OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and venture capitalist Vinod Khosla emerged as saviors, offering startups affected by the Silicon Valley Bank's fallout capital from their accounts.
The bank's shutdown is poised to impact nearly half of the U.S. venture capital-backed startups, reckons TechCrunch. Altman offered the funds with no strings attached. He urged fellow VCs to follow suit and offer cash to struggling startups.
Altman tweeted, "Today is a good day to offer emergency cash to your startups that need it for payroll or whatever. No docs, no terms, just send money."
- Khosla was offering personal loans at borrowing cost.
- One undisclosed VC was offering SAFE notes of nearly half the value of the firm's last fundraising at the same terms as the previous fundraising.
- General Catalyst, Khosla Ventures, Greylock, Kleiner Perkins, Ribbit Capital, Lightspeed, and Upfront were all offering loans at low interest rates to portfolio startups.
- Several VC firms that had their primary fund account at SVB are also impacted by the bank's downfall.
