Technology

Jonah Peretti helped shaped digital media — can he do it again?

Jonah Peretti’s career to date has been defined by constant reinvention. As the founder and CEO of BuzzFeed, Peretti has been at the forefront of digital media for almost two decades, navigating changes as the once small startup transformed into, at one point, a multimedia powerhouse.

But as the company grows older, one question lingers: Has Peretti’s relentless drive for innovation made him too entrepreneurial to lead BuzzFeed to long-term stability?

“The nice thing about this field,” Peretti muses, “is you do something [different] all the time. It’s not been 20 years of one job. It’s been 20 years of running a startup, then managing a hyperscaling business, then figuring out how to get the company public . . .and now the explosion in generative AI. There’s always something to keep the job fresh and new.”

Peretti’s ability to adapt and stay ahead of the curve has been a hallmark of BuzzFeed’s success. Years ago, BuzzFeed enjoyed almost singular success in its uncanny ability to create shareable media. (One video segment, centered on why Disney princes would make “terrible boyfriends,” has racked up 77 million views over the years.)

Today, BuzzFeed’s focus is on AI, including AI quizzes and other AI-generated content. It’s also pouring some of its resources into a product in development called BF Island, a social network that aims to merge AI with content creation to “spread joy and enable playful creative expression.” So he told Axios last month, anyway.

Peretti routinely discusses the company’s upcoming ventures with the media, even when they’re still in their infancy. Asked why, he tells TechCrunch: “The idea of talking about things you’re working on is that you make the product better . . .When you talk about them, it’s not just with your team but with outside people who might want to collaborate. When there’s a new computing platform, there’s an explosion of creativity. Those are the moments when you can build something new.”

This entrepreneurial drive has fueled much of BuzzFeed’s most iconic projects. The company pioneered viral quizzes and listicles, then pivoted to more serious journalism with BuzzFeed News. But not all of these shifts have paid off. Notably, despite its early success, BuzzFeed News was shuttered in 2023, leaving behind questions about whether the company should have stuck to one clear vision rather than jumping between them.

BuzzFeed’s shareholders might be pondering the same after the roller-coaster ride they’ve been on. BuzzFeed went public through a special purpose vehicle in 2021, and as part of the transaction, it acquired a media company, Complex Networks, for $300 million in cash and stock. Today, BuzzFeed still trades publicly, but it doesn’t own that business; it sold it for roughly $108 million last year. More recently, BuzzFeed sold another asset from that Complex Networks deal – First We Feast – in a separate $82.5 million all-cash deal. (Explains Peretti of both sales, “They’re not so much tech businesses. They’re more production and talent heavy.”)

BuzzFeed’s stock, priced at $10 initially, now trades $2.20 per share.

This is where the tension lies. Peretti’s embrace of constant reinvention is striking, but it also means that the company’s strategy has often felt like a series of experiments rather than a cohesive long-term plan. The experiments also come at a cost. Peretti says BF Island is a $10 million gamble for now that is not expected to bring in any revenue this year. He adds that BuzzFeed’s “core business” is profitable.

It’s a fair question whether BuzzFeed would be better served by a singular, consistent vision for the future – like The New York Times has managed to achieve – rather than betting on one new idea after another.

Unfortunately, it’s hard to know the answer. The media industry has long favored stability, but Peretti isn’t wrong to believe the current wave of generative AI is revolutionizing how people create and share content. Also, as excited as he sounds about the possibilities, Peretti sounds clear-eyed about the risks.

“The big thing is that BuzzFeed has given us a lot of experience with new formats,” he says. “We’ve gotten a lot of inbound from people who have ideas and want to collaborate with us.”

Besides, adds Peretti, who by now is accustomed to balancing growth with financial pressures: “I think the deeper next-level understanding is that just doing the same thing over and over again and trying to to grind it out is actually a more risky strategy than innovating, experimenting, trying new things, keeping an open mind, and trying to figure out new approaches or new ways to win in a really tough market.”

