Well! We had a lovely time tonight at our London event.:)

Thanks to our wonderful speakers, including investors Luciana Lixandru of Sequoia Capital, Frederic Court of Felix Capital, Raluca Ragab of Eurazeo, and Synthesia co-founder and CEO Victor Riparbelli. We want to thank our terrific TechCrunch colleagues, Ingrid Lunden and Mike Butcher for their interviewing help. We also want to say thanks once more to Saul Klein and his very gracious team for hosting us and also to all of you who turned up for drinks and conversation despite the rain. We hope to do it again in the not-too-distant future.

For those of you on the East Coast, note that our next StrictlyVC evening is coming up in exactly two weeks in Washington, D.C., with FTC Chair Lina Khan, Revolution founder Steve Case, AI researcher Helen Toner and Humane AI co-founders Imran Chaudhri and Bethany Bongiorno (who are reportedly talking with possible acquirers already?!). Don't miss it -- it's going to be spicy. 🌶️

Tech heavyweights including Microsoft, Amazon, and OpenAI, came together in a landmark international agreement on AI safety at the Seoul AI Safety Summit today, where they said they plan to implement a “kill switch” that would cease the development of their AI models if they can’t guarantee mitigation of certain "intolerable" risks, including automated cyberattacks and the threat of bioweapons. 🫠

Affinity research revealed that more than 33% of investors plan to prioritize portfolio support this year. But how should firms go about supporting their portcos? Join Affinity and Bessemer Venture Partners on June 13 to hear from Augie Wilkinson, Director of Portfolio Monitoring & Analysis. You’ll find out how to facilitate growth opportunities across your portfolio, communicate effectively with founders & management teams, and use technology to drive portco growth.

By Amanda Silberling

Farcaster, a blockchain-based social protocol founded by two Coinbase alumni, announced today that it closed a $150 million fundraise. Led by Paradigm, the platform also raised money from a16z crypto, Haun Ventures, USV, Variant, Standard Crypto and others, according to a blog post by founder Dan Romero.

Farcaster, the social protocol, invites developers to build other apps on top of it; the most popular app is the social network Warpcast, which is similar to Twitter. 

What does it mean to build a social experience on Ethereum? Farcaster is taking a hybrid approach, storing user identities onchain, while data like public posts, follows, reactions and more are stored offchain. Users have to “pay rent” to Farcaster to store their data — as of now, that’s about $7 worth of ETH for 5,000 posts. If a user doesn’t want to pay, then their older casts (that’s what they call posts) will be deleted as they make new casts.

More here.

280 Earth, a two-year-old startup based in Mountain View, CA, that is developing direct air capture technology to remove carbon dioxide directly from the atmosphere, raised a $50 million Series B round led by Builders VC, with Alphabet and Gideon Yu also contributing. Pulse 2.0 has more here.

Farcaster, a three-year-old Los Angeles startup that is building  a decentralized social media platform that uses blockchain technology to give users ownership of their data and identity, raised a $150 million round led by Paradigm, with Andreessen Horowitz, Haun Ventures, Union Square Ventures, Variant, and Standard Crypto also joining in. CoinDesk has more here. 

H (fka Holistic AI), a four-year-old French startup whose goal is "full AGI," raised a $220 million round from Accel, Amazon, Samsung, and UiPath as well as billionaires Bernard Arnault (via his Aglaé Ventures), Eric Schmidt, Xavier Niel, and Yuri Milner. Bloomberg has more here. 

Scale AI, an eight-year-old San Francisco startup that uses a combination of AI tools and machine learning to label and annotate large datasets that are essential for training AI models, raised a $1 billion Series F round at a $13.8 billion valuation, double its previous valuation. Previous investor Accel was the deal lead with Cisco, Intel, AMD, ServiceNow, DFJ Growth, WCM, and Elad Gil as well as previous backers Nvidia, Coatue, Y Combinator, Index Ventures, Founders Fund, Tiger Global Management, Thrive Capital, Spark Capital, Greenoaks, Wellington Management, and Nat Friedman also piling on. TechCrunch has more here.

Suno, a two-year-old startup based in Cambridge, MA, that wants to be the "ChatGPT of music creation," raised a $125 million round from Lightspeed Venture Partners, Matrix, Founder Collective, Nat Friedman, and Daniel Gross. VentureBeat has more here. 

Vitesse, an 11-year-old London company that provides a payments and treasury management platform designed specifically for insurance companies, helping insurers to manage their cash flow and optimize payment processes, raised a $93 million Series C round. KKR led the investment, with Hoxton Ventures, Octopus Ventures, and Hannover Digital Investments also taking part. TechCrunch has more here.

Coactive, a three-year-old startup based in San Jose, CA, that uses AI to manage, categorize, and retrieve visual data such as images and videos, raised a $30 million Series B round at a $200 million valuation. The deal was co-led by Emerson Collective and Cherryrock Capital, with Bessemer Venture Partners, Greycroft, and previous investor Andreessen Horowitz also anteing up. Forbes has more here. 

