Today on Equity, Alex is back on the mic and talking through the latest for stocks and crypto, Planity's hefty Series C, TikTok in trouble (again), and a slew of M&A in Startup Land.

On today's news round up, Alex, Mary Ann and Karyne are talking through Deals of the Week from Rasa, Hippo Harvest, and a startup at the intersection of AI and crypto. We're also digging deep into venture capital’s year of transition and YC’s new call for startups.

Welcome to our Wednesday show, in which we talk through the week’s leading startup and venture capital news. Today we have an absolute pile of material, so let’s get to work: Bret Taylor’s new startup is turning heads: Known for his work at Facebook, Salesforce and OpenAI, Taylor’s new startup Sierra is building conversational AI agents. It has raised a mountain of capital to date, which it might need given that it’s not alone in its niche. FlowFi’s counter-cultural decision: FlowFi is building software to help startups keep their books more intelligently. But it’s not going to try and replace human inputs into financial work. Instead, it’s pairing its software with a labor marketplace so that startups can blend human and computer intelligence. If this means more GAAP accounting for startups, we’re here for it. Bold and Antithesis snag new capital: Bold raised $50 million for its Latin American fintech business, in good news for the sector and region that once went together like peanut butter and honey. Meanwhile Antithesis raised $47 million for its software testing service. Homebrew up, Foundry out: Homebrew is putting together an interesting new $50 million fund, while Foundry has announced that after its current, $500 million fund, it’s out of the game.

This morning we have an interesting mix of stories, which bring technology, politics and AI together in interesting ways. To work: Stocks: It’s another big week for earnings, including Hubspot, Instacart, Monday.com, and Cisco. We should learn a lot about the state of software and hardware sales as last year ended, and what some critical tech names see for the rest of the year. Crypto: Prices are up in the crypto world over the last week. Coinbase reports this week as well, which should give us a feel for how optimistic the leading North American crypto company is feeling. Waymo: Some folks set fire to a Waymo car in San Francisco. Which is so goddamned dumb that I would pull my hair out if I had any. Bugcrowd: A $102 million round? You love to see it. Mega-rounds have become less common in recent quarters, so when bug-bounty-focused Bugcrowd put together just such a round, we had to talk about it. AI field trips: No matter where you are founded, you are going to need to keep tabs on the AI work going on in Silicon Valley.

Today on Equity, we're digging deep into our favorite deals of the week from Starship Technologies and Ambience Healthcare, why Adam Neumann wants to buy WeWork from bankruptcy. We'll also discuss LatAm startups that are seeing success, earnings, ad spend, and the state of the economy.

We're taking a deep look at a number of startup fundraisings, including new capital for vertical saas, fintech and edtech, how quickly SUMA Wealth is growing, why Bluesky is flying high. We're also taking a look at a new early stage fund in Europe and a crypto app with real traction - we promise.

On today's episode, Crypto price movements after the spot Bitcoin ETF, yet another reason for investors to think twice about working with Russian companies, and we close it out by wondering if every startup is now an AI startups.

This week on Equity, we're going over startup raises that caught our eye and bigger deals of the week, including Zum's $140M round, why Ramp is on an acquisition spree, and how the tech layoff season simply refuses to fade away.

This is our interview show, and today we're bringing Anshu Sharma back on the podcast. Last time Sharma was on, the Skyflow CEO riffed with us on interest rates and business cycles. This time, we wanted to talk to him about the Apple Vision Pro and how it fares against a theory he recently blogged about for TechCrunch: The Innovator's Dilemma.

This is our startup-focused, Wednesday episode, so today we’re counting down important venture rounds and chatting our way through other startup and VC news. This week, Plex targets profitability, Rebellions aims to take on Nvidia and Nile is building a new data system for SaaS. We'll also take a look at new funds from Giant Ventures, SMOK Ventures and Ubiquity Ventures.

Today on Equity, we're taking a look at how Arc's new mobile app is taking on Google search, why it might finally be time for Reddit's IPO, why Meta hearts Apple, and...what Garry said.

