Bloomberg’s Emily Chang on Solving Tech’s Diversity Problem

Spencer Rascoff

Spencer Rascoff serves as executive chairman of dot.LA. He is an entrepreneur and company leader who co-founded Zillow, Hotwire, dot.LA, Pacaso and Supernova, and who served as Zillow's CEO for a decade. During Spencer's time as CEO, Zillow won dozens of "best places to work" awards as it grew to over 4,500 employees, $3 billion in revenue, and $10 billion in market capitalization. Prior to Zillow, Spencer co-founded and was VP Corporate Development of Hotwire, which was sold to Expedia for $685 million in 2003. Through his startup studio and venture capital firm, 75 & Sunny, Spencer is an active angel investor in over 100 companies and is incubating several more.

Bloomberg’s Emily Chang on Solving Tech’s Diversity Problem

Emily Chang is a best-selling author and host and executive producer of Bloomberg Technology. Earlier this year, she made waves with her book “Brotopia," an expose on how sexism became pervasive in Silicon Valley, despite its utopian ideals. Drawing on interviews with some of tech's biggest names, Emily shines a bright light on a big problem. In this episode, Emily joins Spencer at Zillow Group's San Francisco office to discuss her inspiration for the book, how the tech community got to this point and what we can do about it.


Press Play to hear the full conversation or check out the transcript below. You can also subscribe to Office Hours on Apple Podcasts and PodcastOne.

Spencer Rascoff: Good to see you all. I'm here with Emily Chang. Hello, Emily. Welcome.

Emily Chang: Hi. Thank you so much for having me. I'm happy to be here.

Rascoff: I'm excited to have you here as a guest and turn the tables. You're usually interviewing me, and I now finally get to interview you.

Chang: It's payback time.

Rascoff: So, let's take a step back and talk about the writing journey of why you decided to write this book, when you started, and what that research and writing process was like, and then we'll jump into some of the themes and discoveries from it.

Chang: Yeah, so, I anchor a daily show on Bloomberg Television, and that's been going on for eight years now, and when we first launched the show, my focus was getting people like you to come on, which wasn't always so easy. Now I think we've gotten there, but you know, over time, I sort of started asking more questions of my guests. “Well, what are you doing about this?" I mean, the tech industry has such a grave inequality, but no one was talking about it. I mean, women hold 25 percent of technical jobs across the board. They account for seven to eight percent of venture investors, and companies that are run by women get just two percent of funding. This is an industry that calls itself a meritocracy, and I highly doubt that women have just two percent of good ideas.

Rascoff: And when you were starting to focus on this, though, the world was not talking about it. This was before Me Too, before Time's Up.

Chang: These questions were very politically incorrect and they made people uncomfortable, which is why I didn't feel like I could ask them initially. And when I did, people would give the sort of politically correct answer, and then they would get off the set and then they would spill it. And so I knew that there was so much more there. And then at the end of 2015, I was interviewing one particular investor, who I talk about in Chapter 5 — very prominent, very successful investor — and they had no women in their US business at the time. And I said, “What are you doing to hire women? What do you think your responsibility is?" And he said, “Oh, well we're looking very hard, and I think we're completely blind to gender, race, sexuality — but, what we're not prepared to do is to lower our standards." And this was on television. And I know some people think that, but they don't normally say it on television. And that was sort of my Time's Up moment. And let's put aside what he said. Maybe it was a flip comment. Let's judge them on their actions. In 44 years, this firm did not hire a single woman investor.

This is an industry that styles itself as a place where anyone can succeed and, you know, my — that it's a sort of modern utopia where anyone can change the world and anyone can make their own rules. I think that can be true if you're a man. But if you're a woman, it's incomparably harder.

Rascoff: Okay. It's depressing, but we're going to change all that, and actually the fact that we're even talking about this, which would have been almost unheard of two or three years ago, is a start. So as you — what surprised you most as you started researching this at companies? I mean, you uncovered some awful, awful things — Harvey Weinstein-type awful. Was that surprising to you or, I mean, what was the most surprising aspect of the research?

Chang: And by the way, the book is — you know, it can be a hard read, but there are bright spots, there are villains, but there are also heroes. And so it's not entirely all depressing, and there's also concrete takeaway —

Rascoff: And there's solutions. And we're going to talk about solutions, yeah.

Chang: And things you can do. But yes, I was surprised, and especially with the behavior on the venture capital side where, you know, deals are done in one-on-one meetings, in one-on-one spaces and just how many women were so often put in these very uncomfortable positions. You know, after Susan Fowler's blog post came out, I had 12 women engineers over at my home for dinner who worked at a range of companies, big and small — Google, a couple of them worked at Uber — and you know, they're telling me about getting invited to strip clubs and bondage clubs in the middle of the day, and they felt like they couldn't say no. Or they were put in this position of, “Well, do I go and be part of whatever work conversations happen or do I not go and then I'm excluded from those conversations?" You know, I do think those are the more extreme and egregious examples, and the even bigger problem is the sort of systemic discrimination that creeps into every space simply because women are so outnumbered in this industry. And so they are often the only woman in a room over and over and over again. And they describe it as having to do this sort of constant emotional labor that they don't get credit for, which is like an entire second job that men don't have to do.

Rascoff: What do you mean by emotional labor?

Chang: Well, it's sort of feeling like they have to prove themselves over and over again, that people are sort of doubting why they're there, you know, fighting against these microaggressions that, again, it's things that are difficult to pinpoint and call out and say, “Hey, I'm being mansplained." Like, that sounds kind of odd, but it sort of wears on them. And I think that is the bigger problem. I mean, this is an industry that has been so male-dominated for so long that it can be difficult to sort of break that up and start fresh

Rascoff: And one of the things I was surprised by in the book was it wasn't always this way. At the beginning of technology, it was a much more equitable world in tech. So, describe what you found during your research.

Chang: When you go back to the '40s and '50s, women actually played a huge role in the computing industry. Men were primarily the hardware makers, but women were pretty well-represented among software programmers. And they were programming computers for the military and programming computers for NASA, and it literally was “Hidden Figures" but industrywide. And then in the '60s and '70s, as the tech industry was starting to explode, they were so desperate for new programmers that they started doing these personality tests and aptitude tests to identify them. And the makers of these tests decided that good programmers “don't like people." Which makes a lot of sense, right? There's no research to support the idea that people who don't like people are better at this job than people who do, and generally, more men fit into that category, I will say. And this stereotype shut out more than half the population, and these tests were used for decades by companies as big as IBM.