You can hear much more from our interview with Peretti in an upcoming episode of StrictlyVC Download; new episodes drop every Tuesday.

Technology

Pintarnya raises $16.7M to power jobs and financial services in Indonesia

Pintarnya, an Indonesian employment platform that goes beyond job matching by offering financial services along with full-time and side-gig opportunities, said it has raised a $16.7 million Series A round.

The funding was led by Square Peg with participation from existing investors Vertex Venture Southeast Asia & India and East Ventures.

Ghirish Pokardas, Nelly Nurmalasari, and Henry Hendrawan founded Pintarnya in 2022 to tackle two of the biggest challenges Indonesians face daily: earning enough and borrowing responsibly.

“Traditionally, mass workers in Indonesia find jobs offline through job fairs or word of mouth, with employers buried in paper applications and candidates rarely hearing back. For borrowing, their options are often limited to family/friend or predatory lenders with harsh collection practices,” Henry Hendrawan, co-founder of Pintarnya, told TechCrunch. “We digitize job matching with AI to make hiring faster and we provide workers with safer, healthier lending options — designed around what they can reasonably afford, rather than pushing them deeper into debt.”

Around 59% of Indonesia’s 150 million workforce is employed in the informal sector, highlighting the difficulties these workers encounter in accessing formal financial services because they lack verifiable income and official employment documentation.

Pintarnya tackles this challenge by partnering with asset-backed lenders to offer secured loans, using collateral such as gold, electronics, or vehicles, Hendrawan added.

Since its seed funding in 2022, the platform currently serves over 10 million job seeker users and 40,000 employers nationwide. Its revenue has increased almost fivefold year-over-year and expects to reach break-even by the end of the year, Hendrawn noted. Pintarnya primarily serves users aged 21 to 40, most of whom have a high school education or a diploma below university level. The startup aims to focus on this underserved segment, given the large population of blue-collar and informal workers in Indonesia.

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“Through the journey of building employment services, we discovered that our users needed more than just jobs — they needed access to financial services that traditional banks couldn’t provide,” said Hendrawan. “We digitize job matching with AI to make hiring faster and we provide workers with safer, healthier lending options — designed around what they can reasonably afford, rather than pushing them deeper into debt.”

image credits: Pintarnya (Founders of Pintarnya Ghirish Pokardas, Nelly Nurmalasari, and Henry Hendrawan)

While Indonesia already has job platforms like JobStreet, Kalibrr, and Glints, these primarily cater to white-collar roles, which represent only a small portion of the workforce, according to Hendrawan. Pintarnya’s platform is designed specifically for blue-collar workers, offering tailored experiences such as quick-apply options for walk-in interviews, affordable e-learning on relevant skills, in-app opportunities for supplemental income, and seamless connections to financial services like loans.

The same trend is evident in Indonesia’s fintech sector, which similarly caters to white-collar or upper-middle-class consumers. Conventional credit scoring models for loans, which rely on steady monthly income and bank account activity, often leave blue-collar workers overlooked by existing fintech providers, Hendrawan explained.

When asked about which fintech services are most in demand, Hendrawan mentioned, “Given their employment status, lending is the most in-demand financial service for Pintarnya’s users today. We are planning to ‘graduate’ them to micro-savings and investments down the road through innovative products with our partners.”

The new funding will enable Pintarnya to strengthen its platform technology and broaden its financial service offerings through strategic partnerships. With most Indonesian workers employed in blue-collar and informal sectors, the co-founders see substantial growth opportunities in the local market. Leveraging their extensive experience in managing businesses across Southeast Asia, they are also open to exploring regional expansion when the timing is right.

“Our vision is for Pintarnya to be the everyday companion that empowers Indonesians to not only make ends meet today, but also plan, grow, and upgrade their lives tomorrow … In five years, we see Pintarnya as the go-to super app for Indonesia’s workers, not just for earning income, but as a trusted partner throughout their life journey,” Hendrawan said. “We want to be the first stop when someone is looking for work, a place that helps them upgrade their skills, and a reliable guide as they make financial decisions.”

