Welcome to our This Week in VC roundup - this week we have stories about how a strong firm and personal brand for augmented, data-driven venture capital.

🚀 Who Got Funded?

Here are a few of our favorite startups that successfully raised VC funding this week:

Klaim - Raised $5M Seed

• What they do: Klaim uses artificial intelligence to forecast cash flows by streamlining the medical billing procedures, allowing healthcare providers to reduce the revenue losses brought on by delayed and rejected payments from insurance companies.
• Industries: Health Insurance, FinTech, Financial Services, InsurTech, SaaS, Artificial Intelligence, Machine Learning
• Location: Dubai, United Arab Emirates

InCitu - Raised $2M Pre-Seed

• What they do: InCitu is on a mission to create an augmented reality map of the world's future built environment in order to enable residents, developers, and city governments to collaborate on the process of urban change.
• Industries: Developer Platform, Smart Cities, Software, Augmented Reality
• Location: New York, United States

Check out MLQ VC: Discover Recently-Funded Startups to get access to all 100+ venture funding deals this week as well as our database of VC-funded startups.

💎 Top Stories

Here are a few of the top stories in startups and venture capital this week:

Firm + personal brand are essential for augmented venture capital of the future

The historic purely human-based VC model has been inefficient, ineffective, subjective and non-inclusive, eventually leading to on average sub-optimal returns and unfair distribution of capital.

However, data-driven approaches have started to change the industry to become more efficient, effective, objective and inclusive so that capital gets allocated to those who deserve it most and have the highest likelihood of success.

The author does not believe in a fully automated VC either. Not today and not in the future.

There are four major areas across the value chain where data-driven approaches are insufficient and where it’s crucial to have a human in the loop/lead:

• Inbound deal flow
• Assessment
• Access,
• and portfolio and board work

For inbound deal flow and access, VCs need to be top of mind for founders and have a strong inbound strategy.

For assessment and portfolio work, VCs need to spend time with the founders to see the “fire in their eyes” and be able to deliver on promises.

The future of VC is augmented and requires a superior firm brand, personal brand, social skills and people.

Read the full story

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