Webtagr - Technology News Summarizer

Supabase Raises $200M Series D, Valued at $2B

2025-04-22

Open-source application development platform Supabase announced a $200 million Series D funding round, bringing its valuation to $2 billion. Accel led the round, with participation from Coatue, Y Combinator, and others. Investors went to extraordinary lengths, with Accel partners even visiting the CEO in New Zealand to finalize the deal. Supabase aims to be a one-stop backend for developers, boasting 2 million developers and 3.5 million databases. Its success is attributed to its focus on the database layer, its understanding of the 'vibe coding' trend, and its remote-first culture attracting top talent globally.

(finance.yahoo.com)

Startup

FTC Sues Uber Over Deceptive Subscription Practices

2025-04-21

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) today filed a lawsuit against Uber, alleging that the ride-sharing and delivery company charged consumers for its Uber One subscription service without consent, failed to deliver promised savings, and made it difficult for users to cancel despite a 'cancel anytime' promise. FTC Chair Andrew N. Ferguson stated that Americans are tired of unwanted subscriptions that are nearly impossible to cancel. The FTC alleges Uber not only deceived consumers but also made cancellation unreasonably difficult. The complaint details deceptive billing and cancellation practices, including falsely advertised savings, obscured subscription information, unauthorized charges, and an excessively complex cancellation process. The FTC contends Uber's actions violate the FTC Act and the Restore Online Shoppers' Confidence Act (ROSCA).

(www.ftc.gov)

Startup

The Unexpected Origins of the NYSE: Buttonwood, Tontines, and a Coffee House

2025-04-21

This article unveils the surprising history of the New York Stock Exchange. While the Buttonwood Agreement of 1792 laid the groundwork, the subsequent development hinges on the Tontine Coffee House. Funded by a unique annuity-like scheme called a tontine – a blend of retirement planning and lottery – the coffee house became a hub for early traders. Investors received dividends until death, with remaining funds increasing the payouts for survivors. This unusual financial instrument, combined with the coffee house's central role, ultimately led to the evolution of the modern NYSE. The story highlights the fascinating evolution of finance and the impact of an archaic financial tool on the modern financial system.

(tontinecoffeehouse.com)

Startup Financial History NYSE

Headset Bridge: Real-Time Inventory Management Drives Cannabis Sales Growth

2025-04-20

Headset Bridge's VMI software provides real-time tracking of sell-through and inventory with dispensary partners, optimizing reorders, targeting marketing efforts, and informing product development. David Craig (CMO) highlights improved collaboration, James Duncan (Director of Sales) emphasizes the value of real-time sales data tracking, and Lauren Marshall (Regional Sales Manager) notes real-time inventory allocation based on sales velocity to maximize revenue and prevent stockouts.

(420.headset.io)

Startup inventory management cannabis sales

Why AI Can't Replace Top Sales Performers: The Irreplaceable Human Element

2025-04-18

A VP of Sales faces pressure from his CEO to replace human sellers with AI. Analyzing a recent $2.7 million deal, he reveals AI's inability to replicate human skills like building rapport, embodying accountability, reacting swiftly to competition, and navigating complex client relationships. He uses the 'HUMAN' framework (Humanity, Understanding, Metrics, Action) to successfully argue for retaining his sales team and even increase the budget for top performers. The article emphasizes that while AI assists, it cannot fully replace the emotional intelligence, judgment, and flexibility of human sales professionals.

(lewislin.substack.com)

Startup

Dot: Hiring its First Customer Success/Sales Engineer

2025-04-18

AI data analysis startup Dot is hiring its first Customer Success/Sales Engineer. This hybrid role encompasses the entire customer journey, from onboarding and support to pre-sales technical evaluations. You'll bridge the gap between product and user, collaborating closely with founders and engineering to maximize customer value. The ideal candidate possesses experience with data warehouses, BI tools, and SQL, along with strong technical troubleshooting, communication, and sales skills. This is a chance to join a small but impactful team, working directly with founders and making a significant contribution to data-driven teams.

(www.ycombinator.com)

Startup AI data analysis Customer Success

Startup Funding: What Money Can and Can't Buy

2025-04-18

This article explores the role of money in startup funding. The author argues that while money solves many problems—marketing, hiring, coding—crucial elements like team building, market positioning, and strategic decision-making are beyond its reach. Successful startups balance both: using funds to accelerate growth while demonstrating the ability to overcome challenges without money, such as A/B testing to optimize products and adapting strategies based on customer feedback. Proving your ability to learn, adapt, and innovate convinces investors your project is worth funding.

