Startup Digest: Fi sacks 10% of workforce, Saregama acquires stake in Pocket Aces, X could turn a profit next year, says CEO & more

Saregama has acquired a 51.82 percent stake in digital entertainment startup Pocket Aces for Rs 174 crore in an all-cash deal. The company plans to invest an additional Rs 15 crore into the firm, it disclosed in a stock exchange filing.

The music label plans to further acquire another 41 percent stake in Pocket Aces within the next 15 months at pre-agreed multiples, a statement said. Saregama has deferred the future pricing to completion of certain metrics, it said.

Saregama’s deal with Pocket Aces comes as the firm ramps up its efforts to broaden its video catalogue.

Market intelligence platform AlphaSense has raised $150 million in a fresh round of funding that boosted its valuation to $2.5 billion. The Series E funding round was led by technology investment firm BOND and saw participation from existing investors including Alphabet’s CapitalG, Viking Global Investors, and Goldman Sachs.

The fresh fundraise comes just months after a $100 million Series D investment led by CapitalG. The funding will be used to expand AlphaSense's enterprise solution, deploying its market-leading AI search capabilities, purpose-built market intelligence and financial LLMs, and GenAI capabilities—all within customers' private clouds, a statement said.

AlphaSense helps its customers extract relevant information from a trove of public and private content such as equity research, earning calls, company filings and news. The firm employs over 1,000 people across offices in the U.S., U.K., Finland, Germany, India, and Singapore.

Third Wave Coffee, a QSR coffee and food brand raises $35 million in a Series C funding round led by Creaegis with participation from existing investors. The company will utilize the capital for expansion, bolstering its supply chain, enhancing capabilities, and investments in technology.

“We have grown 5x through the last year and strategically expanded our footprint across the nation. Going forward, we will continue to double down on technology and product innovation to deliver a superior cafe experience across the country,” said Sushant Goel, Co-founder, and CEO, Third Wave Coffee.

Founded in 2017, Third Wave Coffee is present in several major Indian cities, including Bangalore, Mumbai, Delhi, Gurgaon, Pune, Hyderabad, Noida, Coonoor and Chandigarh. The brand has a network of over 100 cafes.

oorja, a deeptech startup that uses a combination of Physics and ML to perform predictive modelling, has received $1.5 million in seed funding round which was led by Micelio Fund, a venture capital fund focussed on sustainable innovation in the clean mobility ecosystem. The round was co-led by Capital-A and saw participation from Java Capital, Anicut Capital and Lead Angels.

The startup intends to use the fresh capital to build product and make inroads into Europe and North American markets.

“Physics-based tools that are currently used are complex, difficult to deploy and slow down time to market. Our motivation behind oorja has been to solve complex engineering problems at the design stage with a cutting-edge world-class product made in India. Our Hybrid approach uses a combination of physics + ML to improve accuracy and speed up time to market,” said Dr. Vineet Dravid, Founder, oorja energy.

CareerTech platform MentorKart has raised $250,000 from Realtime (RTAF) and Tie Angel India. The startup runs academies on its platform for companies with the objective of making recruits job-ready and achieving peak productivity from the day they join.

The fresh funds will be used to expand its customer base and extend its outreach to aspiring professionals in Tier 2/3 cities looking to kick start their careers across diverse industries, according to a company statement.

“MentorKart has successfully onboarded over 100+ partners in Tier 2 and Tier 3 cities across various states, with ambitious plans to bolster this number to 500+ within the next few months. This concerted effort aims to empower local talent and drive regional development,” said Ashish Khare, Founder & CEO, MentorKart.

DecorTwist, a home decor brand has secured $250,000 in its seed funding round led by serial angel investor Adhvith Dhuddu. According to the firm, the funding will be used to boost product expansion, and B2B growth plans.

“At DecorTwist, we’ve always believed that home décor is about more than just products – it's about creating an environment that reflects your unique personality and style. The funds raised through this round will be strategically utilized in product line expansion, marketing outreach and to facilitate growth in the B2B segment,” said founders Anupam and Nidhi.

The company claims to have clocked a 2.5-fold increase in the number of orders and has doubled its team's headcount over the past few months.

