Tuesday, May 31, 2022

New York-based Digital Asset to help Japan’s financial giant SBI develop ‘smart yen’

SBI Holdings, a Japanese securities and banking giant that launched a crypto-asset fund for retail investors last year, has been actively investing in the infrastructure that will allow it to roll out more crypto products.

The firm has recently made a strategic investment in Digital Asset, a New York-based startup known for building enterprise blockchain solutions, it said in an announcement. As part of the deal, the pair are launching a joint venture this year to operate across East Asia, which includes Japan and South Korea.

The undisclosed round adds to the $300 million in funding that Digital Asset has raised since its founding in 2014 from the likes of IBM and Goldman Sachs, which is tokenizing assets with help from the blockchain company.

The objective of the partnership is to bring programmable money, or digital money that can be coded to act in a certain way based on predetermined conditions, into the Japanese market, said Digital Asset in a separate statement.

The programmable money is tentatively called “smart yen” and will be using Daml, the smart contract language created by Digital Asset and known for playing a role in the Australian Securities Exchange’s distributed ledger technology (DLT) platform. The Hong Kong Stock Exchange is also a customer of Daml, which is expediating settlements for the bourse.

Smart yen, according to Yoshitaka Kitao, president and representative director of SBI Holdings, will “make it possible to build a revolutionary, customer-oriented cash system by directly linking each individual customer loyalty program to deposits, and fully automating the process of providing loyalty through smart contracts.”

The smart money system has to potential to create “additional opportunities for retail banks in Japan to develop innovative offerings, such as loyalty programs, vouchers, and other incentives to drive customer growth and retention,” reckoned Yuval Rooz, co-founder of Digital Asset who took the helm as CEO in 2019.

Digital Asset is just one of a handful of investments the Japanese financial outfit has sealed to expand its crypto business. It made a key acquisition move in mid-May when it scooped up a controlling stake in the Japanese crypto exchange BITPoint. In late 2020, SBI bought UK-based crypto trading platform B2C2.

 



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Kuo says Apple AR/VR headset not coming at WWDC

Ming-Chi Kuo, an analyst well-known for their accurate predictions on Apple products and strategies, suggested that Cupertino is unlikely to release the rumored AR/VR headset and the accompanying realityOS at WWDC next week. Apple VR headset sketch (Image: The Information) The analyst shared that Apple is not ready to launch the project, and a simple introduction will open Pandora’s box of copycats. “Competitors can’t wait to see the hardware spec and OS design” and they will “happily copy Apple’s excellent ideas”, beating Cupertino in the race to put the devices on the store...



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ZTE Blade V40 Vita launched in Malaysia

In the midst of MWC 2022, ZTE announced its four-strong Blade V40 series and three months later one of the phones - Blade V40 Vita is launching in Malaysia. The device will be sold exclusively through Shopee for MYR 599 ($137) and is set to go on pre-order from mid-June. ZTE Blade V40 Vita brings a 6.75” LCD with 90 Hz refresh rate, and 720 x 1,600 px resolution (20:9). The phone packs Unisoc’s T606 chipset with 4GB RAM and 128GB UFS 2.2 storage which is also expandable via microSD. There’s a 48 MP main camera around the back with two 2MP auxiliary modules while the front houses an 8MP...



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Foxconn expects more stable supply chains in H2

In an official statement at its annual shareholder meeting, Foxconn confirmed it’s expecting stability to improve in the supply chains in the second half of 2022. Foxconn chairman Young Liu stated the company is “confident in the stability of their supply chain for the second half of this year”. The recent wave of COVID across China has disrupted demand and supply for all major electronic products including smartphones, tablets and PCs. Foxconn - the world’s largest electronics manufacturer was severely impacted by the long-spanning Shanghai COVID-19 lockdowns. The local government has...



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Temasek in talks to invest in Google-backed DotPe

Google-backed DotPe, which helps businesses in India go online and sell digitally, is in advanced stages of talks to raise about $50 million in a new financing round, a source familiar with the matter told TechCrunch.

Temasek, the Singapore state-owned investment firm, is finalizing deliberations to lead the investment in the Gurgaon-headquartered startup, the source said, requesting anonymity as the details are private.

Terms of the investment could change and the deal may end up not materializing at all, the source cautioned. Temasek declined to comment, while DotPe did not respond to a request for comment.

The two-year-old startup, which also counts PayU and Info Edge Ventures as its backers, also helps brick and mortar stores get visibility on Google Search. Restaurants, which are some of the customers of DotPe, use the startup’s offering to scan their inventories to make them digitally accessible via WhatsApp.

These offerings puts DotPe chasing a similar set of audiences as other startups including Zomato, Swiggy and Dukaan.

“DotPe provides a WhatsApp link which opens a restaurant menu and you can order directly and don’t have to go to Zomato / Swiggy. DotPe works with small merchants across other categories –food delivery , apparel ecommerce, pharma,” analysts at Bernstein wrote in a report last year. “DotPe doesn’t do its own delivery but will work with delivery partners for last mile delivery.”



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iQOO Neo6 launches globally with a Snapdragon 870 chipset

The iQOO Neo6 and iQOO Neo6 SE debuted in China recently and now they are starting their global journey. India is the first stop, and it comes with its own plot twist - the global phone will be called iQOO Neo6, but will have hardware identical to the Neo6 SE. The phone comes with a 6.62” E4 AMOLED, manufactured by Samsung with Full HD+ resolution, 120Hz refresh rate and HDR10+ support. Inside it is a Snapdragon 870 chipset with either 8GB or 12GB RAM and 128GB or 256GB storage. The 64MP main camerŠ° on the back features OIS, and you get 8 MP ultrawide + 2MP macro shooters alongside...



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Monday, May 30, 2022

Gurman: iPhone 14 Pro series to bring AOD functionality

In his latest Bloomberg newsletter report, Mark Gurman talks about iPhone 14 Pro series gaining Always-on display (AOD) functionality, iOS 16’s major new features and other announcements set to appear at WWDC 2022 on June 6. The big headline is the long-rumored AOD functionality which will likely be exclusive to the iPhone 14 Pro and Pro Max and their LTPO AMOLED displays. These panels can dial back the refresh rate on the lock screen in a bid to save up battery power while displaying AOD information like time, date and notifications. Apple already offers AOD on its Apple Watches so it...



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Rumor: Galaxy Z Fold4 to improve cameras, bring iterative upgrades to the rest of the phone

The Samsung Galaxy Z Fold4 is expected to bring important upgrades to the main camera trio and iterative improvements to everything else. We’ve been seeing leaks about this or that detail in recent weeks, now leakster Yogesh Brar has posted an overview of the expected specifications. The star of the show – the foldable display inside – will allegedly remain at 7.6”. Samsung is said to be working on reducing the crease. Part of the effort to improve this display includes using tougher Super UTG. The internal display and the external 6.2” displays will still use 120Hz AMOLED panels with...



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Ayoken raises $1.4M to grow its NFT marketplace for creatives

Ayoken, an NFT marketplace for creatives, has raised $1.4 million pre-seed funding to enable users grow their revenue streams through digital collectibles.

The startup’s marketplace, Ayokenlabs, will feature digital collectibles from musicians, sports brands and influencers from all-over the world.

Ayoken founder and CEO, Joshua King, told TechCrunch that the marketplace is a bridge between fans and artists, and gives supporters a sense of ownership in the success of their idols.

