In California, virtually the only state with hydrogen cars on the road, about 47 active fueling stations serve a trickle of early hydrogen adopters who mostly cruise around Los Angeles and the Bay Area today. These hydrogen-powered passenger vehicles aren’t anywhere near as popular as electric cars, but that isn’t stopping California from spending millions of dollars to support them. Read more >>
LA Startups To Watch 👀
👉 Romeo Power. The electric battery maker has big plans for its new Cypress lab space: to electrify the pollution-emitting trucking industry, one fleet at a time.
👉 Phoenix Motors. SPI Energy filed regulatory papers this week to spin out its electric vehicle unit with hopes of raising $150 million in the public market.
👉 Tagger. Based in Santa Monica, the influencer marketing platform that helps companies search for creators to promote their services or products.
#TechLA's Movers & Shakers This Week 📢
➡️ Snap Inc. is expanding its startup accelerator program to two cohorts a year, offering a $150,000 investment.
➡️ United Talent Agency launched its first SPAC on the Nasdaq exchange on Thursday as it moves into gaming and the creator economy business.
➡️ After serving four tours in Iraq and Afghanistan, Jake Wood built a nonprofit that sent military veterans to disaster relief. The CEO is calling on corporate America to give back, too.LA Tech and Venture Capital News 🗞
🗞 Tinder's co-founders settled their lawsuit against Match after claiming in court that the company cheated them out of billions of dollars worth of stock options.
🗞 Qai Qai, a character co-created by Invisible Universe, is the focus of tennis star Serena Williams' first book for children. The L.A.-based startup hopes to make it into the next hit cartoon character on social media and become “the Pixar of social media.”
🎙 Listen Up 💬
Need a podcast recommendation this weekend? Here are some new pods we have for you:
🎙 At one time, it was crazy to think a venture capital firm could survive outside of Silicon Valley, but Dana Settle moved to Los Angeles and tried it anyway. On this episode of Office Hours, Settle comes on to talk about the booming L.A. tech scene and her investment firm Greycroft.
🎙 On this episode of LA Venture, Kairos Venutre’s Alex Andrianopoulos talks about why he believes in investing in research coming out of the nation’s top universities. Listen on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts.
🎙On this week’s episode of Behind Her Empire, Dr. Mary Pardee has made gut health her life’s work, culminating in the founding of her telemedicine and virtual wellness company, Modrn Med. Listen on Stitcher, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, iHeart Radio or wherever you get your podcasts.🚨 EXTRA EXTRA 🚨
🗞 Cyber Monday sales were down this year as retailers offered fewer discounts and out of stock items.
🗞 Metro’s answer to Uber, Lyft will be coming to Westwood/UCLA on Dec. 12 with the expansion of its rideshare service Metro Micro.
🗞 This week, L.A. County Sheriff Alex Villanueva announced he would not use L.A.-based Fulgent Genetics to test his employees, saying he fears the information would be shared with the Chinese government.Am I doing this right? 🤔
Throw me feedback, compliments or questions on this newsletter at luis@dot.la or on Twitter at @rungomez.