Startups

Alloy Automation, a startup that was part of the Y Combinator Winter 2020 cohort, announced today that it has closed $5 million across two rounds, the most recent of which brought $4 million to the company in October of 2020. The new funds were raised at a $16 million pre-money, $20 million post-mo

TrustLayer, which provides insurance brokers with risk management services via a SaaS platform, has raised $6.6 million in a seed round. Abstract Ventures led the financing, which also included participation from Propel Venture Partners, NFP Ventures, BoxGroup and Precursor Ventures. Interestingly,

Trades in the infamous Reddit-basket of stocks and trades are taking a pounding today, with GameStop down 52.7%, AMC Entertainment off 42.7%, the silver-squeeze flopping and more. CNBC has a longer list if you want to feast your eyes on the carnage. What a surprise that the thing that was always go

If you've ever applied for a mortgage, you know it's one of the most painful processes out there. Keeping up with payments and dealing with customer service over the course of the loan is no picnic either. So it's no surprise that big bucks are being poured into the space with the goal

Despite all the headaches that come with it, homeownership is still the American dream for many. Divvy Homes — a startup that is out to help more people realize that dream by buying a house and renting it back to them while they build equity — has just closed on $110 million in Series C

5G has been on a tear the last few years as wireless operators and smartphone manufacturers have made a marketing push touting higher bandwidth and lower latency for users. Yet, for all the attention that 5G gets from consumers, some of the most important new applications for the next-generation wi

Following a government review, the U.K.’s financial services regulator will be instructed to regulate the buy now, pay later industry made popular by companies such as Klarna and AfterPay (known as Clearpay in the U.K.). A further consultation with the industry is underway and then, when parl

Prakhar Singh and ex-Paystack employee Abdul Hassan have known each other for seven years, building different tech products individually and collectively along the way. Before joining Paystack in 2018, Hassan co-founded payments startup OyaPay the year before. After leaving the Stripe-owned company

In a creator-economy world, if you're only as good as your last YouTube video, then your next YouTube video had better be bigger and louder than the last. Vibely, a new startup co-founded by Asana alumni Teri Yu and Theresa Lee, wants to turn the constant, and often exhausting, beast of content

Batteries are the latest landing pad for investors. In the past week alone, two companies have announced plans to become publicly traded companies by merging with special purpose acquisition companies. European battery manufacturer FREYR said Friday it would become a publicly traded company through

Soon all tech news will be fintech news, all fintech news will be trading platform news and all trading platform news will concern the business mechanics of such services. So, after looking into Robinhood’s fourth-quarter payment for order flow (PFOF) revenues this morning, we’re back w

Companies become industry leaders because of sparks: Ideas that lead to innovation, which shakes up a category. Apple changed the world when it realized that people wanted a PC in their pocket and it had to feel and look good. Research makes sparks possible. In the modern economy, “eureka” mome

Kleiner Perkins is one of the most prestigious venture firms in all of Silicon Valley. The firm has invested in startups like Twitter, Google, Square, Peloton, Spotify, Robinhood and many, many more. As such, the folks at Kleiner Perkins know a thing or two about what it takes to fundraise across t

Popular, highly-scrutinized trading app Robinhood has raised $2.4 billion to its balance sheet from shareholders, as first reported by the Wall Street Journal and then confirmed by the company. The private startup raised $1 billion on Friday, meaning that it has raised $3.4 billion in a handful of