Stocks: More Jobs & Higher Wages. Time To Worry?

Skin rashes, breathing difficulties, and ‘generational rage’ led residents to join a nationwide push against companies that endanger health and the environment. In late September, a massive billow of smoke from a chemical fire spread over metro Atlanta, lingering for weeks and prompting national news coverage.

Every week I commute from Chicago to Nashville for work, and I’m not planning on moving anytime soon. I live in the Chicago suburbs and work in Nashville, where my employer, Vaco Holdings, is headquartered. Every week, I pack a bag, say goodbye, and hop on a 1.5-hour flight for most of the workweek.

Rome-based venture capital firm Scientifica has launched a €200mn fund to support startups in quantum computing, artificial intelligence, and other frontier technologies. The fund, set to launch early next year, will provide early-stage companies with both financial backing and access to advanced lab spaces. Scientifica’s fund is based on a “Zero CapEx” model.

If you live in Europe and you use a neobank, you’ve likely been interacting with Upvest’s investment products without even knowing it. The Berlin-based startup runs a stock-trading API that integrates into some of the biggest fintechs in Europe — Revolut, N26, Bunq, Plum, Raisin, Shares and Vivid. Through these banks, some 50 million users have access use the company’s investment products, it said.

On a warm day in October, three corporates and two startups gathered together in the TNW offices for the conclusion of the one-hundred-day Vodafone IoT Challenge. Innovation is something all businesses want, but few actually have time for. We read about the advanced new tools and technologies collecting richer insights and making things faster and easier than ever before.

Amsterdam-based startup CarbonX has secured €4mn to industrialise a new anode material that could help Europe reduce its reliance on China for graphite, a substance which makes up half the weight of a typical lithium-ion battery.  Netherlands-based VC Energy Transition Fund Rotterdam led the round. It’s an extension on CarbonX’s €10mn capital injection announced in February, capping off the funding round at a cosy €14mn.   Graphite is the go-to material for lithium-ion battery anodes, which is the negative electrode responsible for storing and releasing electrons during the charging and discharging process.