Rascoff: Well, and there's still — you can argue they're not tests, necessarily, but they're still sort of used today in the way a lot of interviewing gets done.

Chang: Exactly, and so it — these tests basically solidified this sort of antisocial, mostly white male nerd stereotype that persists to this day, and then it got repeated in movies and popular culture. And, people sort of think, oh, you know, “Revenge of the Nerds," they created this stereotype, when in fact they were just repeating what they saw in the industry already. And so my argument is that the tech industry created its own pipeline problem. In 1984, women were earning 37 percent of computer science degrees. That has since plummeted to 18 percent where it's been flat for the last decade. And you see the same sort of trend with tech jobs.

Rascoff: And in medicine, for example, it's been quite the opposite.

Chang: It's been the opposite. And actually the implementation of Title IX in the '70s had the opposite effect in law and medicine, where women started charging into these fields and lowering the barriers to entry, but tech actually raised the barriers to entry. And you see the same sort of stereotypes and perception repeated to this day. Case in point, James Damore at Google, who wrote that viral memo where he argued that men are biologically more suited to this job than women, and he was just repeating the same sort of hostile, you know, mythical stereotype that those early programming tests perpetuated.

Rascoff: And yet I thought some of the responses to that were spot on where they talked about actually the importance of empathy, that what engineers are doing, what product people do, is they're trying to solve other people's problems. So, actually empathy is very important.

Chang: Absolutely. I mean, there's a great argument to be made that we need people who like people and care about people to be doing these jobs as well, but, you know, that overall we should have people of a variety of backgrounds building products that billions of people around the world are using. I mean, this is an industry — you guys are building the future. You're changing the way we live our lives, and so it makes zero sense for 95 percent of the decisions to be made by white men.

Rascoff: So, I think we can all agree that some of the things that you discuss here, whether it's the cuddle puddles (which is a term I'd never heard before I read your book and I never want to hear again) or, you know, VCs asking entrepreneurs to pitch them their business idea in a hot tub. I mean, these are obviously gross and inappropriate and disgusting.

Chang: I'm glad you think so.

Rascoff: But the more subtle forms of discrimination or things that impact employee engagement — let's discuss why diversity and inclusion is important. Like, what are the business outcomes that get changed if you have a more diverse set of people forming these decisions and building these products?

Chang: So, I fully believe that if we had, you know, more diverse teams create better products, make more money, are more innovative, and research proves that out. But just saying that can kind of fly over people's heads. So, I interviewed Ev Williams, for example, the founder of Twitter — co-founder of Twitter, and I asked him, “If you had more women on the early Twitter team, designing early Twitter, do you think online harassment and trolling would be such a problem?" And he was like, “You know what, I don't think it would be. We weren't thinking about that at all when we were building Twitter. We were thinking about all the wonderful and amazing things that could be done with it, not how it could be used to send death threats or how it could be used to send rape threats." And, you know, facial recognition technology is already a little bit sexist and a little bit racist and doesn't recognize women and people of color as easily as it does white men. And so I think, well, if women had had a seat at the table 10, 20, 30 years ago, maybe the internet would be a friendlier place, maybe video games would not be so violent, maybe porn wouldn't be so ubiquitous. And so I think there's an incredibly compelling business case here that this can impact product and product design, and you — you know, I know that you guys at Zillow are really focused on this and, you know, for the first time, you've added some pretty innovative information to your listings that has never been done before, right?

Rascoff: This is the Trulia LGBTQ protections. So, a round of applause, by the way, because this team built it.

[Applause]

Rascoff: Yeah, I mean, some other examples, I mean, Uber being built really without passenger or driver safety features, which now they're scrambling to roll out, I mean, probably if more women had been involved in the creation of Uber, perhaps it would have occurred to somebody that some of these people are going to do bad things to riders or to drivers.

Chang: I mean, it is astonishing that this is a company that's been around for almost a decade now and that only now are they thinking about these things. And actually it's so much harder when you are already at scale to go backwards and try to fix what is broken, which is why, you know, it's so much better if you start thinking about these things really early on, and then it's just easier as you go. And I hear from people so often, “Well, it's so hard; it takes so much time to find more diverse candidates." And you know, my answer is, “Well, this will save you time in the long run."

Rascoff: When we first launched Zillow almost 10 years ago, our idea was to turn on the lights and set all this real estate information free — what people paid for their home, what homes were worth, et cetera. And part of that information set is the owner of the home. And so it was very natural for us to consider putting the owner's name on every home, 100 million homes in America. And we were getting ready to do that. Lloyd Frank, our vice chairman, and I thought this was a terrific idea. This is “set information free." And Kristin Acker, who's SVP of product and also very involved here in this office at Trulia, she said, “That's a terrible idea. There are stalkers out there that are going to use Zillow to figure out where their ex-wife lives and bad things are going to happen. And the first time someone gets raped or killed because they were able to find that information out through our site, that's going to be a really awful day." And having — in that case, it was gender diversity in the room and just give that totally different perspective was really valuable, and it allowed us to, I think, make the right product decision.

Okay, let's talk solutions and then we're going to ask — I'm going to ask you some questions that some of our employees submitted through Slack. What can we do about all this? We as a company, we as a society, you know, what's the answer?

Chang: So, first of all, I think change needs to come from the top, and we need CEOs and investors to make this a priority. And so that's why I'm so glad that you invited me here, I'm so glad you're talking about this, I'm so glad you're willing to admit the mistakes. And there are people in the book who are willing to talk about the things that they did wrong, and that's so important. Like, we all have biases, right? Whether you're the CEO or a product designer, you know, we all come at problems based on our own life experience, no matter what that might be, and I think we just need to recognize that.

If you just focus on raising awareness about bias, however, it's not necessarily going to have a huge impact. If you give people tools to combat their bias, that can have a big impact. So, whether that is, you know, not even starting an interview process until you have two female candidates and two candidates of color, or diversifying your recruiting team, or structuring your interview process so you're asking everyone the same questions rather than doing this sort of free-form thing where you sort of tailor the questions to, you know, who they are and, you know, that can obviously lead to bias because if someone looks “the part," you're going to ask them different questions than if someone doesn't look the part.

It's not just about hiring, though. It's about retention and progression and creating a culture where everybody can thrive. And so women are twice as likely to leave tech as men, and they're leaving, you know, 12 years into their career, which could be at this huge inflection point where they've got some real experience and could sort of skyrocket up, but at the same time, you know, they're having this sort of moment of, “Well, am I really feeling valued here?" And there's this perception that women leave because they have families or they're leaning back in their careers, but actually they're going to jobs in other fields. And so, you know, we need to make sure that you're not losing the women that you have. And so that's about creating a culture where everyone can feel included and comfortable and a place where they can be themselves.

