Square’s Better.com name Block is Butter-y smooth

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

It’s Friday, which means the whole crew was aboard for this particular episode. We had Grace and Chris behind the scenes, and Mary Ann, Natasha and Alex on the mics. And, frankly, we needed the full team, because the holidays aren’t slowing any news down.

• First up? Square becoming Block, which we wanted to make fun of but mostly found to be reasonable, given the company’s disparate interests.
• From there we chatted about Inpathy’s neat take on social networking, Massive’s $11 million funding round and why Butter could help grease the skids of many a subscription business.
• Then it was time to trade startups for bigger companies, as we had to riff on Bret Taylor’s quasi-ascension to the top of Salesforce along with a host of other executive exits. Alex calls it cold resignation winter, but Meta clearly has put some people on the hot seat.
• Better.com was also in our remit this week, due to its fundraising and layoffs. We debate if you should raise if it comes at the cost of your employees, and the morality of a Zoom layoff.
• And, finally, Sounding Board’s Series B reminded us that executive coaching, even and especially for the folks above, isn’t just a services business. It’s a SaaS business.

See you here next week, unless Jack shaves off his beard and we’re forced to do a shot.