AI versus SaaS, EV charging, and a new $250M fund | TechCrunch

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Hello, and welcome back to Equity, the podcast about the business of startups, where we unpack the numbers and nuance behind the headlines.

This is our newly revamped Wednesday episode, where we talk about all things startups and venture capital. Our end-of-week news roundtable is untouched, and we’re still recording interviews — just on an as-needed basis this year.

Here’s what we got into this morning:

• Vertice raises $25M: The bet here is that companies are willing to pay to have another company, Vertice in this case, to help them reduce their existing software and cloud spend.
• Electra snags $330M: Charging EVs is big business, and Electra is betting that building its own charging network will pay dividends for a long time.
• Build a Rocket Boy collects $110M: This is a big round for a gaming company with no titles in the market. That said, it must have a few super-cool things cooking to raise that kinda of cash in today’s market.
• We also looked at rounds from Onera, Weavix, Long Story Short, and Xyte. There’s a lot going on!
• Thomvest raises a new fund: Another day, another new fund — that’s the $250 million Thomvest story.

Lastly, there’s good news for African startups on the horizon. And with that, we’ll catch you again bright and early on Friday!