Robinhood's crypto bet, AI-powered healthcare, and more on the fall of Fisker

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Jun 7, 2024

Sean O’Kane, a TechCrunch transportation reporter known for his deep dives into the electric vehicle sector, joins the discussion. The talk kicks off with Robinhood's strategic acquisition of Bitstamp, marking its intentions in the crypto space. They explore the revolutionary AI technologies in health, spotlighting Sword Health's virtual therapy and Eko Health's heart condition detection. The conversation shifts to the tumultuous journey of Fisker in the EV market, highlighting production issues and mismanagement before wrapping up with insights on fintech innovation geared towards Gen Z.

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INSIGHT

Robinhood's Crypto Bet and International Expansion

Robinhood's acquisition of Bitstamp signals its commitment to crypto and international expansion.
This European acquisition follows Robinhood's UK launch and EU crypto trading, indicating broader ambitions.

INSIGHT

AI-Powered Virtual Physical Therapy

Sword Health's AI-powered virtual physical therapy increases access and affordability.
It addresses the challenges of scheduling, cost, and access limitations of traditional physical therapy.

ANECDOTE

Sword Health's Unique Funding Strategy

Sword Health raised $130M, with $30M in primary equity and $100M in secondary sales to employees.
This strategy offered liquidity to early stakeholders and attracted institutional investors.

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As always, there was a lot happening in startup land this week, and the Equity team had so much fun breaking it down for you.

On today’s episode of TechCrunch’s Equity podcast, Mary Ann and Rebecca discussed Robinhood’s plans to buy European crypto exchange Bitstamp for $200 million in cash and why they weren’t really surprised by the news.

The duo then dug into not just one but two exciting health-care related deals. Rebecca wanted to riff on Sword Health’s innovative AI-powered virtual physical therapy tech and recent fundraise and corresponding cool valuation bump. Mary Ann then brought up Eko Health, which just raised $41 million after getting FDA clearance to help detect the first signs of heart failure during a routine medical exam (really, how cool is that?!).

From there, they got to grill transportation reporter extraordinaire Sean O’Kane about his in-depth investigation into the mess at electric vehicle manufacturer Fisker. Think hoods flying off and pinching parts from the production line kind of mess. Oof.

From there, they talked about the drama at AI mortgage startup LoanSnap and how that company is being sued left and right among other things. On a more positive note, they then riffed about two very interesting fintech startups focused on Gen Z, Frich (which stands for ‘effin rich) and Fizz – the latter of which is a YC alum just raised $14.4 million in a seed round led by Kleiner Perkins.

That’s it for this week, but we’ll be back bright and early Monday with more tech and startup news. Talk soon!

Equity is TechCrunch’s flagship podcast, produced by Theresa Loconsolo, and posts every Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Subscribe to us on Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify and all the casts.

You also can follow Equity on X and Threads at @EquityPod. For the full episode transcript, for those who prefer reading over listening, check out our full archive of episodes over at Simplecast.

Credits: Equity is produced by Theresa Loconsolo with editing by Kell. Bryce Durbin is our Illustrator. We'd also like to thank the audience development team and Henry Pickavet, who manages TechCrunch audio products.

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