NVTC Newsletter No. 7
Back at you again with another Tech Tuesday. For those new here, welcome to the NVTC weekly newsletter! Here you’ll find recent updates from the tech world, insightful articles related to startups and highlights from NV portfolio companies.
THIS WEEK’S FEATURES ⚡
🤝 Got Questions Keeping You Up at Night? – Fellow member Mariano Pennini, a software engineer who left Bloomberg for fintech startup Spade, will be answering any questions you have for him for next week’s newsletter.
⭐ An AWSome Deal – BMW’s “Neue Klasse” features new AWS software.
⭐ The Lowdown on LBOs – No, it doesn’t stand for lobotomy.
⭐ Chef’s Specialty Petri Dish – Lab-grown meat. Yummy!
📈 Tech Failures – Does anyone remember Google Glass?
GET TO KNOW NVTC 🤝
Meet fellow NVTC member, Mariano Pennini. Mariano is a software engineer with software development experience across numerous initiatives. During his time at Johns Hopkins, he interned at Paypal and Tile, the pioneer in “finding” technology that was eventually acquired by Life360. Mariano went on to work on ESG data infrastructure at Bloomberg LP before joining Spade, a fintech startup backed by YCombinator. Spade is building a transaction enrichment API which allows fintech companies to underwrite, identify fraud, and better understand their customers.
For next week’s newsletter, Mariano will be answering any questions NVTC has for him. This is a great opportunity to ask the hard questions I’m sure many of you have about what it’s like to switch from a big tech company to the startup world. Reply to this email with any questions you’d like me to include for Mariano.
Some example questions I’ll be asking:
What most influenced your decision to make the switch from Bloomberg (a large tech company) to Spade (an early-stage startup)?
What draws you to working in the fintech sector?
How has your role transformed as a software engineer at Spade compared to Bloomberg?
NV PORTFOLIO HIGHLIGHT 🎢
What happens when a former growth and operations manager at Uber and a former financial controller at Amazon meet? This is the story of Carlos Lau and Luis Ubillas and how they founded Kurios. Lau and Ubillas noticed a gap in digital skills in Latin America. They combined their knowledge in tech to build a company solely dedicated to digitalization in Latin America and supporting the exponential growth tech companies in the region are already experiencing.
Kurios offers state-of-the-art training programs for professionals. The company’s service is a unique combination of self-paced learning and live sessions, allowing employees to work and study with ease. Students receive top-notch instruction from highly talented professionals coming out of tech companies like Google, Amazon, and Stripe.
Kurios offers four major programs that cater to B2B businesses. Large enterprises represent 80 percent of its client base, and the remainder consists of startups and small- to medium-sized businesses. At the pre-seed stage, Kurios has seen incredible results so far, boasting a course completion rate of 90% and an annual customer retention rate of 100%. In addition to NV, other investors include YCombinator, Harvard Management Company, Austen Allred (CEO of Lambda School / Bloom Tech), and ed tech investors like Rethink Education and Dunce Capital.
NEWS & ARTICLES 📖
AWS software will be integrated into BMW’s future lineup of electric vehicles for its “Neue Klasse” platform. This platform will process three times the amount of data compared to the current generation of car models. The data will be used to develop new digital products and will lay the groundwork for future autonomous driving features.
Here’s a more in-depth review of the Twitter Deal and the workings of leveraged buyouts (LBOs). Musk is playing the role of the private equity firm, financing $46.5 billion through a combination of equity contribution and a debt package from big Wall Street banks. If the LBO happens, Twitter is on the hook for billions of dollars more in debt on its balance sheet.
Kaley’s Comment: The top ten largest LBOs in history include companies like HJ Heinz, Dell, Hilton Worldwide, HCA Healthcare, and TXU Energy. Where does Twitter compare? Twitter’s valuation at around $44 billion makes this the largest LBO in history and the fourth-largest deal where a company was bought and taken private.
Over the past few years, we’ve watched as autonomous driving trended in investor circles, increasingly hailed as the go-to tech of the future. Now, profits are down, and stocks related to LiDAR and self-driving vehicles are being sold off. A Crunchbase analysis showed that 14 companies that went public over the past couple years experienced an average post-debut decline of more than 80%.
It may not be Veganuary yet, but vegetarianism is still all the rage. With increased industrialization of animal products, concerns about animal cruelty and environmental impact are heightening. More and more companies are questioning the status-quo and developing new ways to produce meat without raising animals for slaughter. Lab-grown meat is a new area which takes sample animal cells and then multiplies them in the lab.
Kaley’s Comment: The alternative meat market is chockful of startups coming behind Impossible™ and Beyond Meat. Startup Gourmey recently raised $47.7 million dollars in a Series A round with the goal of building Europe’s largest lab for cultivated meat. In 2020, Eat Just received the world’s first approval for cultured meats. Why the hype? Lab-grown meat has the potential to reduce the negative health effects of meat-eating, decrease the growing threat of antibiotic resistance, and minimize our carbon footprint. Biden’s executive order on biomanufacturing further suggests a push for commercialization of meat grown from animal cells.
Although the metaverse has its fair share of skeptics, many also laud it as the second coming of the internet. Its promotion of hyperconnectivity and artificial intelligence has the capacity to fully reimagine human interaction, one example being the doctor-patient experience. The metaverse can train and test in ways impossible in real life, lending new opportunities for physical therapy, cognitive therapy, and rehabilitation.
STARTUP SNIPPETS 🔮
Pillow: an all-in-one platform designed to help newbies save, spend, and invest in crypto
The raise: $18 million in Series A financing
Telda: an Egyptian consumer money app
The raise: $20 million in seed funding from GFC, Sequoia Capital, and Block
TripActions: a Californian business travel startup near decacorn status
The raise: $304 million at a $9.2 billion valuation
Alloy Therapeutics: a company developing new biologic modalities to accelerate drug discovery
The raise: $42 Million in Series D financing
This social media app to mitigate isolation on college campuses is taking over Stanford.
TWITTER HIGHLIGHT 📈
Warren Craddock, a Senior Software Engineer who describes himself as having led a “fun and meandering career” at companies like Google, Lytro, Intersil, and now Waymo, took to Twitter to explain his perspective on why tech fails.
In a hefty, 21-tweet series, we get a glimpse into some of the most interesting downfalls in tech. He guides readers on a product development journey from the Lytro lightfield cameras to Google Glass to Google Clips.
Here are some highlights I picked out, but head over here to get the full story:
OUTRO
Feel free to reply to this email with all questions, feedback, or comments. We’ll be iterating and curating the NVTC newsletter according to your interests.
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