To improve accountability, Norrsken VC ties partner compensation to its portfolio’s sustainable successes

With the close of its latest investment fund, Norrsken VC is is taking an unprecedented step in tying the compensation of its partners to the positive changes the firm’s portfolio companies have on the world — and not just their financial returns. The firm, which released its impact assessment for 2020 last week, has invested […]
https://tcrn.ch/3cuMYqM

The disconnect between Y Combinator Demo Day and due diligence

Within 48 hours, the startup world experienced two momentous events: Y Combinator’s largest Demo Day ever, and the early investor exodus of Dispo, a photo-sharing app. Both events, while seemingly unrelated, taught us a lot about the importance, and difficulty, of due diligence in our current world. For background, early investors in Dispo distanced from […]
https://tcrn.ch/39hSmLS

This Week in Apps: App Store bills gets ghosted, Dispo drama, Facebook’s Clubhouse clone

Welcome back to This Week in Apps, the weekly TechCrunch series that recaps the latest in mobile OS news, mobile applications and the overall app economy. The app industry is as hot as ever, with a record 218 billion downloads and $143 billion in global consumer spend in 2020. Consumers last year also spent 3.5 trillion minutes using apps on Android […]
https://tcrn.ch/3csHOM7

One of Canada’s top investors, John Ruffolo, is back from the brink with a new $500 million fund

John Ruffolo isn’t as famous as some investors, but he’s very well-known in Canadian business circles. The longtime head of Arthur Andersen’s tech, media, and telecommunications practice, he joined OMERS roughly a decade ago when a former colleague became CEO and brought him aboard the pension giant to create a venture fund. The idea was […]
https://tcrn.ch/3fkcocG

Woven Capital kicks off portfolio with investment in autonomous delivery company Nuro

Woven Capital, the investment arm of Toyota’s innovation-focused subsidiary Woven Planet, has announced an investment into Silicon Valley-based autonomous delivery vehicle company Nuro. This kicks off the new $800 million strategic fund, which will invest in growth-stage technology companies that could one day develop into partners or acquisitions to further a mission of building the […]
https://tcrn.ch/31mSTaX

Amid pandemic, Middle East adtech startups play essential role in business growth

There is tremendous potential in the Middle East for adtech startups and digital marketing agencies. Although consumers there used to prefer traditional advertising, the internet took over in 2020.
https://tcrn.ch/3fgSFu4

BBG Ventures just closed on $50 million to fund more women-led startups

BBG Ventures, an eight-year-old, New York-based seed- and early-stage venture firm that only backs founding teams which feature at least one woman, just locked down $50 million in capital for its third fund, a major leap over its first two funds, both sized at $10 million. One determining factor in the bigger fund is that […]
https://tcrn.ch/2NY6KSa