WHAT’S INSIDE

• Tech Companies to Watch: Startup news and deals from the last week

• Big Movers: The Big tech movers, shakers and partnerships this week

• Making Waves: Companies making a buzz in the Tech world

• Open Deals: Startups raising capital this week

• In The Money: Significant raises last week and why they matter

• Exit Watching: Mergers & Acquisitions and IPOs

• The Funding Buzz: VC & PE Activity To Watch

BIG MOVERS

Big tech moves, movers and trends to watch this week

OpenAI — OpenAI is enhancing ChatGPT with productivity features to rival Google Workspace and Microsoft Office and developing advanced autonomous vehicle software, potentially rivaling Tesla.

Amazon — Investing $4B+ to enhance its Same-Day and Next-Day delivery services in 4,000 rural U.S. towns by 2026. Aims to triple its delivery network and generate 170+ jobs amid a 30% rise in rural same-day deliveries.

Google Robotics — Gemini Robotics focuses on AI models for local robotic devices with a model enabling efficient task adaptation and operation without network dependency.

Palantir — Investing $100M in Kentucky’s The Nuclear Company to develop a Nuclear Operating System to streamline reactor construction.

Teaming Up

Apple & Perplexity AI — Apple is exploring the acquisition of the search AI startup to boost its AI capabilities and potentially develop an AI-based search engine for Siri. No formal offer has been made.

Son's AI & Robotics Hub — Masayoshi Son plans a $1T complex in Arizona with TSMC, focusing on AI and robotics inspired by Shenzhen in China.

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MAKING WAVES

Startups, trends and signals to watch in the USA this week

Harvey AI — The professional services AI startup raised $300M in a Series E, boosting its valuation to $5B just months after a $3B valuation. With $75M in ARR, it plans to expand beyond legal services.

Abridge — The AI medical scribe startup raised a $300M Series E, doubling its valuation to $5.3B led by Andreessen Horowitz, It integrates with Epic Systems and reports $117M in ARR, expanding to include AI medical coding.

Kalshi — The US-based and compliant prediction market company has raised a $185M Series C at a $2B valuation led by Paradigm as it focuses on mainstreaming prediction markets. Unlike Polymarket it is fully compliant with US regulations.

Wispr Flow — The AI-powered dictation app startup has seen 50% monthly user growth, it plans to launch an Android version, and develop enterprise features, and raised $30M in Series A funding.

Audos — Co-founded by Henrik Werdelin, this platform aims to launch 100,000 companies annually using AI tools, offering a funding and revenue share model instead of equity for non-technical founders.

[OPEN DEALS] RAISING DOLLARS:

Startups, firms or funds raising capital this week

Meta Platforms — The tech giant is pursuing $29B from private capital to fund AI data centers in the U.S. This includes $3B in equity and $26B in debt, part of a $65B investment to rival OpenAI and Google in AI infrastructure.

Polymarket — The prediction market platform is close to securing $200M at a $1B valuation, led by Founders Fund. It saw record traffic and high accuracy in election predictions. Polymarket is now xAI's official prediction market partner.

Sanmai Technologies — Reid Hoffman is leading a $12M funding round for the ultrasound and AI health tech startup, evidence of an increasing interest in brain science among tech billionaires. It aims to revolutionize human health with tech.

IN THE MONEY

Companies that raised money in the past week and why they matter

Massive Deals

Digital Asset — The institutional finance blockchain company raised $135M to enhance its Canton Network integrating real-world assets into blockchain while addressing privacy and compliance.

Decagon AI — The AI-powered customer service startup raised a $131M Series C at a $1.5B valuation. Known for automating interactions for clients like Hertz and Duolingo, it aims to expand teams and sales for personalized AI agents.

ForSight Robotics — The Israeli robotic surgery company raised a $125M Series B to develop a system for cataract surgery and support upcoming human clinical trials to revolutionize eye surgery with AI and robotics.

Neuron23 — The biopharmaceutical company focused on neurological diseases, raised a $96.5M Series D and initiated a trial for an early Parkinson's disease pharma + digital therapy.