And so it's — you know, I talked about structuring the interview process, but structuring review and feedback systems. Slack is an example in the book. Their motto is work hard and go home. They're like, “We're trying to hire adults here, not just kids out of college," and they're very focused on making sure that people can sustain careers over a long life. This is a super competitive industry. You know, talent — it's a war for talent. And so you don't want people just hanging around for a year and a half, you want them for as long as you can have them. And so there are so many things that I think also individuals can do, and I think we all need to listen better, we need to be having these conversations. I know they might make people feel a little bit uncomfortable. I kind of think that's a good thing right now to raise awareness.

And you know, I'm so grateful for the women who have spoken up over the last year and the collective courage that they have summoned, but this this is not just on women. This is on all of us, men too, and so if you see someone — I mean, I think mentorship and advocacy is so important. I know that's really important to you guys here. But if you see someone being interrupted or you see someone not getting an opportunity, call that out. It can be a lot easier for you to do it as a bystander or a witness than for the victim to say, “Hey, I'm being mansplained. Can you stop that, please?" So I just think there's so much that, sort of, we all can do to help each other on this to get to a better place.

Rascoff: Where we started on this journey, we, at Zillow Group, when we started focusing more on this issue, which was probably three-ish years ago, it actually started with employee engagement. You know, the first thing we did was we said, “OK, we have — we're sadly underrepresented in terms of diversity, but we're not nowhere. Let's actually see how engaged different sets of employees are." And the results were eye-opening and not good. Non-whites were less engaged. They felt less connected to the company, they felt less welcome, and that was the eye-opening moment for me. It was like we spend all this time, effort and money trying to get the world's greatest people into this company. It is incumbent upon us, not to mention that it's the right thing to do, but in terms of business results, I want all of these people to be doing their best work, and if they don't feel connected to the company, we should fix that.

And we've made huge strides in that regard.

The other thing that your comments made me think of was the culture-fit issue. Because a lot of this happens — the tip of the spear is the interview and recruiting. And we try not to talk about culture fit. I think culture fit can be code for hire people that look like me and dress like me and act like me. And so we talk a lot about core-value fit and assessing a candidate to see, do they fit to our six core values, not is it a good culture fit.

Chang: I have a new term for you: culture addition. So looking — it's like you honor your culture, you like your culture, but you're looking for people who are going to add to your culture and expand your culture. You know, and I love the core value ideas as well. And I think writing those down and communicating them to employees is so important.

Rascoff: All right, so a couple questions that came from employees via our Slack channels. From Megan Hansen, who works for Trulia in content strategy, she writes, “Any advice on how we can change a work culture that sees moms as moms but not dads as dads? Specifically, it seems that the work of childcare still falls to working moms, such as needing to leave early for doctors' appointments and daycare pickup, potentially because it seems less likely that working dads are also seen as caretakers while in the workplace."

Chang: So, I do think that work needs to be shared at home more equally if we want work to be shared at work. That's not the reality today. I think that so many of the things that women want at work dads want too, and, you know, both moms and dads are parents. I think it can start with benefits and having equal maternity and paternity leave policies and actually encouraging the dads to take it, because there is — I mean, just like there's — I know that I've taken three maternity leaves. I know how hard it is as a woman to leave for that period of time. And you know, I think for dads, there's still this sort of social stigma against taking that time off, and so I think that that can be really important in sort of starting to change those kinds of cultural norms.

I think flexibility is really important in making sure that work after work is valued, and so I leave to pick up my kids because my boss, the editor in chief of Bloomberg, has said people should feel okay going home and picking up their kids. But I get back online, and I do my work, and I want that work to count. We all want sustainable lives, and so making work work for people of all kinds should be the focus.

Rascoff: From Natalie, an engineer at Trulia, she writes, “In your book, you write about Sheryl Sandberg's response to your email. In addition to having women in leadership roles paving the way for more women in leadership roles, what else do you think is critical to successfully increasing female representation in the workplace?"

Chang: When I was pregnant with my first child, this was now six years ago, and it was just when that article “Why Women Can't Have It All Still" came out. And I was like devastated. I was seven months pregnant, I was having all these sort of conflicting emotions, “How am I going to do this? Maybe it's impossible," and then that article came out and I cried myself to sleep that night. And the next day — and the article really took aim at Sheryl. And I'd never met Sheryl at that point, and I just emailed her out of the blue. And I said, “You know what, I just want to say thank you for putting yourself out there on these issues." She had done her TED Talk and I had re-watched it, and it actually made a difference to me.

And she wrote right back, like in 15 seconds, and said, “Congratulations! Is this your first?" And I was like, “Yes," and wrote this sort of very overzealous response. And then she said “Here's my cell phone. Let me know if you ever want advice." And I was, again, shocked. And of course I didn't just call her cell phone. I found out who her assistant was, I figured — and I got time in her calendar in three weeks, and she called me on the dot. And I got a half-hour of uninterrupted time with her one-on-one — this is before “Lean In" — where she kind of gave me a little pep talk and was like, “You can do this. You will do this, and you need to do this. Like, you're going to keep working."

And I think that that sort of advice and mentorship is really, really important. But I've also had to seek it out, and so I ask those questions. And you know, there's so much that, sort of, we all can do to help other people that we see in these situations, and that really made a huge difference for me.

Rascoff: Question from a Trulia analyst, Ini Li asks, “How much do you believe in a person's ability to evolve some of their views?"

Chang: I think that it's — I believe in us, and I'm really optimistic. I mean, despite the title, I think that the smartest people in the world who are taking us to Mars and building self-driving cars and connecting the world, whether you're, you know, all the way up to the top, I think people — we're smart people. I think we can change, and I think part of it is the ignorance has gone on for too long. But at this point, we can — I've written 300 pages about it. We've been talking about it now for a year, like ignorance can only be willful. Like, we know this is a problem. And so I think people can change, and I think the business case makes a lot of sense, but it's only when the numbers really change that a real culture shift is going to happen. So, if you have 10 men around a dinner table, you swap out one man for a woman, the conversation might change a little bit. But if it's half and half, it's a completely different conversation. And that's when you will see the results. And, unfortunately, we just don't have a lot of great examples where, you know, places are 50-50 and you can see the results. But I do think it's going to take that sort of true number shift that will lead to a true culture shift where views will actually change.

