Laura Mandaro

Lightspeed Venture Partners is raising money for three new funds that could total around $7 billion, according to a person who has discussed the fundraising with the firm’s partners. It’s the latest firm seeking to raise billions after a period when institutional investors pulled back from ...

For creators, getting paid comes a close second in importance to reaching fans. But we don’t often get an inside look at how the payments—from tips to subscriptions—happen. That’s why our colleague Michael Roddan’s reporting on Stripe earlier this week is a must read.Fintech companies like ...

A California bill that could penalize the makers of large artificial intelligence models if they’re found to cause harm is headed to California Gov. Gavin Newsom, where its outcome is uncertain. “I do not know what the governor will do,” said Scott Wiener, the state senator from San Francisco ...

We’re in the throes of artificial intelligence fever, but lessons from the last AI hype cycle still linger.Nearly four years ago, my colleague Amir published two stories detailing how businesses were starting to use artificial intelligence in meaningful (if sometimes rarified) ways, from ...

The artificial intelligence startup co-founded by ex-Salesforce co-CEO Bret Taylor is raising $85 million in a new round led by Sequoia Capital, according to a person familiar with the deal. The transaction is likely to value the startup Sierra near $1 billion, according to Bloomberg, which first reported on the fundraising. The new financing comes roughly six months after the startup, then

Foundry Ventures, a Boulder, Colo.-based venture firm that made early investments in Zynga and FitBit, said its most recent fund would be its last. The firm joins a growing number of venture investors that have decided to end or greatly reduce their investing activity as startup valuations plummet and a generation of investors nears retirement. Partner Seth Levine, who co-founded the firm

General Motors CFO Paul Jacobson said the automaker would cut spending on Cruise by “hundreds of millions of dollars” next year, signaling likely layoffs at the self-driving car unit. In the same conference call with investors, CEO Mary Barra said the company expects the “pace of Cruise expansion to be more deliberate when operations resume.” Cruise lost a license from California regulators to

What a turn of events! OpenAI began the day once again as the hottest startup in tech, run by the smartest hotshots in artificial intelligence. But around lunchtime on the west coast, it was a car crash, one that kept getting worse throughout the day.First, the OpenAI board dropped a bombshell ...

Khosla Ventures is close to raising $3 billion in venture funds, The Wall Street Journal reported. That’s up from a combined $1.85 billion three years ago and slightly higher than targets set at the start of the year. It expects to close the funds by the end of the year, the report said. The firm, a backer of OpenAI, Doordash and Affirm, will focus on research-intensive sectors such as

Paddy Cosgrave, the CEO and co-founder of Web Summit, resigned from his position on Saturday after a slew of high-profile attendees pulled out of the annual summit in the wake of Cosgrave’s comments on the Israel-Hamas war . A spokesperson for Web Summit said the conference plans to appoint a new CEO as soon as possible. The resignation follows just over a week after Cosgrave made comments on

Luther Lowe, a long-time critic of Google and the former policy chief at Yelp, has joined Y Combinator as the head of public policy, Lowe said in a post on X . YC, which invests in very young startups and trains their founders, has hired Lowe at a time when the famed startup accelerator takes on a more publicly combative role under new CEO Garry Tan . In an interview with publication Puck,

ByteDance, the owner of TikTok, generated $6.8 billion in cash in the first quarter, up from $5.8 billion in the year ago period, The Information reported . The Chinese internet company’s finances underscore the strength of ByteDance’s cash engine, even has growth has slowed. ByteDance’s revenue rose 34% to $24.5 billion in the first quarter, a slight slowdown from its 38% revenue growth in

Some venture firms have purchased access to sought-after graphic processing units with the intention of passing them onto startups they back, The Information reported Thursday. The unusual moves illustrates the shortage of artificial intelligence chips, largely controlled by Nvidia, used by startups and large companies seeking to develop generative AI applications. In May, venture firm

OpenAI on Monday said its ChatGPT chatbot will soon be able to have a voice conversation with customers and also will work with images they upload to it, such as suggesting a dinner recipe based on a photo of the inside of a customer’s fridge. The Information reported a week earlier that OpenAI was preparing to launch such image capabilities. The features up the ante with other chatbots

Instacart shares fell 11% in their second day of trading, wiping out nearly all the gains from their initial public offering debut. Shares ended ended at $30.10, close to the $30 IPO price. The drop outpaced the 1.5% decline in the Nasdaq Composite index. The decline bodes poorly for venture capitalists and startup workers hoping for the pace of IPOs to pick up, as well as the investors who

Instacart shares surged more than 40% before ending their first day of trading 12% higher, a modest debut that nonetheless could pave the way for more tech IPOs. The San Francisco startup priced its initial public offering at $30 a share late Monday, raising about $660 million in cash. Under the ticker CART, shares on Tuesday jumped to nearly $43 before ending the day at $33.70, giving it a

Instacart shares surged more than 40% before ending their first day of trading 12% higher, a modest debut that nonetheless could pave the way for more tech IPOs. The San Francisco startup priced its initial public offering at $30 a share late Monday, raising about $660 million in cash. Under the ticker CART, shares on Tuesday jumped to nearly $43 before ending the day at $33.70, giving it a

Elon Musk may replace some of the high-interest debt he used to finance his takeover of Twitter with new margin loans backed by Tesla stock, reported Bloomberg . The news outlet said bankers led by Morgan Stanley and Musk’s advisers have discussed a refinancing to lower the burden of the $13 billion in debt, which saddles the business with $1.3 billion in annual interest costs. An exodus of

Facebook could allow former President Donald Trump back on the social network after the suspension of his account expires early next year, said Nick Clegg, president of global affairs for Facebook-parent Meta Platforms. Clegg, speaking at an event hosted by new media outlet Semafor in Washington,…

John Foley, the co-founder of Peloton, has resigned as executive chair, the company said late Monday. The move, announced alongside another executive departure, marks the end of Foley’s tenure at the internet-connected bike company, which benefited from a surge in demand during the pandemic shutdow…