Tuesday, April 22, 2025

Welcome to TC PM! Today we have everything you need to stay informed on Tesla's much-anticipated Q1 earnings; we have numerous startup funding stories; and we catch up with Julie Wainwright, the founder of The RealReal. Drop in.

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Image Credits: Beata Zawrzel/NurPhoto/Getty Images

🚗 Tesla time: Elon Musk's increased involvement with the federal government has taken quite the toll on Tesla. How much so? We'll find out tonight during Tesla's Q1 earnings call. We've got a preview of what we are watching out for and we're keeping track with real-time updates.

🧹 AI for home services: Lace AI is a customer service AI startup for the home-services industry. It claims that its AI call software can help improve the rate of calls turning into sales. The company works with more than 100 businesses and just raised a $14 million seed round.

‼️ A hack! British retail giant Marks & Spencer confirmed that it has been managing a cyber incident over the last few days as customers have reported outages and disruption. It's not yet clear what the nature of the attack is or if it affects customer data.

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Afternoon must-reads

Image Credits: Adaptive Computer

😎 All about the vibes: Adaptive Computer is a new startup that is looking to bring vibe coding to the PC with its vision to build a platform that will allow nontechnical users to use full-featured apps they built themselves through text prompts. The company just raised $7 million.

🖥️ Speaking of vibe coding: Supabase, an open source database company, raised its second round of funding in seven months. This $200 million Series D round comes as the company is seeing strong traction, especially with the vibe coding trend.

🎙️ Get real: Today's episode of StrictlyVC Download features a conversation with Julie Wainwright, the founder of Pets.com, The RealReal, and Ahara. Wainwright talked about her new book and how she successfully launched The RealReal after feeling like Silicon Valley turned its back on her.

✈️ More miles: Delta SkyMiles members can now earn points from taking Ubers or ordering food on Uber Eats. This partnership is meant to further promote Uber as a method of transit to the airport. Uber also announced plans to expand its economical Airport Shuttle program in Atlanta, Delta's hometown.

🇮🇳 IPOs in India: Ather Energy, a startup in India making two-wheeled electric vehicles, cut the size of its IPO by 18% to $308.3 million. The company is seeking a $1.4 billion valuation, which represents a drop from the $2 billion valuation it strived for when it filed.

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Around the web

👋 Saying goodbye to Skype: Rest of World has a beautiful tribute to Microsoft's Skype ahead of the video and messaging platform's shutdown in May. People wrote about their memories of using Skype to foster family connections and long-distance relationships, and to feel less lonely. Am I crying?

😒 Tariff troubles: Yesterday, TechCrunch brought you a story about what happens to startup M&A in this period of uncertainty regarding Donald Trump's tariffs. Today, Wired has a look at what happens to startup investing amid this uncertainty. Investors are worried.