🎮 The Biggest Game You've Never Heard Of
Startup fraud goes on trial, Facebook x Rayban, and a VC fund investing in sleep
So, what happened this week in the Tech & Startup world? 🌍
To get this every week for free, make sure to sign up below ⬇️
The Grapevine Newsflash 🔥
11 tech & startup stories in 171 super-duper short seconds.
☁️ Sleepy Capital? Supermoon Capital has launched its first $36m fund dedicated to ‘Sleep Tech. Read this quick interview about the fund here.
🩸 A Bloody Mess! The trial of Elizabeth Holmes, the disgraced CEO & founder of Theranos continues this week. Holmes deceived investors by claiming her company’s equipment could detect an array of illnesses from just a few drops of blood. Looking for a good read? Order ‘Bad Blood, a book about the scandal here.
🤓 Facebook Specs? Facebook has announced the launch of their ‘Ray-Ban’ smart glasses equipped with cameras, a microphone, speakers and a voice assistant. Will these glasses rival the Snapchat Spectacles? Read more and see the glasses in action here.
📷 De-Pixalator? Google has developed some insane AI technology that can clean up pixilated photos. It’s awesome and you can see it here.
🐟 A Fishy Future Many of you reading will have tried plant-based meat… but much less of you would have had plant-based fish. More investors have been moving to fund companies working on it, with $83m invested in 2020 (up from $1m in 2017). A big driver has been the desire to combat the seafood industry’s environmental effects. Next up: lab-grown fish.
💰Y Combinators Top EU Fintechs. Check out the 8 European fintechs that pitched at Y Combinators demo day last week! Our favorite? Female Invest, an educational platform focused on educating women about investing. Long term the Copenhagen-based company wants to become the ‘Robinhood for women’. Read about all 8 fintechs here.
🏦 Crypto vs. Regulators Use of decentralised finance has exploded in the last year and that hasn’t gone un-noticed. Regulators globally, especially in the US, have shown concern and are trying to catch up. Coinbase CEO, Brian Armstrong wrote a blog detailing the frustrations and challenges they’ve been having too. This’ll get interesting soon.
🚗 Marshmallow Raises Series B. UK Insurtech Marshmallow has raised $85m at a $1.25bn valuation. What does Marshmallow do? It provides car insurance, but it does so by looking at a wider set of data points and using clever algorithms to offer more people a more competitive rate. Get the full scoop here.
💻 Code4Me OpenAI, a famous research lab, has brought out a new product called Codex. It is a new AI technology that writes its own code i.e. you can tell it what to code and it’ll do so in front of you. It is truly staggering and will surely change the way we all use technology. You can see the full demo here.
🎮 Gaming Ban China’s video game regulator has announced that minors will only be able to play video games 3 hours a week (and are banned during the school week). This is part of a campaign to eradicate perceived issues of nearsightedness and addiction caused by games. This might sound aggressive but China has a history of similar policies, with console gaming banned for over a decade until 2015.
💰 Play-to-Earn Gaming Axie Infinity is a blockchain-based game that has blown up with 1m daily players (up from 500 a year ago). You battle ‘Axies' against other players but you can make a significant amount of money from breeding and selling them. It has made more revenue than any other app or protocol in crypto (apart from Ethereum). For an incredible deep-read on the subject, check out this by Packy McCormick (our favourite newsletter).
Sharing The Grapevine 🔥
Show us some appreciation by clicking on the big green button below to share the Grapevine with co-workers, friends, family, or enemies (even they deserve high-quality news…).
If you share it on LinkedIn, be sure to tag us so we can say thanks!
Want to have a chat?
Shoot us an email at founders@onthegrapevine.co
Don’t follow us on LinkedIn?
Over & Out,
Nick, Louis, & YOU