LabGenius, a 12-year-old London company that uses machine learning and robotic automation to discover and optimize therapeutic antibodies for diseases such as cancer and inflammatory conditions, raised a $44.5 million Series B round. M Ventures led the investment, with Octopus Ventures, LG Corp, Atomico, Kindred Capital, Lux Capital, and Obvious Ventures also pitching in. Silicon Canals has more here. 

XGS Energy, a 16-year-old Palo Alto company that develops geothermal energy technology that enables the extraction of heat from hot rock resources, raised a $20 million Series A extension. Valo Ventures and VoLo Earth Ventures were the co-leads, with B Current Impact Investment, MIH Capital, and previous investor Thin Line Capital also investing. More here.

Zen Educate, a seven-year-old London startup whose service is designed to simplify the process of hiring temporary and permanent staff for educational institutions, raised a $37 million Series B round. The lead investor was Round2 Capital, with Adjuvo, Brighteye Ventures, FJ Labs, and Ascension Ventures also taking stakes. Zen Educate also purchased Aquinas Education, a teacher staffing agency. TechCrunch has more here.

7Analytics, a four-year-old startup based in Bergen, Norway, that provides tools to help insurers manage and assess flood risk using advanced data analytics, raised a $4.3 million seed round. Scale Capital was the deal lead. Forbes has more here.

Haz, a London startup that is building a social commerce app that creates live feeds of users' past and present purchases, allowing them to share and explore buying experiences, raised a $1.4 million pre-seed round led by Speedinvest, with Andreessen Horowitz, Atomico, and Concept Ventures also stepping up. EU-Startups has more here.

Infinitform, a one-year-old Los Angeles startup that has developed an AI-powered assistant specifically for mechanical engineers to enhance the design and manufacturing process, raised a $2.25 million seed round. Schematic Ventures was the lead investor. More here.

KETOS, a nine-year-old San Francisco startup that develops automated water quality monitoring systems that provide real-time data and predictive analytics for agricultural, industrial, and municipal water operators, raised a $10 million round led by Tenfore Holdings, with additional participation from Danu Venture Group as well as previous investors Broadway Angels, Plum Alley Ventures, Plug and Play Ventures, and Accenture. More here.

Limula, a four-year-old Swiss startup that develops automated systems for manufacturing cell and gene therapies, raised a $6.8 million seed round led by LifeX Ventures, with Verve Ventures, Zühlke Ventures, Oxford Seed Fund, Lichtsteiner Foundation, and W.A. de Vigier Foundation also opting in. Tech.eu has more here.

Tenon, a two-year-old Indianapolis startup whose product helps marketing departments streamline their workflows, manage projects, and improve collaboration, raised an $8 million Series A round co-led by High Alpha and StepStone Group and including previous investor ServiceNow Ventures. More here.

Fertility tech startups are on the rise, the sector has raised more than $1.5B since 2019. We at Harmonic are delighted to have partnered with Aya Spencer at Kapor Capital to produce the 2024 Fertility Tech in the United States report. Aya analyzes over 700 fertility tech startups in Harmonic’s database, slicing them by founding year, customer type, stage, and more. Read the report here →

Snowflake talks to acquire startup Reka AI for more than $1 billion have "broken down, dashing an effort by the software company to bring more generative AI muscle in-house," reports Bloomberg. Reka makes large language models; Snowflake makes cloud-based data analytics tools. The outlet has more here.

Oladance, a five-year-old Shenzhen startup that manufactures earbuds, has been purchased by ByteDance for approximately $50 million.  

Autodesk has bought Wonder Dynamics, an eight-year-old Los Angeles startup that helps creators create complex VFX characters and visual effects using AI. Terms were not disclosed. TechCrunch has more here. 

A shareholder group that includes pension funds and Tesla's largest retail investor is loudly opposing the $46 billion pay package that Tesla is promoting for CEO Elon Musk. “Even as Tesla’s performance is floundering, the board has yet to ensure that Tesla has a full-time CEO who is adequately focused on the long-term sustainable success of our company,” the group said in a written statement.

Marc Andreessen talks with Rob Lowe.

Pixar has laid off 14% of its staff, a total of 175 employees, as it refocuses on feature films. The Verge has more here. 

The LA Times explores why Silicon Beach has fallen short as a tech powerhouse.

Researchers at Anthropic have released a paper outlining their attempts to reverse engineer the "black box" decision-making processes of LLMs. “What's going on inside of them?” AI researcher Chris Olah wonders aloud to Wired. “We have these systems, we don't know what's going on. It seems crazy.”

Google is so anxious to avoid a jury trial in the U.S. government's antitrust case against the company that it has preemptively cut a check to Uncle Sam for damages on the theory that the government has no right to a jury trial without a monetary damages claim. Reuters has more here. 

Practical applications of quantum computers may include helping travelers avoid missed connections. (But what about lost bags, we wonder.)

How Wall Street lenders are getting in on the AI boom. 

Examining the mysteries of "dad brain." 

The richest person in every state. 

An electric salt spoon designed to add umami flavor and make low-sodium food taste better.