Microsoft’s Maneuver; Andreessen Horowitz Preps Its Multiplexer Fund

It’s been a busy week. Reddit went public Thursday, marking a rare initial public offering after a two-year winter for new listings. Shares jumped 48% in its first day trading, earning the company a market cap of over $9 billion.That’s a promising sign for IPO-ready, aging unicorns, and good news for Reddit’s backers, especially Condé Nast parent company Advance Publications, Tencent and Sequoia Capital, Cory reports. 

But the more noteworthy event in tech this week was Microsoft’s announcement that it was hiring the two founders and most of the employees of Inflection AI, the artificial intelligence startup behind chatbot Pi. The two companies positioned the move as a major hire rather than an acquisition, and crafted an unusual deal structure that appeared designed to avoid regulatory scrutiny. “A Lina Khan circumvention maneuver” was how one person put it, referring to the chair of the Federal Trade Commission. But my team’s digging shows $650 million is changing hands. Plus, keep reading to learn more about Andreessen Horowitz’s potential Saudi Arabia push and its new Multiplexer fund.