Through the NFT marketplace, he said, fans will have access to tokens such as behind-the-scenes videos and album art. NFT holders will also get other perks like access to unreleased music and exclusive live events by the creatives.

“Through VIP passes, fans will get the ability to actually livestream music by these artists before it arrives on Spotify, YouTube or Apple Music. Fans will get discounts for future events too,” said King, who has 14 years’ experience in strategy, growth and innovation consultancy, and entrepreneurship. His career includes helping scale AZA (Bitpesa), a Nairobi-based platform that leverages bitcoin to facilitate cross-border remittances, and where he first got introduced to crypto and blockchain technology.

King said Ayoken will over the next few months release NFTs of some major African artists, and others across the world.

The London-headquartered startup has already partnered with Ghanaian afrobeats artist KiDi (Dennis Nana Dwamena) for his first NFT drop on the first day of June. King said the cross-chain marketplace (although currently built on Avalanche blockchain) allows crypto and card payments, but plans to add mobile money – as the startup makes it easier for people in emerging markets like Africa to trade with ease. King said they are negotiating partnerships with a number of telcos in the continent to make this a reality.

“We are reducing friction points for the users by letting people use their cards instead of having to use crypto to buy, we are working on partnerships with telcos that will allow people to use mobile money to make the payment in future too. Nothing comes close to what we are doing and that is why we are able to sign some of the biggest names in the creative industry,” he said.

Users will get token (Ayo) rewards when they buy the NFTs or refer people, which they can redeem later for an NFT.

King said, unlike other NFT marketplaces, they have distribution partners including YouTubers, influencers, newsletters, crypto exchanges, and telecoms to promote NFT drops – allowing the creatives to tap a wider audience, and not just their fanbase.

“What this means is that celebrities do not have to rely on their social media following to drive transactions. They get instant access to millions of people all around the world at the touch of a button. And our approach is so different to any other NFC marketplace on the planet. we also have a marketing agency to help these creatives succeed in their first NFT drops,” said King.

“They (distribution partners) will get a revenue share based on any transactions generated on their social media promotions”.

Using the funds raised from the investors, among them Founders Factory Africa, Texas-based Kon Ventures, Europe-based venture capital collective Crypto League, Ghana-based R9C Ventures and Maximus Ventures, Ayoken plans to sign a number of exclusive deals with artists and partnerships with telcos, besides growing its team and secondary marketplaces.

“A majority of the funding will go into buying exclusive licenses and into building our tech team, that is the developers and engineers by fourfold,” he said.



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Realme GT Neo 3T launching on June 7

Realme is set to unveil its GT Neo 3T in Indonesia on June 7. We got official confirmation from the brand and the event will also feature the GT Neo 3 for that market. Those interested in the launch will be able to tune in to the launch live stream via YouTube and Twitter from 8:30 AM Jakarta time (UTC 1:30 AM). Realme GT Neo 3T is expected to launch with Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 870 and a 6.5-inch AMOLED display with a punch hole cutout in the left corner instead of the centered cutout on the regular Neo 3. It remains to be seen what charging speeds are like on the Neo 3T. We’ll make...



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Betastore gets $2.5M to solve stock-outs, financing challenges for informal retailers in West and Central Africa

About 80% of household retail in sub-Saharan Africa is delivered through informal channels, which perennially face several challenges like stockouts, leading to an instability in earnings, and a lack of attractiveness to financiers. These challenges befall millions of micro-retailers across the continent, and Betastore, a B2B retail marketplace for informal retailers, is working to resolve in Nigeria, Ivory Coast and Senegal.

The Betastore marketplace enables informal traders to source fast moving consumer goods (FMCGs) directly from manufacturers or distributors – which keeps the prices of the products competitive by eliminating interactions with sales agents. It also works with logistics partners to ensure the delivery of goods within 24 hours.

The Nigeria-based startup plans to provide these services beyond its current three markets by expanding to Ghana, the Democratic Republic of Congo and Cameroon by the end of this year, after closing $2.5 million in pre-series A funding from 500 Global, VestedWorld, and Loyal VC. Betastore has to date raised $3 million in funding.

“What is really important for us is to be able to continue to scale by leveraging our asset-light model. We plan to enter new markets before the end of the year and to expand to 100 cities across Nigeria, Ivory Coast and Senegal. We are also planning to reinforce our technology and leadership teams, and to bring in new products and to improve existing ones,” said Betastore CEO, Steve Dakayi-Kamga, who co-founded the startup with Leo-Armel Tchoudjang mid 2020.

The asset-light model means Betastore does not have any capital and labor intensive assets like warehouses or its own fleet of vehicles for delivery. Dakayi-Kamga said that this has helped the startup to optimize its technology to ensure that retailers source goods from the closest distributors. On average, a retailer using Betastore makes 4.4 orders per month.

“Our technology enables retailers to order on demand, access a variety of products and solves logistics headaches for them too. With Betastore, they don’t have to close their shops to go get goods from distributors stores or the market, and do not have to lose close to half of the margins in in the logistics,” said Dakayi-Kamga, who previously worked for Jumia, where he led the e-commerce platform’s logistics, warehousing and marketplace fulfillment department.

The B2B ecommerce platform is set to introduce financing in July, a launch that follows a pilot program involving 200 retailers that the startup carried out last year.

The BNPL financing strategy, Tchoudjang says, will be based on retailers’ sales and will go a long way in helping them to grow the value of their shopping baskets, and ultimately their businesses. The startup plans to charge an interest based on product margins.

Betastore is currently integrating its technology into a network of financing partners including fintechs and banks.

“The mandate of some of the partners we have on board is to support the economy by financing small businesses, but are not able to lend to them because they do not have the data to inform decisions. We have the visibility of what is happening in this sector, and have data they can use to extend financing,” said Tchoudjang, who previously held executive and leadership roles within the IFC-backed AccessHolding AG network in Africa. He has also helped multinationals rollout fintech and microfinance products for emerging markets in the past.

Retailers use the Betastore wallet to repay loans, deposit money for their operations, and to send, receive and save money.

“The wallet helps them separate their business money from their own money, and it is directly connected to the whole banking system, meaning that retailers can receive and send money to any bank, and load cash with any agency banking platform,” said Tchoudjang.

Since launch, the startup claims to have grown its customer base and revenues by 10 and 12 times, respectively. The startup anticipates greater growth especially after entering more countries and rolling out its buy now pay later (BNPL) product, as it taps the retail market in sub-Saharan, which was valued at $380 billion in 2021, contributing 20-50% of the region’s GDP on average.

“We want to simplify access to goods and services for the retailers and for the end consumer because we see the merchant as an agent able to make access to goods and services easier. We started out in Nigeria, and we are expanding within Francophone Africa on our way to being a pan African player,” said Dakayi-Kamga.

Amit Bhatti, the principal at 500 Global while commenting on the latest funding round said, “We believe Betastore’s talented team is creating market efficiencies that have the potential to boost the growth of Africa’s retailers. With Betastore, merchants can get greater transparency into wholesaler inventories and price points.”