Rascoff: I mean, you see this with other social movements, right? Whether it's the civil rights movement or America's acceptance of LGBTQ. I mean, there have been radical changes in just 30 years. And some of that is demographic and generational, but a lot of that is individual people changing their attitudes on these topics.

Chang: Becoming woke, if you will.

Rascoff: And I think we're seeing it in a very short period of time here because society has been so jarred by some of these scandals that it's — I mean, it's going to happen — hopefully at least people's attitudes will change faster. Now, it'll probably take decades for more equality to come into the workplace in terms of representation, but attitudes I think are changing.

All right, from an anonymous person, “Is there anything you didn't include in “Brotopia" that, in retrospect, you wish you had? And is there anything you wish you'd left out?"

Chang: I had a very high bar for what was going to be in print. And when you're taking on someone's career and life, you know, I don't take that lightly, and so everything was, like, fully vetted by multiple lawyers, and Bloomberg luckily was very, very supportive and very supportive of good journalism in general. I mean, I'm just — it was 500 pages and I had to cut it down to 300, so I'm more — I think about all the babies that are, like, lying on the floor that I could not include.

Rascoff: Anything you included you regret?

Chang: No. I mean, I have an opportunity — we're coming out with a paperback in March, so I'm going to update it, I'm going to add another chapter, and I'm really excited to talk about sort of the impact that the book has had and the reaction, you know, good and bad. And I mean, for me, the reaction has been what I've seen as mostly positive, and I have been so encouraged by invitations to speak at tech companies, which I honestly did not expect. So you know, I've spoken at Amazon and Microsoft and LinkedIn and Google and places where they could have easily said, you know, “No, thank you. Your book is called 'Brotopia.'" You were one of the first to ask.

Rascoff: Well, but I saw you at a tech conference right when the book had come out, and there was so much heat, let's call it, and I said, “Are you persona non grata, like, at most of these companies, or are you still able to get people to come to your — do your show?" And it was too early to tell, I think, was the —

Chang: Yeah. I think there's a few people who won't be coming on, but you know what, no good change comes without some people feeling a little bit uncomfortable. And honestly, the vast majority of people, I think, are glad that I did it and probably respect me more for putting my voice behind this and, you know, I think some of the people who maybe aren't so happy, hopefully in the long run they understand.

Rascoff: All right, last question. What are the simple, easy, day-to-day things that we can do at work with our teams and at the company to improve equity and inclusion in our workplaces?

Chang: I mentioned listening. I think that's important. And also asking. I think we don't ask each other enough, “How are you doing?" And some people don't want to talk about their personal lives at work, and that's OK, but some people do. Sheryl Sandberg talks about this bringing your whole self to work thing, and it speaks to exactly what you said earlier, that if you don't feel like you can be yourself, you can't be your best self at work.

You know, I had someone who works at a startup tell me, “You know, I was talking to one of my employees, and I found out that both her parents passed away when she was really young." He's like, “I didn't even know. I felt so horrible that I didn't know that that's where she had come from." And those are the things that maybe we should know each other — know about each other.

You know, I think in general we do need to see more examples of female leadership, and maybe that means taking a chance on someone and training them for that role. We see people like Sheryl Sandberg and Marissa Meyer, and we think it can only be that way or that way. Those are the two versions of female success. And the problem is we don't have a lot of other examples, but women — you know, there are all kinds of male bosses, right? And there are all kinds of female bosses as well, we just don't see it enough. And you know, to the point you can't be what you can't see. Like, we can't be what we can't see.

I interviewed seven young girls, teenage girls, at the end of the book who've all learned how to code, and they're so excited to do their part to change the world, but they already have an idea of what they're up against. And, you know, they're in women in tech groups on Facebook, and they read the news and, you know, one of them said to me, “I mean, I heard that Travis was, like, meditating in the lactation room at Uber. What is that about?" And so, yeah, I was surprised. I'm like, “Wow, you guys know your stuff." So they can't be what they can't see.

Rascoff: Some things that I think we've done and can continue to do: Mentor people of all types. Do a great job in interviewing and recruiting. Focus on employee engagement so that everybody feels connected to the company, to the mission, they feel welcome. I'll say the obvious thing, which shouldn't have to be said, but just treat each other kindly and respectfully. Don't make inappropriate comments. Don't do illegal and dumb things. I mean, it's crazy that we say it, but apparently it needs to be said, so don't do that. And, gosh, there's so many more things. I really think the employee engagement is important here.

Also, actually, I think we need to do a better job at this company, and at all companies, of convincing white males why this is important. I'll just be direct and I'll say white males in that case, that there are a lot of people who probably think, “Oh, this doesn't affect me," or, “It's not my problem," or, “I didn't cause this." And I agree — I didn't cause it — but I do think it affects me, and I think it's important that white males understand why it's important to the company, why it's important to our colleagues and our peers, and how they can be part of the solution, even if maybe they weren't part of the problem. So, those are just a couple of my thoughts.

Emily, thank you for turning on the lights on this important issue, and thank you for being here.

Chang: Thank you for having me. Thank you all.

The post Bloomberg's Emily Chang on Solving Tech's Diversity Problem appeared first on Office Hours.

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Tinder, Starlink, and Apple’s New Studio: This Week in LA

🔦 Spotlight

Happy Independence Day, Los Angeles! 🇺🇸

While you're celebrating freedom, here are some electrifying updates lighting up LA’s tech, satellite, and music scenes:

🔥 Tinder mandates Face Recognition in California

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Tinder is now requiring all new users in California to complete a biometric face check, a brief video selfie processed via FaceTec, to verify profiles are genuine. The video is deleted post-verification, though an encrypted face map remains while the account is active. This West Hollywood based move could redefine trust, safety, and privacy in mainstream consumer apps.

🌐 Starlink clears hurdle to launch in India

Elon Musk’s SpaceX backed Starlink has cleared most regulatory and licensing hurdles with India’s Department of Telecommunications, marking a key step toward launching satellite broadband in one of the world’s fastest growing markets. Final approvals from the national space regulator are pending, and services, expected to deliver high speed connectivity to underserved regions, could launch in the coming months. This is a major milestone for Starlink’s global expansion.

