Diem is done, Glossier downsizes, and why you'll have to wait a minute for that electric "Cybertruck"

The week’s volatility continued today and stocks slid lower after the Fed again signaled that it will hikes rates to fight persistent inflation. 🤢

And it's done. According to the WSJ, the Diem Association, the consortium that Facebook founded in 2019 to build a futuristic payments network, is winding down and selling its technology for about $200 million to a small California bank that serves bitcoin and blockchain companies. More here.

You'll have to wait on that "Cybertruck." Elon Musk said today that in the face of ongoing supply-chain disruptions, Tesla won’t introduce new models this year but instead focus on increasing  deliveries of its existing product offerings. More here.

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o9 Solutions, a 12-year-old, Dallas, Tex.-based company that uses AI to help organizations plan their supply chains, has raised $295 million at a post-money valuation of $2.7 billion from General Atlantic and Generation Investment Management, with participation from earlier investors, including KKR. (Indeed, the company had never raised funding until KKR came knocking in 2020.) The outfit has now raised $200 million altogether. VentureBeat has more here.

Athletic Greens, a 12-year-old, New York-based maker of nutritional supplements, including a powdered beverage, has raised $115 million in funding led by Alpha Wave Ventures. TechCrunch has more here.

BenchSci, a six-year-old, Toronto, Ontario-based machine learning application developer for medicine development, has raised $50 million in Series C funding led by earlier backer Inovia Capital and TCV. The company has now raised $97 million to date. Endpoints News has more here.

CaptivateIQ, a 4.5-year-old, San Francisco-based startup that has developed a no-code SaaS platform to help companies design customized sales commission plan, has raised $100 million in Series C funding. ICONIQ Growth co-led the round with earlier backers Sequoia Capital and Accel. Sapphire Ventures also joined as a new investor in the round, which brings the company’s total funding raised to date to $164.6 million. TechCrunch has more here.

Cheetah, a seven-year-old, Pleasanton, Ca.-based supply chain company for wholesale food and restaurant supplies, has raised $60 million in Series C funding co-led by Manna Tree and Sator Grove Holdings. San Francisco Business Times has more here.

Cowboy, a five-year-old Brussels-based startup that makes e-bikes and an accompanying app to manage various services related to them, has raised $80 million in Series C round of funding. Exor, HCVC and Siam Capital co-led the investment, joined by Tiger Global, Index Ventures, Eothen, Isomer Opportunities Fund, Future Positive Capital and Triple Point Capital. TechCrunch has more here.

Domestika, a 12-year-old, Berkeley, Ca.-based online learning platform for creative, has aised $110 million in Series D funding led by Zeev Ventures, with participation from GSV Ventures. More here. 

Fever, a nearly eight-year-old, New York-based live-entertainment discovery platform, just raised $227 million in Series D funding led by Goldman Sachs. Other investors in the round included Alignment Growth, Goodwater Capital, and Smash Capital. Fever sells access to attractions such as an “immersive” digital Van Gogh exhibition in London and a "Bridgerton"- themed gala in Los Angeles, tickets for which are exclusive to its customers. Bloomberg has more here. 

Firebolt, a three-year-old, Israel-based cloud data warehouse company that claims it can run analytics on large data sets cheaper and faster than its competitors, has raised $100 million in funding led by Alkeon Capital. Other investors in the round include Sozo Ventures, Glynn Capital and previous backers Zeev Ventures, Angular Ventures, Dawn Capital, Bessemer Venture Partners, K5 Global and TLV Partners. TechCrunch has more here.

FTX US, the U.S.-based division of the fast-growing 2.5-year-old cryptocurrency exchange FTX, says it has raised $400 million in Series A(!) funding round at a valuation of $8 billion(!). The round included Paradigm, Temasek, Multicoin Capital, Lightspeed Venture Partners, and SoftBank Vision Fund 2, among others. It comes three months after FTX raised $420 million at a valuation of $25 billion. FTX tells Decrypt that the U.S. exchange started last year with about 10,000 customers and an average of $1 million in daily spot trading volume; it says it finished the year with 1.2 million users and about $350 million in daily trading volume. More here.

Hometap, a nearly five-year-old, Boston, Ma.-based loan company that invites homeowners to tap into their home's equity in exchange for a share of their home's future value (eek), has raised $245 million from investors, including Bain Capital and the insurance holding company Group1001. More here.

Leap, a four-year-old, Chicago-based startup that helps brands launch physical retail stores, has raised raised $50 million in Series B funding led by BAM Elevate. Other backers in the round included Harbor Spring Capital, Northern Trust, Simon, Costanoa Ventures and Hyde Park Venture Partners. More here.

Leyden Laboratories, a two-year-old, Amsterdam-based startup that's developing an intranasal spray to go after coronavirus variants, the flu and future viruses, has raised $140 million in Series B funding. Casdin Capital and GV led the round, joined by SoftBank and Bluebird Ventures. The company has now raised $200 million altogether. FierceBiotech has more here.