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vivo T2x is official with Dimensity 1300, Y33e tags along

A new phone arrived today, and it is the vivo T2x that extensively leaked last week. Just as the scrolls foretold, the new device has a Dimensity 1300 chipset and a big battery. vivo also introduced a Y33e phone, which is largely identical to the Y33s 5G but with half the RAM and slower charging. The T2x is vivo’s first phone with the new Mediatek chipset that has a 3.0 GHz CPU and a Mali-G77 graphics unit. The 6.58” LCD has Full HD+ resolution, and vivo decided to keep it traditional with the front-facing camera - a waterdrop notch for the 8MP shooter. There are only two...



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Sunday, May 29, 2022

Why web3 companies get hacked so often, according to crypto VC Grace Isford

On the Chain Reaction podcast this week, Lux Capital’s newest investor, Grace Isford, joined us to talk about the opaque but crucial world of web3 infrastructure. At Lux, Isford invests in the companies working behind the scenes to make sure crypto exchanges are secure and reliable enough to avoid being hacked.

Before joining Lux this February, Isford was an investor at Canvas Ventures focused on enterprise software and fintech. A data infrastructure investment she worked on at Canvas revealed to her the opportunity in the web3 space for companies to “share data immutably at scale,” motivating her pivot to crypto, she said.

“That led me down the rabbit hole, and then I ended up investing myself personally,” Isford said. “I got into yield farming, which coincided with my move to New York, where many of my friends are also in the crypto and VC ecosystem.”

Isford says her investing approach in web3 is rooted in what she calls her “circle of competence,” or the area where she can be competitive compared to others in the space.

“NFT investing is quite different than DeFi investing, which is quite different than crypto data infrastructure investing, and I would argue that any person who says they invest in web three shouldn’t invest in all of that — they should probably choose their sweet spot in their core competency,” Isford said.

Isford’s own “circle of competence,” based on her prior experience, is in enterprise and fintech infrastructure, so we asked her what she thinks some of the biggest challenges are for web3 infrastructure providers.

Compared to web2, Isford said, web3 lacks enterprise-level security solutions. Alchemy and Infura are the only two major node service providers in the industry, meaning that most of crypto is reliant on two infrastructure providers to manage their data.

“There seems to be a new security hack reported every week [in web3],” Isford said, citing the recent Metamask and Ethereum dApp outage that originated from Infura and February’s Wormhole bridge hack.

While a number of startups are working on developing security solutions, Isford said, the tech is “still quite nascent” when it comes to developer tools, data infrastructure monitoring, and storage.

Another major challenge is managing fraud and downside risk, Isford added.

“I think [that issue] is really keeping a lot of folks out of the crypto world right now [because they’re] afraid of losing all their money if they venture too deeply into crypto,” Isford said.

Isford is optimistic that through the massive inflows of investment into web3 startups in the past year, companies will be able to build more reliable solutions.

“I think TRM Labs, Chainalysis, and several other companies in this space have 10x potential in terms of compliance and monitoring because you just do not have that yet at scale in the same way that we’ve kind of created these sophisticated AML systems on the financial infrastructure side in the web2 world,” Isford said, referring to traditional financial institutions’ anti-money laundering technology.

Better fraud and risk management systems are a precursor to more institutional money flowing into crypto, Isford said. As companies like Fidelity, Goldman Sachs, and JP Morgan continue to make strides into crypto, the market will mature she added.

“I think one of the biggest opportunities in crypto right now is still security, if you can build more reliable smart contracts at scale … but you can’t have a reliable system if it’s not secure, right? And you can’t run a system securely if you don’t know who’s within that system, so I think security is probably one of the most important pieces from a prioritization standpoint,” Isford said.



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Week 21 in review: Xiaomi launches Redmi Note 11T and Mi Band 7, Oppo Reno8 series unveiled

We saw week 21 come and go now and the announcements kept on pilling up. Xiaomi kicked things off with the Redmi Note 11T Pro and Pro+ launch in China. The two devices bring similar specs like 6.6-inch 144Hz IPS LCDs. Dimensity 8100 chipsets and 64MP main cams. The major differences come in the storage, battery capacity and charging speed departments. Note 11T Pro+ gets up to 512GB built-in storage, a 4,400 mAh battery with 120W charging while the regular Note 11T Pro sticks to a 5,080mAh cell with 67W charging. Redmi Note 11T Pro starts at CNY 1,799 ($270) for the base 6/128GB trim and...



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Should Oracle or Alphabet buy VMWare instead of Broadcom?

As expected, the Broadcom-VMware deal is a go. The chip giant intends to snap up the virtualization software company for $61 billion in cash and stock, along with taking on $8 billion in VMware debt.

It’s not an inexpensive transaction, but thanks to a “go-shop” provision that gives VMware 40 days to “solicit, receive, evaluate and potentially enter negotiations with parties that offer alternative proposals,” there’s market speculation that another bidder could enter the fray.

After chewing through analyst notes on the deal, Ron and Alex wound up on opposite sides regarding whether a higher price or another bidder would make sense. Ron’s view is that the company’s value is higher than its recent financial results may imply, while Alex feels the company is not sufficiently performative to deserve a higher price.


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We’ve long speculated who might buy VMware, and after Dell spun out the company, TechCrunch listed Amazon, Alphabet, Oracle, Microsoft and IBM as potential acquirers. The fact that we did not foresee Broadcom as a potential suitor underscores our view that we don’t fully grok if it’s the correct buyer for VMware.

So let’s talk about the pros and cons of the matter, ask what VMware is worth, and how it may have value over and above its recent quarterly results. Ron is taking point!

Ron’s take:

With $61 billion on the table, it’s hard to imagine anyone paying more, and research firm Bernstein agrees with the perspective. Before we put the idea to bed, though, it’s worth taking a moment to think about the value of VMware.

VMware’s value goes beyond what its balance sheet or its profit and loss statement tells us at the moment. While the company might not have had a perfect first quarter, it has a particular set of skills that could fit nicely with any of the big cloud infrastructure providers.

In fact, cloud infrastructure-as-a-service exists today only because the early crew at VMware figured out virtualization at scale in the early 2000s. Until then, people used servers, and if a server was underutilized, well, too bad. Virtualization lets you divide a computer into multiple virtual machines, paving the way for cloud computing as we know it today.

While cloud computing has changed some since its early days, virtualization remains a core tenet of the market. Imagine for a moment if one of the three or four cloud vendors — think Amazon, Microsoft, Google or even IBM (although this deal is a bit rich for its blood) — brought VMware into its fold.

VMware brings more to the table than virtualization, of course. Over the years, it has gained various capabilities by acquiring companies like Heptio, a containerization startup launched by Craig McLuckie and Joe Beda, two of the people who helped create Kubernetes.



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Finix goes head-to-head with Stripe

Welcome to The Interchange, a take on this week’s fintech news and trends. To get this in your inbox, subscribe here.

We’ve all been keeping up with the recent drama of Stripe vs. Plaid. Rather than rehash all that here, I’ll point you to some of our recent articles on the topic and just summarize: The two fintech startups have recently grown (much) more competitive.

If things weren’t turbulent enough, another startup has very publicly emerged as a formidable competitor to Stripe: Finix.

Now, Finix is not coming out of nowhere. The SaaS startup — which started out in early 2020 by selling its payments tech to other businesses — raised a $35 million Series B led by Sequoia. In an unusual twist, Sequoia just 1 month later walked away from the deal in which it reportedly wrote the self-described payments infrastructure company a $21 million check. As TC’s Connie Loizos reported at the time, Finix told employees that  soon after issuing its check, Sequoia concluded that Finix competes too directly with Stripe, the payments company that represented one of Sequoia’s biggest private holdings and that in turn counted Sequoia as one of its biggest outside investors.