🎧 Apple Music opens Culver City creative hub

  Image Source: Apple

Apple Music is celebrating its anniversary by launching a brand new 15,000 square foot, three story studio in Culver City. The facility, featuring a 4,000 square foot soundstage, spatial audio suites, podcast booths, and more, is designed by Eric Owen Moss and slated to open mid August. It solidifies LA’s reputation as a creative powerhouse and reaffirms Apple’s commitment to investing in and nurturing our city's cultural ecosystem.

From dating apps to deep space to sound stages, LA isn’t just watching the future unfold, we’re building it.

Here’s to independence, imagination, and everything this city dares to launch next. Happy Fourth, Los Angeles.

🤝 Venture Deals

LA Companies

  • Castelion has raised a $350M Series B round led by Lightspeed Venture Partners alongside Altimeter Capital to scale its hypersonic missile production capabilities. The El Segundo-based defense startup plans to use the funds to expand manufacturing, accelerate testing through its SpaceX-inspired rapid development model, and position itself as a cost-effective supplier of hypersonic weapons to the U.S. military and its allies. - learn more
  • Earth Sama, a Calabasas, California–based climate-tech platform that helps rural farming and Indigenous communities generate and manage carbon credits, secured investment from Omtse Ventures. The funding will support the rollout of Earth Sama’s blockchain-powered field app, climate-creator platform, and smart-contract tools to scale community-led carbon credit projects globally under the Paris Agreement’s Article 6.4 framework. - learn more

            LA Venture Funds

            • Plassa Capital participated in Metafide’s $3.275M funding round. Miami based Metafide, the creator of SURGE, a gamified trading platform that combines AI neural networks and human insight, will use the funds to scale and launch SURGE into the market. - learn more
            • BOLD Capital Partners participated as a founding investor in Syntis Bio’s $33M Series A round, with an additional $5M in NIH grants. The Boston-based biotech is developing oral therapies for obesity and rare diseases, and the funding will help advance its SYNT platform, moving its lead obesity treatment, SYNT-101, into Phase 1 trials and supporting development of SYNT-202 for homocystinuria. - learn more
            • BAM Ventures participated in Cred’s $15M seed round for its predictive intelligence startup. San Francisco based Cred uses AI to unify company data with real time market signals and deliver actionable insights for sales and operations. The funding, led by defy.vc, will be used to scale Cred’s platform, expand its customer base, and grow team and product capabilities. - learn more
            • BOLD Capital Partners participated in Gallant’s $18M Series B round to advance its ready-to-use stem cell therapies for pets. The funding, led by Digitalis Ventures with additional support from NovaQuest Capital, will help Gallant bring its off-the-shelf regenerative treatments to market. - learn more
            • Rebel Fund joined the seed round for Rocketable, contributing to the $6.5M raised to build a portfolio of fully automated SaaS companies. San Francisco-based Rocketable, backed by True Ventures and others, uses AI agents to operate acquired software products, and Rebel’s support will help scale both the platform and acquisitions. - learn more 
                    LA Exits
                    • Leasepath, a cloud-first provider of equipment lease and loan management software, has been acquired by Solifi to enhance its mid-market offerings. The deal allows Solifi to expand Leasepath’s Microsoft Dynamics-based platform into new global markets while keeping Leasepath’s team and leadership in place. - learn more

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                              Senra Raises $25M to Rewire LA's Aerospace Supply Chain

                              🔦 Spotlight

                              Hello Los Angeles,

                              In the shadow of LA’s booming space and defense scene, a new kind of hardware startup is scaling up. And it's not building flying cars or flashy robots. It’s building the infrastructure that builds everything else.

                              This week, Senra Systems announced a $25 million Series A led by Dylan Field and CIV, with participation from General Catalyst, Sequoia Capital, Founders Fund, Andreessen Horowitz, 8VC, and Pax Ventures. Their Redondo Beach-based facility is using custom automation, software, and new design tools to quadruple production speed. The goal is to solve a notoriously manual, bottleneck-prone part of the supply chain: wire harness manufacturing.

                              The company also launched Amp, a CAD software platform that bridges the gap between harness design and physical production. It's a process that has historically been slow, fragmented, and hard to scale. In other words, Senra isn’t just building machines. They’re rewiring the very systems that power aerospace, defense, and industrial tech.

                              It’s not sci-fi. It’s supply chain innovation. And it’s very LA.

                              Catch the latest LA venture deals, acquisitions, and fund updates below.

                              🤝 Venture Deals

                              LA Companies

                              • 2wai, co-founded by actor Calum Worthy and producer Russell Geyser, has emerged from stealth with the launch of its avatar-based social app, allowing users to create lifelike “HoloAvatars” in under three minutes for real-time, multi-language conversations. The platform gives individuals, especially creators and entertainers, control over their digital likeness by restricting avatar responses to pre-approved information, helping counter deepfake threats. The launch follows a $5 million pre-seed raise and sets the stage for broader use by celebrities, brands, and educational partners. - learn more
                              • Superfiliate secured a $2M strategic growth round led by HappyStack to fuel its rapid expansion in the creator commerce space. The platform, which automates influencer and affiliate marketing for CPG and DTC brands via deep Meta and TikTok integrations, has achieved an impressive 400% year-over-year growth. The investment will support scaling its automation engine, deepening social commerce partnerships, and onboarding more e-commerce brands. - learn more
                              • Gemist, a Los Angeles–based jewelry-tech startup, secured $6M in seed funding from Entrada Ventures, Artemis Fund, and Collide Capital, bringing its total funding to $9M. The platform offers real-time 3D visualizations, dynamic pricing, and integrated e-commerce for custom fine jewelry, and is used weekly by over 14,000 customers to design personalized pieces. The new capital will enhance its visualization tools, pricing engine, and commerce features as Gemist expands its footprint. - learn more
                              • Chronicle Studios has raised an oversubscribed $11.6M seed round co-led by Patron and Point72 Ventures to fuel the development of original, audience-driven franchises. Founded by former DreamWorks and Warner Bros. exec Chris deFaria and tech entrepreneur Aaron Sisto, the LA-based studio plans to invest in independent creators and build AI-powered tools, like automated YouTube thumbnails and social analytics, to help storytellers grow and monetize their IP. - learn more
                              • Stackup, a developer platform for crypto applications, has raised a $4.2M in seed funding round led by 1kx. Stackup helps crypto businesses build better user experiences and manage on-chain user data, and the funding will be used to grow its engineering team and expand support for more blockchain networks. - learn more
                              • Doên, a fashion brand known for its vintage-inspired, California aesthetic, has closed a growth equity round led by Silas Capital. The funding will help the company expand its retail footprint, grow its team, and scale operations. Doên plans to continue building its community-driven brand while deepening its commitment to sustainability and women's empowerment. - learn more
                              • Root has raised a $9M seed funding round led by Konvoy and Headline, to develop its platform for managing online communities. The app, currently in closed beta, enables users to build custom tools like raid planners and task trackers right into their social experience. The fresh capital will fuel team expansion and product development ahead of a broader rollout. - learn more
                              • AndrenaM, a defense-tech startup founded by a former SpaceX engineer, raised $10M in just 36 hours. The company is building an AI-powered maritime sensing network using sonar-equipped buoys to provide real-time underwater surveillance. The funding, led by First Round Capital, will support team expansion, custom hardware development, and scaled deployments off the California coast. - learn more