Technology

OpenAI warns against SPVs and other ‘unauthorized’ investments

In a new blog post, OpenAI warns against “unauthorized opportunities to gain exposure to OpenAI through a variety of means,” including special purpose vehicles, known as SPVs.

“We urge you to be careful if you are contacted by a firm that purports to have access to OpenAI, including through the sale of an SPV interest with exposure to OpenAI equity,” the company writes. The blog post acknowledges that “not every offer of OpenAI equity […] is problematic” but says firms may be “attempting to circumvent our transfer restrictions.”

“If so, the sale will not be recognized and carry no economic value to you,” OpenAI says.

Investors have increasingly used SPVs (which pool money for one-off investments) as a way to buy into hot AI startups, prompting other VCs to criticize them as a vehicle for “tourist chumps.”

Business Insider reports that OpenAI isn’t the only major AI company looking to crack down on SPVs, with Anthropic reportedly telling Menlo Ventures it must use its own capital, not an SPV, to invest in an upcoming round.

Technology

Meta partners with Midjourney on AI image and video models

Meta is partnering with Midjourney to license the startup’s AI image and video generation technology, Meta Chief AI Officer Alexandr Wang announced Friday in a post on Threads. Wang says Meta’s research teams will collaborate with Midjourney to bring its technology into future AI models and products.

“To ensure Meta is able to deliver the best possible products for people it will require taking an all-of-the-above approach,” Wang said. “This means world-class talent, ambitious compute roadmap, and working with the best players across the industry.”

The Midjourney partnership could help Meta develop products that compete with industry-leading AI image and video models, such as OpenAI’s Sora, Black Forest Lab’s Flux, and Google’s Veo. Last year, Meta rolled out its own AI image generation tool, Imagine, into several of its products, including Facebook, Instagram, and Messenger. Meta also has an AI video generation tool, Movie Gen, that allows users to create videos from prompts.

The licensing agreement with Midjourney marks Meta’s latest deal to get ahead in the AI race. Earlier this year, CEO Mark Zuckerberg went on a hiring spree for AI talent, offering some researchers compensation packages worth upwards of $100 million. The social media giant also invested $14 billion in Scale AI, and acquired the AI voice startup Play AI.

Meta has held talks with several other leading AI labs about other acquisitions, and Zuckerberg even spoke with Elon Musk about joining his $97 billion takeover bid of OpenAI (Meta ultimately did not join the offer, and OpenAI denied Musk’s bid).

While the terms of Meta’s deal with Midjourney remain unknown, the startup’s CEO, David Holz, said in a post on X that his company remains independent with no investors; Midjourney is one of the few leading AI model developers that has never taken on outside funding. At one point, Meta talked with Midjourney about acquiring the startup, according to Upstarts Media.

Midjourney was founded in 2022 and quickly became a leader in the AI image generation space for its realistic, unique style. By 2023, the startup was reportedly on pace to generate $200 million in revenue. The startup sells subscriptions starting at $10 per month. It offers pricier tiers, which offer more AI image generations, that cost as much as $120 per month. In June, the startup released its first AI video model, V1.

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Meta’s partnership with Midjourney comes just two months after the startup was sued by Disney and Universal, alleging that it trained AI image models on copyrighted works. Several AI model developers — including Meta — face similar allegations from copyright holders, however, recent court cases pertaining to AI training data have sided with tech companies.

Got a sensitive tip or confidential documents? We’re reporting on the inner workings of the AI industry — from the companies shaping its future to the people impacted by their decisions. Reach out to Rebecca Bellan at [email protected] and Maxwell Zeff at [email protected]. For secure communication, you can contact us via Signal at @rebeccabellan.491 and @mzeff.88.

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