Tyler Spalding

Your last weekly space news round-up of 2024 🚀 Featuring stories: 💰 ICEYE closed a $65M extension to the existing growth funding round for a total of $158M raised in 2024 - the funding round extension included participation from funds managed by Solidium Oy, BlackRock, Seraphim, Plio Limited, and Christo Georgiev. 🌡️ SatVu, a global leader in climate technology, has secured £20 million in strategic funding, to expand high-resolution thermal imaging. 🛰️ SpaceX’s satellite internet service Starlink is projected to reach $11.8 billion in revenue next year, driven by strong consumer demand and growing U.S. military contracts. 📈 Space Markets: The Year in Review from Payload 👉 Of the 15 largest space startup funding deals this year, five came from US startups, five were Chinese companies, four were European firms, and one was from an Australian business. 🌌 Commercial space station developer Vast has signed a deal with SpaceX for two private astronaut missions to the International Space Station, pending NASA approval. https://lnkd.in/evUcpr92

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Halle Kaplan-Allen and I will be chatting with Ali Hamed tomorrow about sourcing LPs. You can RSVP here: https://lnkd.in/edYZhKrA Ali wrote this excellent tactical piece on networking that is well worth a read for anyone networking their way to capital: https://lnkd.in/eZ_2f_4x This event is presented by Sydecar, a frictionless deal execution platform for venture capitalists. By pioneering a standardized approach to private investing, they enable capital allocators to identify and back entrepreneurs who are changing the world. Their platform reliably handles back-office operations, automating banking, compliance, contracts, tax, and reporting so that customers can focus on making deals and building relationships.

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We’re excited to announce that Pyka has raised $40M in Series B funding to accelerate the commercialization of their autonomous electric aircraft! Led by Obvious Ventures, with support from Piva Capital, Prelude Ventures, Metaplanet, and Y Combinator, this investment will expand Pyka’s impact in sectors like agriculture, cargo transport, and defense logistics. With commercial operations already underway across multiple continents and partners like Dole and Embraer, Pyka is transforming aviation while driving sustainability and decarbonization. ⚡✈️ More here from TechCrunch: https://lnkd.in/gGYfc824

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In the earliest stages, startups have to balance two needs: capital to build now, and the focus to create the product that will bring their vision to life. We experienced this journey at Prewitt Ridge, and I had the opportunity to share parts of our story last week at AIAA ASCEND, and I wanted to share some of the highlights here, as well as the video clip captured by my teammate York Zhang! Steve Massey and I incorporated Prewitt Ridge in Dec 2019 and hit the ground running in 2020. Building on our experience as engineers working at SpaceX and Slingshot Aerospace, we set out to take a picks-and-shovels approach to build digital engineering software tooling for engineers like us, who are working at the companies out there using the picks and shovels, here on Earth and soon in space. We quickly found that there were a host of resources available to us. We received initial funding through the SBIR/STTR program, an initiative from the US government to provide early-stage technology funding for small businesses. With two STTR awards and a great university partner at UNM, we began to execute on our product vision. Simultaneously, we received phenomenal support from the Techstars Space Accelerator program. This accelerator helped us focus on the tradeoffs of bootstrapped growth through SBIR/STTR vs traditional fundraising. SBIR/STTR are fantastic sources of capital, providing a partnership that helps small businesses build through non-dilutive funding. But it’s important to remember that these opportunities are focused on specific topics and non-recurring. As a business, it's important to be disciplined on aligning the SBIR/STTR opportunities with your core product features and strategies to ensure they don't impede your teams execution. We made the decision to balance both SBIR/STTR with growth via venture capital. We successfully raised a round of funding, led by Squadra Ventures with participation from Stage Venture Partners, Aurelia Foundry, Wonder Ventures, Haystack, Acequia Capital, Techstars and GC&H We’ve had a wonderful experience working with the VC community, highlighted by the hands-on approach and national security expertise of Squadra Ventures. Going forward, we’ll continue to consider both types of funding. These resources have provided numerous connections to government and industry leaders, and in turn they have helped to focus our tool offering and capabilities. Our journey shows the importance of another balance that startups must strike: reducing risk and optimizing opportunities. Thanks to Techstars, AIAA ASCEND and all of the panelists for a great conversation! If you’re interested in discussing solutions for digital engineering, get in touch! #startups #aerospace #AIAAASCEND

