Weekly #FIRGUN Newsletter

It's?#Firgun?time!

As every Friday, it's my pleasure to share a weekly summary of the movers and shakers in Israeli tech and venture. If you're not yet subscribed, click the button get the next edition straight into your inbox.

"Firgun" (Hebrew: ??????/ pronounced 'feer-goon')?is an informal modern Hebrew term and concept in Israeli culture (originally Yiddish), which describes genuine, unselfish delight or pride in the accomplishment of the other person. It's the opposite of schadenfreude. More about Firgun and why it matters on?VC Cafe:?https://lnkd.in/dg2a86p

Naturally, I had to ask ChatGPT to help me with the definition of "Firgun" and how it's used in practice. Here's the answer

"Firgun" is a Hebrew term that is often translated as "altruistic pleasure" or "kindness" or "generosity." It refers to the act of feeling happy or satisfied when others succeed or are fortunate, and is often used to describe a person who takes pleasure in the success or happiness of others. In practice, firgun can be expressed in many ways, such as by offering congratulations, expressing appreciation, or by taking actions that help others achieve their goals. It is an important value in many cultures, and is particularly prevalent in Israeli culture.

"It doesn't matter if you're in favour of France or Argentina, you still want a referee on the court" (link). Hurting democracy will hurt the tech industry, is the message investors and founders are saying aloud. Concern and political activism are growing in the Israeli tech community as the government is trying to push a judicial reform that would strip the supreme court from power.

NEW INVESTMENT ROUNDS

- Congratulations?to the inimitable Amir Haramaty and team aiOla on completing a $25M series A to automate and streamline inspection processes with natural language, image recognition and proprietary AI models

- Mabruk? Itamar Sivan, Ph.D. - WE ARE H-I-R-I-N-G ?and team? Quantum Machines ?on your $20M series B extension (bringing the total funding to $100M) to speed up quantum workloads significantly!

- Well done Yoav Levy and team? Evigence ?on securing your $18M series B to provide food freshness data to help reduce waste.

- Impressive news Alon N. Cohen and team nsKnox on raising $17M series A extension to develop bank account validation and B2B payment security solutions!

- Mazel tov? Jeremy Suard ?and team? Exodigo ?on the a $12M seed extension (bringing the total round to $41M) to develop non-intrusive subsurface imaging for mapping!

- Kudos? Benjamin Gillman , Amalia Bercot and team? myInterview ?on your $11M series A extension to bring technology to the remote interview process!

- Kol hakavod Muli Motola and team Acsense on raising a $5M seed round to provide Okta customers with a single platform for access management!

EXITS

- Congratulations Shira Itzhaki and team Immue (acquired by Forter) on the acquisition by Forter (for an undisclosed sum) to provide a?holistic solution that fights fraud and bots and enables them to focus on their business.

- Well done Eyal Rosenberg and team Nipendo on getting acquired by American Express to automate and streamline business-to-business (B2B) payments processes.

LAYOFFS TRACKER

8,000 Israelis were laid off from tech startups/companies in 2022 (source).

Layoffs announced by ironSource (284 people), ? Snappy (30%, 90 people) and Pagaya (15%, 100 people)

Let's help all affected land new jobs fast

NEW FUNDS

- Congratulations? Hila Rom ?? on the first closing for RUNI Ventures. Given both Kevin Baxpehler and myself are both graduates of Reichman University I look forward to a lot of collaborations with Remagine Ventures !

LINKS FOR YOUR BROWSER

1) ?? New on?VC Cafe: a take by me on "Investing in Generative AI tools" - will VCs be turned down by IP issues, platform risks and competition or are we in the down of a new AI-powered startup renaissance?

2) Fair use or copyright infringement? The first class-action copyright infringement lawsuit around AI Art was filed against Stability AI and Midjourney , while OpenAI and Google DeepMind shared words of caution - the data used for generative AI training has no attribution.

Related: check out the interview of Sam Altman, OpenAI's CEO (part 1, part 2)

3) The Future 100 - trends and change to watch in 2023 (PDF) by 伟门

CHART(s) OF THE WEEK

The updated Israeli Generative AI startup landscape (by me). I mapped 50 startups so far. If you notice one missing, please fill this form

Who owns the generative AI platforms? To understand how the generative AI market is taking shape, we first need to define how the stack looks today. Here’s a preliminary view by Andreessen Horowitz

Guide to Alternatives 4Q 2022 by J.P. 摩根 . Venture capital continued to be the number one Alternative asset class in terms of returns

Talk about large markets... The US government will spend $858,000,000,000 on defence in 2023. $34 billion, or 4%, will go to startups for early-stage research and development.?

2022 has been the biggest year ever in gaming with record deal activity of over $127 billion, according to a new report by Drake Star , and 2023 is opening with a bang, as Playtika makes $810M bid to acquire Rovio Entertainment

That's all for this week. Thanks for tuning in - we crossed the 3,000 subscribers!

There's so much to celebrate in our "small" community - keep on creating!

#tech #Israel #startups #venturecapital #ai #innovation