The Big M&A Slowdown, And Inside Sam Altman's Many, Many, Many Investments

July 29, 2023 The Big Slowdown: M&A Involving US-based Startups Weakest Since 2013 It’s no secret venture has cooled considerably since late 2021, but so have possible exit opportunities for startups. While the IPO pipeline is still frozen, M&A involving U.S.-based, VC-backed companies is on pace for its slowest year since 2013, per Crunchbase data. M&A Slowdown → Beyond OpenAI: Sam Altman The Investor Takes Center Stage If it seems like Sam Altman is more in the news for things non-OpenAI related, that’s likely because it is becoming more and more true as he has become one of the Valley’s most active investors in everything from renewable energy to health care to — of course — AI. Altman Investments → The Week’s 10 Biggest Funding Rounds: Lvrch Capital Advisory, OneTrust And Kriya Raise Big A trio of big rounds led the way this week, including a huge $400 million raise. The week didn’t provide any specific trends, but did see a unicorn raise a down round and investors writing big checks to two companies using AI in health care. Biggest Rounds → The Most Valuable US Tech Companies Still Aren’t Buying Startups So far this year, the “Big Five” most valuable U.S. tech companies — Apple, Microsoft, Google, Amazon and Nvidia — have made just five known startup acquisitions, per Crunchbase data. Snubbing Startups → Clean-Concrete Startups Cement Their Status Over the past two years, investors have poured hundreds of millions into startups working on reducing the carbon footprint of concrete. Using Crunchbase data, we assembled a list of 20 such companies. Concrete Cleanup → AI Leads For New Unicorns In June  Six companies joined The Crunchbase Unicorn Board in June 2023, with half of them coming from the AI sector. New Unicorns → Privacy Policy | Terms of Service | View in Browser | Unsubscribe Crunchbase, Inc. 564 Market Street, Suite 700 San Francisco, CA 94104