                                      LA Venture Funds

                                      • Westlake Village BioPartners joined Neuron23’s $96.5M Series D financing round. The capital will fund the global Phase 2 NEULARK trial of NEU‑41, a brain-penetrant LRRK2 inhibitor for early-stage Parkinson’s disease, as well as support commercial and R&D scale-up. Neuron23 also announced that the first patient has been dosed in the NEULARK study, with initial results expected in 2027. - learn more
                                      • Fika Ventures participated in Spinwheel’s recent $30 M Series A round led by F‑Prime Capital. The funds will be used to accelerate their AI-powered platform that streamlines debt and credit management, reducing friction in account authentication, automating payments, and integrating liability data, all to deliver instant, developer-friendly credit APIs. This investment supports rapid growth across fintech and banking partners aiming to improve consumer credit outcomes. - learn more
                                      • Chaac Ventures participated in a $7M seed funding round for Meridian, a New York and Miami‑based startup using its AI-powered deal management platform to help private equity firms streamline sourcing, automate workflows, and improve diligence efficiency. The funding will accelerate product enhancements, expand the global go‑to‑market strategy, and deepen its traction with large institutional investors. - learn more
                                      • WME joined a debut funding round for haircare disruptor isima, which raised over $12M to accelerate its launch. Shakira-backed and science-driven, isima will use the capital to scale operations, expand product development, and roll out via isima.com and placements at Ulta Beauty (U.S. in July; Mexico in August), debuting across nearly 30 global markets. - learn more
                                      • M13 participated in Maven AGI’s Series B round, which raised $50M to expand its Business AGI platform for enterprise use. The funding brings Maven’s total capital raised to $78M. The company will use the investment to accelerate product development and go-to-market efforts as it scales its AI platform that unifies customer journeys across support, sales, and operations. - learn more
                                      • Alexandria Venture Investments joined GeneCentric Therapeutics’ $8M Series C round. The funding will support the commercial launch of GenomicsNext™, a groundbreaking liquid biopsy platform that combines extensive gene expression profiling with high‑fidelity DNA variant detection from ctDNA. This capital is expected to carry GeneCentric through 2026 and to help it scale predictive biomarker development for oncology applications. - learn more
                                      • MTech Capital and B Capital participated in COVR Global’s $2.5M seed round, led by MTech Capital. The funding will help COVR develop its AI-powered Decision Engine—a modular platform that enables insurers to make instant, data-driven claims decisions, such as coverage validation, liability assessment, and settlement automation. The investment will fuel product development and team growth as COVR scales across the UK, Spain, Japan, and Australia - learn more
                                      • Bedrock and Khosla Ventures co-led Mach Industries’ $100M Series B round. The defense-tech startup will use the capital to ramp up production at its Forge Huntington factory, grow its Mach Propulsion engine division, and further develop and deploy its advanced unmanned systems—Viper, Glide, and Stratos. This funding brings Mach’s total raised to about $185M as it scales vertically integrated defense manufacturing. - learn more
                                      • Fifth Wall participated in Juniper Square’s Series D funding round, which secured $130M at a $1.1 billion valuation. The investment will be used to accelerate the development and deployment of JunieAI, an AI-powered, agentic platform tailored specifically for private markets general partners to streamline investor relations, reporting, and fund administration. - learn more
                                      • Mucker Capital led CarePilot’s $2.5M seed round, with participation from KCRise Fund. The Overland Park-based startup will use the funding to further develop its AI-powered tools including its new “ProblemAssist” diagnostic and coding tool and expand its team as it scales solutions for healthcare providers. - learn more
                                      • Prototype Capital participated in Sunrise Robotics’ seed round, which raised $8.5M to emerge from stealth and advance its factory automation technology. The Ljubljana-based startup develops dual‑arm robotic cells trained in simulated environments, enabling rapid, cost-effective deployment and continuous learning across a fleet. The funds will be used to scale AI and simulation capabilities, expand team and manufacturing across Europe, and deepen customer deployments in sectors like electronics, supercars, and battery production. - learn more
                                            LA Exits
                                            • Comco, the pioneer behind the MicroBlaster® micro-precision sandblasting system, has been acquired by Medical Manufacturing Technologies (MMT), a portfolio company of Arcline Investment Management. This strategic move integrates Comco’s advanced abrasive technology into MMT’s suite, expanding its capabilities in precision microblasting for medical, aerospace, microelectronics, and industrial applications. MMT CEO Robbie Atkinson emphasized that the acquisition strengthens their end-to-end manufacturing offerings, while Comco President Colin Weightman joins MMT to drive continued innovation and customer growth. - learn more
                                            • 3BlackDot, the creator-first gaming and digital media studio known for popular YouTube franchises like Gaming While Black and Alpha Betas, has been acquired by Offscript Worldwide, the parent company of Revolt. With an audience of over 128 million subscribers, the acquisition marks Offscript’s entry into the $347 billion gaming industry and strengthens its creator-led IP development and distribution capabilities. 3BlackDot will now leverage Offscript’s infrastructure to scale its cultural impact while maintaining its creator-first approach. - learn more
                                            • Dr. Squatch, the fast-growing natural men’s grooming brand known for its social-first marketing and strong DTC presence, is being acquired by Unilever from Summit Partners. The move gives Unilever access to a brand with viral campaigns, influencer collaborations, and revenues reportedly around $400M, enhancing its premium personal care offerings. The deal is expected to close later this year pending regulatory approvals. - learn more
                                            • CloudSoda has been acquired by Diskover Data, combining CloudSoda’s intuitive data orchestration and automation with Diskover’s enterprise-scale indexing, metadata enrichment, and AI-ready infrastructure. This comes alongside Diskover’s $7.5M seed round, led by Snowflake Ventures and NetApp, positioning the company to accelerate unified, intelligent management of unstructured data. - learn more
                                            • Inspire Clean Energy has been acquired by Rhythm Energy, significantly expanding Inspire’s reach beyond its original markets. The merger creates one of the largest independent green energy retailers in the U.S., combining Inspire’s subscription-based, 100% renewable electricity plans with Rhythm’s technology-driven platform. This union positions the combined company to serve millions more customers nationwide, offering enhanced digital tools, demand-response programs, and time-of-use pricing to promote clean energy adoption. - learn more

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                                                    Mattel Isn’t Just Playing Anymore

                                                    🔦 Spotlight

                                                    Hello Los Angeles,

                                                    AI just became Mattel’s newest playmate.

