Inside Startup Battlefield is back in our feed with episode three. There are 180 companies solving crucial problems that didn’t make it to the Disrupt stage, but that doesn’t mean they’re making any less of an impact. TechCrunch writers Devin Coldewey and Harri Weber take us on a walk through the Expo Hall and let us listen into their conversations with a handful of the most interesting companies in the Battlefield 200. New episodes of Inside Startup Battlefield drop every Monday. Be sure to check out all of the other podcasts in the TechCrunch Podcast Network: Found, Equity, The TechCrunch Podcast, Chain Reaction and The TechCrunch Live Podcast.

Alex is back and bringing our Monday show off the page and into your ears bright and early. Today, he got into: a rise in stocks, crypto, and NFTs, the US turning its attention to the Adobe-Figma deal, more layoffs at Twitter, and why the fintech market is not dead, and startup news with ProsperOps and Flock.

This week Natasha, Mary Ann, and Becca Szkutak welcome back a familiar voice - Alex Wilhelm! We had the whole gang back together to dig through the week's pile of news: FreshToHome, Den, and Klarna's recent deals, the possible return of IPOs, an accelerator backing startups of laid off tech workers, and accountability at the early stage.

This week, Natasha interviewed Kaisa Snellman, an economic sociologist and an associate Professor of Organizational Behavior and Academic Director of the INSEAD Gender Initiative. (We know, we know, it's a flex.) We talked about Kaisa’s recent Harvard Business Review piece with Isabelle Solal: For Female Founders, Fundraising Only from Female VCs Comes at a Cost. 

Inside Startup Battlefield is back in our feed with episode two. In the second episode of Inside Startup Battlefield, we take a trip to TechCrunch Disrupt 2022 to hear pitches from the top five companies: Aaron Hall from Intropic Materials, Elizabeth Lawler from App Map, Chad Mason from Advanced Ionics, Sheeba Dawood from Minerva Lithium, Tim Lichti from Swap Robotics. We get to know the companies and the unique problems they’re solving through their pitches and the judges’ follow-up questions. Plus we hear from our host and Battlefield Editor, Neesha Tambe, about what working with each company was like. New episodes of Inside Startup Battlefield drop every Monday. Be sure to check out all of the other podcasts in the TechCrunch Podcast Network: Found, Equity, The TechCrunch Podcast, Chain Reaction and The TechCrunch Live Podcast.

This week, Natasha, Mary Ann Azevedo and Becca got on the mic to talk startups, pet peeves and focaccia. Oh, we also talked about deals of the week: Descope's $53 million seed round, Phenomenal Ventures' new fund, and a Mexican neobank's latest raise. For our themes, we dug deeper into BNPL woes, VC advice to those impacted by tech layoffs, and the EU's tech scene

This week, Natasha interviewed Elana Berkowitz, founding partner at Springbank Collective and an early-stage investor working to close the gender gap. The pair dug into what people are missing when they talk about women's health, how to build a venture firm that wants to disrupt the way the world thinks about care, and the big opportunities out there to keep women in the workforce (and the low hanging fruit that we should all be thinking about).

Check out the newest podcast from the TechCrunch Podcast Network: Inside Startup Battlefield, the four-part series that takes you behind TechCrunch’s Startup Battlefield competition. In this episode, our host and Startup Battlefield Editor Neesha Tambe breaks down how the Battlefield companies are selected for the TechCrunch Disrupt stage. Then we take a deep dive into what makes a pitch perfect with pitch coach and TechCrunch writer Haje Jan Kamps and Startup Battlefield judge and VC Nisha Dua. You’ll also hear from: Julia Somerdin from Labby, Young-Jae Kim and Tara Peters from Anthill, Quddus Pativada from Digest AI, Blessing Adesiyan from Mother honestly, Hikari Senju from Omneky, Mitch Tolson from Ally robotics, Elizabeth Lawler from App map, Aaron Hall from Intropic materials. Sheeba Dawood from Minerva. New episodes of Inside Startup Battlefield drop every Monday. Be sure to check out all of the other podcasts in the TechCrunch Podcast Network: Found, Equity, The TechCrunch Podcast, Chain Reaction and The TechCrunch Live Podcast.

