Equity

Latest Episodes:

Equity Live: Self-flying helicopters, AI and the battle of the features Sep 20, 2023

Show notes

We were live at TechCrunch Disrupt 2023! Yes, even though our dear friend and colleague Mary Ann had to handle a family emergency, the larger Equity family rallied to put on a rollicking early-morning show at the venue. From the Builders' stage where Alex had to introduce himself, Kirsten Korosec and Becca Szkutak rounded out our hosting crew and we had a blast.

Here's the rundown:

Instacart went public! Finally, at last, at long last, Instacart is a public company. It priced at $30, the top-end of its raised range, and then went on to trade higher. More here, but a solid result.
Joby is all-in on the Buckeye state: What has batteries and goes straight up? EVTOLs, apparently, even if that acronym is a big of a mouthful. Kirsten reports that a TechCrunch scoop was born out when Joby picked Ohio for its manufacturing hub. A lot of state-derived help did not hurt, either.
Eldertechis a growth market: Becca wanted to talk about her latest Deal Dive, which was all about getting senior citizens to move for. Exercise is a pretty massive hack for a healthy body and life. We also had to point out that a graying world means that elder tech is only seeing expanding TAM.
Writer brings back nine-figure joy! And to close out, Alex wanted to riff on the latest Writer round, which is building a generative AI service for other companies. With some demonstrated traction, and a model that we think seems well rounded, Writer is one to watch.

Whew! The Equity crew is all over Disrupt for the next few days so make sure to say hello!

For episode transcripts and more, head to Equity’s Simplecast website.

Equity drops at 7 a.m. PT every Monday, Wednesday and Friday, so subscribe to us on Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify and all the casts. TechCrunch also has a great show on crypto, a show that interviews foundersand more!

Credits: Equity is produced by Theresa Loconsolo with editing by Kell. Bryce Durbin is our Illustrator. We'd also like to thank the audience development team and Henry Pickavet, who manages TechCrunch audio products.

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We'll probably retire before Databricks IPOs Sep 15, 2023

Show notes

Here's what Mary Ann, Alex and Kirsten got into:

More layoffs at Divvy Homes: More cuts at a company that was once richly valued and heavily venture-backed. Rising interest rates are having a ripple effect across startup-land.
Databricks is big, and now richer: With $500 million in a new Series I, Databricks is now worth more money and has fresh capital to continue working on AI.
Lime, just go public already: What is profitable and private and a tease? Lime. Well, that last bit is a stretch, but really you can only ring us up and tout profits and growth so many times before we expect an S-1.
More data is good: Venture capital firms, however, seem to disagree.
If you want groceries in 15 minutes, here's where to live: Brazil, for one. Or India. Differing labor costs around the world appear to be the axis around which quick deliveries are feasible, or a financial mess.

We are back next week for a busy run at Disrupt! We'll see you there!

For episode transcripts and more, head to Equity’s Simplecast website.

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What’s more venture capital than space lasers? Sep 13, 2023

Show notes

This week, we brought TechCrunch+ senior climate reporter Tim De Chant on to talk climate tech, hardware breakthroughs, and why we have a whole stage this year at Disrupt focused on sustainability.

On that last point, perhaps you have gone outside recently. Extreme weather around the world, warming oceans, fires — it's a mess out there. That's the bad news. The good news is that a number of startups are working hard to build new technologies that could shoothe our struggling planet. And perhaps make a lot of money in the process.

Here's what we got into on the show:

Climate tech venture capital activity. Why aren't we seeing more capital despite some interesting activity.
The question of fusion. Is it really around the corner (this time)?
Why we're both excited about potential hardware breakthroughs, even if LK-99 was not the real deal.
Dread about our changing world.

Tim is not only a great journalist, he's also very good at the whole science thing, so he was a treat to talk to!

We're back on Friday for our last recording before we're on stage at Disrupt! Talk soon.

For episode transcripts and more, head to Equity’s Simplecast website.

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Equity Monday: Instacart, Klaviyo and the art of the unicorn haircut Sep 11, 2023

Show notes

Here's what we got into on the show today:

Instacart IPO: We have a first price range for Instacart! And the company is going to take a roughly $30 billion haircut on the valuation it raised at back in 2021. Still worth north of $7 billion by our math , Instacart is set to raise a lot of money at a multi-billion price. Hard to get too worried about that. (Even more, the company's fully-diluted valuation range is, if we are doing our sums correctly, $8.6 billion to $9.3 billion.)
Klaviyo IPO: Also taking a price cut is Klaviyo, which also dropped its first IPO price range this morning. It is taking a smaller cut in both absolute and percentage terms, but in aggregate the two companies show just how much room there is for 2021 prices to come down. What we worry about is what less-strong startups will have to endure, as Instacart and Klaviyo are both very healthy.
Coinbase and India: Coinbase is not leaving India, contrary to reports. What it is doing is shuttering some accounts in the country. Crypto and regulation continue their long, and twisty path.
Cheap, shared satellites: What raised $50 million and wants you to share a LEO satellite? This startup!

Disrupt is literally around the corner and by that we mean next week! We'll see you there.

For episode transcripts and more, head to Equity’s Simplecast website.