Fast-forward to last week. Finix announced that it was becoming a payments facilitator, in addition to enabling other companies to facilitate payments. This move puts it in direct competition with Stripe, something that CEO and co-founder Richie Serna is not shy about admitting.

In an interview this past week, Serna elaborated by noting that Finix indeed started out to build software that gave any software company a way to become their own payment facilitator.

“We were building technology that would take a three-year in-house build by dozens of engineers, with tens of millions of dollars of technical R&D and investment, and taking that down to a number of months by getting developer-friendly APIs to start monetizing their payments,” he said. “That was our biggest core offering. What we’ve done now is become the payments facilitator ourselves, so that we can not only provide the payments, but also all the back office requirements and compliance certifications, so that our customers can get up and running in a matter of days, rather than months.”

He says the move gives Finix the ability to work with companies and software platforms who have $0 in processing volume all the way up to companies with billions of dollars in processing volume.

“This allows these customers to get a better product experience and faster speed to market, and allows us to take on those non-technical aspects of rolling out and monetizing, and getting payments,” Serna added.

You see, historically, companies needed to hit a certain volume threshold before Finix could work with them. But now, according to Serna, they can start working with them in their earliest states.

“Customers can start working with us from day one, use finance APIs, and when they’re ready to take on more of that ownership and more of that responsibility around risk, underwriting and compliance operations, they can graduate and become their own payment facilitator,” he said, “since we’re still using the exact same APIs.”

Finix has also entered what the executive described as the “card present,” or in-person, payments space. This means that it is able to provide software for many types of businesses to accept credit card payments.

“If you think about a software provider for restaurants, they’re going to need a different set of devices than the device provider for gyms, or food trucks,” Serna said. “And so that’s something that we uniquely offer and bring to the market.”

So, in case you haven’t figured it out, Stripe did have reason to be concerned because Finix indeed is directly competing with it. So how are they different?

According to Serna, the answer lies in the fact that Finix has built “an open system and open architecture that is modular and configurable.” Stripe, on the other hand, he said, “continues to double down on that vendor lock in so it can continue to close their system and architecture.”

“We think about it very similar to iOS,” Serna told TechCrunch. “We think about ourselves much more like Android…And I think we’re just going to continue to see those characteristics magnified as we continue to build our products and build our companies.”

With just over 150 employees, Finix is powering over 12,000 merchants in the U.S. with its APIs today. It has raised about $100 million in funding from investors such as American Express Ventures, Bain Capital Ventures, Homebrew, Inspired Capital, Lightspeed Venture Partners and Visa.

Meanwhile, in a recent Forbes article, Stripe co-founder John Collison told Alex Konrad, reportedly with a shrug: “We will compete with a bunch of companies, and we’ll partner with a bunch. Everyone just needs to be a grownup and well-behaved about it.” In that same article, sources told Alex that Stripe saw gross revenue of about $12 billion in 2021, up 60% year-over-year. It also reportedly posted net revenue of about $2.5 billion.

Weekly News

Speaking of Stripe, Ingrid Lunden reported on May 24 that the company debuted its App Marketplace, a new offering where Stripe will provide access to both third-party apps and scripts created by app publishers, users and Stripe itself, that incorporate those apps with Stripe. It potentially represents its biggest leap yet away from payments.

Swedish payment giant Klarna reportedly cut 10% of its workforce, or 700 jobs, this past week. The move came just after the Wall Street Journal reported that the company was going to cut its valuation in order to raise fresh capital.

One-click checkout startup Bolt is believed to have laid off as many as 240 employees across go-to-market, sales and recruiting roles. Earlier reports had cited that 100 workers would be impacted, but as details emerged, it appeared to be more. In mid-February, founder Ryan Breslow made headlines after announcing on Twitter that Bolt was offering every employee the chance to borrow money from the company to exercise their stock options. Now, it’s unclear what happens to the people who were laid off and borrowed money from the company. The company told Bloomberg that the number of affected workers that took out loans is in “the single digits.”

But not all fintechs are laying off. Fidel API says it “is rapidly growing” after its $65 million Series B announcement and is hiring for more than 60 roles across its engineering, sales and customer-experience teams. The fintech says it has doubled in size over the past 6 months and intends to double again before year’s end.

Peggy Mangot has left her role as operating partner at PayPal Ventures to serve as the new head of fintech partnerships for JPMorgan Chase Commercial Banking. At PayPal Ventures, Mangot helped lead investments  globally across fintech, commerce, infrastructure and crypto.

Both large and small companies are retaining their crypto optimism despite the recent market correction in the developing technology space. Mass adoption of blockchain technology and digital assets is going to happen sooner rather than later, according to Mastercard’s VP of new product development and innovation, Harold BossĆ©. Read more here.

Fundings and M&A

Seen on TechCrunch

Paddle acquires ProfitWell for $200M to bring analytics and retention tools to its SaaS payments platform

Founder alleges that YC-backed fintech startup is ‘copy-and-pasting’ its business

Revenue-based financing platform Bloom secures $377M Series A led by Credo and Fortress

Viola Credit closes $700M fund to provide asset-based lending to fintech startups

Roofstock founder closes on $90M fund to back early-stage proptech startups

Zip lines up $43M at a $1.2B valuation for its growing ‘concierge for procurement’

Nowports streamlines LatAm’s shipping to deliver a $1.1B valuation

Indian fintech Jar eyes $50 million investment

And elsewhere

Canaan leads $15M investment in Brazilian B2B payments startup Marvin, marking the firm’s largest LatAm investment to date.

equipifi, a fintech company providing banks and credit unions with a white label buy now, pay later (BNPL) solution, completed a $12 million Series A funding round.

That’s it for this week! If you’re reading from the U.S., hope you enjoy the rest of your long weekend, and for everyone else, have a great day and week ahead. And to borrow from my brilliant friend and colleague, Natasha Mascarenhas, you can support me by forwarding this newsletter to a friend or following me on Twitter.



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How Box escaped the SaaS growth trap

Enterprise productivity company Box reported results earlier this week for the first quarter of its fiscal 2023, the three-month period ending April 30. Box managed to beat revenue expectations, though it missed on adjusted per-share profit. Shares of the company initially lost modest ground.

You might read the above paragraph and wonder why we’re digging into a SaaS company that had a quarter that appeared to be somewhat mixed in results terms and largely neutral from an investor perspective. The reason is that Box is accelerating out of a period in which external investors took aim at its leadership over complaints about flagging growth; the company managed to fend off activist investor demands and is now reaping the results of the work it did while out of favor with Wall Street.

Box’s revenue expansion decelerated to single-digit percentage points. Since Box went through the activist wringer, we’ve seen other public software companies with similar growth rates come under external pressure. This is what we’re calling the SaaS growth trap — a time when a company’s revenue expansion has slowed, but its profitability has not sufficiently scaled to keep investors content with its performance.


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Public software companies in the trap have to find a way to ignite growth without torching profitability. It’s akin to the position that many startups find themselves in today, with growth expectations staying high as private-market investors are simultaneously less interested in high-burn models. Startups have to keep the growth coming while also paying double attention to their cost structure. It’s a hard path to navigate.

