Andreessen Horowitz raising a $20 billion AI-focused fund & Mira Murati’s new AI venture adds co-creator of GPT as advisor.

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STARTUPS RAISING MILLIONS

💰 Startup funding updates

Glimpse, a NYC-based provider of an AI-powered end-to-end deduction management service for CPG brands, raised $10M in Series A funding. The round was led by 8VC, with participation from existing investors YCombinator, Origin Ventures, and Informed Ventures, as well as new investor Allison Pickens, the former COO of Gainsight.

Tracera, a NYC-based provider of an AI-powered platform that automates the collection, verification and auditing of sustainability data, raised $12M in Series A funding. The round was led by Foundry, with participation from Rho Ignition, Tola Capital, and Contour Venture Partners.

BRINC, a Seattle, WA-based manufacturer of emergency response drones, raised $75M in funding. The round was led by Index Ventures, with participation from Motorola Solutions, Mike Volpi and Figma’s CEO and founder, Dylan Field.

HoneyHive, a NYC-based provider of an AI agent observability and evaluation platform, raised $7.4M in total funding. The round consisted of a $5.5M Seed round led by Insight Partners and a previously unannounced $1.9M Pre-Seed round led by Zero Prime Ventures. The Seed round also saw participation from investors including Zero Prime Ventures, 468 Capital, and MVP Ventures, while the Pre-Seed round included AIX Ventures, Firestreak Ventures, and angel investors such as Jordan Tigani (CEO at Motherduck) and Savin Goel (CTO at Outerbounds).

Starday, a Scottsdale, AZ-based AI-driven food innovation company, raised $11M in Series A funding. The round, led by Slow Ventures and Equal Ventures, includes $8m in equity, and $3m in a debt credit facility from Silicon Valley Bank, along with investment from large global food and beverage companies.

Gallatin AI, a Washington, DC-based defense technology company, raised $15M in Seed funding. The round was led by 8VC, with participation from Silent Ventures, Moonshots Capital, Timeless Partners, and Banter Capital.

Portnox, an Austin, TX-based provider of cloud-native, zero trust access control solutions, raised $37.5M in Series B funding. The round was led by Updata Partners.

Adaptis, a Toronto, Canada-based provider of a platform that aligns sustainability and profitability for building owners and operators, raised $4M in Seed funding. The round was led by Building Ventures with participation from MetaProp, 2048 Ventures, Powerhouse Ventures, and Blue Vision Capital.

Rain, a Santa Monica, CA-based provider of an employer-integrated earned wage access (EWA) and financial wellness app, raised $75M in Series B equity funding. The round was led by Prosus with participation from Nextalia Ventures, Spark Growth Ventures, and existing investors including QED, Invus Opportunities, and others.

Aurascape, a Santa Clara, CA-based AI-native security company, raised $50M in funding. The round was led by Mayfield Fund and Menlo Ventures, with participation from Celesta Capital, Mark McLaughlin, Greg Clark, Lip-Bu Tan, and Manoj Apte.

Spektion, an Austin, TX-based software vulnerability management company, raised $5M in Seed funding. The round was led by LiveOak Ventures with participation from Tau Ventures and Dauntless Ventures.

Corsha, a Washington, DC-based company specializing in machine-to-machine (M2M) traffic protection for operating systems and critical infrastructure, raised $18m in Series A-1 funding. The round was led by SineWave Ventures, with participation from Razor’s Edge Ventures and Ten Eleven Ventures.

Untamed, a London, UK-based subscription cat food brand, raised £10M in Series B funding. The round was led by Coefficient Capital with participation from Five Seasons Ventures, and Redrice.

Optilogic, an Ann Arbor, MI-based supply chain design software provider, raised $40M in Series B funding. The round was led by NewRoad Capital Partners, with participation from MK Capital and Moore Strategic Ventures.

Anecdotes, a Palo Alto, CA-based provider of a data-driven Governance, Risk, and Compliance (GRC) platform, raised $55M in Series B funding. The round, which brought the total amount to $85M, included $30M led by DTCP, after the initial $25M led by Glilot with participation from Vertex and Red Dot.

Starhive, a Stockholm, Sweden-based startup providing flexible IT asset and service management solutions, raised $5M in Pre-Series A funding. The round was led by Ventech. Existing investor node.vc also participated.

Osstec, a London, UK-based joint replacement implants startup using 3D printing technology, raised £2.5M in funding. The round was led by Empirical Ventures.

QurieGen, a Nijmegen, the Netherlands-based cellular technology company, raised €2.2M in funding. Backers included Tensor Ventures, Lighthouse Ventures, BSV Ventures, Moondust Ventures, and 22 Hor Invest, as well as Tim Draper of Draper Associates.

NEW VCs IN THE MARKET

🏦 Venture Capital updates

Andreessen Horowitz is reportedly raising a $20 billion AI-focused growth fund, its largest ever, to back U.S. startups amid global investor demand. The firm aims to pool capital from international LPs seeking exposure to American AI companies without restrictions. A16z has been actively investing in top AI players like xAI, Databricks, and Mistral, and is offering portfolio startups access to thousands of Nvidia GPUs.

