Q3 data: Our first looks are here. Access the key top-line metrics that will shape our upcoming reports for PEand VC.
Decoding Anthropic’s leaked S-1: What does Anthropic’s leaked draft prospectus reveal about the business and its proposed $2 trillion valuation? We examine.
Senior Research Analyst, Carbon & Emissions Tech and Clean Energy Tech
Lithium-ion batteries have long been the default choice for stationary energy storage, thanks to their maturity, energy density, and established supply chains.
But growing demand for long-duration storage is now pulling VC investment toward alternative technologies. Data center developers facing gas turbine shortages are turning to wind and solar, and need storage to manage that intermittency, a shift that’s reshaping where investor dollars go.
According to our recent analyst note on data center power needs, lithium battery investment accounted for roughly three-quarters of energy storage VC deal value from 2019 to 2023, before that balance shifted in 2024 and 2025, when its share fell to 25% and 31.4%, respectively.
Lithium battery deal count held relatively steady at an average of 38.2% of annual totals from 2019 to 2025, suggesting the segment has mainly lost its large rounds, with much of lithium-ion’s scale-up and cost reduction now happening through established manufacturers rather than VC-backed developers.
The capital moving away from lithium-ion is spread across chemical and nonchemical energy storage technologies.
Nonlithium batteries—including sodium-ion, metal-air, and redox flow—led 2024 deal value at 41.7%, while alternative energy storage, covering thermal, kinetic, compressed air, and gravitational systems, took the top spot in 2025 with $527.5 million, or 40.7% of the total.
The trend looks strong in 2026 so far, with August rounds for iron-air battery developer Form Energy and thermal storage company Antora Energy making up $1.3 billion of the $1.7 billion in Q3 deal value to date, leaving lithium batteries with just 11.3%.
Alternatives still trail lithium-ion in maturity and energy density, but their advantages in cost, safety, material availability, and duration are drawing an increasing share of investor attention.
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After a five-year decline, private market fundraising is showing bright spots: Rolling 12-month PE fundraising rose for the first time in seven quarters, and VC is on pace for a 40% rebound. But the money isn’t spreading out; it’s going to bigger, more established managers.
Healthcare is a prime example of this concentration.
Private healthcare PE funds raised $16.2 billion in H1—more than 90% of 2025’s full-year total—across just 11 closes. Two megafunds did most of the work: Blackstone Life Sciences’ $6.3 billion sixth fund, the largest private life sciences fund on record, and Patient Square Capital’s $4.4 billion second fund.
Healthcare took 6.1% of all PE capital raised, an all-time high in our data. And LPs are sticking with who they know: nine of the 11 closes came from returning managers.
Healthcare VC was quieter at $4.7 billion.
A slow first half is becoming the norm for life sciences venture, which captured $3.6 billion, compared with $1.1 billion for healthtech. But annual life sciences VC fundraising has become heavily back-weighted over the past two years, which puts the focus on H2 and exits.
The reopened biotech IPO window has been the story of 2026, and alongside Big Pharma M&A, it’s finally getting cash back to LPs. The question is whether they recycle it into healthcare. If not, specialists risk ceding ground to tech investors already writing big checks into AI-enabled biotechs.
Read more in our H1 2026 Healthcare Funds Report, which covers PE and VC funds dedicated to the sector and profiles more than 500 specialist managers.
For much of the past decade, robotics investment focused on intelligence and treated the hardware as largely settled. That assumption is becoming harder to sustain.
Motion systems determine how much a robot can lift, how long it runs, how safely it behaves around people, and how often it needs service. According to McKinsey & Company’s estimate, they also account for roughly half of a humanoid’s hardware cost.
Robot joint requirements have moved beyond what many off-the-shelf industrial products were designed to do. A robot limb must offer sustained force in a light package, possess the ability to yield safely on contact, and be durable enough to survive impacts. Financing has accelerated alongside that interest.
The opportunity depends on what robot makers outsource, how quickly suppliers reduce costs, and where they can compete with established manufacturers and Chinese rivals.
