Anthropic's New Round Amps Up the AI Arms Race

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Anthropic raised a $30 billion Series G round at a $380 billion valuation. The deal was co-led by GIC and Coatue, with D. E. Shaw Ventures, Founders Fund, MGX, Accel, General Catalyst, Jane Street, and the Qatar Investment Authority also investing. TechCrunch has more here.

WP Engine alleges in a new court filing that Automattic’s Matt Mullenweg planned to seek 8% royalty payments from 10 WordPress hosting rivals and pressured Stripe to cut off WP Engine, escalating a dispute over trademark use and open source contributions. TechCrunch has more here.

Musk Needed a New Vision for SpaceX and xAI. He Landed on Moonbase Alpha.

Image Credits: SpaceX

By Tim Fernholz

“Join xAI if the idea of mass drivers on the Moon appeals to you,” CEO Elon Musk proclaimed yesterday following a restructuring that saw a stream of former executives exit the AI lab.

This is an interesting recruitment strategy after the company’s merger with Musk’s rocket maker, SpaceX, and the combined company’s anticipated IPO. You might think that xAI employees ought to be fascinated with achieving AGI, using deep learning models to disrupt traditional software companies, or simply bad wordplay like “Macrohard.” But instead, Elon is going to the moon.

After outlining plans to build AI data centers in orbit, the primary synergy between the two companies, Musk took the idea further. “What if you want to go beyond a mere terawatt per year?” Musk asked. “To do that, you have to go to the moon…I really want to see a mass driver on the moon that is shooting AI satellites into deep space.”

In Musk’s telling, the step beyond data centers orbiting Earth is even larger computers in deep space. And furthermore, Musk says the best way to achieve that is to build a city on the moon to manufacture space computers and hurl them into the solar system using a big maglev train.

If that all feels a bit much, veteran Musk watchers know there’s a clue about where the discussion appears in a video of an all-hands meeting xAI shared with the public. The slide describing the moon base comes at the end of the presentation deck, where, during SpaceX pep talks, Musk typically shares renderings of SpaceX rockets landing on Mars and waxes rhapsodic about the future of multi-planetary humanity.

Notably, the moon base comes just after SpaceX has publicly backed away from its long-held goal of colonizing Mars. Now, with xAI in the corporate fold, Musk needs a new science fiction metaphor for the future: In this case, the Kardashev Scale, a theoretical measure of galactic civilizations coined by the eponymous Soviet astronomer in the 1960s. The idea is climbing the scale of energy usage — early civilizations figure out how to leverage all the power sources on their planets, and then (hypothetically) go to space and build infrastructure to capture the energy of the sun.

Massive Fundings

Lassie, a six-year-old Stockholm startup that operates a pet insurance platform that uses automation and AI to manage claims and preventive care tracking, raised a $75 million Series C round. Investors included Balderton Capital, Felix Capital, Inventure, and Passion Capital. The Next Web has more here.

Loyal, a six-year-old San Francisco startup that develops drugs aimed at extending the lifespan of dogs, raised a $100 million Series C round led by age1, with Baillie Gifford also digging in. The company has raised a total of $250+ million. More here.

Neurent Medical, a 12-year-old Irish company that provides a minimally invasive radio frequency system to treat chronic rhinitis, raised a $74.2 million Series C round led by MVM Partners, with Sofinnova Partners as well as previous investors EQT Life Sciences, Atlantic Bridge, Fountain Healthcare Partners, and Enterprise Ireland also engaging. More here.

Simile, a Palo Alto startup founded last year that predicts human behavior using AI models trained on interviews and historical behavioral data, raised a $100 million round led by Index Ventures, with Bain Capital Ventures, A*, Hanabi Capital, Fei-Fei Li, and Andrej Karpathy also participating. Bloomberg has more here.

