Daily Crunch: 2 weeks after extended system failure, Alibaba CEO takes over company’s cloud division

To get a roundup of TechCrunch’s biggest and most important stories delivered to your inbox every day at 3 p.m. PDT, subscribe here.

We’re getting close, folks. It’s the last Thursday of 2022, and today we have some news for you out of Alibaba and Spotify, as well as some crypto news out of India. As always, we bring you some goodness from TC our premium membership program. Read on, dear readers, and we’ll be back again tomorrow to bring you the final moments of 2022 in tech. — HP

The TechCrunch Top 3

Alibaba’s cloud move: Alibaba Cloud has a new president, Rita reports. Daniel Zhang, the company’s CEO, has been appointed acting president of the third-largest cloud infrastructure provider in the globe, after AWS and Microsoft.
Ring it in with Spotify: Aisha writes that the platform wants to help you welcome 2023 in style with what it thinks you might enjoy. You will be able to dance until the wee hours with playlists like “Party Hits”, “Floor Fillers”, “Rock Party”, and “Rock Party”. You can also find DJ mixes from TT the Artist and Carlita, AMEME. Coco & Breezy. &ME. Get down!
Indian crypto regulation: Under its G20 presidency, India has said it will look to prioritize the development of a framework for the global regulation of unbacked crypto assets, stablecoins and decentralized finance, writes Manish.

Startups and VC

Recall this: Catherine writes that Recall.ai raised $2.7 million in a seed funding round to help with a unified API that works with Zoom, Google Meet and Microsoft Teams to help customers build apps for a number of use cases.
Down rounds: Mary Ann spoke with GGV’s Hans Tung and Robin Li about the firm’s position in a challenging venture environment. (Requires TC subscription. )

Redefining ‘founder-friendly’ capital in the post-FTX era

Would the FTX disaster have been avoided if investors were more involved in the company’s operation?

Given the cold climate for late-stage funding and widespread economic uncertainty, “it is time for the startup comunity to redefine what Founder-friendly Capital means and balance both source and cost of capital,” writes Blair Silverberg (co-founder and CEO at Hum Capital).

In a guest post for TC , he discusses the relative advantages of active and passive investors, breaks down the basics and shares advice “for founders looking for a better balance between capital and external expertise to their businesses .”

TechCrunch is our membership program that helps founders and startup teams get ahead of the pack. You can sign up here. Use code “DC” for a 15% discount on an annual subscription!

Looking back and looking ahead

We rounded up the best of our TC coverage from the roller-coaster year in crypto. Too little? Jacquie provided us with a couple extra in order to squeeze more pulp out of the crypto juice:

Ron took a look at the private equity that dominated the top 10 enterprise M&A deals this year. The deals totaled nearly $154 billion. (Requires TC subscription. )

Rebecca has some ideas about what is in store for the micromobility market in 2023 — after what she said was a “tumultuous” year.