Swag Program Manager?

Since last post we’ve seen 3 M&A deals, 4 funding rounds, 9 people moves & promotions, 4 roles, 1 article, 1 newly added upcoming event, and 1 bonus meme.

This week brought to you in partnership with Similarweb. Check out their latest pre-IPO report below.

36 months of Claude.ai user retention data before the first print.

Similarweb has tracked claude.ai since 2023. This report benchmarks claude.ai and the Claude mobile apps against peers including ChatGPT, Gemini, DeepSeek, Grok and Perplexity through August 2026, with cohort retention curves, monthly share shift and the sign-up-to-upgrade funnel.

Want to know where demand is coming from, whether users stayed, where the audience is shifting? Check out the report here.

M&A

• Databricks acquired Row Zero (AI spreadsheets)

• EMARKETER acquired RetailX’s research business (multichannel retail and eCommerce intelligence)

• Salesforce acquired Listen Labs (AI-powered market research)

_{*Deals are announced but may not be closed.}

Funding

• F2 (agentic OS for credit) received a $5M investment from Golub Capital

• Firecrawl (web data API) raised $75M in a Series B led by Smash Capital

• iCapital (investment platform) received a strategic investment from The Depository Trust & Clearing Corporation (DTCC)

• Menos AI (AI for institutional investing) raised $5.1M in a Pre-A round led by Copper Sky Capital

People Moves, Promotions, and Appointments

Moves

• Mark Bell - Bipsync as CMO

• Tim Richards - Lloyds Banking Group as Head of Market Data Services CIB

• Sid Singh - Oxford Data Plan as Director of Partnerships and Strategy

• Chris Stevens - Rokos Capital Management as Alternative Data Lead

Promotions

• James Da Costa - CTO at Cint

• Josh Haecker - Head of Enterprise AI at Dow Jones

• Jackie Ilacqua - Global CEO, Healthcare at Ipsos

• Will Kinlaw - Head of Data Intelligence and Markets Research at State Street

• Bethany Klebnov - SVP, Data Science & Strategy at People Inc.

*may not have started roles, but roles are announced or updates provided online.

Who’s Hiring

• AlphaSense is hiring a Sector Lead (TMT) Directed Content

• Cooley AI is hiring a Director of Data Products ($250K - $320K)

• DiligenceSquared is hiring a Head of GTM ($190K - $220K)

• Jane Street is hiring a Swag Program Manager ($150K - $200K)

_*salaries only listed where provided by the company and may vary based on location and other factors. See links for specific salary details.

What I’m Reading

• AI Data in Bankruptcy and Liability Management: From Bankruptcy Data Sales to Potential Dropdowns by High Yield Harry

Upcoming Events

*new events added since last newsletter

• BattleFin Discovery Day, Oct 1, London

• Restecher Capital Markets Day, Oct 7, NYC

• Collingwood Value Creation Summit, Oct 7, London

• World Financial Information Conference (WFIC), Oct 11-14, Copenhagen

• Enterprise Data & Tech Summit: Data in the Age of AI, Oct 27, NYC

• *Accurate Insights 2026, Oct 28, Virtual (I’ll be speaking)

• BattleFin Discover Day, Oct 29, NYC

• The Qualitative Insights Summit, Nov 10-11, Virtual

Favor

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Views here are the author’s own and not of any employers or companies. The author may be compensated for pieces in this newsletter.