Box managed it, though it took time. The company’s $238 million worth of Q1’F23 revenue was up 18% compared to its year-ago period, a growth rate that bested the 17% it managed in the quarter prior, and the 14%, 12% and 10% growth rates it reported in the quarters stretching back to the first quarter of its fiscal 2022. Notice the upward trajectory — it’s important.

So how did Box manage to get out of the growth trap while also growing its gross margins, operating income and net profit in its most recent quarter? Let’s talk about it. It’s a lesson for public companies, yes, but also one that startups will want to understand as they navigate a more complex and demanding investment market for early-stage technology shares.



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EV SPACs are facing a new regulatory speed bump

It’s been a bumpy road for the electric vehicle startups that rushed to go public over the past two years by merging with a publicly traded shell company.

Now, the SEC’s broadest attempt to crackdown on these so-called reverse mergers could put a few speed bumps on the road to becoming — and maintaining — a SPAC.

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission will conclude Tuesday a 60-day public comment period on a number of proposed guidelines for SPACs, specifically around disclosures, marketing practices and third-party oversight. If approved, the barrier of entry to becoming a SPAC will rise, putting it on par with the regulatory burden placed on companies that pursue the more traditional IPO path.

The rules will “help ensure that investors in these vehicles get protections similar to those when investing in traditional initial public offerings,” SEC Chairman Gary Gensler said when the proposal was first released back in March. The rules, if approved, will also strengthen protections for current investors, as well as prevent SPACs from using “overly optimistic language or over-promise future results” to appeal to potential investors.

“Ultimately, I think it’s important to consider the economic drivers of SPACs,” Gensler said in March. “Functionally, the SPAC target IPO is being used as an alternative means to conduct an IPO.”

The details

The most significant change to the proposed guidelines requires aligning the financial statements required for SPACs with those of traditional IPOs, a major step toward creating more transparency. This includes more disclosure across several areas.

The guidelines also call for gatekeepers such as auditors, lawyers, and underwriters to be held responsible for their work, including assuming liability for the registration statements SPACs must file ahead of a target IPO. Gensler said the changes “provide an essential function to police fraud and ensure the accuracy of disclosure to investors.”

While the proposal winds through the approval process, some players in market have pressed the pause button.

For instance, Goldman Sachs halted its dealmaking in May as it waits to see how the new regulations will affect dealmaking, especially if the SEC revokes the so-called safe harbor protection that until now has allowed SPACs to make bullish projections. Credit Suisse and Citigroup have voiced alarm, too.

“I could say I think I’m gonna make a bajillion dollars in 2025, but here are all the reasons why I might not,” said Ramey Layne, a capital markets and M&A attorney at Vinson and Elkins. “If you say that there’s a safe harbor, then you can’t be sued for that if it proves to be wrong.”

The SEC’s proposed regulations are “a very big step in the right direction,” said Stanford Law School professor Michael Klausner, especially if SPACs are required to “disclose the extent to which their shareholders’ equity is diluted at the time of the merger.”

The SEC expects to finalize new guidelines during the second half of 2022. Meanwhile, of the roughly 600 SPACs currently searching for a company to acquire, some deals have ground to a halt or been scrapped, according to SPAC Research.

The catalyst

Allowing pre-revenue startups to take a shortcut to an IPO before selling a single vehicle has led to trouble on numerous fronts.

Regulations today are so lax that commercial EV maker Electric Last Mile Solutions has gone without an auditor for the last three and a half months. The manufacturer, which went public in June 2021 through a $1.4 billion merger with Forum Merger III, said Friday in an SEC filing that it is in danger of running out of cash in June, one month sooner than projected, if it doesn’t find funding.

Electric Last Mile Solutions is also at risk of being delisted if it doesn’t file its delayed 2021 annual report and Q1 2022 financial report. The company blamed the delay on an acrimonious split with its accounting firm, BDO.

The public spat over who had helped the EV maker’s leadership architect a scheme to buy discounted shares pre-merger – a move that led to the resignations of both the company’s CEO and chairman in February – sparked an SEC investigation into the company in March.

That news sent shares tumbling below $1 and compelled the company to lay off nearly a quarter of its workforce to cut costs, and pull its guidance for the remainder of 2022. Now the SPAC is at risk of being delisted from the Nasdaq if it doesn’t submit a plan by Tuesday to comply with regulations.

Other examples of this laissez faire approach abound in the SPAC world. Canoo, Faraday Future, Lordstown Motors and Nikola are just a few of the SPACs that have run into trouble.

Faraday Future also faced a Nasdaq delisting, but managed to file its 2021 annual report and 2022 first quarter financial results this month.

While the earnings reports staved off the delisting, they also showed a company burning through cash with little to no prospects of revenue in the near term.

The company reported an operating loss of $149 million for the first quarter of 2022, compared with $19 million for the same period a year ago. The widening loss is due to “a significant increase in headcount and employee related expenses, and an increase in professional services primarily related to the special committee investigation,” the company said in a statement. Net loss increased to $153 million for the three months ended March 31, 2022, compared with a $76 million loss for the first quarter of 2021.

Faraday Future also continues to have trouble getting its fantastical, 1,050-horsepower FF 91 into production. The flashy sedan can travel from 0 to 60 mph in 2.39 seconds and travel more than 300 miles on a single battery charge, the automaker said.

The company recorded 401 pre-orders for the FF 91 as of March 31 and plans to launch the car during the third quarter of 2022, CEO Carsten Breitfeld said in a call with investors on Monday. The $1,500 pre-orders are fully-refundable non-binding deposits, and pricing will be announced closer to launch.

“Keep in mind that the FF 91 is not a high-volume car,” Breitfeld said, adding that the automaker plans to ramp up eventually to 6,000 to 8,000 units a year.

About 80% of the equipment Faraday needs to build the FF 91 is at its factory in Hanford, California, and the rest is on track to be delivered. The automaker said it has funding to cover its current production run but will need more money to produce its second model, an FF 81 sedan for the mass market, and smart last-mile delivery vehicle called the FF 71.

Faraday also said it signed a lease on its first store, in Beverly Hills, California, and secured a dealer license to sell its cars nationwide online.



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Flashback: some crazy phones had three or even four SIM card slots

How many SIM slots does your phone have? In some regions dual-SIM models are quite popular, though in recent years eSIM (embedded SIM) has started taking over from the secondary slot for an external card. Many carriers offer low cost roaming or there is no roaming at all (e.g. within the EU), so having the option to pop in a extra card from a local carrier has become less important. But this is now, a decade ago some makers weren’t sure how many phone lines you may need in your pocket. One? Two? Four? Let’s start with the loneliest number. As we explained in a previous installment, the...



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Weekly poll: the Oppo Reno8 trio awaits your verdict

Earlier this week Oppo unveiled the Reno8 series, which arrives with three new chipsets. All three phones have high refresh rate AMOLED displays, 50MP primary cameras and 4,500mAh batteries that charge at 80W. Is any of the three likely to be your next phone? We’ll start with the Oppo Reno8 Pro+ as the most impressive model of the trio. It features the Dimensity 8100-Max chipset, paired with 12GB of LPDDR5 RAM and 256GB UFS 3.1 storage. This is going to be one speedy phone. The Dimensity is aided by the custom MariSilicon X chip that does AI-based processing on photos and videos coming...



