This is a weekly feature that runs down the week鈥檚 top 10 announced funding rounds in the U.S. Check out last week鈥檚 biggest funding deal roundup here.

Startups raised funding rounds with a lot of zeroes at the end this week. Three companies 鈥� , and 鈥� secured financings of $1 billion or more. Additionally, a robust lineup of companies in sectors including AI, e-commerce, cybersecurity, biotech and even mining also announced sizable new rounds.

1. , $1.37B, manufacturing: Hadrian, a developer of highly automated factories, raised $1.37 billion in Series D funding led by , , , , and . The financing sets a $7.87 billion valuation for the 6-year-old, Torrance, California-based company.

2. (tied) , $1B, energy storage: Austin-based Base Power, a developer of residential battery energy storage systems, secured $1 billion in Series D financing at a $13 billion post-money valuation. , , and led the financing, which coincided with the launch of the company鈥檚 Base Core home battery.

2. (tied) , $1B, nuclear power: Valar Atomics, a developer of technology and infrastructure to deliver nuclear energy, closed on $1 billion in Series B funding led by . The El Segundo, California-based company also secured a $200 million credit facility led by and .

4. , $700M, AI connectivity: Lumilens, developer of a connectivity platform for AI infrastructure, emerged from stealth and announced more than $700 million in new funding. , , , and led the financing for the San Jose, California-based startup.

5. , $545M, live shopping: Live shopping marketplace Whatnot bagged $545 million in Series G funding. The round reportedly a $20 billion valuation for the Los Angeles-based company, with , and as lead investors.

6. , $310M, critical minerals: Mariana Minerals, a software-focused developer of projects for supplying critical minerals, picked up $310 million in Series B financing led by . The 4-year-old company engineers, builds and operates mines and refineries using its software platform.

7. , $300M, AI infrastructure: Volta, a developer of AI cloud infrastructure, from stealth and said it raised a Series A at a $2.4 billion valuation, led by , , and .

8. , $250M, cybersecurity: San Francisco-based cybersecurity provider Horizon3, announced a $250 million Series E. and led the round, which set a valuation of more than $2 billion, triple the value set for its Series D last year.

9. , $188M, biotech: Watertown, Massachusetts-based drug discovery startup LifeMine Therapeutics secured $188 million in Series E funding led by . The funding will go toward clinical development of its lead program and advance its pipeline of transplantation and immunology therapies.

10. , $150M, agentic AI: HappyRobot, developer of an agentic AI platform geared for enterprises in sectors including logistics, financial services, utilities and manufacturing, raised $150 million in Series C funding led by and .

Methodology

We tracked the largest announced rounds in the 兔子先生传媒 database that were raised by U.S.-based companies for the period of Aug. 1-7. Although most announced rounds are represented in the database, there could be a small time lag as some rounds are reported late in the week.

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That was the intent of our latest 兔子先生传媒 News data dive into seed-stage trends. For this installment, we focused on mid-sized rounds of between $5 million and $10 million, analyzing around 800 global seed financings that closed this year.听

Why this range? In a startup investment climate characterized by the ascendance of megarounds, the idea was to focus on rounds more representative of the classic seed deal: a risky bet on unproven founders, technologies or business models.

Using this methodology we identified multiple popular investment themes and zeroed in on five. The first 鈥� cybersecurity 鈥� we tackled in a separate piece. Here we delve into the other four: proptech, cancer therapeutics, space tech and robotics.

No. 1: Proptech

Real estate is the world鈥檚 most valuable asset class, providing startups a huge and varied addressable market. By one estimate a few years ago, real estate accounted for a staggering two-thirds of global net worth.

Given the size of the space, actual venture investment tied to real estate and construction looks comparatively meager. Last year, per 兔子先生传媒 analysis, proptech startup investment totaled just over $10 billion, far below peaks hit several years ago.

Seed investors seem to believe there鈥檚 a good case for startup driven growth ahead. In particular, they鈥檙e funding a lot of rounds in the $5 million to $10 million range for companies looking to add efficiencies to the planning and building process, streamline rental operations, reduce building power consumption, and more.

To illustrate, below we put together a sample set of 15 companies that closed seed rounds in our target range this year:

A few standouts include , an AI-powered home management system, , a developer of software to support real estate decarbonization, and , an AI-enabled construction supply chain platform.听

No. 2: Cancer treatments

Startup founders don鈥檛 need persuasive superpowers to convince investors that cancer is a sufficiently serious area to address. Today, it鈥檚 that 39% of Americans will be diagnosed with cancer at some point in their lives. Cancer also ranks as the second leading , behind heart disease.听

Seed-stage companies aren鈥檛 expected to bring down numbers in the near term, but as they progress, it鈥檚 increasingly plausible. That鈥檚 the apparent mindset for investors at this stage, who鈥檝e backed a good-sized number of rounds in the $5 million to $10 million range this year for developers of cancer therapeutics and diagnostics, charted below:

Three California startups secured $10 million, the largest financing in our sample set. They include: , which is working on AI-driven discovery of undetected cancer targets, , a developer of targeted therapies for solid tumors, and , which is focused on cancer diagnostics.

No. 3: Space and satellite tech

This year鈥檚 most attention-getting event in space tech finance was obviously the IPO of sector pioneer . But while that debut may have dominated headlines, quite a few smaller, earlier, lower-profile deals were also getting done.

Per 兔子先生传媒 data, space tech was a popular area for seed financings in the $5 million to $10 million range. To illustrate, below we put together a sample set of nine such companies that raised rounds this year:

The largest fundraiser in our target range was , which is focused on developing reusable satellites. Next was , focused, as its name implies, on in-space propulsion systems, followed by , developer of an ML-native operations platform for satellite fleets.