Talkiatry, a seven-year-old New York startup that provides in-network psychiatric care through an AI-powered clinical operations platform, raised a $210 million Series D round led by Perceptive Advisors, with Sofina as well as previous investors Andreessen Horowitz, blisce, and Left Lane Capital also stepping up. The company has raised a total of $400+ million. More here.

Big-But-Not-Crazy-Big Fundings

Didero, a two-year-old New York startup that provides an agentic AI layer to automate manufacturing procurement workflows across emails, purchase orders, and ERP systems, raised a $30 million Series A co-led by Chemistry and Headline, with M12 also participating. TechCrunch has more here.

Ever, a four-year-old San Francisco startup that operates an AI-driven marketplace for buying and selling used electric vehicles, raised a $31 million Series A round led by Eclipse, with Ibex Investors, Lifeline Ventures, and JIMCO also joining in. TechCrunch has more here.

️Hades, a one-year-old Munich startup that is developing ultra-deep drilling technology to extract critical minerals and geothermal energy from deep rock formations, raised a $17.8 million round ️co-led by HV Capital and Headline and including previous investors Project A and Visionaries Tomorrow. More here.

ManageMy, a London startup that provides insurers with a platform to manage digital customer engagement, underwriting, and claims decisioning, raised a $20 million Series B round co-led by Ventura Capital and OCVC, with BNF also contributing. The company has raised a total of $45 million. More here.

Nucleus Security, an eight-year-old startup based in Sarasota, FL, whose cybersecurity exposure management platform correlates vulnerabilities with threat intelligence and automates remediation workflows, raised a $20 million Series C round led by Delta-v Capital. The company has raised a total of $86+ million. SecurityWeek has more here.

Opaque Systems, a five-year-old San Francisco startup that provides a confidential AI platform that secures sensitive data and models during processing, raised a $24 million Series B round at a $300 million valuation. The deal was led by Walden Catalyst Ventures, with Intel Capital, Race Capital, Storm Ventures, Thomvest Ventures, and the Advanced Technology Research Council also participating. The company has raised a total of $55.5 million. SiliconANGLE has more here.

Uptiq, a four-year-old Dallas startup that provides an AI platform for financial institutions to automate lending, wealth, compliance, and operations workflows, raised a $25 million Series B round led by Curql, with Silverton Partners, 645 Ventures, Broadridge, Green Visor Capital, Live Oak Ventures, First Capital, Epic Ventures, Tau Ventures, and Evolution VC also piling on. More here.

Winn.AI, a four-year-old Tel Aviv startup that provides a real-time AI platform that guides sales representatives during live calls, raised an $18 million Series A round co-led by Insight Partners, Mangusta Capital, and S Capital, with Moneta, HighSage, Alumni Ventures, Sarona Ventures, and OurCrowd also taking stakes. CTech has more here.

Smaller Fundings

Ando, a one-year-old San Francisco startup that provides AI forecasting and scheduling tools for hourly workers, raised a $4 million seed round led by Slow Ventures, with additional participation from Blitzscaling Ventures, Zero Capital, Monochrome, Gaingels, Mana Ventures, and Fireroad. More here.

Bracket, a two-year-old London startup that provides an AI platform to automate treasury operations and foreign exchange workflows for mid-market businesses, raised a $7 million seed round led by Macquarie Group and Blackfinch Ventures, with Failup Ventures also investing. Tech Funding News has more here.

The Compression Company, a one-year-old London startup that provides AI-driven software to compress satellite data onboard, raised a $3.4 million pre-seed round led by Long Journey. EU-Startups has more here.

Cydelphi, a recently founded Dallas startup that provides an AI-driven digital forensics and incident response platform for ransomware recovery, raised a $3 million seed round led by Glasswing Ventures, with Blu Ventures, Hyde Park Angels, and Merlin Group also anteing up. Pulse 2.0 has more here.

Demoboost, a five-year-old Warsaw startup that provides a platform for B2B software companies to create and track interactive product demos, raised a $3.3 million round co-led by Digital Ocean Ventures and RIO, with B-Value also participating. Tech.eu has more here.