                                                    This week, Mattel announced a new partnership with OpenAI, setting the stage for a toy box transformation powered by artificial intelligence. The El Segundo-based toy giant will use ChatGPT to breathe new life into its iconic brands, including Barbie, Hot Wheels, and Masters of the Universe. The collaboration will start with interactive AI experiences and creative tools to support product development internally.

                                                    It's a bold move for Mattel, which has been steadily shifting its identity from a traditional toy maker to a modern entertainment company. Between box office hits like Barbie and now this AI integration, Mattel is showing that legacy brands can still lead the charge into the future. The partnership supports CEO Ynon Kreiz’s long-term vision to expand Mattel's intellectual property into a broader, multi-platform universe. OpenAI is now playing a key role in that strategy.

                                                    This also points to a larger trend unfolding in Los Angeles. The lines between tech, entertainment, and consumer products are blurring quickly. AI isn’t coming to the mainstream; it’s already here. And if Barbie is getting an upgrade, other LA-born icons may not be far behind.

                                                    We’re keeping an eye on how this unfolds and whether it becomes more than just a flashy concept. One thing’s certain: Mattel isn’t just playing around.

                                                    Catch the latest LA venture deals, acquisitions, and fund updates below.

                                                    🤝 Venture Deals

                                                    LA Companies

                                                    • Coco Robotics, a Santa Monica-based startup specializing in last-mile autonomous delivery robots, has raised $80M in a strategic funding round led by angel investors Sam Altman and Max Altman, with participation from Pelion Venture Partners, Offline Ventures, Ryan Graves, and others. The company will use the funding to scale its AI-powered platform, grow its zero-emission robot fleet to 10,000 vehicles by 2026, expand partnerships with delivery platforms like Uber and DoorDash, and broaden its presence in more cities across the U.S. and internationally. - learn more
                                                    • PopID, a fintech startup specializing in biometric payment and loyalty authentication using face and palm recognition, has closed a new equity financing round backed by major strategic investors including Verifone, PayPal, Commerce Ventures, Chipotle’s Cultivate Next, and Visa Ventures. The fresh capital will support the expansion of its global biometric network by leveraging Verifone’s terminal infrastructure to integrate secure and seamless biometric payments and loyalty programs across merchants worldwide. - learn more
                                                    • Rosebud, an AI-powered journaling app designed to serve as a personal growth mentor, has raised $6M in seed funding led by Bessemer Venture Partners. The funds will be used to expand the team, advance its proprietary memory-driven AI engine, and pursue partnerships with therapists, educational institutions, businesses, and clinics to enhance access and deepen the app’s reflective capabilities. - learn more
                                                    • Impulse Space, the in-space mobility startup founded by ex-SpaceX engineer Tom Mueller, has raised $300M in a Series C funding round led by Linse Capital with participation from Trousdale Ventures and others, bringing its total financing to $525M. The company designs and builds orbital transfer vehicles—like Mira and upcoming Helios—to transport satellites between orbits, and the new funds will scale production, hire new staff, accelerate R&D (including electric propulsion), and fulfill a backlog of over 30 commercial and government contracts worth nearly $200 million. - learn more
                                                    • dataplor, a Manhattan Beach, CA-based provider of global location intelligence, has secured a $20.5M Series B round led by F‑Prime Capital. The funds will help dataplor scale its privacy-focused point-of-interest and foot traffic mobility products, expand global coverage, enhance data capabilities, and accelerate product growth for enterprise clients seeking real-time consumer insights. - learn more