No. 4: Robotics

Robotics is a perennial favorite in our seed-funding data dives, including the last one, focused on AI. This time, the sector made the ranking again, thanks to a bevy of intriguing seed-stage companies that met our parameters.

Turns out, you can jumpstart some highly ambitious ventures on a $5 million to $10 million seed round. To illustrate, below we aggregated a sample of 18 funded this year:

Robotics was also the most geographically dispersed sector in our lineup, with startups hailing from Asia, North America, Europe and Australia. A few that stood out include , a developer of what it calls 鈥渋ntimacy robots,鈥� , a maker of autonomous underwater robots, and , focused on robots for greenhouse harvesting.

Big picture: Midsized seed rounds for outsized ambitions

Overall, seed funding trends reviewed above may tell us more about the kinds of companies investors are willing to bet on than about the sectors attracting interest, which are already well-established.

Clearly, startup investors still believe that small, modestly funded teams with grand missions remain a worthwhile and viable wager. That鈥檚 particularly encouraging these days, when the venture and seed financings we most commonly hear about tend to be the largest ones.

That鈥檚 not to diss large rounds. Startups that are led by prominent serial entrepreneurs or have established traction hold obvious appeal, even at pricier terms. But for those of us who enjoy rooting for the underdog, it鈥檚 encouraging to see lower-profile companies with outsized ambitions are still in the game.

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, , , , , , and several other investors also participated in the financing. The round brings Throne鈥檚 total funding to nearly $18 million since its 2023 inception.

The startup was founded in 2023 by CEO , who previously worked for nearly a decade in software product management at various companies, CTO , and former co-founder and CTO , for whom the company鈥檚 mission is also a bit of a personal one as he has ulcerative colitis.听

鈥淲e started Throne because we believe it鈥檚 inevitable that people will one day measure their health from their waste,鈥� Hickle told 兔子先生传媒 News.

Connecting the dots

Earlier this month, Throne introduced a beta version of its Gut Health AI coach, which lets users ask questions about their data and receive personalized feedback.听

The tool uses LLMs to interview users after episodes of bad gut health to understand what the relevant factors underlying each episode might have been.听

鈥淚t’s a conversational AI experience very similar to speaking with a dietitian or nutritionist who might ask you about stress or changes in your diet or sleep,鈥� Hickle said.听

“The coach connects the dots between someone’s diet, their lifestyle, and what’s actually happening in their gut, turning daily readings into insights they can use,鈥� Hickle said. 鈥淭his is where we think the long-term value lives, and it’s a meaningful differentiator.鈥�

Capodilupo, who serves as Throne鈥檚 chief product officer, believes that longitudinal data 鈥渋s the whole game.鈥�

Throne sells directly to consumers but is also exploring sales through clinicians, particularly functional-medicine practitioners. A third potential business line involves academic and pharmaceutical research. Studies of digestive health often depend on patients accurately describing and recording their own bathroom habits; Throne argues that its passive system could provide researchers with more consistent, objective data.

The device enters a market that includes , which recently introduced its Dekoda toilet-mounted health tracker. Hickle pointed to usability, battery performance and software as key differentiators between the two offerings.听

A 鈥榮moke detector for colon cancer鈥�

Throne鈥檚 longer-term goal, according to Hickle, is to build an at-home system capable of identifying changes that could serve as early warning signs of colorectal cancer, as well as bladder and kidney cancers, kind of like a 鈥渟moke detector for colon cancer.鈥�

That capability remains under development and is not a feature of the product now being sold.

For now, the technology behind Throne is showing clinical promise. The company was recently accepted to present its first academic abstract demonstrating that its visual AI assesses stool form with accuracy on par with board-certified gastroenterologists.

Validation studies with researchers at , and the are also underway, according to the company.

Throne has recently added several executives and medical advisers, including gastroenterologists and colorectal-cancer experts Dr. Fola May and Dr. Aasma Shaukat, as it works to establish credibility in both consumer technology and gastrointestinal health.听

The next frontier in health monitoring

Will Ventures managing partner said the opportunity reflects the broader adoption of passive health tracking pioneered by companies such as Whoop and . He views passive digestive monitoring as the logical successor to wrist-worn wearables.

鈥淩oughly 80% of consumers now adopt at least one gut-health targeting behavior, yet there is no existing medium for the continuous tracking of gut health markers,鈥� Gardner wrote via email.听

鈥淭here is an immediate opportunity to build a premier gut health brand, and to make a real impact on public health along the way.鈥�

Gardner also believes that the software-hardware integration gives Throne an edge in an emerging category.听

鈥淭hrone鈥檚 product is entirely non-invasive and relevant for everyone from GI patients to biohackers to general wellness seekers,鈥� he said. 鈥淟ongitudinal health data related to daily bathroom visits will be incredibly powerful, and it will be deeply enhanced by AI.鈥�

Looking ahead, Throne plans to use the Series A capital to scale consumer education, expand clinical channels and advance core R&D.

鈥淲e’re creating a new category, so we’re investing heavily in educational content to help people understand why this matters,鈥� Hickle said.

Though the company declined to disclose specific valuation or growth figures, Hickle expressed confidence in Throne’s market trajectory.

鈥淲e’re not sharing hard numbers at this stage, in part because this is a David-and-Goliath situation with a competitor like Kohler,鈥� he said. 鈥淲hat I can say is that we’re following a trajectory similar to the wearable pioneers who came before us, like Whoop and Oura, giants on whose shoulders we stand.鈥�

Related 兔子先生传媒 query:听

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• Investments In Poop Startups Are Piling Up听

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This is a weekly feature that runs down the week鈥檚 top 10 announced funding rounds in the U.S. Check out last week鈥檚 biggest funding deal roundup here.