Large Deals

Canary Technologies — The hospitality AI startup raised $80M Series D at $600M valuation to support global expansion and AI product development, strengthening partnerships with major hotel brands.

XBOW — The San Fran-based AI-driven software security startup raised $75M Series B to enhance AI capabilities that surpass human hackers, already utilized by top security teams to combat AI-driven threats.

Tacta Systems — The Silicon Valley-based robotics company secured $75M in funding ($11M seed, $64M Series A) to advance technology enhancing robotic solutions with human-like tactile skills and spatial awareness.

Centific — The Seattle-based AI services startup raised $60M Series A led by Jenny Lee of Granite Asia, specializing in data pipelines for AI systems with Nvidia and Microsoft partnerships.

OpenRouter — The AI integration startup raised $40M to enhance its multi-model inference platform, accelerating product development and expanding support for efficient LLM solutions among developers and organizations.

Smaller Deals

Kognitos — The San Jose-based AI automation company raised $25M in Series B led by Prosperity7 Ventures to enhance its neurosymbolic AI platform for business process automation across industries.

Eventual — The San Fran-based AI infrastructure company raised $20M in Series A led by Felicis for its data warehouse that simplifies querying multimodal data, already used by Amazon and CloudKitchens.

Delphi — The San Francisco-based digital minds platform secured $16M Series A led by Sequoia Capital to develop technology that creates digital versions of users for personalized knowledge sharing in content-heavy environments.

Foresight — The data and AI infrastructure startup raised $5.5M in seed funding led by NEA to revolutionize private market investment by integrating multiple data sources into a unified platform.

Lux Aeterna — The satellite technology startup secured $4M in funding to develop its reusable satellite Delphi, set for 2027 launch with NASA-inspired designs to reduce costs and increase deployment flexibility.

Castle — The US-based startup raised $1M to provide SMBs with an automated bitcoin treasury solution protecting against inflation, with plans to enhance platform development and integrate with popular financial tools.

EXIT WATCHING

Mergers & Acquisitions and IPOs

Crossing Minds — OpenAI is acquiring the U.S.-based AI recommendation startup to enhance customer personalization capabilities, Crossing Minds will stop accepting new clients.

Meta — The tech giant is in advanced negotiations to acquire PlayAI, an AI voice replication startup, to strengthen its AI assistant and smart device capabilities in the competitive AI technology market.

Rubrik — The data security company acquired open-source AI model startup Predibase for an estimated $100M to $500M to integrate AI capabilities with secure data platforms, enhancing enterprise AI agent development across major cloud services.

CareerBuilder + Monster — The merged job search firm filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy after experiencing a 40% revenue drop post-pandemic, initiating a court-supervised sale of their assets including job board and media properties.

IPO WATCH

Lime — The Uber-backed electric bike startup has hired Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan Chase for its upcoming U.S. IPO, aiming to exceed its 2020 valuation of $510M amid a recovering IPO market that has raised nearly $27B this year.

Wealthfront Corporation — The automated wealth management fintech firm, valued at $1.4 billion in 2022, has confidentially filed for a U.S. IPO, seeking to capitalize on increased investor interest in new listings amid a surge in successful IPOs.

THE FUNDING BUZZ

VC & PE Activity To Watch

Galaxy Digital — Galaxy Digital has raised its first external $175M venture fund, exceeding its $150M target, to invest in bridging traditional finance and digital assets, focusing on payment infrastructure and stablecoin technologies.

Aria Growth Partners — The VC firm raised $152M for its second fund, nearly doubling its debut, led by Trevor Nelson and Jackie Dunklau to back better-for-you food products with focus on traditional retail success.

Scenic Management — Scenic Management is raising $150M for its second fund to acquire private company shares from early-stage venture firms amid a liquidity crunch due to declining public listings and M&A activity.

Sorenson Capital — The Utah-based firm raised $150M third fund for early-stage enterprise software and cybersecurity ventures with zero write-offs, previously backing successful startups like CloudKnox and Fastly.

Laude Institute — Databricks and Perplexity co-founder Andy Konwinski commits $100M to establish the Laude Institute for AI research, starting with $3M annual grants for projects like the AI Systems Lab at UC Berkeley.

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