VNTR Newsletter Dec 8, 2024 – Venture Capital News, Events, VC Reads
Venture Capital, Web3, and Private Equity – News, Events, and VC Reads
Hello friends,
Happy Sunday!
VNTR Newsletter is delivered to 100k+ investors and subscribers weekly to share the latest news, events, and articles from the global VC and startup ecosystem.
Scroll down to discover VNTR Community News, Upcoming Events, and the latest VC News and Reads.
VNTR COMMUNITY NEWS
Spotlight
Abu Dhabi: Join us on Dec 11 at the VNTR Investor Roundtable Abu Dhabi, a side event to Global Family Office Investment Summit (request invite) and Abu Dhabi Finance Week. Sponsorship packages are available.
VNTR Expert Session on Dec 10: Learn about the pros and cons of investments in Bitcoin mining versus Bitcoin from our experts from Gomining.
VNTR Seed round: We are finalizing a $1m seed round to scale VNTR to 50+ chapters in 2025 and grow the VNTR community to 10k+ community investors. Interested investors can join via VNTR Syndicate or contact Yuri to discuss.
Christmas Speed Networking on Dec 18: Festive end-of-year celebration and an opportunity to network with 100+ investors. Engage in dynamic one-on-one speed networking sessions, each lasting 5-7 minutes, to build meaningful connections as we wrap up 2024.
VNTR at Davos WEF 2025: This January, VNTR is bringing the global VC community together in Davos during the World Economic Forum for the 4th time with an exclusive series of three high-impact events designed to foster connections, insights, and opportunities among leading investors.
VNTR GCC Roadshow: As part of our 2025 programming, we aim to deliver exceptional value to our VNTR Club members by leveraging our global network and curated events. The roadshow helps members connect with qualified peers, meet co-investors, raise capital for new funds, and expand their portfolios.
We invite seasoned General Partners (GPs) raising their third or subsequent funds to join our VNTR GP Club membership by contacting Elise. Participants in this exclusive roadshow will connect with potential Limited Partners (LPs), capital allocators, co-investors, and partners from GCC.
Preliminary GCC roadshow dates:Feb 6 VNTR LP Roundtable Dubai AI Everything
Feb 7 Curated one-on-one meetings in Dubai
Feb 11 VNTR LP Roundtable Riyadh LEAP
Feb 12 Curated one-on-one meetings in Riyadh
Feb 13-16 VNTR Club Retreat - Desert road trip from Riyadh to Manama
Feb 18 VNTR Investor Conference Bahrain (Sponsorship packages)
Feb 20 Curated one-on-one meetings in Manama
Feb 25 VNTR LP Roundtable Web Summit Qatar
Feb 26 Curated one-on-one meetings in Doha
.vntr domains: Get your .vntr domain name (40% discount using VNTRWINTER code)
Annual Corporate Partnership: Discover our annual corporate partnership packages to connect with the VNTR global investor community in 2025.
VNTR Podcast: Tune in on YouTube, Spotify, and Apple. Stay updated with our latest episodes, and subscribe on your preferred platform to never miss insightful discussions. Contact Elise if you would like to be on the show.
VNTR Fellowship Program: In 2025, VNTR is expanding its chapter network to over 50 cities worldwide. To support this growth, we are onboarding Chapter Directors/Venture Partners who will participate in a five-week intensive fellowship program to equip fellows with the skills and tools to lead thriving regional VNTR communities.
Contact Irina to apply for the January 2025 cohort. The ideal candidates are entrepreneurs looking to emerge into venture capital, become investors, and serve as super connectors in their local VNTR chapter community. Joining the VNTR team involves a minimum two-year partnership commitment to build and expand the chapter while successfully implementing VNTR services within the local community and launching a local, regional pre-seed / seed fund with VNTR.
Thank you to our partners:
Hivello — With just a few clicks on the Hivello app, users can effortlessly participate in multiple DePIN networks. This seamless process empowers users to generate passive income by leveraging their idle computers. For partnership opportunities and to learn more, contact Domenic Carosa directly.
Perfect — Your Personal Lifestyle app that helps you Book flights and hotels and manage your lifestyle. Enjoy personalized assistance with tasks, errands, and reservations, freeing time for what truly matters. Join Perfect using "VNTR" code to get special discounts and access to VNTR experiences.
Follow us on Social media: Instagram, LinkedIn, Facebook, Flickr, and X.