Startup investors poured capital into a varied lineup of large rounds this week, targeting sectors including physical AI, biotech, cybersecurity, AI infrastructure and fintech. By far the largest financing of the week was a $1.7 billion round for founder 鈥檚 physical AI startup, , followed by sizable investments for 3D AI model developer and battery technology company .

1. , $1.7B, physical AI: Atoms, the physical AI startup founded by founder , raised $1.7 billion in a funding round led by . Kalanick touted the Los Angeles-based company鈥檚 vision as 鈥渁bout the coming industrial revolution where large industrial economic sectors get completely digitized.鈥�

2. , $400M, AI for 3D: Silicon Valley-based Meshy AI, a startup developing foundation models for AI-powered 3D generation, closed on $400 million in Series B funding at a $1.5 billion valuation. Lead backers include , and , per 兔子先生传媒 data.

3. , $300M, battery technology: Battery technology company Sila secured $300 million in a new round led by and . The Alameda, California, company will use the funding to expand its silicon anode plant in Moses Lake, Washington.

4. , $300M, inference technology: Etched, a co-designer of chips, racks, software and manufacturing methods for use in frontier models, picked up $300 million in Series C funding. led the round, which set a $10 billion pre-money valuation for the San Jose, California-based company.

5. , $180M, fintech: Augustus, a startup aimed at providing financial institutions around the world direct access to dollar accounts, secured $180 million in Series B funding. led the round, which set a $1 billion valuation for the San Francisco-based company.

6. , $160M, defense tech: Cathedral, a startup aimed at expanding U.S. military cyber capabilities, reportedly $160 million with backing from Sequoia Capital and Andreessen Horowitz. The Washington, D.C.-based startup was reportedly founded by a 鈥媡eam of former DOGE employees.

7. , $130M, biotech: Crystalys Therapeutics, a biotech developing therapies for people living with gout, closed an oversubscribed $130 million Series B round. led the financing for the San Diego-based company.

8. , $120M, healthcare software: San Francisco-based Candid Health, developer of a revenue cycle management platform for the healthcare industry, landed $120 million in Series D funding led by .

9. , $100M, cybersecurity: Glow, a Palo Alto, California-based AI-powered endpoint security startup, launched from stealth and announced it has raised $180 million to date, of which, per 兔子先生传媒, $100 million comes from its newest financing. Lead backers include Sequoia Capital, , , and .

10. , $75M, cybersecurity: Boston-based Neo Security, a startup working on an agentic software control platform for enterprises, picked up $100 million in a new round led by and Andreessen Horowitz.

Methodology

We tracked the largest announced rounds in the 兔子先生传媒 database that were raised by U.S.-based companies for the period of July 18-24. Although most announced rounds are represented in the database, there could be a small time lag as some rounds are reported late in the week.

Illustration:

While financings of a few million haven鈥檛 gone away, today most venture capital actually goes to rounds of a billion dollars or more. Moreover, it looks like a rising trend.

So far this year, 60% of global startup funding across stages听1 听鈥� around $320 billion 鈥� went to rounds of $1 billion or more, per 兔子先生传媒 data. Such rounds were instrumental in pushing global funding for the first half of the year to record levels.

The U.S. funding tallies are even more tilted to megadeals this year, with 73% of funding going to billion-dollar-plus rounds. Of the $290 billion invested in these deals, just two rounds for AI leaders and account for more than half the total.

As you can see, the notion of billion-dollar-plus rounds accounted for a minority of funding before this year. The lone exception was the first quarter of 2025, when OpenAI closed a $40 billion financing.

Not just bigger deals, more of them too

Giant rounds aren鈥檛 just getting more ginormous. They鈥檙e happening with greater frequency too.

So far this year, U.S. startups have closed 23 known rounds of $1 billion or more, per 兔子先生传媒 data. That puts 2026 already on par with 2025, a record-setting year, and we鈥檝e still got about five months left.

Not surprisingly, these megarounds are generally later-stage rounds or corporate financings. Only two of this year鈥檚 billion-dollar-plus rounds 鈥� and 鈥� were seed or early-stage rounds, per 兔子先生传媒 data.

Lessons from the first crop of billion-plus financings

In the history of startups, meanwhile, the billion-dollar-plus venture funding round is a fairly contemporary phenomenon.

The first American example, per 兔子先生传媒 data, was 鈥檚 $1.2 billion Series D, in 2014. Over the next three years, a handful of others pulled in 10-figure rounds as well, including , , , , , , , and .

Most of those companies went on to go public and reach valuations that well-exceeded levels set for prior megarounds. SpaceX ($1.6 trillion recent market cap), Uber ($148 billion) and Airbnb ($87 billion) were the standout success stories.

Two of the megafund recipients 鈥� Argo AI and WeWork 鈥� did not fare so well, while a third, cancer diagnostics provider Grail, has been up and down. Fanatics, meanwhile, remained private and is still thriving.

If these early billion-plus fundings taught investors anything, it was that pouring unusually large sums into well-regarded unicorns can be quite lucrative but is far from a sure bet.

Uncharted territory

In the current funding cycle, it鈥檚 not enough to ask whether billion-dollar rounds have potential for high returns. With Anthropic and OpenAI, the question now applies to rounds in the tens of billions or even over $100 billion. As both have already filed confidentially to go public, it may not take us long to find out.

Related 兔子先生传媒 query:

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• 兔子先生传媒 Data: Q2 Brought The Most Billion-Dollar Startup Exits Since 2021
• The $100M+ Round Is Now Just Your Typical Late-Stage Financing

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Ten of those companies were AI labs, collectively valued at $65 billion. The most well-known was Beijing-based open source model developer 鈥� at $50 billion, the highest valued new unicorn to join the 兔子先生传媒 this year.