MyMandi, a B2B marketplace based in Gwalior that caters to cart-pushers, has raised Rs 10 crores from Real Time Angel Fund (RTAF) in its CCD round.

The investment will be used to expand its offerings, enhance technological infrastructure, and increase market reach.

The enterprise currently claims to cater to over 3000 cart-pullers/small retailers and aims is to bring aboard 5,000 by the end of this financial year.

Fintech unicorn CRED has forayed into the vehicle management space with 'CRED Garage' — offering its members concierge services, parking services, document management, insights on spending and more.

The feature is within the Cred App and will be rolled out to all its members starting September 28, the firm said in a statement. Users can register their vehicles with CRED Garage by adding the vehicle’s number.

The fintech firm has also integrated DigiLocker into its app, so members can access essential documents like driver's licenses, vehicle registration certificates, and insurance papers whenever they need them.

ChatGPT maker OpenAI is in advanced talks with former Apple designer Jony Ive and SoftBank's Masayoshi Son to build the "iPhone of artificial intelligence", fuelled by more than $1 billion in funding from the Japanese conglomerate, the Financial Times reported.

Sam Altman, OpenAI's chief, has tapped Ive’s company LoveFrom to develop the ChatGPT creator’s first consumer device, the report said.

Discussions are said to be “serious” but no deal has been agreed on, and it could be several months before a venture is formally announced, the report said, adding that Son, Altman and Ive have discussed creating a company that would draw on talent and technology from their three groups.

China's artificial intelligence (AI) chip startup Enflame, backed by tech giant Tencent, on Thursday said it raised 2 billion yuan ($273.68 million) from investors including funds linked to a government authority in Shanghai.

The deal came as the development of generative AI, boosted by the success of OpenAI's ChatGPT, raises investor interest in companies working on AI-related infrastructure such as AI chips.

Enflame said the latest fundraising was co-led by investors including a few funds backed by Shanghai International Group, which is under the control of the state asset regulating authority in the municipality of Shanghai.

Social media platform X could turn a profit in early 2024, Chief Executive Officer Linda Yaccarino said, during a wide-ranging interview in which she defended the company's progress under billionaire owner Elon Musk.

The appearance at Vox Media's Code conference comes as Yaccarino marked 100 days as CEO of the platform formerly known as Twitter. When asked about third-party estimates that showed X's active app users have fallen to 25th place behind Samsung's clock app, Yaccarino said key metrics around time spent on X were "trending very, very positively," without providing specifics.

Yaccarino added that about 1,500 advertisers have returned to the platform in the last 12 weeks, and that 90% of the company's top 100 advertisers have returned.

Amazon has won court backing for now in its fight against EU tech rules that label it as a very large online platform (VLOP) required to provide researchers and authorities access to its ad repositories to see how ads are targeted.

The U.S. online retailer took its grievance to Europe's second highest court, the Luxembourg-based General Court, in July after EU antitrust regulators in April designated it as a VLOP along with 18 other platforms and search engines.

It asked for an interim measure to suspend Digital Services Act (DSA) requirements on compiling and making public an advertisement repository, and on providing users with an option for each of its recommender systems which is not based on profiling, until the Court rules on its challenge against its label.

Norway's data regulator will refer the ongoing fine it has imposed on Meta Platforms to the European data authority, it said, a move that could make the penalty permanent and widen it to the European Union.

The owner of Facebook and Instagram has been fined one million crowns ($93,000) per day since August 14 for three months for breaching users' privacy by harvesting their data and using it to target advertising at them, a business model common to Big Tech.

Datatilsynet is now referring its decision to the European Data Protection Board (EDPB), which could make the decision permanent and widen it to the European Union and the European Economic Area. Norway is not a member of the EU but is part of the European single market.

GameStop has named billionaire Ryan Cohen as its CEO and chairman, tightening the activist investor's grip on the ailing brick-and-mortar videogame retailer that he intends to turn around.

Cohen is GameStop's largest investor and has been on the board for more than two years. He became executive chairman in June after former CEO Matt Furlong was ousted.

Gamestop said he will relinquish that title and will not receive any compensation for his new roles. Cohen arrived at GameStop after building online pet products retailer Chewy into a powerhouse that he sold for $3.5 billion in 2017.