Metagenomi, an 3.5-year-old, Emeryville, Ca.-based gene editing startup, has raised $175 million in Series B funding co-led by PFM Health Sciences and Farallon Capital Management, with participation from earlier backer Bayer and a long list of other investors. FierceBiotech has more here.

MinIO, the seven-year-old, Palo Alto, Ca.-based company behind the MinIO multi-cloud object storage suite, has raised $103 million in Series B funding led by Intel Capital. VentureBeat has more here.

Paack, a nearly seven-year-old, Barcelona, Spain-based last-mile e-commerce delivery company, has raised €200 million in Series D funding led by SoftBank. TechCrunch has more here.

Plenty, a nearly nine-year-old, South San Francisco-based indoor vertical farming tech company, has raised $400 million in Series E funding. One Madison Group and JS Capital led the round, joined by Walmart and earlier backer SoftBank Vision Fund. CNBC has more here.

Vecna Robotics, a 24-year-old, Waltham, Ma.-based autonomous mobile robots developer, has raised $65 million in Series C funding led by Tiger Global. Other investors in the round included Lineage Logistics, Proficio Capital Partners, and Impulse. TechCrunch has more here.

Veriff, a nearly seven-year-old, Tallinn, Estonia-based Identity verification company, has raised $100 million in Series C funding co-led by Tiger Global and Alkeon. Earlier backers IVP and Accel also joined the round, which brings Veriff’s total funding to date to $200 million. TechCrunch has more here.

Alta, a 5.5-year-old, San Francisco-based virtual reality metaverse studio, just raised $12.4 million in seed funding co-led by Makers Fund and Andreessen Horowitz. Other investors in the round included Pioneer Fund and Boost VC. TechCrunch has more here.

Aruna, a nearly seven-year-old, Jakarta, Indonesia-based fishery and marine platform, has raised $30 million in extended Series A funding led by Vertex Ventures, with participation from earlier investors Prosus Ventures, AC Ventures, and East Ventures, among others. More here.

Cialfo, a nearly five-year-old, Singapore-based student career exploration and college application network, has raised $40 million in Series B funding led by Square Peg and SEEK Investments. The round brings the company's total funding to $55 million. TechCrunch has more here.

DigitalOwl, a 3.5-year-old, Portland, Me.-based natural language processing startup focused on medical records, raised $20 million in Series A funding. Insight Partners led the round, joined by earlier backers Ibex and Fusion VC. VentureBeat has more here.

Eaglebrook Advisors, a 2.5-year-old, Washington, D.C.-based cryptocurrency investment firm that's working to devise new products for wealth management professionals, has raised $20 million in Series A funding. Castle Island Ventures and Brewer Lane Ventures led the round, joined by Gemini Frontier Fund, Avon Ventures, Jump Capital, and Sybil Capital. Blockworks has more here.

Laka, a nearly five-year-old, London-based insurance startup targeting the mobility industry, has raised $12 million in Series A funding led by Autotech Ventures. Business Insider has more here.

LEX Markets, a four-year-old, New York-based real estate securities marketplace for investors, has raised $15 million in Series A funding led by PEAK6. Other investors in the round include a mix of new and earlier backers, including Khosla Ventures, Two Lanterns, MUFG Innovation Partners, MetaProp, and Gaingels. The company had previously raised $10 million across two seed rounds. More here.

Logixboard, a 4.5-year-old, Seattle, Wa.-based customer experience platform for freight forwarders and logistics service providers, just raised $32 million in Series B funding led by Insight Partners. Redpoint Ventures, F-Prime Capital, Social Leverage, and Founders’ Co-op also joined the round. GeekWire has more here.

Order, a nearly six-year-old, New York-based inventory management platform that just rebranded (it was formerly Negotiatus), has raised $30 million in Series B funding led by Stage 2 Capital. Other round participants included Clocktower Ventures, Collaborative Fund, Seven Peaks Ventures, and Ankona. More here.

Polly, a nearly three-year-old, SaaS startup focused around the secondary market for mortgages, has raised $37 million in Series B funding led by Menlo Ventures. Other investors in the round include Movement Mortgage, First American Financial, FinVC and earlier backers 8VC, Khosla Ventures and Fifth Wall. Polly has now raised $50 million altogether. TechCrunch has more here.

PQShield, a four-year-old, U.K.-based cryptographic software startup that spun out of the University of Oxford, has raised $20 million in Series A funding led by Addition. VentureBeat has more here.

Stonks, a year-old, Bay Area-based startup that's focused on building a network of investors through live demo day events that Stonks hosts on its own platform, has raised $15 million in funding led by Andreessen Horowitz. Matrix Ventures, Pioneer Fund, and a long list of individual investors, including Naval Ravikant, also joined the round. More here.