The new unicorn frontier labs are focused on new architectures in AI model development in robotics, physics and self-learning, as well as on open source development, and in the case of one India-based startup, sovereign AI.

Other leading sectors with multiple companies were in robotics and AI infrastructure, with four companies in each.

Of the new unicorns, 16 are U.S-based, while eight are from China. Two new unicorns joined the board from India, Germany and the United Kingdom and one each from Netherlands, Belgium, Canada and Saudi Arabia.

Big exits remove a trillion

Despite the influx of newcomers, the total value of The 兔子先生传媒 兔子先生传媒 dropped by more than $1 trillion in June as , its most valuable company, went public.

Other notable exits from the board last month were , the maker of AI coding tool Cursor, which was acquired by SpaceX for $60 billion after last being valued at $29.3 billion. , an AI infrastructure company that operates as a layer on top of GPUs, was acquired by , and customer experience agent was purchased by 1, both for well above their last private valuations.

New unicorns in June

Here are June’s new unicorn companies:

AI labs

• Hangzhou-based raised a $7.4 billion Series A, its first external financing, in a deal led by CEO . The 2-year-old company was valued at $50 billion and is said to be planning to list in as early as Q2 2027.
• is building a new AI architecture based on neuroscience called Cortex AI that promises lower power use. It raised a $500 million Series A from , , and . The less than 1-year-old New York-based company was valued at $2.5 billion.
• London-based , an AI for physical product design in aerospace, defense, energy, automotive and semiconductors, raised a $300 million Series C led by . The 6-year-old company was valued at $2.4 billion.
• , a model developer for robotics trained on gaming videos from its sister company , raised a $320 million Series A led by . The 1-year-old New York-based company was valued at $2.3 billion.
• , an embodied robotics intelligence company, raised a $400 million Series B led by . The 2-year-old San Mateo, California-based company with researchers from and was valued at $2 billion.
• Shanghai-based , a听 robotics intelligence company, raised a $220 million seed round led by and . The less than 1-year-old company founded by an researcher was valued at $2 billion.
• , a builder of world models to simulate the real world impacting robotics, science, healthcare and defense, raised a $310 million Series B led by . The 2-year-old Menlo Park, California-based company was valued at $1.5 billion.
• Bengaluru-based , an Indian sovereign AI developer, raised a $234 million Series B first close led by . The 3-year-old company was valued at $1.5 billion.
• , an AI lab seeking to automate AI research for scientific use cases, raised a $200 million seed funding led by and . The less than 1-year-old San Francisco-based company was valued at $1 billion.
• Hangzhou-based , a 3D model developer used in gaming, entertainment and product design, raised a $200 million Series A led by . The 3-year-old company was valued at $1 billion.

Robotics

• Germany-based , a physical AI company building intelligent machines to to work alongside humans, raised a $1.4 billion Series C led by stablecoin issuer among other strategic and growth investors. The 7-year-old company, with $1 billion in its order pipeline and strategic deployments, was said to be valued at $7 billion.
• Shenzhen-based , a builder of humanoid robots, raised a $148 million Series B led by . The 3-year-old company was valued at $1.5 billion.
• Guangdong-based , a humanoid robotics company, raised a $147 million Series B. The 5-year-old company, which projects 1,000 shipments in 2026, was valued at $1.5 billion.
• , a builder of industrial arm robotics for manufacturing that said its technology learns through demonstration, raised a $200 million Series C led by and . The 9-year-old New York-based company was valued at $1 billion.

AI infrastructure

• , which pivoted from crypto mining to data center build out for AI, raised a $400 million funding led by , and . The 2-year-old Coral Gables, Florida-based company was valued at $2.4 billion. The company has filed for a direct listing on .
• Las Vegas-based , a cloud operator that offers customer AMD chips, raised a $350 million Series B led by and . The 2-year-old company was valued at $1.6 billion.
• Beijing-based , an inference solution offering customers API access to hundreds of models, raised a $296 million Series B. The 2-year-old company was valued at $1.2 billion.
• , an AI developer cloud to train, fine-tune and deploy AI, raised a $100 million Series A led by . The 4-year-old New Jersey-based company valued at $1 billion has 1 million developers using the platform.

Defense

• , a precision weapons company enabling existing weaponry to defend against unmanned drones, raised a $200 million Series B led by . The 4-year-old Austin-based company was valued at $2.2 billion.
• , a manufacturer of unmanned aerospace and defense systems, raised a $300 million Series C led by and . The 3-year-old Huntington Beach, California-based company was valued at $1.8 billion.
• , a cyber intelligence company building products for the U.S. military, raised a $100 million Series B led by , and . The 1-year-old Arlington, Virginia-based company was valued at $1 billion.

Proptech

• Montreal-based , a mortgage financing platform, raised a $217 million Series E round. The 8-year-old company was valued at $1.1 billion.
• India-based ,听 a property brokerage that also owns a mortgage marketplace, a property management platform, and a home interior brand raised a $95 million private equity and debt financing led by . The 13-year-old company was valued at $1 billion.

Data analytics

• Belgium-based , an intelligence platform for global physical trade, raised a $1 billion secondary market funding led by . The 12-year-old company was valued at $3.7 billion.

Biotechnology

• , a biotech company focused on reverse cellular aging, raised a $435 million Series C led by . The 4-year-old San Francisco-based company with plans for clinical trials next year for human liver cells, was valued at $3.1 billion.

Materials

• Cambridge, U.K.-based听 , building a network of labs using AI for new material discovery, raised a $450 million funding led by and . The 2-year-old company was valued at $2.6 billion.

