Michele Novelli

Frugal innovation. It's going to increasingly challenge US and European companies. DeepSeek AI just launched an AI product that caused a $1 Trillion collapse in stock prices today. With NVIDIA, Broadcom, TSMC and Oracle loosing over $700 Billion in market cap. Why? Frugal innovation. DeepSeek AI created an AI model that's at least as good if not better than US companies like OpenAI, Meta, Google have created, with only $6 million in funding. Compare that to the $21 Billion that OpenAI has raised. How? Necessity. Most technology companies around the globe don't have the luxury of receiving billions of dollars of Venture Capital. They have to grow frugally an focus on things like revenue and profits. Frugal Innovation is why I'm focused on technology companies in places like #Africa, #Latam, #MENA and #EasternEurope. Companies in those regions are by far much scrappier and focused on their customers and on business fundamentals vs US companies awash in VC. The don't have the luxury of ignoring business fundamentals. Another recent example. Nubank, a Brazilian all digital neo-bank currently has a market cap of about $60 Billion USD. That's more than the market cap of Barclays and Deutsche Bank combined. But, Nubank has only been in business for 12 years. Yes, US businesses will always have problems solved by Silicon Valley, and easy access to capital is often a moat and a competitivo advantage. But, increasingly, I believe we're going to see companies whose _lack_ of access to capital is a competitive advantage, and US companies should beware. Frugal innovation is a competitive advantage and a moat to other companies competing with you. Iyinoluwa Aboyeji Aman Verjee, CFA Dave McClure, Israel García Ballesteros Jose Kont Natasha Ibarra (She/Ella) Neil Shah Chris Mayo, CFA

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"We're not building another application layer on top of existing models. We've developed a completely new foundational architecture that enables us to create specialised AI assistants that outperform current solutions in specific domains like programming and medicine, while using twenty-five times less computational resources," says the CEO of Farang, our latest investment at APEX Ventures 🚀 When Voima Ventures introduced us to Emil Romanus, we were immediately fascinated by him as a person and AI developer. We completely share his perspective, that today's LLMs achieve their "magic" through a brute-force approach and there must be a more natural — more human brain like — way to train AI models. This is exactly what Farang has set out to do and we cannot wait to share the first models with the world 🤖 We are very proud to back Emil and his team on their mission to build the kind of foundational change we believe will separate the next generation of AI leaders from today's incumbents. https://lnkd.in/g792s9An #deeptech #venturecapital #onwardsandupwards

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For the last 10 years, I’ve been told you can’t build “big enough” companies in deep tech. Too hard. Too slow. Too capital intensive. That kind of value creation, they said, belonged to consumer internet, enterprise SaaS, fintech, or whatever was trending that year. And yet—today, NVIDIA just became the world’s first $4 trillion company. A semiconductor company. Not a crypto protocol. Not a neobank. Not a social app. Nvidia is the prototypical OG Silicon Valley company—headquartered in Santa Clara, not Market Street or Mission Bay or (welp) Miami!. The kind of place where startups were built when I was in the trenches in the ’90s and 2000s. Back when deep tech was the default. Their rise is a salute to that era—of hard engineering, real science, and foundational innovation. And it’s not just Nvidia. Look at the some of the most valuable companies created in the last 10 to 15 years - 🔹 SpaceX – Rewriting the rules of space access 🔹 Starlink – Expanding global infrastructure from orbit 🔹 Palantir – Operationalizing data at national scale 🔹 Anduril – Building the future of defense autonomy 🔹 OpenAI / Anthropic – Redefining what machines can do These are companies solving humanity’s hardest problems—with high stakes, long arcs, and massive outcomes. At MFV Partners, we are proud that we never wavered from this path. We back early-stage deep tech founders not because it’s easy or fashionable (like it is becoming today), but because it’s where the next era of value will be built. Congratulations to Jensen Huang and the Nvidia team. You didn’t just reach $4T—you proved a generation of investors wrong. #DeepTech #VentureCapital #Founders #Engineering #Semiconductors #BuildingTheFuture https://lnkd.in/guB4VuWd

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.Lightshift is investing in Byzantine Finance — the native staking aggregation layer. Here’s why we are backing the $3M pre-seed to define the future of restaking & AVS security. 👇 1️⃣ The Opportunity: Restaking is Expanding --- AVSs (Actively Validated Services) need restaked assets to ensure security & decentralization instead of bootstrapping their own models. Meanwhile, capital allocators are chasing yield by providing this security through restaking. This is why restaking is now one of DeFi’s fastest-growing primitives, with $20B+ TVL and rising. 2️⃣ The Problem: Fragmentation is Killing Efficiency --- 🔹 Too many restaking protocols. 🔹 Too many chains. 🔹 Too many AVSs to choose from. EigenLayer & Symbiotic on Ethereum. Babylon on Bitcoin. Solayer on Solana. Managing exposure across multiple chains & protocols is a nightmare. LRTs (Liquid Restaking Tokens) attempted to solve this, but they force exposure to all AVSs—introducing unnecessary risk. Restaking today is messy, inefficient, and full of forced risk exposure. 3️⃣ The Solution: Byzantine - The Native Restaking Aggregation Layer --- Byzantine is full control, zero compromise. 🔹 Customize your restaking strategy 🔹 Choose exactly which AVSs to back 🔹 Deploy across any chain & any restaking protocol 🔹 Use any asset—LSTs, stablecoins, ERC-20 tokens, or directly restake ETH 🔹 Control your exact risk-reward profile This is precision staking. 4️⃣ Why Byzantine? --- Byzantine vaults bring game-changing benefits for capital allocators: ✅ One-click simplicity → Enterprise-grade UX without the complexity. ✅ Risk isolation → No pooled risks. Dedicated validators for each vault. ✅ Full transparency → See exactly who your validators are & how they perform. ✅ Higher yields → Lower fees, less friction, better capital efficiency. This is restaking done right. 5️⃣ Built for Institutions --- Byzantine is built for institutions and capital allocators who: - Want customized staking strategies without setting up infrastructure. - Need risk-adjusted yield on their digital assets. - Manage assets for clients and want turnkey staking solutions. The future of restaking will be custom, composable, and chain-agnostic. Byzantine is leading the way. 6️⃣ Partners --- Proud to back Byzantine alongside Node Capital , Blockwall , MASTERKEY Venture Capital , Kiln , and Angels from Eigen Labs, BitGo, P2P, and more. Follow Byzantine Finance for all updates as they redefine the future of restaking.

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