter Ventures, with VC414, Serac Ventures, and Gala Capital Partners also taking part. TechCrunch has more here.

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Yuga Labs, maker of Bored Apes, is acquiring Proof, a startup founded by Kevin Rose that created the Moonbirds NFT collection, for an undisclosed sum.

A cybersecurity firm is claiming that over 75% of the Super Bowl traffic received by Elon Musk's X was fake.

Speaking of Elon Musk, "Twitter Files" journalist Matt Taibbi just released a 2023 tweet from Musk yesterday in which the billionaire told Taibbi, "You are dead to me."

Figma CEO Dylan Field is feeling better about that Adobe breakup.

Norwest, the venture and growth equity firm, announced six promotions yesterday. 

Is OpenAI being too secretive about its new video-generation tool? (Which, yes, is dazzling.)

The science behind why Cybertrucks are rusting.

Why the video game industry is in "survival mode."

It turns out that recycling plastic is not really a thing.

Amazon and SpaceX to labor law: "Drop dead."

NASA is looking for volunteers to live in a simulated Mars habitat for a year. 

There's a new thing to worry about when you fly - maggots. 

Jack White can name any Beatles song in one second.

Air Canada has ditched its chatbot support system after one of its chatbots invented a refund policy, and a Canadian tribunal forced the airline to honor it.

With the now-emancipated Steamboat Willie in tow, John Oliver dared Disney to sue him during an appearance on "The Late Show with Stephen Colbert."

Live it up at Le Barthélemy Hotel & Spa, a St. Barts resort that boasts its own Michelin star chef.