Cryptocurrency

• , a blockchain and smart contract solution for global financial institutions, raised a $355 million Series F led by . The 12-year-old New York-based company was valued at $2 billion.

Image generation

• Beijing-based , a video generation company, raised a $300 million Series B led by , and . The 3-year-old company was valued at $2 billion and says it has built a creator community of more than 30 million users. As of May 2026 the company has $300 million in annual recurring revenue.

Financial services

• Saudi Arabia-based , a mobile banking company, raised a $400 million Series A. The 6-year-old company was valued at $1.6 billion.

Semiconductor

• Rotterdam-based , a 3D metrology inspection tool for semiconductor manufacturing, raised a $380 million Series D led by . The 10-year-old company was valued at $1.6 billion.

Aerospace

• Beijing-based , a space infrastructure and satellite company, raised a $207 million Series D. The 10-year-old company was valued at $1.5 billion.

E-commerce

• , an e-commerce provider that supports customer interactions post purchase, raised an $81 million Series B led by . The 4-year-old Utah-based company supporting 4,100 brands and 1,750 merchants was valued at $1.3 billion.

AI healthcare

• , an AI agent built for a patient’s healthcare journey and used by healthcare providers, raised a $120 million Series C led by . The 3-year-old San Francisco-based company was valued at $1.2 billion.

Transportation

• Munich-based , a car subscription platform operating in Germany and partnering with 25 brands, raised a $113 million Series D led by . The 7-year-old company was valued at $1.1 billion.

Related 兔子先生传媒 unicorn lists:

• (1,822)
• (637)
• (213)
• (190)
• (118)
• (102)
• (935)
• (539)
• (248)
• (39)
• (488)

Related reading:

• 兔子先生传媒 Data: Global Startup Investment Hit Record $510B In H1 2026 As AI Boom Accelerates Funding And Exits
• AI Services And Robotics Lead Diverse Crop Of 29 New May Unicorns As SpaceX, Anthropic And OpenAI Line Up Blockbuster Exits

Methodology

The 兔子先生传媒 兔子先生传媒 is a curated list that includes private unicorn companies with post-money valuations of $1 billion or more and is based on 兔子先生传媒 data. New companies are as they reach the $1 billion valuation mark as part of a funding round.

The unicorn board does not reflect internal company valuations 鈥� such as those set via a 409a process for employee stock options 鈥� as these differ from, and are more likely to be lower than, a priced funding round. We also do not adjust valuations based on investor writedowns, which change quarterly, as different investors will not value the same company consistently within the same quarter.

Funding to unicorn companies includes all private financings to companies that are tagged as unicorns, as well as those that have since graduated to .

Exits analyzed here only include the first time a company exits.

Please note that all funding values are given in U.S. dollars unless otherwise noted. 兔子先生传媒 converts foreign currencies to U.S. dollars at the prevailing spot rate from the date funding rounds, acquisitions, IPOs and other financial events are reported. Even if those events were added to 兔子先生传媒 long after the event was announced, foreign currency transactions are converted at the historic spot price.

Illustration:

This is a weekly feature that runs down the week鈥檚 top 10 announced funding rounds in the U.S. Check out last week鈥檚 biggest funding deal roundup here.

It was not a holiday week on the funding front, as a raft of largely AI-focused companies closed big rounds. The largest of these was a $1.5 billion financing to enterprise AI startup and a Series D for meal and delivery provider . The week also included some big financings for enterprise tech, food delivery, drones and construction automation.

1. , $1.5B, enterprise AI tools: Fireworks AI, a developer of tools for enterprises to turn 鈥済eneral-purpose models into specialized intelligence trained on their own data,鈥� raised $1.505 billion in Series D funding. , and led the financing, which set a $17.5 billion valuation for the San Mateo, California-based company.

2. , $650M, meals and delivery: Wonder, an operator of kitchens and meal delivery services, closed on $650 million in Series D funding at a $9 billion pre-money valuation. Capital will go in part toward expanding operations for the New York-based company, which currently has 140 locations.

3. , $400M, life sciences AI: AI drug discovery startup Chai Discovery secured $400 million in Series C funding at a $3.8 billion valuation. led the financing, investing alongside , , and others.

4. , $300M, robots: Cambridge, Massachusetts-based Walden Robotics, a startup building general-purpose robots for work in manufacturing and logistics, launched out of stealth with $300 million in funding. and led the round, which values the company at $1.1 billion.

5. , $125M, drones: Seattle-based Brinc, a developer of drones for use in public safety and emergency operations, raised $125 million in fresh funding. led the financing, with participation from , and founder and CEO .

6. (tied) , $100M, construction automation: Austin-based TerraFirma, a developer of AI-enabled software and autonomous robotics technology for the construction industry, landed $100 million in new funding, bringing total investment to date to $115 million.

6. (tied) , $100M, enterprise AI: Spectro Cloud, a provider of AI infrastructure management software, said it raised more than $100 million in a Series D round led by . The financing brings total capital raised by San Jose-based Spectro Cloud to $260 million.

8. , $80M, defense tech: Singularity, a startup focused on developing air defense technology, emerged from stealth with $80 million in Series A funding. and 1听led the financing, which set a $400 million valuation for the Los Angeles-based company.

9. (tied) , $70M, fintech: San-Francisco-based fintech startup Flex, a private banking platform for high-net-worth business owners, raised $70 million in a Series B1 financing led by . The round follows the company’s $60 million Series B in December.

9. (tied) , $70M, AI and policy: State Affairs, an AI platform for policy and regulation, secured $70 million in Series A funding led by Khosla Ventures and .