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✨ Breaking: Bek Ventures Announces New Fund.- Bek Ventures Fund III: Launched in November 2024, Fund III from Bek Ventures focuses on investing in founding teams from Central and Eastern Europe with potential for billion-dollar outcomes. Despite not specifying the exact fund size in the article, it is confirmed to be over €235 million. The fund, which was oversubscribed, primarily invests in technology sectors, from seed to growth-stage startups. https://lnkd.in/dAX6WFEQ Please share to let other #Founders know For the ❤️ of Startups #Fusion42 #Startups #Venturecapital

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Markets talk. We listen. We've from heard from capital allocators (#VC, #PrivateEquity, #FamilyOffices....even #VentureStudios, #Incubators and #Accelerators) that due diligence is a bottleneck to deal flow. It's time-consuming, expensive and often, subjective. We've launched #VentureIQ by the 9point8 Collective to directly address this problem. VentureIQ is an AI-enabled diligence solution that provides rapid scale diligence reports with exceptional fidelity and demonstrable cost efficiency - all within a single business day. We're in our soft launch, now. So, if you want to gain back valuable time and expose the long tail of deal flow diligence, shoot me a DM or visit VentureIQ.ai.

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Thrilled to double down on Bhanu and Layer2 Financial. Their growth is eye-popping and they have integrated stablecoin/fiat technology together in a way that's actually useful. Their APIs are - by far - the most mature in a rapidly emerging SWIFT-killers market. What's not in the press release is maybe the most impressive: - 2022/2023 banking/crypto crises (through no fault of their own) set the difficulty to "hard mode". They lost revenue, customers, upstream partners. Many founders would have wilted or quit. - They buckled down, stayed lean, built incredible product redundancies, and made some killer hires. - The new product foundation enabled them to grow 10x in 9 months. They are now processing *billions* in $ volume (which directly translates to ARR). Truly a case of a great team first surviving and now thriving in a rapidly expanding market.

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This is the beginning of big corporates in industrial and foundational industries solving the data availability problem to leverage the power of generative AI

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Kettleborough VC has been active for ~6 years, invested in ~30 companies, gone through ~80 funding rounds, witnessed ~12 exits including ~4 instances of partial principal erosion, seen ~4 seed to $100M journeys, tracking ~29% XIRR across the portfolio. A couple of IPOs from the portfolio surely seem very much in line ahead.

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On Thursday, stocks dropped as strong economic data fueled worries about continued high interest rates. Despite the broader sell-off, Nvidia continued to soar on impressive earnings and a stock split announcement. Boeing, however, plunged on production woes. In world markets, gold is sharply down on new dollar strength propelled by the unexpectedly hawkish tone of the FOMC minutes. Crypto prices plunged, with BTC leading the decline by nearly 3% and touching 67K. The broader market mostly followed BTC, with the exception of ETH, which held above 3.7K. #crypto #cryptocurrency #bitcoin #exchange #assets #investing #cryptonews #market #trading #blockchain #ethereum #token #analytics #Markets #Finance #Economy #Business #Evernomics #Svetrating Read the full text: https://lnkd.in/gKWrnd6W

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I will be here today understanding the latest state of Crypto in Capital Markets

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Check out the Business Insider article by Rebecca Torrence.