UPCOMING VC EVENTS
Dec 9-12 Abu Dhabi Finance Week, UAE
Dec 10-11 Global Family Office Investment Summit, Dubai, UAE (Request invite)
Dec 10-11 World AI Summit, Doha, Qatar
Jan 7-10 CES, Las Vegas, USA
Jan 15-17 CFC St. Moritz, Switzerland
Jan 16-18 DLD, Munich, Germany
Jan 20-24 World Economic Forum, Davos, Switzerland
Feb 3-6 4YFN, Barcelona, Spain
Feb 4-6 AI Everything Global, Dubai, UAE
Feb 5-7 Techchill, Riga, Latvia
Feb 9-12 LEAP, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia
Feb 18-20 Consensus, Hong Kong
Feb 23-26 Web Summit Qatar, Doha, Qatar
April 14-16 GITEX Africa, Marrakech, Morocco
April 23-25 GITEX Asia, Singapore
April 27-30 Web Summit Rio, Brazil
April 30 - May 1 Token2049, Dubai, UAE
May 12-13 Dubai FinTech Summit, Dubai, UAE
May 14-16 Consensus, Toronto, Canada
May 21-23 GITEX Europe, Berlin, Germany
May 27-30 Web Summit Vancouver, Canada
June 11-14 Viva Technology, Paris, France
If you would like to submit VC-related events, please get in touch with Yuri or Telegram @byuric
VC Reads and News
View curated VC news and articles on the VNTR Platform
The Week’s Biggest Funding Rounds: Tenstorrent And Nuvig Top List
After a slow Thanksgiving week, investors made up for lost time with a slew of big-money rounds. VCs spread their cash around pretty liberally, notching big rounds in semiconductors, biotech, carbon capture and more.
The Cold Email Handbook
There are few growth levers that could allow a single person to grow a startup from $0 to $1M ARR in a matter of months. There are even fewer that could be done with nothing but an internet connection and a laptop—and virtually no budget.
Cold outbound is one such lever.
Within seconds of this very moment, you could send an email to your dream investor. Or a potential customer. Or Patrick Collison. A few minutes from now, that person could reply. And a week from now, you could be on the phone having a conversation that will change the course of your company and your life. It’s almost unbelievable how powerful cold outbound is: in business, you can get almost anything you want with a damn good email. If we can be honest for a moment, though? You’ve already heard this.
SpaceX tender offer caps standout year for secondary sales
The world’s largest private tech companies are bending the normal rules of venture capital to get liquidity for employees and other shareholders.
Elon Musk’s SpaceX is planning a tender offer at a valuation of around $350 billion, Bloomberg reported, a $140 billion jump over what it was worth in a similar transaction earlier this year. The planned deal would cement a blockbuster year for secondary share sales of VC-backed companies, which have blossomed even as broader startup investment struggles.
The rocket maker joins ChatGPT developer OpenAI, payments leader Stripe and graphic design company Canva in tapping secondary markets this year. Since 2020, around 25% of US unicorns have raised a secondary transaction, according to PitchBook data.
The investors behind Europe’s 250 fastest-growing startups
The inaugural Sifted 250 is a ranking of Europe’s fastest-growing startups, by revenue, listed by compound annual growth rate (CAGR).
Combined, the 250 companies employ more than 25k people across the continent and have generated revenues of €6.86bn over the past three financial years.
They’ve raised a total of €17.67bn between them from 1,735 different investors — including VCs, CVCs, public funds, banks, angels and accelerators.
Global VC Funding Ticked Up In November Thanks To AI And Billion-Dollar Deals
Global venture funding totaled $28 billion in November 2024, Crunchbase data shows. That’s down from the $32 billion raised in October 2024, but up from the $21 billion raised in November 2023.
More than a third of funding last month came from just three companies that each raised billion-dollar-plus rounds: AI foundation model companies xAI and Anthropic, and quality engineering testing service Tricentis.
Seed- and early-stage funding both fell year over year, Crunchbase data shows. Seed funding last month totaled just over $2 billion, down about a third compared to a year earlier. Meanwhile, early-stage funding in November fell just over 20% year over year.
New York’s top VCs under 30
The next generation of New York City investors are already making their mark in the Big Apple.
They come from big-name venture firms like Female Founders Fund and Lerer Hippeau and smaller ones like Chai Ventures. They work in areas like growth, consumer, and health. They canoe, hike, and play pickleball on the weekends. We chatted with some of the young investors — think, under 30 — who are helping to shape the future of venture capitalism in New York City.
