Setting standards and spacing out 🗒️
Necessary Nuggets
Happy Wednesday! If you’re new here, welcome to Necessary Nuggets, your one-stop pre-seed shop. We deliver updates from Necessary Ventures and helpful tidbits on our little corner of the world. Every edition is also on our blog.
Jobortunities 🚨
✨NEW FEATURED ROLE✨
Nevoya: First fully-electric trucking fleet in the United States, helping truckers trade gas-guzzling for environment-protecting. Get involved and tackle unsolved problems in the trucking industry.
Taro: Taro increases access to healthcare while reducing costs and physician burnout via direct primary care based health insurance.
| Product Engineer |
Reach out with any questions! All 136 open job postings are listed here.
Market Stirrings đźš©
Here's what the week looked like in pre-seed:
$875k
Total Amount Raised
8
Total Funding Rounds
$109k
Average Dollars per Round
$364k-$1.1M
Estimated Valuation Range
Data aggregated from proprietary research and Crunchbase; valuation estimate based on 10-20% ownership stake.
CLIMATE'S CLIMB
VC funds are experiencing a better climate for climate. Climate VC funds raised $3.4 billion so far in 2024, compared to $3.9 billion for the entirety of 2023. At the current pace, climate VC funds could raise double the amount of capital they did last year. Interestingly, the number of funds is significantly lower, sitting at 18 funds closed so far in 2024 versus 38 funds closed in 2023.
Good Reads đź“–
For the rushed reader …
The Carbon Removal Standards Initiative (CRSI) launched this week with a mission to create standards for carbon dioxide removal.
Lyft is piloting a new feature called Price Lock to address primetime inconsistencies and attract new customers from competitors.
With rapid advancements in AI, spatial intelligence is emerging as the next potential “it” tech and would allow computers to dynamically interact with the physical world.
For the less rushed reader …
NOT ANOTHER CARBON COPY: Carbon dioxide removal efforts are turning up the heat. The Carbon Removal Standards Initiative (CRSI) launched this week with a mission to create standards for carbon dioxide removal. As concerns grow about which technologies are viable, the CRSI will provide much-needed oversight and technical assistance to regulators and organizations working on carbon removal policies. CRSI pocketed initial funding from Breakthrough Energy Ventures. The project has already put together a publicly available database with academic papers and other resources so people can read up before they remove up. CRSI means serious business.
CAN-DO ATTITUDE: Catch a Lyft of this attempt to capture new business. Lyft is piloting a new feature called Price Lock to address primetime (AKA surge pricing) inconsistencies and attract new customers from competitors like Uber. For those that detest price surges during rush hour, Price Lock will cap the price of a ride on a specific route at a specific time. In an effort to beat out the more expensive competition, Lyft has made a concerted effort over the past year to reduce the number of rides impacted by surge pricing, decreasing that number 25% quarter-over-quarter. Price Lock is the next hot step in that plan. The best part? CEO David Risher announced this is Lyft’s way to “open up a can of whoop ass on primetime.”
AN IDEA FROM SPACE: Could spatial intelligence be the next big tech that overshadows the ChatGPT buzz? With rapid advancements in AI, spatial intelligence is emerging as the next potential “it” tech and would allow computers to dynamically interact with the physical world. If successfully trained on complex spatial reasoning, computers could move and react autonomously in physical space. Stanford University professor Fei-Fei Li launched a startup called World Labs in April that serves as one example of spatial intelligence being put to work. Her goal is to develop AI capable of human-like processing of visual data, able to predict what something would look like in three-dimensional space based on an image. World Labs is already valued at over $1 billion. Who knew something babies learn when they’re a year and a half old could have so much hype?
Fire Up the Pre-Seeds🔥
Check out details on the pre-seed raises from the past week:
healthtech
100XBIO - T-easing out biotech innovation.
100XBIO raised $25k at an $8 million pre-money valuation. 100XBIO is creating efficiencies for immunotherapy by delivering 100x more data on T cells.
iCardio.ai - A startup that’s heart to beat.
iCardio.ai raised $100k from Cedars-Sinai Accelerator. iCardio.ai is automating ultrasound interpretation using machine learning. Earlier this year, it received FDA Breakthrough Device Designation for automated detection of aortic stenosis.
MDandMe - Like Bumble BFF for patients and doctors.
MDandMe recently raised $500k. MDandMe is creating a gen-AI-powered platform to help people make sense of their health, so everyone has a doctor BFF they can talk to.
climatetech
Scout Climate - The climate funding genie in a lantern.
Scout Climate raised $250k from Lorimer Ventures and Forum Ventures. Scout is playing matchmaker using advanced algorithms to help companies acquire the climate grants they need.
Outro🚪
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Thanks for reading, and see you next week!
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