Natasha, Becca, and Mary Ann are wrapping up the week with deals from Partech, ShiftMed, and Rebellyous, an update on two companies we (somehow) haven't talked about in the past few weeks, the latest on Stripe, and an analysis of the AI funding space.

This week, Natasha interviewed Cleo’s chief business officer, SJ Sacchetti. We spoke about nearly every theme most founders and chief executives are too scared to talk about: ego, stepping down and becoming a “statistic” and why a company needs to succeed without you.

Today, Natasha got into the latest headlines from SoftBank CEO Masayoshi Son's absence on the Japanese conglomerates' earnings call, Getarounds NYSE warning, the hr-tech-meets-edtech-meets-fintech startup, Minu, and some serial founders in the startup space.

For our deals of the week, Natasha and Becca talked about Artifact, the new startup from the previous co-founders of Instagram, Spill, a new Twitter alternative that raised pre-seed funding, and Disclo, a startup looking to make it easier for individuals to seek accommodations for their disabilities at work. Then we chatted about the recent flurry of new venture funds and what the timing of these announcements says about where the VC market is at right now. We wrapped up the day with climate tech and how the recent wave of startups in the sector is a promising sign.

This week, Mary Ann is taking over and sitting down with Hans Tung, managing partner of GGV Capital, to talk through how companies can weather a downturn - early and late stage alike - along with his new initiative around embedded fintech.

This Monday, Natasha talks all about recent fintech M&A, Stripe, the latecomer advantage in startups, Atomos' $16 million round, and funding trends form Black Web3 founders

This week, Natasha, Mary Ann and Becca took the mic to talk through deals of the week, All Raise's CEO departure, what Google's antitrust lawsuit means for startups, how the downturn impacted the way companies are hiring and why femtech stood out in 2022.

This week, Natasha interviewed Sarah Oh, the co-founder of T2, a Twitter rival, and Twitter's former Human Rights advisor. Sarah also spent time traveling around the world to help companies build safer, more responsible companies.

Natasha is back in the Bay after five weeks away, so some could say: San Francisco is back. She started off with some big tech news for Salesforce, Thoma Bravo, and Microsoft, then hopped into the Big Idea around VC's dry powder, and ended with some good news, some bad news and what to look out for in the startup world

This week, Natasha Mascarenhas, Mary Ann Azevedo and Rebecca Szkutak jumped on the mic to talk through a diverse news week, including deals from Sophia Amoruso's new fund, Welcome Homes, and Carry1st and a look at the State of Venture, compliment-focused social media, and Microsoft's latest round of layoffs.

This Wednesday, Natasha interviewed Roger Lee, an entrepreneur who's spent the better part of a decade building tools for employees and employers alike. Lee is the creator of Layoffs.FYI and co-founder of Comprehensive and Human Interest.

Thanks to a long weekend here in the US, we're bringing you Equity Monday on a Tuesday! With much to catch up in, Natasha has the latest on good news in crypto, unicorn trends (or a lack thereof) in Africa, Stripe's internal valuation cuts, Clearco's executive shakeups, and a new Twitter rival.

Natasha, Mary Ann, Becca are back with your weekly roundup to talk about the latest and greatest in tech: incoming deals from Inflow, Deel and Fidelity, layoffs and lawsuits at Carta, Microsoft's deal with ChatGPT and OpenAI, and SBF's Substack debut.

This week, Natasha chatted with Haje Kamps and Brian Heater about CES which took place last week over in the ever-exciting Las Vegas area. All of our fantastic CES coverage can be found on the site, but for the purposes of today's show, we tried to keep it analytical, chatty and, at times, even a bit robotic. (You'll see what we mean).

Natasha is starting the week with a look at Vista Equity Partners' acquisition of Duck Creek, the generative AI bubble, Magic Leap's comeback, and Black founder funding trends

Natasha and Mary Ann were joined by Equity regular Becca Szkutak for the first Friday episode of the year. The crew took a look at some early standouts from CES, USV and Doorstead's deals of the week, the latest development in the FTX and SBF saga, and an exploration into how laid off talent is rethinking risk for their next jobs.

Happy New Year and welcome to 2023! Natasha is kicking things off with our first episode of the year. Here's what she got into: Tesla stocks, new Meta acquisitions, Matrix, and a look at CES.