Methodology

We tracked the largest announced rounds in the 兔子先生传媒 database that were raised by U.S.-based companies for the period of July 11-17. Although most announced rounds are represented in the database, there could be a small time lag as some rounds are reported late in the week.

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Everywhere you look, venture headlines imply that seed rounds have meaningfully changed shape.

raised $1 billion for a company that didn’t exist a week earlier. launched with $6.2 billion out the gate. hit $475 million two months after founding.

It’s easy to read those headlines and conclude the venture model has been rewritten, that AI is a once-in-a-generation opportunity requiring once-in-a-generation capital.

We disagree. And so does the data.

The biotech parallel

At , we鈥檝e built deep domain expertise in biotech, the sector with the longest history of mega first rounds in venture.

Biotech mega-seeds are common because the science requires it, you can’t run a Phase 1 trial on $3 million, but the return profile is often humbling. Large first rounds in biotech have produced a handful of strong outcomes for first-check investors 鈥� and a very long tail of modest ones. Our experience with this trend in biotech motivated us to compile a dataset and pressure-test our intuition more broadly.

We pulled every publicly available $100 million-plus first round we could find over the last 15 years (roughly 200 deals) and found that only 20% had recorded exits. Of those, only a few delivered what we’d call a venture-like return: 10x MOIC or better for the first-round investor. In other words, approximately 1% of companies that publicly raised $100 million or more in their first financing round generated returns that justify the asset class. Capital intensity, as it turns out, actually worked against venture outcomes.

That distribution will improve with a few well-placed AI outcomes this year. and alone will essentially double the number of outlier returns in this data set when they exit. But even there, the return math is nuanced for first round investors. According to reports, first-round investors are looking at 30-40x returns at OpenAI鈥檚 projected IPO valuations.

That’s a fantastic outcome, but it’s also a fraction of what early institutional investors made on the generational outcomes of prior eras.

and each turned roughly $12.5 million of their checks into around $4 billion, driving reported returns somewhere north of 300x. reportedly turned a roughly $500,000 investment in into $2.5 billion 鈥� nearly 5,000x.

These are exponentially larger outcomes. Why? The difference wasn’t a byproduct of company quality but of entry price. Those historical investors got in at a price that left room for the upside to actually compound.

The mega round is real, but not replacing the market

The number of $50 million-plus seed rounds has exploded since 2018. But traditionally sized first rounds are also growing. The headline-grabbing rounds are a small fraction of what’s actually getting funded, and an even smaller fraction of what will return venture-scale capital.

Moreover, the companies people now hold up as AI winners started small, only further reinforcing this point.

‘s first round was less than $10 million. ‘ was $2 million. ‘s was $11 million. ‘s was $25 million. Even at the frontier-model layer, ‘s first round was $5 million. Today, every one of those companies is valued north of $5 billion and generating hundreds of millions in revenue.

Cursor at less than $10 million is the more representative data point. Project Prometheus at $6.2 billion is the exception.

Capital intensity is not a moat

Raising a massive first round doesn’t inherently make a company more likely to generate venture size returns for its investors. Sometimes it’s a necessary cost of doing business, but the venture math is unforgiving.

High entry prices leave less room for the upside to accrue, regardless of the underlying opportunity. The playbook that has worked across every prior technology wave is to buy meaningful ownership in capital-efficient companies at prices that leave room for the upside.

That playbook doesn’t make for dramatic headlines in 2025. But it’s what the historical data, from Google to Uber to Cursor, consistently vindicates.

A few of today’s mega-seeded AI companies will absolutely deliver 10x-plus MOICs, just as a few winners have in every era. But the data鈥檚 been consistent for 15 years, and building a portfolio around the exceptions, rather than the pattern, is a bet with a long losing track record.

is a principal at , where she draws on a decade of infrastructure and technology investing experience as well as a systems engineering background to support exceptional entrepreneurs building the next generation of frontier technology companies. Prior, McDonald was an investor at , where she focused on growth-stage climate tech companies. She began her career in‘ power and utilities group and then at , where she developed deep expertise across energy, infrastructure and project finance.

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Related reading:

• The Largest Recent Seed Rounds Are All For AI Companies
• In Charts: Seed Deals Keep Getting Bigger As Odds Of Reaching Series A Fall Dramatically
• Data: The Seed Funding Boom Is Concentrating Capital In The San Francisco Bay Area
• Seed Funding Is Bigger Than Ever 鈥� And Harder To Get

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This is a weekly feature that runs down the week鈥檚 top 10 announced funding rounds in the U.S. Check out last week鈥檚 biggest funding deal roundup here.

AI once again dominated venture funding this week, claiming five of the 10 largest announced rounds, including a pair of billion-dollar financings for AI infrastructure and cybersecurity that led the pack. Investors also continued to back quantum computing, geothermal energy, crypto infrastructure and aerospace startups with large checks. Let鈥檚 take a look.

1. (tied) , $1B, cybersecurity: Keyfactor raised a $1 billion private equity round led by. Other investors in the private equity round for the Independence, Ohio-based company included and . Keyfactor provides digital identity and machine identity management software that helps enterprises secure certificates, encryption keys and connected devices. It has now raised $1.21 billion to date, .

1. (tied) , $1B, AI infrastructure: Palo Alto, California-based SambaNova officially announced a long-awaited $1 billion Series F deal at an $11 billion post-money valuation led by. A of other investors joined the round, including ,,,,, and. SambaNova develops AI chips and enterprise AI infrastructure for training and inference workloads. The company has raised nearly $2.5 billion to date, .

3. , $300M, quantum computing: , and co-led a sizable $300 million Series A for South Pasadena, California-based quantum startup Oratomic. A of 16听 investors participated in the round, including , , , co-founder , and computer scientist . Oratomic is developing neutral-atom quantum hardware and fault-tolerant architectures designed to accelerate the commercialization of quantum computing, an area that has seen robust venture investment in recent years.