(longform.asmartbear.com)

Startup

Buffett's $334B Cash Hoard: Waiting for the Fed

2025-04-17

Berkshire Hathaway, led by Warren Buffett, holds a staggering $334 billion in cash, enough to buy the bottom 476 companies in the S&P 500. However, last year Buffett quietly offloaded stocks, including Apple and Bank of America, even liquidating his holdings in S&P 500 ETFs. This move preceded a sharp drop in the Nasdaq and S&P 500. Instead of buying the dip, Buffett is waiting for the Federal Reserve to act, mirroring his approach during the 2020 pandemic when he only invested after the Fed's rate cuts and stimulus. Buffett's strategy is simple: don't overpay, and if nothing is cheap, buy your own company.

(www.mitrade.com)

Startup Buffett Berkshire Hathaway Investment Strategy

OneSignal Embraces Flexible Work

2025-04-16

OneSignal prioritizes workplace flexibility to foster productivity and employee happiness. Recognizing diverse needs across roles, teams, and individuals, they support both fully remote and hybrid work models. Headquartered in San Mateo, CA, they also offer shared workspaces in various locations (CA, NY, UT, PA, WA, and TX) to facilitate collaboration. Globally, they maintain an office in London and a shared workspace in Singapore in partnership with Piloto Asia.

(onesignal.com)

Startup

Tract's Post-Mortem: Why a UK Proptech Startup Failed

2025-04-16

Tract, a UK proptech startup, aimed to tackle Britain's housing crisis by streamlining planning permissions. After raising £744,000 in pre-seed funding, they iterated through several business models, including developer site-sourcing, free landowner appraisals, acting as a tech-enabled land promoter, and finally, an AI-powered planning document platform. Despite building technically impressive products, Tract ultimately failed to secure a viable venture-scale business model. The British property market's conservatism, low willingness to pay for software, and the operational complexities of land promotion proved insurmountable. After nearly two years without revenue, they returned capital to investors and shared their post-mortem, offering valuable lessons for future founders on market selection, business model validation, and the importance of prioritizing commercial traction over technology development.

(buildwithtract.com)

Startup proptech

Temu's Sudden Google Shopping Ad Halt: A Trade War Casualty?

2025-04-15

Temu, the cross-border e-commerce platform from Pinduoduo, abruptly stopped running Google Shopping ads in the US on April 9th, causing its app store ranking to plummet from the top 3 to 58th within three days. This coincided with the Trump administration's imposition of high tariffs, making Temu's low-price strategy unsustainable due to increased costs and import restrictions. While Temu's parent company remains financially strong, and this retreat may not be permanent, its impact on the e-commerce advertising market and small and medium-sized businesses is noteworthy. Short-term effects include potential ad cost reductions, while long-term implications could involve increased market uncertainty.

(searchengineland.com)

Startup Google Shopping Ads

Startup's $7k Vercel Bill: A Tale of AI Bot Scraping

2025-04-15

Metacast, a podcast startup, faced a near-$7,000 Vercel bill due to a surge in AI bot traffic. Amazonbot, Claudebot, and other bots sent 665,000 requests in a single day, scraping thousands of images from their 1.4 million podcast episode pages. Vercel's Image Optimization API, while making the app snappy, proved costly. The startup quickly responded, blocking the bots and disabling image optimization for external URLs, averting disaster. This incident serves as a cautionary tale for startups about the potential costs and risks of unexpected AI bot activity.

(metacast.app)

Startup AI bots

The Quirkiest Public Companies: A Hunt for the Oddest Businesses

2025-04-14

This article profiles several small but publicly traded companies, each with a unique character. From a German dairy factory named "Little Swallow" to a Japanese game publisher with a beloved penguin mascot, a Swiss cable car company, and a Japanese candy maker, the author explores their unusual business models and cultures. The lighthearted tone highlights the quirks and strategies of these companies, while also touching upon the potential issues arising from a decreasing number of publicly traded businesses.

(fi-le.net)

Startup

Newton Education Platform Hiring Senior Product Manager

2025-04-14

Fast-growing education platform Newton is seeking a Senior Product Manager to lead major product initiatives and scale Newton into a platform serving millions. The ideal candidate will have 5+ years of product management experience, familiarity with agile development and AI tools, and a passion for EdTech. This role offers remote work opportunities across the US.

(www.ycombinator.com)

Startup EdTech Product Manager

Palantir's Controversial 'Meritocracy Fellowship': Bypassing College for High School Grads

2025-04-14

Palantir Technologies, a successful tech firm, has launched a controversial internship program called the "Meritocracy Fellowship." Targeting recent high school graduates who haven't attended college, the four-month program offers a substantial monthly stipend of $5,400. Applicants need exceptionally high SAT/ACT scores and must answer questions about their accomplishments and career aspirations. This move aligns with founder Peter Thiel's anti-higher education stance, sparking debate about tech talent acquisition and the value of college. While controversial, Palantir's initiative might offer a solution to the tech industry's talent shortage and inspire other companies to explore alternative recruitment strategies.