Secondary discounts for startups have almost recovered
Huge discounts on startup secondaries are vanishing, a sign that demand for these minority stakes is finally catching up to supply.
Relative to their last funding round, prices of direct secondaries have gone from trading at an average discount of 50% in early 2023 to 12% in September of this year, according to data from secondaries marketplace Zanbato.
The 10 Biggest Rounds Of November: xAI And Anthropic Raise Billions Again
While some things tend to slow as the year winds down, artificial intelligence fundraising apparently isn’t one of them. Last month, xAI and Anthropic raised a combined $9 billion as AI funding remained red-hot. Other sectors, including IT management and robotics, also saw big rounds. Let’s take a look.
Bitcoin ‘still in early innings’ at $100K — ARK’s Cathie Wood
Bitcoin became a $2 trillion asset in less than 16 years, while companies like Apple and Amazon took 42 and 29 years, respectively, to reach that value.
Bitcoin recorded a historic milestone by smashing the $100,000 price mark on Dec. 5, but the cryptocurrency is still in the “early innings,” according to the ARK Invest CEO.
From Founders To Funders: A Fresh Approach For Venture Capitalists To Find The Right LPs
In the third quarter of this year, venture capital fundraising tightened significantly, with only $66.5 billion raised — down 16% quarter over quarter and 15% year over year. Amid this challenging environment, institutional investors are being more cautious and reassessing their investment strategies. For some VCs, this has highlighted an often-overlooked fundraising approach: courting entrepreneurs, including ex-portfolio founders, as limited partners.
Here’s why it worked for us.
Crypto VCs ‘cautiously optimistic’ on Trump’s pick for SEC chair
Crypto markets continued their rapid climb after President-elect Donald Trump disclosed his SEC appointee, Bush administration veteran Paul Atkins.
Even as bitcoin’s price surpasses $100,000, how Atkins oversees private crypto markets remains to be seen. But expectations are that his SEC tenure will bring about a de-escalation of current SEC Chair Gary Gensler’s framework, which much of the industry sees as “regulation by enforcement.”
IPO Readiness: What Biotech Startups And Others Need To Know
To say that the biotechnology sector is booming would be a significant understatement. The industry has grown to $1.38 trillion as of 2023 and is projected to balloon to $4.25 trillion by 2033. Given this success, many biotech companies are looking to move on to the next phase of their organizational growth — which may mean an initial public offering.
India’s Web3 dominance fueled by 1K startups, global investments, dev talent
India is on track to lead Web3 adoption by 2027, driven by startups, developers and government-backed blockchain initiatives.
A massive startup network supported by global investment and local adoption has positioned India to spearhead Web3 innovation, according to a report on the country’s Web3 landscape.
India currently hosts over 1,000 Web3 startups across the finance, infrastructure and entertainment sectors, according to a Hashed Emergent report released on Dec. 4 at the India Blockchain Week conference.
Dealmakers see no ‘quick return to a rosy IPO market’ in 2025
Uncertainty surrounding the new administration’s policy agenda and the trajectory for interest rates is leading some dealmakers to feel somewhat gloomy about 2025.
Many private market funds plan on sitting on the sidelines rather than deploying capital, at least until the early part of next year.
“As I look into 2025, I don’t think it’s as rosy as people thought the morning after the election,” said Louis Lehot, a partner at Foley & Lardner, at a roundtable hosted by the law firm on Wednesday.
Wealth Management Startups See Funding Rise
The ultra-rich run family offices, hire wealth managers and hold stakes in private investment funds.
For those who are well-off but hardly jetsetters, however, portfolios look much more mundane. Typically, their largest asset is their home. Other holdings might include a 401(k), a few stocks, a bank account and a car.
There’s nothing terrible about this sort of asset assortment. But, given that over the years we’ve seen a persistent pattern of the ultra-wealthy getting wealthier, it’s reasonable to think the bottom 99.9% might also benefit from the tools and investment vehicles the rich have at their disposal.
Is Your Startup Ready To Work With A VC? Key Points To Consider, From Pitch To Due Diligence
The right amount of investment and general support from venture investors can be just what a startup needs to go from the early-stage ideas phase to competitive market player. But receiving funding from VCs has grown tougher. This makes communicating with funds an increasingly crucial step for startup teams.
To help startups and their founders overcome this challenge, here are some recommendations.