                                                          LA Venture Funds

                                                          • WndrCo participated in Meter’s $170M Series C financing. Meter provides a full-stack, enterprise-grade internet infrastructure solution that covers routing, switching, WiFi, and cellular for businesses ranging from single offices to large data centers. The new funds will accelerate global expansion, grow its channel partnerships with companies like CDW, Microsoft, and WWT, and support further deployment and R&D. - learn more
                                                          • Sound Ventures participated in Landbase’s $30M Series A round, co-leading the investment alongside Picus Capital. Landbase uses AI, leveraging a GPT‑4o-based model trained on 40 million marketing campaigns, to automate and enhance outbound sales outreach, helping small and mid‑size businesses build trust and scale customer acquisition. The funding will support expansion of its team, product development, and go‑to‑market efforts as it rapidly grows its customer base. - learn more
                                                          • Rebel Fund participated in Outset’s $17M Series A round, which was led by 8VC. Outset uses AI-powered agents to conduct and analyze in-depth video interviews at enterprise scale, serving clients like Nestlé, Microsoft, and WeightWatchers. The new funding will accelerate growth by expanding its go‑to‑market and engineering teams, enhancing its AI agent capabilities, and scaling its platform globally. - learn more
                                                          • Anthos Capital returned as a participant in Laurel’s $100M Series C round, led by IVP. Laurel, the world’s first AI-powered “Time Platform” for professional services firms, automates time tracking and links how employees spend their time directly to business outcomes. The new funding will be used to scale the platform globally, enhance AI-driven time categorization and analytics, and help firms optimize resource allocation and profitability. - learn more
                                                          • Vamos Ventures participated in Trustible’s $4.6M Series Seed round led by Lookout Ventures. Trustible provides an AI governance platform that helps enterprises inventory AI use cases, manage risk, comply with regulations like the EU AI Act, and accelerate responsible adoption. The funding will power product development, hire engineering and go‑to‑market talent (particularly in the D.C. area), and scale operations to help enterprise and public-sector customers deploy AI safely. - learn more
                                                          • Village Global participated in Qanooni’s $2M pre‑seed round, joined by Oryx Fund, TA Ventures, and a group of strategic angels. Qanooni, founded in 2024 and based in the UAE, builds an AI-powered legal platform that integrates directly into Microsoft Outlook and Word to help lawyers draft, review, and manage documents using their own style and standards. The new funding will fuel expansion into the UAE and UK and advance its proprietary AI engine tailored for legal workflows. - learn more
                                                          • Muse Capital and Rocana Venture Partners participated in Eli Health’s $12M USD Series A round, led by BDC Capital’s Thrive Venture Fund, boosting the company’s total funding to around $20M USD. Eli Health has developed the Hormometer™, a real-time, saliva-based hormone monitoring system currently in beta for cortisol with plans to expand to progesterone and other biomarkers. The new capital will scale production, add biomarkers, support commercialization, and accelerate global rollout of its instant hormone health platform. - learn more
                                                          • Crossover VC participated in ai.work’s $10M seed round led by A* and lool ventures. ai.work has emerged from stealth to launch an “AI Workers” platform—autonomous agents designed to streamline enterprise workflows across IT, HR, Legal, Finance, and more. The funding will be used to scale operations, accelerate product development, and deploy AI Workers into pilot programs with large enterprises. - learn more
                                                          • MANTIS Venture Capital participated in AIM’s $50M funding round. The company has built the first embodied AI platform that retrofits heavy machinery, like bulldozers and excavators, for autonomous operation, aiming to boost safety, efficiency, and productivity in construction and mining. The new capital will help AIM scale deployments, advance its AI technology, and expand its plug-and-play autonomy solutions across heavy equipment fleets worldwide. - learn more
                                                          • Watertower Ventures led Finofo's $3.3M seed round, with continued backing from Motivate Venture Capital, SaaS Ventures, and several angel investors. Finofo offers a modern business banking platform that automates accounts payable, treasury, and global receivables, enabling seamless, low-fee payments across more than 90 countries with ERP integration. The funds will support expanded AP and AR automation features, the launch of a small-business plan, and hiring across product, engineering, and go-to-market teams. - learn more
                                                          • Finality Capital Partners participated in RISE Chain’s latest $4M raise, bringing its total funding to $8M. RISE Chain is building an ultra-fast Ethereum Layer 2 blockchain using "Shreds" architecture to deliver sub-5 millisecond transaction confirmations and scale toward 100,000 transactions per second. The new capital will support the mainnet launch, accelerate product and app development, and expand its real-time performance capabilities for advanced DeFi and high-frequency applications. - learn more
                                                          • Emerging Ventures participated in Taiv’s $14.4M CAD (≈ $10.5 M USD) Series A round, led by Denmark’s IDC Ventures. Taiv equips bars, restaurants, and retail venues with free hardware that transforms existing TVs into targeted advertising and content delivery tools, then shares ad revenue with the venues. The funding will power expansion across North America (starting in Canada this summer), grow the team, and enhance its AI-driven content delivery platform. - learn more
                                                          • Matter Venture Partners led an $18.4M investment in Kargo. The company offers an AI-driven inventory management system, including hardware like "Towers" and Lifts, that automatically captures and processes freight data at warehouse loading docks to improve accuracy, real-time visibility, and operational efficiency. The new funding will be used to develop new products, expand deployment across their customer base, and scale their computer vision platform in global supply chains. - learn more
                                                          • Bam Ventures and Trust Fund participated in the $10.6M funding round for Nectar Social, a Seattle-based startup that helps brands convert social media engagement into revenue using AI-powered “social copilot” agents. The platform consolidates comments, DMs, mentions, influencer outreach, and analytics into one interface to streamline brand interactions and boost performance. The funding will support product development, team expansion, and scaling operations with enterprise customers. - learn more
                                                          • MTech Capital participated in Voxel’s $44M Series B funding round. The company has developed an AI-powered workplace safety platform that integrates with existing cameras to detect hazards and unsafe behavior in real time, reducing accidents and operational risks. The new funding will accelerate R&D in computer vision, deepen its AI capabilities, and grow its team of industry experts to scale deployments across high-risk industries such as manufacturing, logistics, and ports. - learn more
                                                              LA Exits
                                                              • Hennessey Digital, a leading legal marketing agency known for its SEO, digital PR, PPC, and web design services, has been acquired by Herringbone Digital. The acquisition expands Herringbone’s platform into the legal marketing space while retaining Hennessey’s leadership and team. With added resources and support, Hennessey Digital plans to scale its services and integrate new AI-driven marketing tools to better serve law firms nationwide. - learn more
                                                              • Prosthetic Records has been acquired by MNRK Music Group and will now operate under its MNRK Heavy division. The deal brings Prosthetic’s extensive heavy metal catalog - featuring pioneering acts like Lamb of God, Animals as Leaders, and The Acacia Strain - under MNRK’s umbrella. MNRK plans to amplify the label’s legacy through anniversary reissues, remastered editions, curated collections, and new releases from standout acts such as Pupil Slicer and God Alone. - learn more
                                                              • RKO Pictures, the legendary film studio behind classics like King Kong and Citizen Kane, has been acquired by Concord Originals, the film and TV division of Concord. The deal gives Concord derivative and adaptation rights to over 5,000 RKO titles, including sequels, remakes, stage adaptations, and unproduced screenplays. RKO will continue as an imprint under Concord Originals, co-led by Sophia Dilley and Mary Beth O’Connor, with plans to revive its storied catalog through reissues, new productions, and adaptations. - learn more
                                                              • StartADAM has been acquired by LeapXpert, bringing its AI-powered chat agent technology and founding team into LeapXpert’s fold. The acquisition enhances LeapXpert’s communication intelligence platform with advanced AI features, new messaging channel support, and deeper CRM integrations. StartADAM’s founders, including co-founder Adam Stone, who became LeapXpert’s VP of AI Product will lead development to scale these capabilities globally. - learn more
                                                              • CASHét has been acquired by Entertainment Partners, integrating its suite of digital payment services including p-cards, automated accounts payable, and vendor verification into EP’s production finance ecosystem. The acquisition ensures that CASHét will continue supporting productions worldwide, regardless of their payroll or accounting systems, while expanding its services into new global markets. With this move, EP enhances its end-to-end financial workflow offerings, bringing faster, more secure, and fraud-resistant payment tools to film and TV productions. - learn more
                                                              • Element Brand Group has been acquired by The Lede Company, with founder Heather Leeds Greenfield joining as a partner and head of brand partnerships. Greenfield’s senior team, including two SVPs, will move over to expand The Lede Company’s integrated marketing and communications offerings. The acquisition strengthens Lede’s cultural campaign capabilities and equips both firms with enhanced resources and scale for brand-driven initiatives. - learn more

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