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Who shuts down the shut down-ers? Sep 08, 2023

Show notes

Here's what Mary Ann, Alex and Kirsten got into:

Mentra wants to help neurodivergent jobseekers find ideal jobs: We love a startup that is doing good for itself and doing good for others. This deal that Mary Ann wanted to chat through seems to check both boxes.
SimpleClosure raises $1.5 million: What happens if your startup dies, and you need to wind down? You might need a simple way to close things up, right? Enter SimpleClosure.
Argo AI founders are building something new: What just raised more than $1 billion to take another crack at self-driving trucks? This company.
All Things YC: You can find demo day favorites from day one here, and day two here. And, for an overview of sectors, here you go.
EU x Regulation: We wrapped with a quick look at regulation from the EU that will impact a bunch of major tech companies. It led to a conversation of what sort of market regulatory structure is most conducive for startup growth.

For episode transcripts and more, head to Equity’s Simplecast website.

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Y Combinator is still paranoid (re-run) Sep 06, 2023

Show notes

While the Equity crew prepares for another Y Combinator Demo Day, we're throwing it back to when Natasha and Alex caught up with current YC Partner and Managing Director of YC Early Stage, Michael Seibel. The main question on the pair's mind was how is YC evolving to meet a changed market?

Seibel doesn't often do press -- and neither does YC -- sothe interview was used to connect the dots on news from the accelerator, cross check top trends from the 2022 summer batch and ask about some of the biggest critiques people have about the institution.

We went a bit long, but figured it was worth it given the way the conversation was going.

As always, we'll be back with our weekly roundup on Friday, and don’t forget that Equity is opening this year’s Disrupt. We’ll see you there!

For episode transcripts and more, head to Equity’s Simplecast website.

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Equity Tuesday: Arm's IPO won't resurrect private-market liquidity Sep 05, 2023

Show notes

Here's what Alex got into this morning:

Earnings Season Never Ends: Gitlab, Asana, UiPath, Docusign, Rent the Runway and others will report this week.
Crypto Down Bad: Prices for major cryptoassets are flat this morning, while the crypto venture picture is looking up to some degree.
Arm Sets IPO Range: Shares of Arm are expected to sell for $47 to $51 per share, according to the company. The question for investors is whether to value the company on its trailing results, or future profits.
More on the impact (or lack thereof) of Arm's upcoming debut can be found here.
The Catalyst Fund: The Africa-focused venture fund has reached a first close, and intends to invest in climate-focused startups on the continent.
Elon Musk Is Mad
And to close out, a new Chinese semiconductor fund is potentially coming, while India wrestles with net neutrality.

Don’t forget that Equity is opening this year’s Disrupt. We’ll see you there!

For episode transcripts and more, head to Equity’s Simplecast website.

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What’s the opposite of a lean startup? Sep 01, 2023

Show notes

Here’s the show rundown:

Teamshares: Here’s an interesting one. Teamshares has raised a lot of money and is buying a lot of SMBs. But that’s just the start. It also plans to allow employees of those companies to buy most of their stock over time, while serving up centralized fintech services to all its sub-companies. Who doesn’t love to chat about a new model?
MoonPay’s new venture arm: Crypto payment infra company MoonPay is getting into the venture game, with a focus on crypto, gaming, and fintech. The union of those three is crypto games, of course, but we have two eyes fixed on what MoonPay decides to invest in. New crypto-thematic, or crypto-adjacent funds are rarer these days, making the MoonPay news exciting.
Rent Butter and Kiki: Now that the zero interest rate period is over, and the experiment in building new iBuying and mortgage service startups has partially concluded, renting is hot again. And thus, so too are rental-focused startups.
The IPO drought has lasted longer than you anticipated: Working off a Crunchbase dataset, Alex has notes on just how long we have been waiting for real tech IPOs. The good news? They are (partially) back!
What happens when you bring lean startup ideology into the AI world? A lot of experiments, it turns out.

And that is us until next week. Due to an American holiday, Equity will kick off on Tuesday next week instead of Monday!

For episode transcripts and more, head to Equity’s Simplecast website.

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What founders can escape venture's no-man's land? Aug 30, 2023

Show notes

This week, Alex spoke to Anu Hariharan, who’s previously worked with a16z, sits on Brex’s board, and more recently has been investing in later-stage companies at Y Combinator. She's also working on something new.

Hariharan recently tweeted about how "great" founders were successfully guiding their companies towards cash flow positivity. Since that very interesting post, both Instacart (a former Y Combinator company) and Klaviyo have filed to go public. And both have super strong cash flows.

Our chat could not have come at a better time. We dug into how early- and late-stage startups should approach growth and cash conservation (in her view), the future of venture as an asset class, and how healthy the unicorn herd really is. We had a blast recording this one! Enjoy!

For episode transcripts and more, head to Equity’s Simplecast website.

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Equity Monday: IPOs are back and the Equity crew is feasting Aug 28, 2023

Show notes

As a small heads up, we had a bonus show over the weekend that is well worth your time! Alright, here’s what’s on the show this morning:

Stocks are up around the world: A good note to start the week on, of course. In the meantime, the crypto market is still dragging. We’re back to minimal week-over-week price movements.
Tech IPOs are back: After a drought that will be talked about for years, it’s raining tech IPOs again! Instacart and Klaviyo have filed their Form S-1s to go public, and we are busy digesting the numbers.
On the Instacart front, read our first impressions here. In short, the company’s trailing performance is super solid, but the question is, how much it can scale total transaction volume in the future.
We are still getting our boots on when it comes to Klaviyo, but the business seems strong. Is it the champion that software companies have waited for? We’ll have to see. More to come on the site later today.
And Didi is selling part of its business to Xpeng. This is not the first time we’ve seen a ride-hailing company divest non-core assets.