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Mary Ann was off this week, but Kirsten took the lead with Becca Szkutak and Rebecca Bellan in the co-host seats. This episode is packed with deals, antitrust musings, AI and more, so let's get into it!\n\nFor deals of the week,\xa0 we kicked things off with a look at why one of the many lawsuits Musk faces after firing 6,000 Twitter employees after his 2022 takeover was dismissed. The result may be good news for Musk, he still faces at least one other lawsuit from CEO Parag Agrawal, who along with three other former Twitter Inc. executives are seeking $128 million in severance payments from X Corp. \n\nNext up, Rebecca broke down Microsoft\u2019s decision to leave its observer seat on OpenAI\u2019s board, after which the AI company will no longer host observers. The legacy tech giant said it has seen enough progress being made at OpenAI and is \u201cconfident in its direction,\u201d but we\u2019re not exactly buying that Microsoft would give up such a coveted spot so easily. We suspect that the decision was fueled by ongoing antitrust scrutiny of Big Tech\u2019s influence over emerging AI players. \n\nLast but not least, Becca talked about Duolingo\u2019s deal to buy Hobbes, a Detroit-based animation and motion design studio. Hobbes is a company that Duolingo has worked with for years on several features, including Duolingo Music, so it\u2019s interesting to see the acquisition happen at this stage. Maybe Hobbes was having money trouble and needed a lifeline? Either way, Duolingo is calling this an acqui-hire deal. While Hobbes isn't an AI company, we make a prediction that we'll see similar acquisitions of smaller AI startups as larger companies scoop up the AI startups they're already working with. \n\nGetting into our themes this week, we\u2019ve been noticing a few stories lately that investigate what happens when a company\u2019s founder or owner dies. Today, Rebecca went over the story of Unseen Capital, whose founder Kayode Owens passed away in 2021 just after raising $30 million. The VC\u2019s mission was to help early-stage healthcare companies started by underrepresented founders. Pharma company Eli Lilly was one of Unseen\u2019s LPs, and in a move to protect its own investment while signaling confidence in Unseen\u2019s mission, has brokered a deal for Seae Ventures to acquire the unmoored VC. It\u2019s a good fit, as Seae Ventures is another diversity-focused VC firm.\n\nMeanwhile, a recent TC story on deep tech funding caught the Equity pod\u2019s attention. The gist: a recent survey of 30 deep tech VCs from eight countries found that very technical CEOs raise larger rounds. The survey also noted that pre-seed and Series A deep tech hardware rounds were bigger in 2023 than in 2022.\n\nWhile the survey seems to provide a rosy picture for technical CEOs, it does not provide a complete one. For instance, the survey focused on Europe, which got the Equity crew musing about whether those same stats would hold up in North America. \n\nAnd it followed rounds up through Series A. The Equity pod wondered if the results changed in Series B rounds and beyond. Plus, we think the rise of deep tech-focused funds may also play a role here too.