(www.thestreet.com)

Startup Recruitment Higher Education

The Open Guide to Equity Compensation: A Comprehensive Overview

2025-04-13

This guide unravels the complexities of equity compensation, covering various forms like restricted stock, stock options, and restricted stock units. It aims to empower employees, hiring managers, founders, and students to understand the intricacies of equity compensation, make informed decisions, and avoid costly mistakes. Topics include equity compensation basics, fundamentals of stock corporations, how equity is granted, tax basics, taxes on equity compensation, plans and scenarios, offers and negotiations, and further resources. The guide also addresses common pitfalls and provides practical suggestions.

(github.com)

Startup stock options tax planning

The Math Behind Housing Development: Why It's So Hard to Build New Homes

2025-04-13

Building and financing new housing is a complex process fraught with market and regulatory hurdles. This article aims to demystify the financial calculations involved in housing development, providing insight into the challenges of creating an adequate housing supply.

(www.ternercenter.app)

Startup real estate finance market analysis

B2B Marketplaces: Build In-House or Spin Out?

2025-04-13

Companies building B2B marketplaces to streamline transactions need to carefully consider ownership structure. New research shows that outright ownership offers greater control and supplier access but can also create regulatory hurdles and channel conflicts. Depending on objectives, a spinoff or independent startup can be effective. The article examines three common models: pure startups, internal units, and corporate spinoffs, weighing their pros and cons – internal markets offer security and resources, while external ones prioritize flexibility and innovation. The optimal choice depends on market fragmentation, the costs and benefits of independence, and the value of external partners or investors.

(sloanreview.mit.edu)

Startup B2B Marketplaces Business Models Strategic Decisions

SF Startup Artie Hiring Founding Product Engineer

2025-04-12

Fast-growing San Francisco-based database replication startup Artie is seeking its third engineer, a Founding Product Engineer. You'll build real-time database replication solutions leveraging Kafka and CDC, directly interact with technical customers to improve UX, and build new features (e.g., column exclusion, encryption, schema change alerts). The tech stack includes Go, PostgreSQL, Redis, Kafka, Elasticsearch, Kubernetes, and Terraform. This challenging role requires 4+ years of web development experience in a startup environment; Go proficiency is a plus.

(www.ycombinator.com)

Startup

Fintech Unicorn Solid Files for Bankruptcy: The Price of Hypergrowth

2025-04-11

Solid (formerly Wise), a fintech startup once valued at $330 million, has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. Despite claims of 10x revenue growth, profitability, and 100 customers, the company crumbled under the weight of failed fundraising and a costly legal battle with investor FTV Capital. FTV accused Solid of misrepresenting revenue and customer numbers, while Solid countersued, alleging strong-arm tactics by FTV. The lawsuit settled, but Solid, now down to three employees, is pursuing bankruptcy restructuring. Solid's downfall serves as a cautionary tale for rapidly expanding fintechs and highlights the challenges of the current funding environment.

(techcrunch.com)

Startup

AI Shopping App Founder Charged with Defrauding Investors: The Nate Saga

2025-04-11

Albert Saniger, founder of the AI shopping app Nate, has been charged with defrauding investors of over $50 million. Nate claimed its app used AI for one-click purchases across e-commerce sites, but in reality, relied heavily on hundreds of human contractors in the Philippines to manually complete transactions. Investigations revealed Nate's automation rate was effectively 0%, exposing the company's exaggeration of its AI capabilities during fundraising. Nate subsequently went bankrupt, leaving investors with near-total losses. This case highlights the issue of startups overhyping their AI capabilities.

(techcrunch.com)

Startup AI Fraud Startup Failure Investment Scam

The Unexpected Economics of Planned Website Downtime

2025-04-10

This article challenges the conventional wisdom of 24/7 website uptime. Using B&H Photo's Saturday closures as a case study, it argues that not all e-commerce sites need to be constantly available. The author explores the high cost of continuous uptime and suggests that planned downtime doesn't necessarily lead to significant customer loss. The article draws parallels with Google's SRE team intentionally introducing minor outages to force users to consider fallback plans. Finally, it calculates the potential cloud cost savings from scheduled downtime and weighs the trade-offs against employee on-call compensation.

(bobbiechen.com)

Startup

SPVs and the Shadowy World of Pre-IPO Trading

2025-04-09

Private company share trading is booming, with accredited investors increasingly accessing pre-IPO shares through platforms like EquityZen and Forge Global. However, these trades often involve Special Purpose Vehicles (SPVs), which own shares of the operating company, bypassing securities laws designed to limit the number of investors. This allows companies to stay private longer and raise capital, but it also exposes investors to opaque funding vehicles with hefty fees and limited transparency. The underwhelming IPO of CoreWeave highlights the risks, suggesting that reliance on private markets isn't sustainable without a robust public market for accurate valuation. The system exposes moderately wealthy retail investors to significant dangers.