Black Sheep Foods, a 2.5-year-old, San Francisco-based maker of plant-based food that tastes like lamb meat (and that's aiming to produce other meat flavors ties to Mediterranean staples), has raised $5.25 million in seed funding. Backers in the round include AgFunder, Bessemer Venture Partners, New Crop Capital, Siddhi Capital and former Fortress Investment Group exec Smita Conjeevaram. TechCrunch has more here.

Byteboard, a 3.5-year-old, San Francisco-based technical interviewing platform, has raised $5 million in seed funding led by Cowboy Ventures. TechCrunch has more here.

Kleoverse, a  year-old, Helsinki, Finland-based web3 startup for freelancers to create a professional identity (that will then help them land jobs with web3 startups), has raised $1.2 million in funding. Backers in the round include byFounders, Sfermion, crypto entrepreneur Ville Vesterinen, and Equilibrium. EU Startups has more here.

Project Galaxy, a 1.5-year-old, San Mateo, Ca.-based community that says it's trying to rethink how digital credentials will be handled in the future, has raised $10 million in funding co-led by Multicoin Capital and Dragonfly Capital, with participation from Sky9 Capital, Coinbase Ventures, and Binance Smart Chain Growth Fund, among others. Coindesk has more here.

SiteAware, a six-year-old, Houston, Tex.-based company whose drone-based construction tech aims to verify that a building’s structure, shell and interiors are being assembled correctly, has raised $15 million in Series B funding led by Vertex Ventures. Calcalist has more here.

Superdao, a months-old, Bay Area-based outfit that says it wants to "make it absurdly easy to start and operate DAOs" or decentralized autonomous organizations, has raised $10.5 million in seed funding led by SignalFire. More here.

Sync Computing, a 2.5-year-old, Cambridge, Ma.-based distributed cloud infrastructure company, has raised $6.1 million in funding co-led by Moore Strategic Ventures and National Grid Partners. More here.

Tribevest, a 3.5-year-old, Columbus, Oh.-based platform for investor groups to form and fund businesses together, has raised $3 million in seed funding. Backers in the round include I2BF Global Ventures, Mucker Capital, Gaingels, and Vibe Capital, among others. TechCrunch has more here. 

TRLab, a months-old, New York-based NFT art platform for discovering, collecting and interacting with artists, has raised $4.2 million in seed funding. Investors in the round include Pace Gallery, Animoca Brands, BAI Capital and Digital Renaissance Foundation. More here.

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The 52-year-old, U.S. venture firm CRV is raising $1 billion for its 19th early-stage fund and $500 million for a second "select" fund, per SEC filings first flagged by Axios. CRV closed its last early-stage fund with $600 million in 2020; it quietly closed its first select fund with $200 million last year. More here.

Swiss bank UBS has agreed to buy the 11-year-old, Palo Alto, Ca.-based automated wealth management company Wealthfront in an all-cash deal the two companies said was worth $1.4 billion. Wealthfront had raised at least $200 million from its investors over the years, according to Crunchbase data. Reuters has more here.

WeWork is making its first acquisition since its current CEO, Sandeep Mathrani, took over from the coworking company’s embattled co-founder, Adam Neumann. The company has agreed to buy Common Desk, a coworking startup with 23 locations in Texas and North Carolina, for undisclosed terms. Common Desk will continue to operate as an independent brand. As Bloomberg notes, the deal is central to WeWork's core business, unlike some of its past M&A deals.

A judge in Santa Clara County has granted Apple a temporary restraining order against a woman accused of stalking and threatening CEO Tim Cook.

Glossier, the popular beauty brand led by former blogger Emily Weiss, let go of 80 of its corporate employees today, according to an internal email obtained by Modern Retail. The cuts, which amount to around one-third of Glossier’s corporate workforce, will primarily impact the company’s technology team.  More here.

Three new faces -- the head of the London School of Economics, a billionaire philanthropist, and a founder of a nonprofit management consulting firm -- will be helping to steer the Gates Foundation, it was announced earlier today. It's the first time that the foundation will be governed by a board that includes people who are not named Gates or Buffett, notes the New York Times.

Spotify went with Joe Rogan.

Apple is planning a new service that will let small businesses accept payments directly on their iPhones without any extra hardware, according to Bloomberg. The outlet notes that Apple has been working on the new feature since around 2020, when it acquired a Canadian startup, Mobeewave, that developed technology for smartphones to accept payments with the tap of a credit card. The service is poised to rival payment terminals like that of Square.

A SpaceX rocket is set to become the “the first unintentional case” of space junk hitting the moon.

Ripple engineers a higher valuation for itself.

She was a notorious hacker in the '80s -- then she disappeared.

Biden's likeliest Supreme Court pick.

The high price of a crypto salary.

A Twitter bot waging war on Wordle aficionados gets booted.

Electric, self-towing Airstreams are coming.

Swear bank.