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Saturday, May 28, 2022

Black Shark 5, 5 Pro's global launch set for June 8

Xiaomi's Black Shark unveiled the Black Shark 5 series in March, which includes three smartphones - Black Shark 5, Black Shark 5 Pro, and Black Shark RS. These are currently only available in China, but the lineup will begin its global rollout next month, starting with Malaysia. Black Shark's Malaysian division took to social media to announce the launch of the Black Shark 5 and Black Shark 5 Pro in Malaysia on June 8. The event will begin at 7PM local time and will be live-streamed on the company's Facebook and TikTok accounts. The Black Shark 5 RS won't be a part of the June 8...



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Telegram to soon launch its premium plan

A new finding by Alessandro Paluzzi reveals that Telegram is moving closer to introducing its premium tier. The hint comes from a data string that drastically changes the wording of the welcome screen when downloading and installing the messaging app. Right now, you will read "Telegram is free forever. No ads. No subscription fees." but that text will be replaced with "Telegram provides free unlimited cloud storage for chats and media." That's a clear indication that a subscription-based plan is in the works and will likely be introduced very soon. The same developer sheds some...



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Sequoia is the latest VC firm telling you to take the downturn seriously

Sequoia takes things seriously. The storied venture firm is known to react to macroeconomic events with grand memos aimed at portfolio companies and sometimes the entrepreneurship scene at large.

Most recently, Sequoia created a 52-slide deck, first reported by The Information, titled “Adapting to Endure.” The document reads like a follow-up course to its infamously ill-timed “Coronavirus: The Black Swan of 2020” memo of March 2020.

The firm is not always right in its prognostications — maybe why it stuck to internal musings instead of a Medium post this time — but it does do a service in providing a snapshot of how one of the most weathered, and successful, VC firms of all time thinks about a looming downturn.


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“Our intention in gathering today is not to be a beacon of gloom,” the deck reads. “But we also believe that winning in the years ahead is going to depend on making hard, decisive choices confronting uncomfortable challenges that may have been masked during the exuberance and distortions of free capital over the past two years.”

Sequoia’s advice largely followed the same script that other venture firms have been using: extend runway, focus on sustainable growth and recognize that an economic recovery may be a ways away. There were, however, some tidbits that stood out, such as a subtweet that I’m guessing is meant for Tiger Global and a precise explanation of how founders should define fluff these days.

The capital provider blames capital itself — capitalism, huh?

One of the clearest subtweets within the deck is Sequoia’s commentary on cross-over funds. The firm says that “cheap capital is not coming to the rescue” at this moment:



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HTC's flagship phone delayed

We doubt that there are many of you holding your breath waiting for HTC's next flagship phone given that it's been a while since the company released a high-end device. The handset was expected to make its debut in April but it seems that it has been delayed. The reason for the delay is reportedly COVID-19-induced supply chain issues, so HTC hasn't abandoned its project. Some believe that the phone will have an unusual appeal, just like the Exodus 1 and Exodus 1s smartphones, which were blockchain-centric. This time around, HTC's flagship will likely be related to the company's...



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Can Andreessen Horowitz prevent the next crypto winter?

Hey everyone, and welcome back to Chain Reaction.

Last week, we talked about the rough road ahead for Coinbase. This week, we’re talking a bit about Andreessen Horowitz’s multibillion-dollar bet on web3’s continued viability. Read on to check out the latest episode of the Chain Reaction podcast as well.

To get this in your inbox every Thursday afternoon, you can subscribe on TechCrunch’s newsletter page.


$4,500,000,000

May hasn’t been the kindest month to crypto. Consecutive weeks of drops have left whispers of the “buy the dip” going cold as industry players buckle down for winter.

A brief moment of warmth came this week, when Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) announced that it has raised $4.5 billion for its fourth crypto fund, more than doubling the size of its last fund. It’s the largest institutional crypto firm to date and comes at an interesting time…

While VC firms the world over have been pressing their portfolio companies to cut burn rates and buckle down for bad times, many crypto founders were already prepared for this moment, having raised stupid amounts of money from VCs solely for the purpose of not having to raise cash later. While tech broadly has not suffered a prolonged recession since the early 2000s, crypto startups have endured much tighter windows of boom and bust. Despite plenty of coffers being full, it’s fair to assume that a crypto winter will put plenty of venture-backed startups on ice.

A16z didn’t let too many details fly on their exact plans for this fund, but they did interestingly detail that they’re planning to devote at least $1.5 billion of the fund to seed deals. That’s an awful lot of seed deals — likely hundreds of them — coming from a single fund.

The question is whether the rest of the venture ecosystem around crypto sticks around. Plenty of hedge fund entrants to the markets have gotten burned and other traditional venture firms seemed to sheepishly poke their head into this cycle and may already be close to the door.

For a market that’s been frothing with dumb money for a couple years, any sort of pullback is going to leave startups in a lurch, and a16z’s focus on young companies with their new fund may be tough for companies eyeing growth dollars.


neumann, new man?

Now that Lucas has given you the breakdown on a16z, it’s Anita here to get you up to speed on the latest episode of the Chain Reaction podcast, where we unpack the latest web3 news, block-by-block for the crypto-curious. 

We talked plenty about Andreessen Horowitz, which really said “what downturn?” this week, announcing the largest dedicated crypto venture fund ever. Granted, much of that capital was probably raised before the crypto markets started tanking, but we unpacked the storied firm’s strategy and discussed a somewhat questionable investment it just made in a well-known grifter’s new blockchain startup (hint: he kinda looks like Jared Leto).

For our guest, we had investor Grace Isford join us from Lux Capital to talk about the infrastructure that works behind-the-scenes to make web3 tech run smoothly.

Subscribe to Chain Reaction on Apple, Spotify or your alternative podcast platform of choice to keep up with us every week.


follow the money

Where startup money is moving in the crypto world:

  1. Singapore-based metaverse app BUD closed $36.8 million in a Series B round led by Sequoia Capital India.
  2. NFT-based social platform Primitives raised a $4 million seed round with Redpoint as lead investor.
  3. NFT fraud detection startup Doppel scored $5 million in seed funding led by FTX Ventures.
  4. DAO community management platform Common raised $20 million from Spark Capital, Polychain and others.
  5. Carbon credit tokenization protocol Flowcarbon raised $70 million through a Series A round led by a16z as well as a private token sale.
  6. Blockchain infrastructure provider StarkWare closed a $100 million Series D led by Greenoaks Capital and Coatue.
  7. DeFi personal finance app Pebble raised a $6.2 million seed round led by Y Combinator.
  8. Digital asset manager Babel Finance scored $80 million in a Series B round from Jeneration Capital, 10T Holdings, Dragonfly Capital and others.
  9. NFT social marketplace Bubblehouse nabbed $9 million in seed capital from Cassius Family, SV Angel, angel investors Steve Aoki and David Guetta and others.
  10. Crypto tax prep software ZenLedger nabbed $15 million in a Series B led by Parafi.

the week in web3

Everyone’s been talking about a cooldown in the crypto markets, but as reporters covering the space, we’ve felt busy as ever. It seems like venture investors are keeping busy, too, trying to put massive amounts of capital to work that they raised largely before the markets went south. 

As for the firms currently raising new funds, they seem to have conviction that there are still lucrative opportunities out there in the crypto startup world, and that this downturn will simply separate the winners from the losers. (They’re hoping their portfolios already contain the winners.)