(www.businesslawprofessors.com)

Startup Pre-IPO SPVs Securities Law

Dollar General's Expansion: Goliath's Rise and the Fight Back from Small Towns

2025-04-09

Dollar General's rapid expansion, fueled by government subsidies and tax loopholes, has made it the largest retailer in the US. This growth, however, has severely impacted small, local businesses, creating an uneven playing field. Communities are pushing back; Prairieton, Indiana residents successfully blocked a new Dollar General, not opposing development itself, but rather the inefficient use of land. This highlights the complex balancing act between large retailer expansion, local community interests, and the role of local governments.

(www.strongtowns.org)

Startup Government Subsidies Local Communities

The Rise and Fall of US Government Efficiency: From WWII Prowess to Modern Ineptitude

2025-04-09

This podcast delves into the evolution of US government efficiency. During WWII, the government employed process charting and work simplification initiatives, showcasing surprisingly modern management techniques resembling lean principles. However, the 1960s saw a shift towards corporate-style 'long-run planning', resulting in increased bureaucracy and decreased efficiency. Using the USDA and IRS as case studies, the discussion contrasts effective and ineffective management, highlighting the importance of process simplification and continuous improvement. The authors emphasize learning from historical successes and applying these lessons to improve modern governance.

(www.governance.fyi)

Startup historical case studies Government Management

Venture Capitalist's Son Pens Book on Nepotism

2025-04-08

Daniel Breyer, son of a highly successful venture capitalist, shares his story of entrepreneurship and his perspective on wealth and nepotism. Acknowledging the privileged world he inhabits, Breyer's book tackles the realities of nepotism within the startup world, though he assures us his characters are less virtuous than his father.

(sfstandard.com)

Startup Nepotism

Quartz: The Rise and Fall of a Digital Media Darling

2025-04-07

Quartz, once lauded as a 'pirate ship attacking the Royal Navy' in the digital media landscape, met its demise after a decade-long journey. From its 2012 launch to its 2018 acquisition by a Japanese firm and subsequent 2022 takeover by G/O Media, which ultimately dismantled it, Quartz experienced both triumph and tragedy. The founder recounts the tumultuous ride, from ambitious beginnings to the heartbreaking sale, highlighting the brutal realities of digital media competition and the challenges of sustainable business models. Ultimately, Quartz's core value lay in its people and culture, while the intervention of private equity ultimately destroyed this once promising brand.

(www.zachseward.com)

Startup digital media media acquisition

AI-Powered Resume Deception: A Kapwing Hiring Nightmare

2025-04-07

Kapwing, an online video editing startup, recently experienced a surreal job interview with a candidate who used AI to prepare. The candidate's resume and initial answers were impressive, but deeper technical questioning exposed inconsistencies. The candidate ultimately admitted to using AI. This highlights the need for more rigorous interview processes in the age of AI, including detailed situational questions, focusing on the human impact of solutions, and thorough reference checks.

(www.kapwing.com)

Startup AI Deception

Escaping the Valley: A B2B SaaS Path Less Traveled (and More Founder-Friendly)

2025-04-07

Matt, a founder who successfully sold his company Vizzly to WPP, shares his unconventional approach to building a B2B SaaS business. He argues against the typical VC-backed path of massive funding or complete bootstrapping, advocating for a 'middle path'—raising less than $1M, retaining most equity, avoiding board seats, and focusing on profitability and asset value. This approach, while unpopular with VCs due to their high-return expectations, offers founders more control and a balanced return, mitigating the risk of significant losses in liquidation events. The author encourages entrepreneurs to choose a funding strategy aligned with their values and goals, not just VC approval.

(mattgiustwilliamson.substack.com)

Startup Funding Strategy

SF Mayor Lurie's Tech-Driven Plan to Revitalize the City

2025-04-06

San Francisco Mayor Daniel Lurie is on a mission to restore the city's former glory, leveraging the tech industry's power to achieve it. He's actively engaging with tech CEOs and entrepreneurs, seeking collaborations to address pressing issues. His approach involves tackling the drug and homelessness crisis, including rolling back a program distributing drug paraphernalia. Simultaneously, he's streamlining building permits with 'Permit SF' and proposing rezoning for taller buildings to increase housing. Lurie is aggressively courting AI companies, securing commitments like Databricks' AI conference through 2030, offering tax incentives while emphasizing community investment. A new 'Partnership for San Francisco' fosters communication between businesses and city hall. Despite labor union challenges, he's pushing for autonomous vehicles. Lurie envisions San Francisco regaining its technological innovation leadership, attracting talent and businesses globally.

(techcrunch.com)

Startup Urban Revitalization

Category: Startup