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BlackRock has shaken up public and private markets again in 2024. Not once (Global Infrastructure Partners (GIP), not twice (Preqin), but a third time. And this time, BlackRock has added vast private credit capabilities to its growing private markets platform. Reinforcements came this week in the form of HPS Investment Partners, LLC, a $148B AUM credit manager that BlackRock acquired for over $12B. This week's Alt Goes Mainstream AGM Alts Weekly takes a different look into this landmark transaction that could shake up the private markets landscape. There were clues ... read on for more and for who AGM thinks could be next👇. This week's Alt Goes Mainstream's AGM Alts Weekly, brought to you by 73 Strings, covers: 🗂️ AGM Index, an index that tracks the leading publicly traded alternative asset managers. 💻 Post of the Week by Blackstone President & COO Jon Gray on his outlook for 2025. 🗞️ AGM News of the Week, this week covering: 📌 Financial Times Mary McDougall & Yu Sun on OMFIF's study about pension plans and sovereign wealth investors looking to invest more into private markets in 2025. 📌 PitchBook's Jessica Hamlin on EQT Group's acquisition of ju:niz Energy and what it means for energy transition investing. 💻 Who is hiring: Senior-level positions from companies Blackstone, Apollo Global Management, Inc., iCapital, Blue Owl Capital, Vanguard, BMO, Hamilton Lane, Sagard. Subscribe👇 to see the latest trends & navigate this rapidly changing landscape as alts go mainstream.

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The venture apocalypse is upon us. Only two funds raised 44% of the venture money in the US in 2024. The cash amounts deployed against emerging managers (firms with less than three funds) relative to more established firms dropped from 19% in the 2010 to 2020 periode to 16% and falling. Lux Capital's predictions of 30-50% of emerging managers ceasing to exist over the next couple of years are over-shadowed only by claims of an outright extinction of venture capital. This post explores the bigger context and why such developments are short term healthy and long term risky for a nascent startup ecosystem: https://lnkd.in/d-fsYg6b

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On Wednesday, stocks were mixed, with energy stocks declining while tech stocks gained, led by Nvidia, Intel, and AMD, suggesting strong AI demand. The overall market sentiment remains cautious due to concerns about a slowing economy, despite the recent rate cut. Internationally, the Euro rose (strengthened) to a 14-month high on Fed easing and China stimulus, while Argentina's economy shrank less than expected, confirming some success of Milei's drastic cost-cutting economic policies. BTC and ETH were stalled on 63K and 2.5K. #crypto #cryptocurrency #bitcoin #exchange #assets #investing #cryptonews #market #trading #blockchain #ethereum #token #analytics #Markets #Finance #Economy #Business #Evernomics #Svetrating Read the full text: https://lnkd.in/g_Wes3e9

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Incredible insights from Renee Hanna, Managing Director of Investments at Baylor University, about why her team has started to lean in on emerging manager funds vs. the large mega funds. Worth paying attention to, given the Baylor endowment has been outperforming the usual suspect Ivy League endowments. Hanna discussed with David Weisburd in a 10X Capital podcast episode that late-stage venture fund returns look about the same as S&P 500 returns (but with less liquidity and longer duration), making them less attractive. Moreover, the IRR they generate doesn’t beat the middle market. Baylor prefers investing in smaller funds earlier in their life cycle because they “have a higher probability of generating the venture type returns that we think are necessary to justify being in the portfolio” and because emerging managers “tend to be hungrier” and have “better loyalty and alignment with the LPs.” More institutional investors like the Baylor endowment are waking up to the fact that Alpha in venture is at the early stage. But how can institutional investors’ average check sizes align with the smaller fund sizes seen in this segment of the venture capital market? Connect with us to learn more about our 𝗘𝗺𝗲𝗿𝗴𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗠𝗮𝗻𝗮𝗴𝗲𝗿 𝗔𝗹𝗽𝗵𝗮 𝗮𝘁 𝗦𝗰𝗮𝗹𝗲 𝘀𝘁𝗿𝗮𝘁𝗲𝗴𝘆 that enables institutional investors, family offices and HNW LPs to invest in a portfolio of the top 1% emerging manager funds. #Investmentstrategy #MDSVCapital #VCInvesting #FundManagers

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Led by Anduril, defense tech funding sets a new record this year | TechCrunch https://buff.ly/4129kts Anduril, a leader in defense technology, has driven defense tech funding to an unprecedented high this year. Investments in this sector have surged, reflecting a growing interest in advanced military solutions and cutting-edge innovations. This milestone underscores the increasing importance of tech-driven defense initiatives in modern security strategies. As global tensions rise, there's a notable shift towards integrating AI, robotics, and autonomous systems into defense operations. The record-breaking funding highlights the critical role technology plays in national and international security landscapes. #DefenseTech #InnovationInSecurity

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