September 6th Newsletter

Fresh from this morning, the U.S. economy added 142,000 jobs in August, slightly below expectations of 161,000, with unemployment falling to 4.2%. Part-time employment surged while full-time jobs declined. Wage growth exceeded forecasts at 0.4% monthly and 3.8% annually. This data, along with recent weak unemployment data from ADP and job openings reports, adds more complexity to the Fed's rate cut decision. Stock Market had its worst fall on Wednesday since August 5th of this year. The tech sector was hit particularly hard, with Nvidia suffering a record $279 billion market cap loss in a single day. Oil markets saw unexpected inventory drops of 7.4 million barrels, with U.S. crude hitting a 9-month low of $69.19/bbl. The Federal Reserve's Beige Book revealed stagnant or declining economic activity across 9 of 12 regions, underscoring the complex landscape facing investors. Amidst this economic uncertainty, the tech world continues to innovate, with Apple's September 9th event promising to showcase the first iPhone equipped with Apple Intelligence at launch, while the AI Conference is set to take place on September 10-11 on Pier 27 in San Francisco.

Top 5 AI highlights

[1] The 2024 TIME100 AI list spotlights influential leaders in AI, including Sundar Pichai and Meredith Whittaker, excluding Elon Musk. The list, dominated by tech giants, reflects AI's rapid evolution, growing real-world impact, and industry concerns about safety. Details on Times.

[2] 💡Safe Superintelligence (SSI), founded by Ilya Sutskever (OpenAI co-founder), Daniel Gross (Apple veteran), and Daniel Levy (OpenAI researcher), has raised $1 billion in seed funding, achieving a $5 billion valuation in under 3 months of inception. The impressive funding round attracted notable investors, including NFDG (managed by Nat Friedman and Daniel Gross), as well as prominent venture capital firms a16z, Sequoia, DST Global, and SV Angel. Read more on their site.

[3]  💼 Salesforce is bolstering its AI and cloud capabilities with two key acquisitions. The company will purchase AI voice agent developer Tenyx, enhancing its Agentforce platform, with the deal closing by October 31, 2024. Additionally, Salesforce will acquire Own Co. for $1.9 billion to improve cloud backup services, set to finalize by January 2025.  More information on Own and Tenyx.

[4] 🌐 Startup Grind's AI Month in September offers global events and workshops to help startups integrate AI, optimize operations, and remain competitive. The initiative provides valuable insights and strategies for leveraging AI in the evolving tech landscape, supporting startup growth and innovation. The event schedule is here.

[5] 🚗 Volkswagen introduces AI-powered voice assistant IDA with ChatGPT integration in select car models. Rolling out on September 6th, the feature combines local and cloud-based processing. Available in 2024-2025 models with subscription and free trials, it sparks discussions on AI's impact on automotive technology and user experience. Details on the Verge.

Founder’s Corner

Paul Graham’s Founder Mode 

What we read and listened to this week

• Disney pulls ESPN, ABC, and Hulu from DirecTV in a contract dispute over carriage fees and bundled services (CBS).

• Intel explores strategic options amid stock decline, while new "Lunar Lake" chips promise top-tier performance (CNBC)(TheVerge)(Stratechery).

• NASA identified strange Starliner noises as audio feedback from its connection with the space station(ARS).

• J&J owes Auris shareholders $1 billion for breaching the 2019 merger, neglecting iPlatform technology development (Reuters).

• Verizon acquires Frontier for $20B, expanding its fiber network and boosting revenue with synergies (VZN).

AI M&A and Fundraising news

September 6:

• Agree.com: AI-powered document signing platform, raised a $3M Pre-Seed round.

September 5:

• Acuvity: AI governance platform, raised a $9M Seed round.

• All Hands AI: AI agents for coding, raised a $5M Seed round.

• Capsa AI: AI-powered due diligence for PE, raised a $2.2M Seed round.

• Sedric: Compliance copilot, raised a $18.5M Series A.

• ZipBio: AI platform for Therapeutic development, raised a $4M Seed round.

September 4:

• Blitz: AI coding automation, raised a $4.4M Seed round.

• Entalpic: AI materials discovery, raised a $8.5M Seed round.

• Paradigm: AI for spreadsheets, raised a $2M Seed round.

• Revefi: AI data operations platform, raised a $20M Series A.

• Root Signal: LLM response evaluations, raised a $2.8M Seed round.

• Sakana.ai: Japan AI foundational model, raised a $132M Series A.

• You.com: AI-powered search platform, raised $50M Series B.

• Zive: AI knowledge management, raised a $3.2M Pre-Seed round

September 3:

• Approveit: AI-driven operation/automation platform, raised $1M.

• Champion: AI customer advocacy platform, raised a $3.3M Seed round.

• Mintlify: AI for software documentation, raised a $18.5M Series A.

• Monda: AI data monetization platform, raised a $5M Seed round.

• Palm: AI treasury management platform, raised a $6M Seed round.

• Salesforce acquired Tenyx, an AI-powered voice agent.

• Treble: Sound automation/synthetic audio, raised a $11M Series A.

September 2:

• Samsung Medison acquires Sonio, an AI ultrasound startup, for $95.1M.

Attached to this email, you’ll find a summary of this week’s highlights and the financial performance of select public companies, providing you with a snapshot of recent market movements.