Startups Weekly: Oyo’s toxicity + A farewell

Welcome back to Startups Weekly, a weekend newsletter that dives into the week’s noteworthy startups and venture capital news. Before I jump into today’s topic, let’s catch up a bit. Last week I wrote about the

startups we lost in 2019

. Before that, I noted the defining moments

of VC in 2019.

Unfortunately, this will be my last newsletter, as

I am leaving TechCrunch

for a new opportunity. Don’t worry, Startups Weekly isn’t going anywhere. We’ll have a new writer taking over the weekly update soon enough; in the meantime, TechCrunch

editor Henry Pickavet will be at the helm. You can still get in touch with me on Twitter @KateClarkTweets.

If you’re new here, you can subscribe to Startups Weekly

here

. Lots of good content will be coming your way in 2020.

India’s WeWork?

TechCrunch reporter Manish Singh penned an interesting piece on the state of Indian startups this week:

As Indian startups raise record capital, losses are widening

(Extra Crunch membership required). In it, he claims the financial performance of India’s largest startups are cause for concern. Gems like Flipkart, BigBasket and Paytm have lost a collective $3 billion in the last year.

“What is especially troublesome for startups is that there is no clear path for how they would ever generate big profits,” he writes. “Silicon Valley companies, for instance, have entered and expanded into India in recent years, investing billions of dollars in local operations, but yet, India has yet to make any substantial contribution to their bottom lines. If that wasn’t challenging enough, many Indian startups compete directly with Silicon Valley giants, which while impressive, is an expensive endeavor.”

Manish’s story came one day after

The New York Times

published an in-depth report

on Oyo, a tech-enabled budget hotel chain and rising star in the Indian tech community. The NYT wrote that Oyo offers unlicensed rooms and has bribed police officials to deter trouble, among other toxic practices.

Whether Oyo, backed by billions from the

SoftBank

Vision Fund, will become India’s WeWork is the real cause for concern. India’s startup ecosystem is likely to face a number of barriers as it grows

to compete with the likes of Silicon Valley.

*Follow Manish *

here

• or on Twitter

for more of TechCrunch’s growing India coverage.*

Venture capital highlights (it’s been a slow week)

• Brazil’s Loft nabs $175M from a16z, Vulcan

• Shipfix raises $4.5M seed for its dry cargo shipping platform

• InsightFinder gets $2M seed to automate outage prevention

• The 5 biggest rounds in tech in 2019

• A look at Utah’s biggest venture rounds of 2019

• In the shadow of Amazon and Microsoft, Seattle startups are having a moment

How to find the right reporter to pitch your startup

If you’ve still not subscribed to Extra Crunch, now is the time. Longtime TechCrunch reporter and editor

Josh Constine

is launching a new series to teach you how to pitch your startup. In it he will examine embargoes, exclusives, press kit visuals, interview questions and more. The first of many, How to find the right reporter to pitch your startup

, is online now.

Subscribe to Extra Crunch

here

.

#EquityPod

Another week, another new episode of TechCrunch’s venture capital-focused podcast, Equity. This week, we discussed a few of 2019’s largest scandals, Peloton’s strange holiday ad and the controversy over at the luggage startup Away. Listen

here

and be sure to subscribe

, too.

For anyone wondering about changes at Equity following my departure from TechCrunch, the lovely

Alex Wilhelm

(founding Equity co-host) will keep the show alive and, soon enough, there will be a brand new co-host in my place. Please keep supporting the show and be sure to recommend it to all your podcast-adoring friends.