This week, we invited Senior Data Editor at Crunchbase News Gené Teare to come back on the podcast. We'll dig into Q4 2023 venture capital results, and what is coming up this year. Gené and Alex are talking stages, sectors — including both AI and web3 — and where we are seeing both weakness, and strength.

This week on Equity, Plural VC announces a new fund, Fantuan teams up with Chowbus, Vroom leaves the car selling business, and we chat through what's happening over at Brex.

This is our startup-focused, Wednesday episode, so today we're counting down important venture rounds, and chatting our way through other startup and VC news. This week, Artisse AI raised a new round, Bilt Rewards was proof that fintech is still alive and kicking, and there's new M&A in Venture Capital Land.

Equity is starting the week with a look at stocks, crypto's post-ETF boom, the newest AI unicorn, how Canva is getting bigger, and developer sentiment around the Apple Vision Pro.

Today on Equity, Alex and Mary Ann are chewing through funding rounds galore from Pomelo, Tandem and Briq. We also discuss how C-Suite executives feel about AI and the enterprise, and the potential for valuations to recover in 2024.

Today on Equity, we invited Cowboy Ventrues’ Aileen Lee to chat through her massive new entry concerning the unicorn world. If you didn’t know, Lee initially coined the term “unicorn” in a TechCrunch article back in 2013. Together, Alex, Mary Ann and Aileen are diving deep into how the concept has evolved over the last 10 years, where unicorns are based today, why seed rounds are getting bigger, and what we can expect from US unicorns in the decade to come.

Our newly revamped Wednesday show focuses on all things startups and venture capital. This week, we're digging into raises from Vertice, Electra, and Build a Rocket Boy, and what Thomvest plans to do with its new $250 million fund.

Today on Equity, we're covering the weekend's headlines and prepping for the week ahead with a look at stocks around the world, key earnings and what's happening with crypto. Elsewhere, Uber is shutting down Drizly, Spot Technologies and Kuda are raising fresh capital, and changes are coming for Apple, Microsoft and OpenAI.

This week, we talked to Jenny Fielding, co-founder and managing partner at Everywhere Ventures, a founder collective and early-stage (think pre-seed) venture firm. Besides founding her own venture firm, Jenny previously worked as a managing director for accelerator Techstars and founded several companies including mobile software company Switch Mobile, which was acquired by Via One. Jenny and Mary Ann discussed a wide variety of topics, including startups’ flight to quality in 2024 and how smaller firms are competing with larger firms in the current investment landscape. We also dug into the “great VC resignation” so stay through to the end for that.

This week on Equity, Shimmer raises fresh capital to offer 1:1 personalized ADHD coaching, vacation rental startup Overmoon shows impressive growth, and we're also taking a deeper look at how the IPO window is reopening in 2024. We grabbed our friends Kirsten Korosec and Haje Jan Kamps to close out the show and bring us the latest from CES.

This is our newly revamped Wednesday episode, and we’re going to be digging deep into critical startup and venture capital news. This week, PhotoRoom is raising more money, Treasure Financial is cutting staff, and two micromobility companies are tying the knot to try and use scale to their advantage. We'll also take a look at what's going on in the world of AI hardware, why Keith Rabois is heading back to Khosla Ventures, and Seedstars Africa Ventures added $30 million to its upcoming fund.

Equity is kicking off the week with an update on Bitcoin ETFs, why Carta is in trouble (again), new competition for SpaceX in the form of the ULA, and what we're keeping an eye out for ahead of the GPT store launch.

This week on Equity, we kicked things off with news of Ruth Foxe Blader leaving Anthemis to launch Foxe Capital and Exponent announcing their second fund. We then dove deep into layoffs and shutdowns for Frontdesk and Countdown Capital, respectively, and new efforts to support tech startups in both Israel and Palestine.

Today, we’re bringing you a special mini episode led by TechCrunch’s very own Morgan Sung. During this year’s Disrupt, Morgan caught up with Shruti Dwivedi, the co-founder and CEO of health-tech startup, Duly. Duly, which is focused on simplifying & personalizing contraception for young women in India & beyond, was part of this year’s Startup Battlefield 200. The pair talked about the stigma around contraception, cultural roadblocks Duly faces that its US and UK counterparts may not have to consider and of course, what’s next for the startup.