Sources: Masayoshi Son seeks up to $100B for an AI chip venture to rival Nvidia; one scenario involves $30B from SoftBank and $70B from Middle Eastern investors
Welcome to Runtime! Today: why ridiculous sums of money … Pranav Dixit / Business Today : After Sam Altman, SoftBank founder Masayoshi Son joins AI chip race to challenge Nvidia d...
Investor document: Stripe seeks to raise ~$2.3B to cover Q1 tax withholdings and plans to withhold an additional $500M in 2023 and $700M in 2024
Bloomberg :
Court filing: FTX Digital Markets co-CEO Ryan Salame told The Bahamas' securities commission on November 9 that customer funds were used to cover Alameda losses
FTX executive told securities regulator crypto exchange was likely funnelling cash to Alameda trading firm
Internal FTX documentation shows a GitHub account bearing the name of engineering director Nishad Singh authored code to hide Alameda's ballooning liabilities
A GitHub account bearing the name of former FTX executive Nishad Singh authored code that hid Alameda Research's ballooning liabilities …
New York-based Bilt, which offers a loyalty program and credit card to convert rent payments into points, raised $150M led by Left Lane at a $1.5B valuation
Bilt Rewards, which operates a loyalty program and credit card that converts rent payments into points, said its valuation more than quadrupled to $1.5 billion.
Sources: SoftBank's Rajeev Misra is stepping back from the organization but will remain CEO of the first Vision Fund; Misra has secured $6B+ for his own fund
Rajeev Misra is stepping back from his main roles at SoftBank Group Corp., marking the exit of one of the key architects …
Sources say Masayoshi Son's profit-sharing plan for Vision Fund employees is contributing to a stream of defections, because it is based primarily on seniority
Ever since billionaire investor Masayoshi Son set up the giant Vision Fund in 2017 to provide backing for technology startups … Tweets: @gilliantan and @pelstrom Tweets: Gillian Ta...
Sources: Apple tried to buy rap battle livestreaming service Verzuz before it was acquired in March by Triller
Bloomberg :
Chia, a storage-based cryptocurrency founded by Bram Cohen, raises $61M with a16z among investors, more than doubling valuation to ~$500M, according to a source
Gillian Tan / Bloomberg :
Sources: Intercontinental Exchange's Bakkt is in advanced talks to go public via a merger with SPAC; combined entity could be valued at $2B
Bakkt, the cryptocurrency platform majority owned by Intercontinental Exchange Inc., is in advanced talks to go public through a merger …
Sources: Nextdoor is considering going public, through a direct listing or merger with a SPAC, targeting a $4B-$5B valuation; it was last valued at $2.2B in '19
- Social network for neighbors had rebuffed SPACs in the past — Company was last valued at $2.2 billion in September 2019
Source: meditation and sleep app maker Calm is looking to raise ~$150M at a $2.2B valuation; Calm was valued at $1B in July 2019
Source: London-based investment firm Centricus and Triller seek to buy TikTok's US, AU, NZ, and India operations for $20B; TikTok says it hasn't received a bid
Dinesh Nair / Bloomberg :
Source: London-based investment firm Centricus and Triller seek to buy TikTok's US, AU, NZ, and India operations for $20B; TikTok says it hasn't received a bid
- London firm, video app said to propose $10 billion up front — Bid includes assets in U.S., Australia, New Zealand, India
VC firm Initialized raises $230M for its fifth fund and says the fund was “heavily oversubscribed” despite the departure of co-founder Alexis Ohanian
- Existing portfolio includes unicorns Instacart, Coinbase, Ro — Fifth fund “heavily oversubscribed” despite co-founder exit
Talkdesk, which develops cloud-based customer service software, raises $143M from investors including Franklin Templeton, at a $3B+ valuation
Gillian Tan / Bloomberg :
Sources: Discord is in talks to raise new funds at a valuation of between $3B and $4B; the chat app was valued at $2B in December 2018
originally used only by gamers but adopted by book clubs, schools & other communities during the pandemic — is in talks to raise new funding at a valuation of >$3bn. Scoop w/ @Kati...
Sources: Zeus, a long-term corporate housing marketplace, raises $15M from existing investors, halving the company's valuation to ~$110M from December round
Bloomberg : Tweets: @livcarville , @gilliantan , and @katie_roof Tweets: Olivia Carville / @livcarville : Covid-19 continues to bulldoze the travel industry, slashing valuations l...
Sources: Airbnb raises another $1B in debt from investors including Apollo Global and Silver Lake, after raising a similar $1B funding round last week
New debt finance deal comes a week after an equal-sized funding round to help weather crisis — Airbnb is raising $1bn of senior debt …
Sources: Airbnb is paying 10%+ interest on the $1B funding it raised on Monday; investors were offered free stock warrants based on an $18B valuation
Airbnb's new investors get free warrants based on company valuation of $18 billion — Airbnb Inc. agreed to pay its new investors interest …