4. , $134M, clean energy: Houston-based Quaise Energy raised a $134 million Series B led by . Additional investors included , and. Quaise is developing millimeter-wave drilling technology to unlock deep geothermal energy, an emerging source of carbon-free power. To date, the company has raised $225 million.

5. , $130M, artificial intelligence: San Francisco-based Prime Intellect raised a $130 million Series A led by . A of investors 鈥� many of them prominent Silicon Valley figures 鈥斕齤oined, including CEO , CEO听 , co-founder , CEO and co-CEO . Corporate investors , and also backed the round. Prime is building an open platform for training and deploying AI models across distributed compute networks. It has now raised $200.4 million total, .

6. , $125M, crypto infrastructure: New York-based Gauntlet raised a $125 million Series B, with Japan鈥檚 as the sole investor. The company develops simulation, risk management and optimization software for decentralized finance protocols.

7. , $120M, artificial intelligence: New York-based Norm AI secured a $120 million Series C led by at a reported $1.2 billion valuation to expand its AI-powered regulatory compliance platform. The company develops AI systems that translate complex laws and regulations into software to help enterprises automate their compliance workflows. The latest funding included a long list of other venture, corporate and individual backers including , , , and , the chairman of and former president of , which also participated in Norm AI鈥檚 deal. The startup has now raised just over $256 million, .

8. , $91M, aerospace and defense: Aerospace continues to draw substantial investor attention, as was the case this week with Houston-based Venus Aerospace鈥檚 $91 million Series B. backed the round, which will be used to advance development of Venus鈥� hypersonic propulsion technology. The company is building engines and aircraft designed to dramatically reduce long-distance flight times while supporting future defense applications. It has now raised $197 million total. An of investors joined in its Series B, including , , , and .

9. , $76M, fintech: Digital asset exchange EDX Markets raised $76 million as institutional interest in crypto trading infrastructure continues to grow. The deal was backed by sole investor , marking the second large crypto funding deal for the Japanese firm this week, along with Gauntlet鈥檚 aforementioned round. EDX operates a marketplace designed specifically for institutional investors. It鈥檚 not clear how much it raised in previous rounds.

10. , $67.4M, biotechnology: Philadelphia-based Fore Biotherapeutics (previously known as NovellusDx) raised $67.4 million in Series D funding to advance its precision oncology therapies targeting rare cancer mutations. The company is developing targeted treatments for patients whose tumors are driven by specific genetic alterations. led the latest round, which brings its total to date to just over $274 million. , , , and other investors also joined.

Large non-US deals:

Several startups based outside the U.S. also raised notable fundings this week. They include:

• , 鈧�411M, fusion energy: Munich-based Proxima Fusion raised a 鈧�411 million (about $468 million) Series B funding round to develop what鈥檚 poised to become Europe鈥檚 first commercial fusion energy power plant. Lead investors in the round include , , and .
• , 鈧�200M, workplace tech: led the 鈧�200 million ($229 million) private-equity round for Paris-based Skello, which makes HR software for employers to handle tasks such as payroll, scheduling, compliance and employee communications.

Methodology

We tracked the largest announced rounds in the 兔子先生传媒 database that were raised by U.S.-based companies for the period of July 4-10. Although most announced rounds are represented in the database, there could be a small time lag as some rounds are reported late in the week.

Illustration:

Our inboxes overflowed with interesting deals in the past month, but we managed to sift through them all to find the five most intriguing ones.

They include a startup that鈥檚 simultaneously developing AI models for biology and trying to prevent the threats that stem from those types of advances, a company that says it wants to prevent modern day private markets from the kind of paperwork crisis that shut down Wall Street in the ’60s, and AI agents that can dispatch plumbers and electricians to your door.

$50M for ‘general biological intelligence’

AI has conquered text, images and code. Now one startup wants to do the same for DNA.

San Francisco-based last month emerged from stealth with a hefty $50 million seed round led by , with participation from , , and . The startup said it also received pre-seed backing from co-founder .

Radical Numerics was founded by the team behind , one of the first AI models capable of reading and generating DNA sequences at scale. The startup鈥檚 mission is even more ambitious: building what it calls 鈥済eneral biological intelligence,鈥� or multimodal AI models that can reason across DNA, RNA, proteins and other biological data to accelerate drug discovery, cancer diagnostics and biosecurity.

Alongside the funding, the company previewed Omnii, its next-generation genome language model.

The company’s dual focus on human health and biodefense reflects a growing theme in frontier AI investing. 兔子先生传媒 data shows that as models become increasingly capable of designing biological systems, investors have poured tens of millions of dollars into startups that promise not only to accelerate scientific discovery, but also help detect and defend against AI-generated biological threats.

鈥淓vo showed that AI can generate DNA and whole genomes, the next generation of models will go further with the ability to control function, and eventually, create entirely new forms of life,鈥� Radical Numerics CEO said in a statement. 鈥淥ur multimodal models are already far more capable, and we understand the responsibility that comes with that. The same models that can help cure disease may also lower the barrier to designing harmful biology. These forces are inseparable. Biology will be the most consequential application of AI.鈥�

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$40M for AI that dispatches the plumber

The AI gold rush has reached an unlikely destination: your local plumber and HVAC company. New York-based said last month that it has raised $40 million in new funding: a $34 million Series A led by and a $6 million seed round led by , with Sequoia also participating in the Series A.

The startup is building what it calls an AI operating system for home service businesses, from plumbers and electricians to HVAC contractors. Rather than adding yet another AI chatbot or voice agent, Probook says it aims to replace the patchwork of software many contractors use with a single platform centered on dispatch, arguably the most critical function in the business.

