A week all about firsts 1️⃣
Necessary Nuggets
Happy Wednesday! If you’re new here, welcome to Necessary Nuggets, your one-stop pre-seed shop. We deliver updates from Necessary Ventures and helpful tidbits on our little corner of the world. Every edition is also on our blog.
Jobortunities 🚨
✨NEW FEATURED JOB✨
Mental: Putting the men in mental health. Action-oriented tools targeted towards strengthening the manly mindset.
| Head of Growth |
Taro: Taro increases access to healthcare while reducing costs and physician burnout via direct primary care based health insurance.
| Product Engineer |
Arc Boats: Electrify watercraft. Build the Tesla of boats. Arc’s aim is both sustainability and high performance. Arc is currently accepting internship applications, so go ahead and forward this to every engineering student you know.
Reach out with any questions! All 139 open job postings are listed here.
Market Stirrings 🚩
It’s a legacy land. First-time funds are in short supply compared to recent years, dropping from a tall peak in 2021 of 318 funds in the market to just 97 funds in 2023. Although the pool of funds was a bit shallower, the amount of capital was not. Capital raised was fairly steady in 2023 compared to 2022 at $6.5 billion and $7.3 billion respectively.
Good Reads 📖
For the rushed reader …
Particle.news launched a private beta last weekend and is offering an AI-powered news reading experience.
Researchers at Kyoto University built the very first wooden satellite made from magnolia and took it for a test drive in the International Space Station.
Ven^x launched last week and is the first deep tech venture collaborative, created to serve as a force multiplier in the deep tech ecosystem.
For the less rushed reader …
THAT'S NEWS TO ME: Necessary Nuggets is shaking in its bits over this one. Particle.news launched a private beta last weekend and is offering an AI-powered news reading experience. Talk about competition. Founded by former Twitter and Tesla engineers, Particle aims to create a platform that not only summarizes news, but also does so in a way that fairly compensates authors. In case you haven’t read about it in the news, the news ecosystem is rapidly shrinking, and AI exacerbates news-lovers’ worries. In the wrong hands, AI could limit clicks to publishers’ websites, which would make it difficult to monetize via advertising. Let’s hope there’s enough money (and news nuggets) to go around.
GALACTIC TREES: Wood you like to float in outer space? Researchers at Kyoto University built the very first wooden satellite made from magnolia and took it for a test drive in the International Space Station, finding it to be surprisingly stable. Plans are in the works to launch the LignoSat probe on a US rocket this summer. Satellites reentering the Earth’s atmosphere burn up and leave behind tiny aluminum particles that could eventually affect the environment. Wood could (tree)t the atmosphere right because it would burn completely upon reentry, leaving no dust in the atmosphere. Better yet, wood is a great contender for space because there are no animals and moisture to cause rot. I can already imagine what the satellite would say if an alien tried to abduct it: “Leaf me alone!”
DEEP adVENTURE: There’s a new cool kids club in venture capital, and they want all the deep tech startups to sit with them at their lunch table. Ven^x, which is harder to decide how to say than Elon Musk’s son’s name, launched last week and is the first deep tech venture collaborative, created to serve as a force multiplier in the deep tech ecosystem. The hub is located in downtown Boston, nearby universities like MIT known for regularly spinning out new technologies and scientific breakthroughs. The collaborative will partner with startups in the area to grant access to additional expertise and a larger pool of capital. The founding firms include Anzu Partners, Hitachi Ventures, Myriad Venture Partners, SkyRiver Ventures, and a real estate consulting firm, The Steele Group. It seems like college kids in Boston just hit the jackpot if they’re willing to take the deep dive in tech.
Fire Up the Pre-Seeds🔥
Notable pre-seed raises in …
fintech
Buildstock - Hand AI a hammer
The Problem: Late payments cost the construction materials industry $1.4 trillion in 2022.
The Tech: A marketplace for construction materials with AI-driven product discovery that enables cost savings, better tracking, and flexible financing.
Recently Raised: $1.6 million in funding from Precursor, MGV, XFactor, RefashionD, and a list of angels.
Also Note: Buildstock is currently based in the NY tri-state area and plans to expand across the United States.
artificial intelligence
Kusho - AI Agents Want Your Bugs
The Problem: Software is a tricky business and often results in unnoticed bugs that can create unreliable software.
The Tech: A simulated AI software developer that can discover bugs with greater accuracy and in less time than humans.
Recently Raised: $600k in funding led by Antler India.
Also Note: The AI agents will enable all software to be thoroughly tested before release, freeing time for more difficult programming tasks.
Outro🚪
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Thanks for reading, and see you next week!
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