  • A16z’s whopper of a web3 fund speaks to their commitment to the space, even if other firms pull back, investor Arianna Simpson told Lucas in an interview.
  • Soona Amhaz’s Volt Capital announced a $50 million crypto fund, just over a year after it debuted its $10 million vehicle. Marc Andreessen and Chris Dixon are amongst the familiar faces backing Amhaz. Lucas has the details here.
  • Anita wrote about some Twitter drama that unfolded this week as the founder of fintech startup, Eco, took to the platform to accuse the founders of Y Combinator-backed Pebble of copy-pasting its business model. The battle between the startups, which both use stablecoins to provide yield, caused some to question the investment approach taken by accelerators like YC.

TC+ analysis

Curated analysis that you can read on our subscription service TC+ (written by TC’s Jacquelyn Melinek): 

Terra’s community passes proposal to revive LUNA cryptocurrency following stablecoin-led implosion
Nine days ago, Terraform Labs (TFL) founder Do Kwon shared a plan to revive the Terra Ecosystem after its stablecoin and cryptocurrency nosedived earlier this month and brought down the crypto markets with it. Now, the plan has passed approval from Terra’s community for a new Terra 2.0, which not everyone is certain will succeed. Will history repeat itself? 

StarkWare quadruples valuation to $8B in 6 months, closing round in choppy market
Crypto markets may be choppy right now, but big players are still raising capital as demand for scalable blockchain infrastructure remains strong. The most recent example of that fact is StarkWare Industries, which just raised $100 million at a valuation of $8 billion, the company shared on Wednesday. The new capital came just six months after the unicorn closed a $50 million Series C, quadrupling its valuation from $2 billion to $8 billion.

Mastercard exec is bullish on crypto, sees mass adoption ‘sooner rather than later’
Both large and small companies are retaining their crypto optimism despite the recent market correction in the developing technology space. Mass adoption of blockchain technology and digital assets is going to happen sooner rather than later, according to Mastercard’s VP of new product development and innovation, Harold BossĆ©. But there are a number of challenges right now stopping corporations from entering the market, BossĆ© said, like lack of senior management understanding and regulatory concerns, among other aspects. 

Luna Foundation Guard adviser says Do Kwon hasn’t reached out since UST crash
There seems to be no shortage of news around Terraform Labs’ cryptocurrency LUNA and algorithmic stablecoin TerraUSD (UST) imploding. Last Friday, one of the four advisers to Luna Foundation Guard (which was Terra’s Singapore-based nonprofit dedicated to protecting UST), told TechCrunch there have been no meetings with Terra founder Do Kwon since UST crashed. How does the adviser keep up with the Terra situation? Through Twitter like everyone else, he said. 


Thanks for reading and please subscribe to Chain Reaction on TechCrunch’s newsletter page,

Lucas and Anita



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Xiaomi Redmi 11 5G specs and release date revealed

One of the most anticipated low-end smartphones from Xiaomi is supposed to see its release sometime next month, with no information on the actual date. 91mobiles got the most important specs ahead of launch, though, along with the Indian pricing. The device is expected to feature a 6.58-inch FHD+ LCD panel, supporting 90Hz refresh rate. A MediaTek Dimensity 700 chipset will run the show coupled with at least 4GB of RAM and 64GB of expandable storage via a microSD card slot. Xiaomi Redmi 10 The camera configuration is also known- 50MP sensor will be aided by a 2MP sensor on the...



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Friday, May 27, 2022

Joywell Foods raises $25M to bring sweet proteins to market

When consumed in moderation, sugar is not bad for us, and humans’ ability to detect sweetness is etched into our DNA, but with the abundance of it in today’s food and drinks, we are getting more than we should.

Companies have created alternatives to sugar over the years, like Stevia, while others have tapped into technologies to come with new ways of sweetening foods in a way that is healthier. Some of those include Supplant, DouxMatok, MycoTechnology and Sensient.

Food tech startup Joywell Foods has been in this sector for nearly a decade, building up a sweet proteins platform and is nearing the commercialization of its first products, boosted by a cash infusion of $25 million in Series B funding.

The round was led by Piva Capital, with participation from B37 Ventures, Global Brain Corporation and existing investors Khosla Ventures, Evolv Ventures, SOSV’s IndieBio and Alumni Ventures.

As a part of the investment, Piva partner and co-founder Adzmel Adznan will join Joywell’s board. The new investment brings Joywell’s total funding to $38 million since the California-based company’s inception in 2014 by Alan Perlstein and Jason Ryder.

Joywell uses a proprietary microbial fermentation process to produce sweet proteins that are nearly identical to those found in exotic fruits and berries. Though these proteins taste like sugar — and are around 2,000 times sweeter than sugar —  they don’t impact blood sugar levels or gut microbiomes, CEO Ali Wing told TechCrunch.

“We’re biologically predisposed to crave sugar, so it’s not something we should actually feel so bad about,” she added. “If you really look at consumption today, over 70% of consumers are actively seeking to reduce sugar in their diets and the No. 1 culprit for that is daily added sugars. We just need to solve it differently, and that’s the beauty of technology and what we are doing.”

When Wing joined the company about a year ago from the healthcare industry, Joywell had just one protein. Now it has about half a dozen proteins derived from fruits, like the serendipity berry and katemfe fruit, and is working on a wide range of products. Wing said she was not able to go into exactly what those products were, but the company is already working on canned drinks and foods, like chocolate, and will essentially be able to plug into any food category that includes sugar.

In addition to providing a healthier alternative, Joywell is also out to be more sustainable, saying that “for every one percent reduction in sugar production results in approximately 650,000 acres of sugar cane fields saved.”

The company is still pre-revenue, so there was not much in the way of growth metrics Wing could speak about, but she did say she joined to lead Joywell’s commercialization, and the new funding will accelerate the R&D and scale-up efforts.

“A lot of what I’ve done in my nine months here is a lot of consumer testing around multiple product formulations to build the insights for the launch,” she added. “The most important next steps are very much in the regulatory process and have several regulatory milestones in front of us. We are also adding proteins and will be building a pipeline around those.”



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Honor shares details about the Magic4 Pro R&D process

The Honor Magic4 Pro is finally available globally, and to mark the occasion the brand decided to reveal more about the process of how its latest flagship came to be. The company shared details about its new Intelligent Manufacturing Industrial Park, as well as the processes happening inside at the R&D department. Honor revealed over 200 reliability tests are applied, including drop tests, button durability testing and extreme weather simulations. The production line of the new plant is 75% automated to minimize the risk of human error. All systems are digitally controlled, and...



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Realme unveils 512GB version of the GT Neo3, offers discounts for China's 618 shopping festival

The Naruto Edition of the Realme GT Neo3 sure looks cool, but some might find more RAM and storage more practical. Luckily, Realme has not stopped refining the phone since its launch in March. The latest version to show up doubles the maximum storage to 512GB while keeping the RAM capacity at the maximum 12GB. The previous top model had a 12/256GB configuration. That one is comes with 150W fast charging and has an MSRP of CNY 2,800. The 512GB model will have a regular price of CNY 3,200 ($475/€445/₹37,000), but will be available at a special introductory price of CNY 2,900 at first....



