California Bulletin #62
Sharp signals. Local leverage. No fluff.
đ The Daily Edge
Hollywoodâs Real Estate Glut Is a Startup Advantage in Disguise
Hollywoodâs post-strike slowdown is snowballing: over 1.2M sq. ft. of office and studio space sits vacant across LA County. Most blame shifting production timelines and streamers cutting costsâbut smart founders see leverage.
Private landlords and REITs like Hudson Pacific are now offering 6â12 months rent-free leases for creative or tech firms willing to fill the space. One founder locked in a 6,500 sq. ft. lease for $0 up frontâcontingent on hiring 3 local employees and agreeing to a 2-year term.
If your startup has any creative armâmedia, AI-generated content, post-production toolingâthis is your moment to claim Hollywood space for pennies.
đ§ What to do:
Look for âfilm-adjacentâ subleases or reach out directly to REIT reps. You wonât find these on Zillow or LoopNet.
â ď¸ The Legal Shift
AB 1963 Quietly Redefines 'Gig Worker' for B2B SaaS Teams
Passed last Friday, AB 1963 will redefine how 1099 contractors are treated if they work with product, engineering, or design functionsâespecially in tech teams with fewer than 50 employees.
đ Key Change:
If your contractors contribute to core product features and work over 90 days, they may now be classified as employees under state lawâeven if theyâre out of state.
This affects:
Remote dev teams
Fractional CTOs/designers
AI research contributors
đĽ What to do now:
Review your contractor agreements immediately. Misclassification fines could hit small startups harder than funding slowdowns.
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𧊠Founder Resource
How to Pitch the Right Way When You're Not "Hot" Yet
A founder in Fresno closed $550K in pre-seed funding from a boutique VC last week. The twist? He had no pitch deck, no tractionâbut used Loom videos + vertical pain storytelling with tailored Reddit posts to prove demand.
He leaned into:
â Reddit threads where users described the problem
â A 2-minute screen-share walkthrough
â Personalized âwhy us, why nowâ videos instead of cold emails
The tactic worked because it showed problem fluency, not just a shiny product.
⥠Try This: Make a 90-second walkthrough video and tie it to a real community pain post. Investors want signals, not polish.
đť Tech & IT Pulse
SB 702 Could Shake Up Enterprise IT Procurement
A quiet California Senate bill (SB 702) proposes mandatory open standards and interoperability requirements for all state IT contracts by 2026.
Translation: if you're a startup that integrates or builds middleware, your odds of landing a state tech contract just went way up.
The state currently spends $4.5B/year on ITâmostly on outdated, non-interoperable systems. SB 702 is a foot in the door for startups that can modernize legacy setups without requiring wholesale system changes.
đĄ What to Watch:
This could lead to RFPs favoring low-lift dev tools, API layers, and modular infra products. Get in front of this curve.
đ Todayâs Data Drop
CA Tech Layoffs Are CoolingâBut Only in Specific Sectors
New WARN Act filings from April 15â20 show a 36% decrease in layoffs across tech roles compared to March. The decline is mostly concentrated in:
GovTech
Energy AI
Applied fintech (compliance, B2B banking infra)
However, Consumer AI and vertical SaaS are still trimming 5â15% of non-technical staff.
đ Hidden Angle: Startups offering employee redeployment tooling, internal mobility software, or compliance-led outplacement services are seeing a 7x increase in demo requests.
If youâre in this lane, nowâs the time to build partnerships with HR leaders across mid-market tech companies.