Its software ties together customer intake, scheduling, messaging and outbound communications so technicians spend less time waiting for jobs and office staff spend less time coordinating them.

“I started Probook to solve a problem in my own business,” Probook CEO and co-founder said in a statement. “I grew up pressure washing in upstate New York with my dad. Six summers in the truck. I spent two to three hours of my day driving between jobs. I’d be up on a ladder washing a house and miss calls because I couldn’t hear my phone ringing.”

The company is tapping into a growing trend of vertical AI startups targeting industries that have historically lagged in software adoption, and they鈥檙e seeing keen enthusiasm from investors betting that trades such as plumbing, electrical and HVAC represent a massive opportunity to automate workflows and potentially boost profit margins for businesses that still run much of their operations by phone, clipboard and spreadsheet.

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$25M for subterranean warfare

Defense investors have poured billions into startups developing drones and missiles for the sky, tanks and other vehicles for land warfare, and autonomous military vessels for the water.

But a newly funded startup, , is betting the next battlefield is below the ground. The Austin-based startup emerged from stealth last month with a $25 million seed round led by , with participation from a long list of other investors including , , , and , and strategic angels including and founders from and .

Traysar calls itself the world’s first “subterra” defense tech company. Rather than building systems for the skies or seas, it’s developing autonomous platforms that can tunnel underground, map subterranean networks, breach hardened infrastructure and deliver payloads beneath the Earth’s surface. It鈥檚 there that it says modern warfare is increasingly being conducted in places like Iran, with its underground nuclear bunkers; Gaza, which has a vast Hamas-built subterranean tunnel network; and Ukraine, which has moved more of its military infrastructure beneath the surface to protect it from aerial drone threats.

The startup, whose founding team includes former engineers from and , is developing two autonomous underground systems. The first is an excavator-type robot designed to navigate, map and breach tunnels from within, giving military operators a way to explore or disable underground networks without sending in troops.

The second is a high-speed burrowing platform that drills new underground access points and can carry payloads 鈥� from explosives to sensing equipment 鈥� beneath the surface, bringing tunnel-boring technology to the battlefield.

Through the first half of 2026, defense-tech startups globally raised nearly $15.8 billion, by far the largest funding half-year for the sector on record, per 兔子先生传媒 data. Of course, the vast majority of that has gone toward above-ground or marine technologies.

鈥淭he global defense industry has a vertical bias: hundreds of billions flow skyward into missiles, missile defense, drones, and counter-drone systems, while adversaries dig in building deeply buried facilities the U.S. cannot reliably strike, and cannot affordably keep disabled,鈥� Traysar in its funding announcement.

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$23.7M for AI growth tools for small businesses

Most AI startups chase large enterprise customers. is betting the neighborhood coffee shop and corner restaurant are the bigger opportunity.

The New York-based startup last month emerged from stealth with $23.7 million in funding, including a $19.5 million Series A led by . , ‘s , , , , and also participated.

Pie says it鈥檚 creating an AI-powered growth platform that helps local merchants get discovered听 across AI search platforms like ChatGPT and Claude where customers increasingly begin their searches, as well as more traditional marketing channels like Maps, and .

The company also unveiled Front Desk, an AI agent that it says can answer calls around the clock, book appointments and handle customer inquiries when business owners can’t get to the phone.

Founded by former and executives, Pie says it has already reached thousands of businesses through partnerships with industry software providers while operating in stealth.

鈥淧ie is bringing AI to Main Street by starting with one of the biggest pain points for small business owners: finding new customers,鈥� , partner at Lightspeed, said in a statement. 鈥淐ustomer acquisition is a powerful entry point, but the broader vision is to build an AI platform that can support small businesses across more of their daily operations over time.鈥�

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$2M to tackle the private market paperwork crisis

Wall Street once got so buried in paperwork that the shut down every Wednesday . Six decades later, Berlin-based thinks private markets are headed toward a similar reckoning and just raised $2 million to stop it.

The company鈥檚 pre-seed round was led by , with participation from and individuals from firms including and .

Founded by two early employees of fund administration startup , Nomerra is building AI agents for the operational work that keeps private capital markets running behind the scenes.

While public markets rely on standardized infrastructure, private markets still depend heavily on emails, PDFs, spreadsheets and disconnected software, the company said. Its software plugs into existing ERP systems, banking platforms and document repositories, then uses AI agents to read documents, reconcile information across systems and complete workflows such as fund accounting, treasury operations and transfer agency work.

At the same time, private markets are expected to swell from roughly $13 trillion today to more than $30 trillion over the coming years, according to Nomerra, even as the industry faces a shortage of qualified accounting and operations professionals.

Rather than replacing existing software, the company says it aims to automate the manual tasks that have traditionally required growing back-office teams.

鈥淭hink of how telephone operators used to connect one caller to another by plugging cables into a switchboard,鈥� , Nomerra co-founder and CEO, said in a statement. 鈥淭oday, the idea that humans once routed every phone call manually seems absurd. Private market operations are at the same turning point. In a few years, people will look back and wonder how any of this was ever done by hand.鈥�

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Related reading:

• 5 Interesting Startup Deals You May Have Missed: On-Demand Custom Manufacturing, Underwater Geothermal Energy, And Adventure Group Travel
• 5 Interesting Startup Deals You May Have Missed: A Law Firm Operating System, Building Defense Tech Near The Battlefield, And Cell-Based Milk
• 5 Interesting Startup Deals You May Have Missed: Blood-Drawing Robots, Inboxes For AI Agents, Franchised Defense Manufacturing, And More

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