Startups Weekly: Wiz’s bet paid off in an M&A-rich week

1 year ago 14

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It’s rare to report on an 11-figure startup acquisition, let alone multiple high-value deals in a single week. And there are more subtle signs that things are looking surprisingly upbeat in startup land.

Most interesting startup stories from the week

This week brought us some acquisitions, new startups, and sometimes heated rivalries.

Bet paid off: It took some serious nerve for Wiz to walk away from Google’s $23 billion offer last year, but it was worth it. Google now agreed to pay a record $32 billion in cash to buy the cloud security startup, plus another $1 billion in retention bonuses.

This exit will be a large liquidity event for many, but particularly for Israel-based VC Cyberstarts, which will get a massive 200x return on its early investment into Wiz.

Amped up: SoftBank Group will acquire chip startup Ampere Computing in a $6.5 billion all-cash deal that is expected to close in the second half of 2025.

Reinsured: Insurtech startup Next Insurance is getting acquired by Germany’s Munich Re for $2.6 billion.

Synthetic dreams: Nvidia reportedly acquired synthetic data startup Gretel for a nine-figure price tag exceeding its latest $320 million valuation.

Bits and bolts: The former CEO role of one-click checkout startup Bolt is launching a new e-commerce startup. Spangle AI, as it’s called, creates custom landing pages for shoppers based on what they searched for or clicked on.

Generalist robots: A key senior research scientist at DeepMind left Google to create Generalist AI, a stealth robotics startup that is already backed by Nvidia, with the ambition “to make general-purpose robots a reality.”

Replaced: Shortly after its IPO filing, Swedish scale-up Klarna announced it would now be Walmart’s exclusive BNPL partner instead of competitor Affirm.

Freightnemies: Logistics unicorn Flexport is suing two former employees who formed competing startup Freightmate AI, alleging that they stole documents and code, which the pair strongly denies.

HR drama: HR tech company Rippling is suing competitor Deel in a lawsuit largely centered on an employee who Rippling claims was working as a spy for Deel. Deel denied the allegations.

Most interesting VC and funding news this week

Here are some funding news items that, perhaps somewhat unexpectedly, hinted at confidence this week.

European cloud: Evroc, a Swedish startup aiming to build “secure, sovereign, and sustainable hyperscale cloud” from Europe, raised $55 million in Series A funding.

No dilution: Spanish HR unicorn Factorial secured $120 million from General Catalyst. This is neither equity nor venture debt, but rather a nondilutive loan.

Assistive programming: Graphite, an AI-powered code-review platform, secured a $52 million Series B round led by Accel, with participation from Anthropic’s Anthology Fund and others.

AI-hungry: Food e-commerce startup GrubMarket raised a $50 million Series G equity round at a post-money valuation of over $3.5 billion and said it will fund the implementation of more technology, including AI.

Upbeat: Fintech-focused VC firm Ribbit Capital is raising $500 million for a new fund in yet another positive signal for the sector.

Climate investments: Just Climate, an offshoot of Al Gore’s Generation Investment Management, raised $175 million from Microsoft’s Climate Innovation Fund and CalSTRS.

Last but not least

Shortly after Y Combinator’s W25 Demo Day and a couple weeks before its spring batch, the accelerator announced the departure of once-CEO Michael Seibel, who had already transitioned into a less operational group partner role and will now simply be a “partner emeritus.”

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