Gm. For weeks, global space agencies watched with bated breath as a giant Chinese rocket booster was set to make an uncontrolled reentry into the Earth's atmosphere. Had the rocket's debris landed in a populated area, it would have been disastrous.

But no need to bring your steel umbrellas outside anymore—the remnants from the booster splashed down harmlessly in the Indian Ocean on Saturday morning ending the world’s highest altitude game of chicken.

FRESH POWDER

Looking at three funds that recently topped up their coffers.

FUNDRAISING 

To bootstrap or not to bootstrap

Bootstrapped founders and venture-backed founders are often like oil and water. But as the economic environment pulls a reverse Sour Patch Kid and turns from sweet to sour, bootstrapped companies that have costs under control are becoming the apple of venture capitalists’ eyes. Over the weekend, TechCrunch’s Natasha Mascarenhas wrote about a few bootstrapped founders that decided it was time to hop on the venture-blacked treadmill.

Cavan Klinsky, who founded Healthie, a payments processor for healthcare companies, said that the key benefit to being bootstrapped is that you can be “really opportunistic about what the right time is” to take in outside capital.

That time might be now

Bootstrapped founders that decide to take the plunge say it's party because the crypto fundraising boom has made the labor market so damn expensive. “Engineers and other key hires cost more and more and more….[crypto] has bloated compensation.” Payman Taei, the founder of content creation platform Visme, told TechCrunch.

• Going the venture-backed route gives bootstrapped founders some extra juice in order to compete in an expensive labor market.

• Plus, the broader pullback means that bootstrappers are more willing to give up part of their company if it means having a little extra cash in the bank.

Their sensibilities are rubbing off on venture-backed companies

A common theme from the first half of this year is that VCs have plenty of fresh powder in their coffers, but aren’t writing any checks. This is partly due to the fundraising bonanza of 2020 which pushed valuations to absurd levels and also sends a clear message that high-burn, low-revenue startups are out of favor. Bootstrapped founders are having their moment because they tend to be may more cost-efficient with customers, Mascarenhas writes.

• VCs are confirming this: Precursor Ventures’ Charles Hudson told TechCrunch that he has “generally more interest in companies that have gotten to product-market fit…with relatively little capital,” which describes bootstrappers to a T.

Zoom out: SaaS and consumer brands that are capital efficient and have scalable growth likely stand to benefit the most from the death of the grow-at-all cost mindset from recent years.

GAMING

Video games need a power up

As the tremors of a recession turn into something of an earthquake, the video game industry is confronting the fact that it might not be as recession-resistant as it once was.

The backstory: During the last downturn in 2008, video games were the lone bright spot in an economy that had otherwise ground to a halt. A weak labor market meant that lots of people had new time on their hands to game which contributed to the narrative that the industry is “recession-proof.”

But this recession is weird

The labor market is much stronger than in 2008 which means unemployment is likely not going to drive an increase in video game sales. The industry has also shifted towards mobile gaming and free-to-play models which are reliant on ads for revenue. And as we wrote about last week, the ad industry is shaky right now which is likely to spill over into gaming.

Bottom line: Activision reports earnings today so we’ll have some numbers to gauge the health of the industry.

QUICK HITS

Seed Round

Stat: Snap’s new $3.99 premium subscription, Snapchat+, is gaining some traction. It’s brought in $7.3 million in its first month, still small compared to its overall earnings yet an impressive feat relative to Twitter Blue, which has made a measly $4 million since its launch last June. Snap’s push into subscriptions comes in the wake of Apple’s new privacy changes that have thrown a wrench into the ad market.

Story we’re watching: Chipperwave and Fluttercash are two of the biggest fintech startups providing services in Africa. But over the weekend, Kenya’s monetary authority told the companies that they were not actually licensed to operate in the country and told all banks to stop conducting business with them. It’s a major blow for the two fintechs valued at $3 billion and $2 billion respectively which have been facilitating payments in Kenya since 2016.

Rabbit hole: Why punish criminals? (The MIT Press Reader)

WHAT ELSE IS GOING ON

• Instagram is reducing the number of recommended posts and walking back its test of a TikTok-style full-screen feed after coming under heavy criticism

• Helium, a web3 startup, reportedly listed fake customers on its website.

• Elon Musk has countersued Twitter but the details of the lawsuit are not yet publicly available.

• The winning ticket of the $1.3 billion Mega Millions jackpot was sold in Illinois.

PICK THAT PITCH DECK

Today’s pitch deck is from a private SaaS company founded in 2011.

MONDAY MUSIC

The best work jams to write, focus, and build your company to.

• Artist: Nicolas Jaar (Spotify)

• Playlist: Big Desk Energy (Spotify)

• Song: Wavelength (Spotify)

P.S. If you have any songs or artists you love, feel free to reply to this email and send ‘em our way.

LAYOFFS TRACKER

Notable layoffs this week

Lemonade: 60 people

Ola Cabs: 1,000 people

Clearco: 125 people (25%)

Knock on wood, but it looks like layoffs hit their peak in June.

FOUNDERS CORNER

The best resources we came across this weekend that will help you become a better founder, builder, or investor.

🧑‍💻 How to start a startup as a software engineer 

⌛️ Why you’re spending too much time on easy decisions

🧑‍🏫 10 timeless lessons from the greatest venture investors

🤝 Parallel is an all-in-one hiring stack that makes hiring early employees dead simple…all for $0 per month.*

*This is sponsored advertising content

PICK THAT PITCH DECK ANSWER

Intercom