The original version of this newsletter was posted on Linkedin here.
It’s #Firgun time.
The word “Firgun” (Hebrew: ??????/ pronounced ‘feer-goon’) is an informal modern Hebrew term and concept in Israeli culture (originally Yiddish), which describes genuine, unselfish delight or pride in the accomplishment of the other person. It’s the opposite of “schadenfreude”. Firgun is all about genuinely feeling and expressing happiness, pride, or admiration for someone else’s accomplishments, good fortune, or well-being. More about Firgun and why it matters on VC Cafe: https://lnkd.in/dg2a86p
Israel’s preemptive strike on H**bolla* may have prevented a wider regional war, according to analysts. This week was marked by the liberation of Kaid Farhan Elkadi, a Bedouin Arab hostage who was kidnapped by Hamas during the 7 October attack on Israel. Everyone rejoiced seeing him being united with his family of 11 children after 325 days in captivity where he was held in a tunnel underground. The time for the remaining hostages is running out. We must #Bringthemhome now.
It’s not every day that an Israeli startup gets acquired for over $1 billion, but it happened last week when Johnson & Johnson acquired Israeli startup V-Wave for $1.7 billion. Another rare milestone for startups is reaching a billion dollars in revenue and that happened for two Israeli companies in the past two weeks: monday.com and Moon Active (the latter raked $1.2 billion annually since 2020. One more impressive milestone is a new foundational AI model released by AI21 Labs this week, who unveiled a new family of open source language models called Jamba.
In the wider tech world, Pavel Durov, the founder of messaging app Telegram Messenger was arrested in France for enabling serious crimes (drug trafficking, ter**r, etc on his platform. It raises questions on company’s CEO’s responsibilities on what’s happening on their platform.
QUOTE OF THE WEEK
“Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity.” – Seneca
NEW FUNDING ROUNDS
- Congratulations Ran Harpaz and team Lettuce Financial on raising a $15M series A for your automated tax and accounting services specifically designed for solo entrepreneurs!
- Kudos Yoav Oz and team Rep AI on your $8.2M series A for your AI concierge to rescue lost revenue!
- Well done Amit Eyal Govrin and team Kubiya.ai for raising a $6M seed extension for your AI devops workflow automation platform!
- Way to go Eran Atlas and team DreaMed for securing a $3M series B extension for your personalised recommendations for insulin dosing based on a user’s data!
EXITS
- Congratulations Neal Eigler M.D. and team V-Wave on the $1.7 billion acquisition by Johnson & Johnson!
- Kudos Yochai Corem and team Cyberint on the acquisition by Check Point Software for $200M!
- Way to go Ilan Hadar and team Silexion Therapeutics Corp on your Nasdaq IPO in a SPAC deal!
NEW FUNDS
- Congratulations Amikam Norkin and team Ace Capital Partners on launching a new fund focused on military tech startups!
LINKS FOR YOUR BROWSER
Israel:
- Venture Funding To Israeli Startups Bounces Back
- AI21 unveils upgraded long-context Jamba models for enterprises
- Israel’s preemptive strike prevented a wider war
Global:
- The dark side of generative AI is here – by me on VC Cafe
- The top 100 AI consumer apps
- Multi modal models and AI agents will transform human relationships – by Bessemer Venture Partners
MEDIA OF THE WEEK
Israel has seen two consecutive quarters of an uptick in funding, and the current quarter is on pace to be slightly more than $1 billion.
Key takeaways from the latest Jefferies “Israel’s Economic Resilience During Military Conflicts” (August 2024) report
Top 50 consumer generative AI apps by Monthly active users
Market map of multi modal innovation by Bessemer Venture Partners
AI pixar – the interactive video landscape by Andreessen Horowitz (source)
The seemingly unstoppable growth of NVIDIA
That’s all for this week. Thank you for reading. There’s a lot to celebrate in our “small” community. Keep on creating!
I'm a former general partner at google ventures, head of Google for Entrepreneurs in Europe and founding head of Campus London, Google's first physical hub for startups.
I'm also the founder of Techbikers, a non-profit bringing together the startup ecosystem on cycling challenges in support of Room to Read. Since inception in 2012 we've built 11 schools and 50 libraries in the developing world.
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