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📶 Index raises more (but less)

📶 Index raises more (but less)

Index and Redpoint raise massive funds, StepStone is capitalizing on the venture liquidity crunch, and new Pitchbook data on funds

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Good morning 👋

And Happy National Ice Cream Cake Day to those who celebrate. For everyone else, Happy Thursday.

Yesterday had some headlines.

Index and Redpoint raised massive new funds.

StepStone is capitalizing on the liquidity crunch.

New Pitchbook data is out.

Let’s get into all of the rest.

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HEADLINES
Index closes on $2.3b (but less than last time) 💰

Source

Index Ventures Raising $2.3 Billion for Pair of Funds—Less Than It Did Last Time (WSJ)
StepStone Sees Opportunity in Venture Capital’s Liquidity Crunch (WSJ)
Can AI Startups Outrun Dot-Com Bubble Comparisons? Investors Aren’t So Sure. (WSJ)
Partial exits on GPs’ radar in quest for liquidity (Pitchbook)
For U.S. VCs, average fund size this year hit $153.5 million. But fundraising is only going well for a select few, PitchBook data shows (Fortune)
Redpoint Closes $740m Growth Fund (The Information)
Why Waymo’s Accelerating Progress Deserves More Attention (The Information)
Volkswagen throws struggling Rivian a lifeline with $5 billion investment (Fortune)
Dappier is building a marketplace for publishers to sell their content to LLM builders (TechCrunch)
Nubank acquires AI-for-banks startup Hyperplane (TechCrunch)

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LINKS

🤫 Secrets to Ads: Some of the best advertising advice I’ve gotten from Twitter

🎤 Gossip is Free Advertising: Why Christian Dior loves creating gossip

━ The Great Flattening: Ben Thompson asks whether AI will be something we control, or if human will and initiative be flattened, or expanded?

💵 How I Save Over 50% of My Income: Sam Parr dishes on his process

🍎 Apple Intelligence and AI Maximalism: Ben Evans suggests Apple is proposing generative AI is technology, not a product.

📝 Investor Updates in Tough Times—A Guide for Founders: Your communication style, especially during challenging times, says a lot about what kind of leader you are on the battlefield.

⏎ Do Startup Valuations Matter for Investment Returns?: What AngelList data says about how relative deal valuations affect investment returns

🌱 Seed Investments Have to be Reasonably Unreasonable: Anything “reasonable” is either wrong or will get competed to death

🧭 Memorized Rules—How to Give Your Life Direction: Julian Shapiro stopped self-sabotaging and started turning advice into action

📶 17 Lessons From Arthur Patterson: Frameworks from one of the godfathers of Silicon Valley

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FUNDS

Name	Fund Size	Fund Number
A*	$315m	II
Columna Capital	$310m	III
Zendesk	$10.2b	I
Charlesbank Capital Partners	$1.3b	II
The Engine	$398m	III
Hamilton Lane	$5.6b	VI

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STARTUPS (Together with Harmonic)
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Name	Description
🛠 Gendo	AI for Architecture
🔢 Safebooks	Financial Data Governance Platform
⚙️ Catio	Copilot for Tech Stack Architecture
🎥 Nim	The Ultimate Platform for AI Video Production

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RECS

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