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Honor 70 Pro listed on Geekbench with Dimensity 8000 and 12GB RAM

One of Honor’s upcoming 70 series phones just stopped by Geekbench fkexing MediaTek’s Dimesnity 8000 chipset and 12GB RAM. The listing has the phone with the Honor SDY-AN00 model number and reveals it managed 819 single-core points and a 3,303 multi-core score. We can also observe the device boots Android 12 which will likely be layered with Honor’s Magic UI 6.0 on top. Honor 70 Pro Geekbench scorecard All Honor 70 models will use 54MP Sony IMX800 camera sensors (1/1.49” size, f/1.9 aperture) alongside two other sensors. All three phones will bring BOE OLED displays with...



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Indian fintech Jar eyes $50 million investment

Indian fintech Jar, which closed a $32 million financing round in February this year, is in talks to raise new funding as it looks to scale its product and expand its offerings.

The Bengaluru-headquartered startup is engaging with several investors to raise about $50 million at a $350 million valuation, according to four people familiar with the matter. Asked for comment on Wednesday, Misbah Ashraf, co-founder of Jar, said it was too early to comment.

Tiger Global, an existing backer of Jar, is positioning to lead the one-year-old startup’s Series B funding, the sources said, requesting anonymity as the details are private. Folius Ventures and Paramark are also engaging to invest in the new round, the people said.

Jar is helping millions of Indians begin their investment and saving journeys. Nearly a billion Indians have bank accounts today, but they have never made any investment. Part of the reason is confusion, explained Nishchay Ag, co-founder and chief executive of Jar, in an earlier interview with TechCrunch. “Their world is littered with ads of different financial instruments,” he told TechCrunch in an earlier interview.

For decades, banks and mutual funds have been trying to tap India masses with their products. Despite the hundreds of millions of dollars they have sunk in to win the market, they have been able to court fewer than 30 million individuals.

“Manufacturing a product is one thing and being able to sell it is another. All these institutions are good at manufacturing. For selling, you have to be aligned with the individual’s persona, idiosyncrasies, insecurities, cognitive load and the cultural significance. That’s an art and science by itself,” he said then.



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Oppo A57 4G announced with Helio G35 SoC and faster charging

Oppo unveiled the A57 in April with Dimensity 810 SoC and 5G connectivity, and now it has announced a 4G-only version powered by the Helio G35 chip. That's not the only difference between the two variants, though. The 4G model packs a 5,000 mAh battery which now charges faster up to 33W instead of 10W, but the screen refresh rate is reduced from 90Hz to 60Hz. It is still a 6.56" LCD having HD+ resolution. The memory and storage have also come down. You get 3GB RAM and 64GB of storage onboard. However, the Oppo A57 4G supports RAM expansion up to 4GB - which will hardly make any...



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Thursday, May 26, 2022

As the head of Helios’ new VC arm, Wale Ayeni sees value in frontier markets

Wale Ayeni, one of Africa’s well-known investors, has a new role as the head of Helios Digital Ventures, the venture capital strategy of private equity firm Helios Investment Partners, TechCrunch has learned.

This appointment comes a month after Ayeni left the International Finance Corporation (IFC), the private sector arm of the World Bank Group, where he led venture capital investments across Africa, the Middle East and Central Asia for over 5 years.

Ayeni has a similar function at Helios Digital Ventures: to spot and back disruptive startups in frontier markets, particularly in Africa and the Middle East. 

The firm, which, according to Ayeni, spun out from a conversation between himself and Helios Investment Partners’ founders, has backed one startup already: Egyptian payments company Paymob. The fintech provides an omnichannel payment infrastructure for merchants to accept payments via various methods such as bank cards, mobile wallets, QR payments and POS. It raised $50 million in Series B earlier this month, in a round that marked PayPal Ventures’ first MENA investment.

Paymob offers a glimpse into the blueprint of Ayeni and Helios Digital Ventures’ investment thesis: it’s at a stage that Ayeni dubs “early-growth” and is in a vital sector that affects a large segment of the population. 

“I’ll call it a mid-cap VC fund. It’s not early, and it’s not quite growth. It’s early growth,” Ayeni told TechCrunch, describing the stage he considers the fund to play in. “What we’re trying to do from a strategy perspective is to say what sectors are large enough from an addressable market point of view and affect or impact the mass market.”

There are five broad sectors Ayeni said Helios Digital Ventures would be targeting: financial services, food security, talent and human capital, healthcare and sustainability. 

He also mentioned that the fund would scout for startups in other sectors — that is, frontier technologies such as crypto, web3 and biotech — especially as venture capital keeps evolving quickly. 

“I think that you get the greatest impact or provide a lot of value when you match frontier technology with frontier markets, regions with no legacy from an adoption perspective,” he stated.

Ayeni and the Helios Investment Partners team declined to comment on the VC firm’s overall fund size. But sources close to the matter believe that the new fund will target between $5 million and $20 million in “early-growth” and follow-on checks.

Helios Investment Partners has experienced great success as a private equity firm since Tope Lawani and Babatunde Soyoye launched it in 2004. The firm manages funds totaling $3.6 billion. 

The firm is still raising money, hence its hesitancy to disclose some details. Yet, achieving its fund target will determine if the team can replicate similar levels of success in the VC world, particularly in a funding environment that has done an about-face from last year, resulting in enormous losses for hedge funds like Tiger Global.

This market downturn also affects startups, big and small, as their finances and valuations take a beating. But despite market forecasts of peril in startup land, Ayeni is upbeat and believes the VC firm will back legacy businesses in frontier markets just as its Helios Investment Partners did with Interswitch and Fawry, decades-old fintechs that it has partially exited.

“Obviously, multiples have collapsed, which is not necessarily bad. In both good and tough times, good companies are still good companies,” Ayeni said. 

“One would argue that good companies differentiate themselves in tough times; it is easy to see who has been creating value versus ones that have been focused on ‘vibes,'” he added. “I contend that there is a lot of value to be created in frontier markets.”

Ayeni started his career as a microprocessor design engineer with Intel Corp. and later with Qualcomm. He then launched his finance career with JP Morgan’s technology investment banking group in San Francisco. He executed more than $12 billion worth of closed transactions, spanning M&A to IPOs for large-cap technology clients.

Before the IFC, Wale led venture capital early-stage investments for Orange in the U.S. and was a principal advisor for early-stage Pan-African fund EchoVC from 2013 to 2016.

Under Ayeni’s watch across three roles in the IFC, the organization backed more than a dozen African tech companies. Some of them include unicorns Andela and Wave; he led the firm’s investments in the latter, as well as Africa’s TalkingKobo360MaxABBrimoreTradeDepot and Twiga. He was a board director at some of these startups. 

On his decision to leave the IFC to Helios, Ayeni said that while he thoroughly enjoyed his stay at the IFC, it was time for him to return to the private sector because he believed that frontier markets would benefit “a lot more from commercial and private sector capital and participants,” which is what Helios Digital Ventures offers.

Tope Lawani, the co-founder and managing partner of Helios Investment Partners, said the team brought Ayeni onboard because of his global experience in the venture asset class and a deep understanding of the African markets and tech ecosystems.

He also stated that his PE firm will support Helios Digital Ventures-backed startups with private equity as they mature.

There are very few funds with large ticket sizes like Helios Digital Ventures dedicated to frontier markets. But from an African lens, funds like Norrsken22, Juven, TLcom Capital and Partech Africa come to mind.

“One thing that will potentially differentiate Digital Ventures Fund from other funds out there will be expertise around frontier markets, about what frontier markets look like, not what people read about.” Ayeni noted.



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