October 16, 2024

To infinity and beyond

Hi there, 

"A skyscraper went into space, returned to earth, and parallel parked” — Sylvia Smith

What SpaceX just did is a marvel of modern engineering & science: flying a 233-foot rocket booster back to the launch site and catching it in the air with robot arms. 

We should be showing kids in school this and highlighting for them the limitlessness of human ingenuity.

Really amazing the times we live in.

For those who want to dig into SpaceX a bit more, we mapped out its growth strategy here.

Healthy wealthy

Q3’24 wasn’t great for fintech.

Funding and deals both dropped QoQ, with deals hitting their lowest quarterly level since 2017.

However, not all of fintech is down & out.

Wealth tech startups were a bright spot in the fintech world as they saw funding climb 67% QoQ thanks to 2 mega-rounds.

From wealth tech to banking, dive into fintech performance by sector in our State of Fintech Q3’24 Report.

Pay and spray

We took a look at B2B payments markets to see how they stack up.

A key takeaway? AI is powering automation and customization across the payments landscape.

Companies in more established markets (e.g., spend management, accounts payable automation) are using AI to generate recommendations for cost savings — in addition to automating workflows.

Meanwhile, players in other markets (e.g., treasury & cash management) are launching genAI assistants and no-code platforms to automate data analysis.

Learn more and dive into other key takeaways in our B2B payments market ranking.

Off the chain

The insurance value chain is typically more resistant than other sectors to tech disruption, but genAI is already making notable inroads.

​Insurance leaders are looking to genAI to reshape how they work — across distribution, underwriting, operations, and claims.

Within underwriting, for example, risk assessment agents and copilots are emerging.

Startups in this space are aggressively racing to build a leading genAI underwriting platform, underscored by a flurry of recent dealmaking:

• Sixfold — $15M Series A in June
• Ema — $36M Series A in July
• DeepOpinion — $12M Series A in September
• Roots Automation — $22M Series B in September

From distribution to claims, discover how genAI is transforming each step of the insurance value chain.

I love you.

Anand

@asanwal 

Co-Founder & Exec Chair

P.S. Yesterday, our analysts dove into the future of the factory. Get the session recording here.

Get started with CB Insights

CB Insights' emerging technology insights platform provides all the

analysis and data from this newsletter. Our data is the easiest way to discover and respond to emerging tech. 

Was this email forwarded to you? Sign up here