Amazon spends $2.75 billion on AI startup Anthropic💸, The Founders Guide to Optimizing Your Fundraise📘, The Pulse of SaaS☁️ & more!

Welcome to The VC Corner, your weekly dose of Venture Capital and Startups to keep you up and running! 🚀

• Prospectful.ai sponsors this week’s newsletter:

Prospectful.ai offers AI-driven automation for lead generation, engagement, and deal closing. It is specifically designed for company founders focusing on B2B markets.

It streamlines sales efforts, making processes more efficient and saving time and resources. For founders looking to enhance their sales strategies and drive growth, exploring Prospectful.ai's solutions could be a significant step forward.

Visit their website for more information and to get started. Discover how this platform can transform your sales process.

---

Top Headlines 🚨

• Amazon spends $2.75 billion on AI startup Anthropic in its largest venture investment yet 💸 [CNBC]

• Early-stage SaaS boasts best expected exit success rate for VCs 📈 [Pitchbook]

• The U.S. Investors Caught in the Scrum Over TikTok. Susquehanna and Sequoia Capital own stakes in ByteDance, the parent of TikTok. Their investments are increasingly under fire 🔥 [The New York Times]

• Accenture’s Generative AI Revenue Surpasses All VC-Backed Startups Combined 🏅 [Analytics India Mag]

• Avenzo Therapeutics, Inc., a San Diego, CA-based clinical-stage biotechnology company developing next generation oncology therapeutics, closed a $150m Series A-1 financing 🧬 [FinSMEs]

• New Summit is raising a new $100 million fund to back climate tech and underrepresented fund managers 🌍 [TechCrunch]

• AI cloud startup Astera Labs rockets 72% in Nasdaq debut 📈 [Pitchbook]

---

In-Depth Insights 🔍

• Why Microsoft’s surprise deal with $4 billion startup Inflection is the most important non-acquisition in AI 🤝 [Kylie Robison]

• How to Navigate Venture Debt 🧭 [Eclipse.vc]

• The Founders Guide to Optimizing Your Fundraise 📘 [Mario Gabriel]

• A New Framework: The Four W’s of Product-Led Sales 🛍️ [Elena Verna]

• Understanding Venture Math 🧮 [DC Palter]

• Your ultimate guide to affiliate referrals for B2B SaaS 🤝 [Alexander Estner, Stefan Bader]

• How Venture Capitalists Evaluate Successful Startup Founders 🕵️ [The VC Factory]

• Two Roads Diverged: The Splitting of Venture Capital 🍴 [Rex Woodbury]

• GTM strategies to reach $250M ARR at ActiveCampaign 🎯 [Kyle Poyar]

---

---

Interesting Reports 📊

• Venture Capital Term Sheet Guide 2024 📄 [HSBC]

• 2024 Institutional Crypto Hedge Fund & Venture Report 💼 [VisionTrack]

• The Pulse of SaaS, the future of sustainable growth 🌱 [Capchase, Norbert Gehrlke]

• The State of Fintech 2024 – Europe & US 💳 [Dealroom, BN AMRO, Motive Ventures]

---

Useful Tools 🔧

• Prospectful.ai: Automates B2B sales for startups, focusing on lead generation and email outreach to ensure founders get qualified meetings

• Folk: A contact management platform that helps founders organize and leverage their network effectively

• Wise: A financial tool for cost-effective international money transfers, allowing startups to handle overseas payments to employees and vendors easily

• Beehiiv: An email platform focused on helping founders build, engage, and monetize their newsletter subscriber base, essential for community building

• SendPulse: A comprehensive marketing automation platform that enables founders to communicate with customers across emails, SMS, and chatbots

• PhotoAI: Help founders create engaging visual content for marketing, social media, and product development with efficiency

• Lasso: An affiliate marketing tool designed to optimize link performance and revenue, helping founders monetize their content and track recommendations

• tl;dv: Smart tool that generates concise summaries and action items from your meetings, helping founders capture crucial insights and decisions efficiently

• Freshsales: Sell smarter and close deals faster. Grow your pipeline, boost conversions, and power productivity with an AI-powered, easy-to-use sales CRM

---

Upcoming Events 📅

I want to shout out the first Data-Driven VC Summit, organized by Dr. Andre Retterath, Partner at Earlybird. It’s on May 5-8th, and 20+ speakers will be present from leading institutions like Lightspeed, ICONIQ, EQT, Moonfire, Stanford, UCL, and more. Details are here.

• Startup Competition - RAISE Summit 2024 | Paris | Apr 8

• GP/LP Roundtable: State of European VC Fundraising | Remote | Apr 10

• The AI Rabbit Hole | San Francisco | Apr 19

• SF Climate Week | San Francisco | Apr 21-27

• On building a $1B company with a small team | Toronto | Apr 29

• How To Run A Pilot: Skan.AI | Remote | Apr 16

• AI Conference for Founders and Business Leaders | Remote | Apr 19

• Want to start a startup? Meet all the YC partners | Boston | Apr 20

• AVPN Global Conference 2024 | Abu Dhabi | Apr 23-25

• VC Platform - Global Summit ‘24 | New York | Apr 24-26

• Investing in Tomorrow - Advancing Technology & Society | San Jose, California | Apr 25

• EU-Startups Summit | Malta | May 9-10

• 0100 Conference CEE 2024 | Prague | May 14-16

• Plug and Play Italy Summit 2024 | Milan | May 16

• Tech Fest 2024 | Toronto | May 20-24

• Global Fashion Summit | Copenhagen | May 21-23

• The LP/VC relations event | Vienna | Jun 1-6

• Silicon Valley Summit 2024 | Jun 11-13

• Super Climate | New York | Sep 24

• sifted summit | London | Oct 2-3