KEY STORIES IN TECH

📜 Latest in tech

Colossal brings dire wolves back to life in world first de extinction breakthrough:

• Startup Colossal Biosciences revealed three live dire wolves — Remus, Romulus, and Khaleesi — created using CRISPR-edited gray wolf embryos based on ancient dire wolf DNA, claiming them as the first true de-extinction.

• While Colossal says the wolves are 99.5% genetically similar to their extinct ancestors, some scientists argue they’re just modified gray wolves mimicking dire wolf traits, not true species revival.

• The $10.2B startup says the dire wolf project could aid red wolf conservation and spawn future revenue streams via biodiversity credits, tech spinouts, and potential government contracts.

Mira Murati’s new AI venture adds co-creator of GPT as advisor:

• Former OpenAI CTO Mira Murati’s new AI venture, Thinking Machines Lab, has quietly added two influential advisers: Bob McGrew, OpenAI’s ex-chief research officer, and Alec Radford, co-creator of GPT and DALL·E.

• The startup, led by Murati as CEO and co-founded with ex-OpenAI scientist John Schulman and CTO Barret Zoph, aims to build customizable and general-purpose AI tools that are easier to understand and adapt.

• While Thinking Machines Lab has been vague about its roadmap, the addition of Radford and McGrew further signals the company’s deep AI pedigree, attracting talent from OpenAI and DeepMind as it reportedly raises over $100M in funding.

Amazon launches Nova Sonic AI voice model to rival ChatGPT voice mode:

• Amazon unveiled Nova Sonic, a generative AI voice model that processes and generates speech with natural conversational flow, boasting performance comparable to OpenAI and Google’s best voice models.

• Nova Sonic is integrated into Alexa+ and available via Amazon Bedrock’s streaming API, with Amazon claiming it's 80% more cost-efficient than GPT-4o and faster, responding in just 1.09 seconds.

• The model excels at speech recognition, with a low 4.2% word error rate across five languages and superior performance in multi-speaker environments, forming a key part of Amazon’s broader AGI strategy.

TSMC faces $1 billion US penalty over Huawei-linked AI chip exports:

• The US Commerce Department is investigating TSMC over chips it made for Chinese firm Sophgo, which allegedly ended up in Huawei’s banned AI processors, possibly violating export control laws.

• TSMC could face fines exceeding $1 billion — twice the value of the transactions — due to its use of US technology in manufacturing, which places it under US export regulations.

• The potential penalty comes amid strained US-Taiwan trade relations and TSMC’s $100B investment pledge in US chip facilities, further complicating diplomatic and business dynamics.

Shopify CEO says no new hires without proof AI can’t do the job:

• Shopify CEO Tobi Lütke has instructed employees to demonstrate why AI cannot handle tasks before requesting additional staff or resources, emphasizing a new company standard for resource allocation.

• In a memo shared on X, Lütke explained that "reflexive AI usage" is now a baseline expectation at Shopify, describing artificial intelligence as the most rapid workplace shift in his career.

• The company is integrating AI usage into performance reviews, with Lütke stating that effectively leveraging AI has become a fundamental expectation for all Shopify employees.

Instagram plans major search upgrade to compete with TikTok and Google:

• Instagram head Adam Mosseri says the app’s search is lacking, especially for content discovery, and reveals Meta has expanded the team to improve it significantly in the months and years ahead.

• Mosseri acknowledges Gen Z increasingly uses Instagram and TikTok over traditional search engines like Google, prompting Instagram to invest in better content resurfacing and discovery features.

• Upcoming updates include improved recommended searches based on comment section discussions, aiming to match TikTok’s contextual search suggestions and boost long-term content value for creators.

LAST COFFEE SIP

☕Other news

Amazon-owned Zoox begins autonomous vehicle testing in Los Angeles:

• Amazon-owned Zoox is deploying retrofitted Toyota Highlanders in Los Angeles to collect mapping data as it prepares for autonomous testing and a future robotaxi service.

• While Waymo already offers paid robotaxi rides in LA, Zoox is still testing, including its custom-built vehicles without steering wheels or pedals in San Francisco, Foster City, and Las Vegas.

• The LA expansion comes shortly after a voluntary recall and adds to Zoox’s testing footprint, which now includes six U.S. cities.

Apple may boost India iPhone imports to avoid China tariffs:

• Apple is reportedly considering importing more iPhones from India to avoid the 54% tariffs on Chinese-made goods announced by President Trump.

• The move is seen as a short-term solution while Apple negotiates for tariff exemptions, as the company is not yet ready to overhaul its China-centric supply chain.

• Analysts say Apple could produce 25 million iPhones in India this year, and importing all of them to the U.S. could meet around 50% of U.S. demand.

HIRING ALERT: STARTUPS & VC ROLES

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