Automattic Gains Beeper, Observing Fintech’s Decline and YC’s Scarcity of Latin American Entrepreneurs

At TechCrunch, we’re always drawn to thrilling news pieces, and IPOs certainly rank high among our favorite kind. Yet another type of exciting news we don’t come across as often as we’d like is the acquisition of one startup by another. These deals are always intriguing, as they can bring an influx of talent or technology to an already thriving company, potentially propelling its growth even further.

That’s why the Equity Podcast team was thrilled to delve into the recent news of Automattic’s acquisition of Beeper for a whopping $125 million. It’s worth noting that the WordPress parent company also acquired Texts.com for $50 million just last year. And there’s more deal news to go around – Proton recently bought Standard Notes, and we recently discussed the Wonderschool-Early Day purchase. Stay tuned for more exciting news in the world of startups!

In our column “Deals of the Week,” Mary Ann highlighted Payjoy’s impressive new run rate, while Alex wanted to delve into the Proxima Fusion round and how it could potentially bring us closer to the next energy revolution.

To wrap things up, we turned to Anna Heim’s latest report on the diminishing number of Latin American startups participating in Y Combinator’s program. We speculated that this may have something to do with investors losing interest in the fintech sector, which has historically been associated with a significant amount of founder activity in Latin America.

But don’t worry, fintech isn’t completely out of the game. However, it’s clear that the industry is nowhere near its 2021 peak. Equity will be back on Monday to jumpstart your week with even more exciting news! See you then!