Among lead investors, topped the ranks last month, while was by far the busiest backer by deal count. The highest-spending investors for the period, meanwhile, appear to be and .

For more detail, below we ranked active investors for July by several metrics. These include most prolific venture dealmakers, most active lead backers, biggest spenders and highest-volume seed investors.

Active lead investors

We鈥檒l start with active lead investors for the month, which, as usual these days, featured a heavily AI-centric lineup of deals.

Khosla Ventures ranked as the most active lead investor in rounds of $5 million or more, with eight deals in July. The largest were a $300 million Series A for quantum computing startup and a $120 million Series C for AI-enabled legal tech provider .

took the No. 2 slot, with six lead deals, followed by , with five. Below, we charted the top eight lead investors for the month by deal count.

Busiest venture investors

The ranks looked quite different when we widened the category to include both lead and non-lead investments in rounds of $5 million or more.

By this metric, repeat frontrunner Y Combinator once again took first place, participating in at least 19 such rounds. The storied accelerator typically takes a non-lead stake in follow-on rounds for startups it incubated.

Insight Partners and Andreessen Horowitz were next on the list, with 10 deals each, followed by Khosla and , with nine each. For a bigger-picture view, below we ranked the top 18 busiest venture investors for July.

Highest spending investors

When we focus on investors who led the most expensive assortment of startup financings last month, the lineup shifts once again.

For July, Coatue ranked as the apparent highest-spending听1 lead investor, backing a $10 billion financing for 鈥� rocket company, . (It should be noted though, that Blue Origin, founded in 2000, is probably too old to be considered a startup, although it is still a private company.)

Nvidia also stepped up, backing a $5 billion financing for foundational AI startup . Index Ventures and Andreessen Horowitz ranked high as well, each leading or co-leading rounds collectively valued above $2 billion.

Below, we rank 18 of the highest-spending lead investors for the month.

Seed dealmakers

Seed dealmakers were a bit more challenging to rank for July, in part because there鈥檚 often a time delay before smaller deals enter the dataset. One thing that is apparent is that Y Combinator was the most prolific investor at this stage, while other 鈥渦sual suspects,鈥� like and , also ranked high.

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• A Record 14 Billion-Dollar Rounds In July Pushed Venture’s Historic Run Higher

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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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• In Charts: Seed Deals Keep Getting Bigger As Odds Of Reaching Series A Fall Dramatically听
• AI Seed Trends: More Multimedia, Backend Automation, Agentic Security, And Yes, Robots

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Before that, Larco had spent nearly eight years as a partner at (NEA), one of the world’s largest venture capital firms.听

There, she served on the firm’s investment committee and led investments across enterprise software, developer tools, and consumer technology, including , , , , and . She also served as a board observer at leading up to its 2021 IPO.听

Known for her sharp product intuition and hands-on operational experience, Larco focuses heavily on helping founders evaluate market dynamics, navigate product-market fit and scale resilient teams.

Before transitioning to venture capital, she built a career as a product leader and founder. After earning a degree in computer science with honors from the , she began her career at working on and , before leading core product teams at companies like and . She also founded an app development startup that she successfully ran and sold before joining NEA.

兔子先生传媒 News recently sat down with Larco to discuss how changing founder preferences and the (SVB) collapse drove her to launch a specialized pre-seed and seed fund designed to make early-stage founders a top priority.听

Among other topics, we also discussed how she evaluates startups based on founder potential rather than initial ideas, looking for teams that leverage AI to make products dramatically faster, cheaper, or easier to use while avoiding rigid, single-model wrappers.

This interview has been edited for clarity and brevity.

兔子先生传媒 News: You were at New Enterprise Associates for nearly a decade before branching out on your own. What led you to start your own firm? Was there a specific gap in the market, or was there a premise you felt couldn’t necessarily be fulfilled at a fund that size?听

Larco: There were a lot of things. At a multi-billion-dollar fund, writing $2 million checks is never going to be a top priority. They invest across all stages, but when you have to deploy between $3 billion and $6 billion depending on how you look at it, it鈥檚 impossible to do that $2 million at a time with standard team sizes.

Even if you still write those checks, founders have gotten wiser to what it feels like when they are a top priority versus when they aren’t. One founder put it to me this way: 鈥淚 want my investor at every round to feel like the check size hurt 鈥� that it’s a big percentage of their fund 鈥� because that鈥檚 how I know I鈥檓 going to be a top priority when push comes to shove.鈥�

So, for a pre-seed round, they want a pre-seed fund where the check size hurts. For a seed round, they want a seed fund where the check size hurts. For a Series A, they want a mid-sized fund where the check size hurts.

That frank conversation put a lot into perspective. Founder preferences have shifted over the past few years. Emerging funds over the last three to four years are winning very competitive deals, securing lead slots against more established, bigger firms. This was virtually unheard of before.

How has that happened?

A side, unintended consequence of the SVB collapse was this change in founder preference. When SVB was going under, every single founder called everyone on their cap table saying, 鈥淚 can’t make payroll on Wednesday. Can you help me?鈥�

Every VC was getting dozens to hundreds of calls. Depending on portfolio size, you can’t help everybody or be on the phone with every single company. Everyone had to prioritize. If firms scraped together money to help cover payroll, they couldn’t cover everyone across the entire portfolio. Very quickly, founders got to see where they sat on the priority list.

That’s interesting. As I cover rounds lately, I鈥檝e noticed the lead investors aren’t as often the big mega-funds.

Not at pre-seed or seed.

Even Series A. You’re seeing less of it happening.

Part of it is that fund sizes got really big, so they are writing bigger checks, which inevitably leads to more calculated ROI risk and moving to later stages. Part of it is that founders want to be a top priority, and they saw what happens in a crisis.

Founders are on WhatsApp channels, hacker houses, and communities, so one bad story spreads faster than ever. It used to be just repeat founders who wanted specialized, focused firms at the earliest stage for signaling risk and other reasons. Now, even first-time founders hear those stories and want a specialized investor.

When customer preferences change in any market, you realize there’s an opportunity. We asked ourselves: 鈥淐an we capitalize on this shift? If you were to build something from the ground up targeting this specific ICP, what would you build?鈥�

We did what we tell our founders to do: a listening tour. We interviewed people in our ICP and asked: What do you wish you had? What works, what doesn’t, what taglines are you skeptical of, and what is tangibly helpful? We doubled down on what we could provide well and cut out things people assume are best practices that founders don’t actually value.

We think of Premise as a startup, and our product happens to be a fund, so it still has to be something people want.

Do you invest strictly at those very early stages, or across other stages?

Strictly pre-seed and seed. Check sizes range from $500,000 to $3 million.

It鈥檚 noisy out there. How are you able to cut through that noise to identify real potential versus people riding the AI bandwagon? As a journalist, I struggle with that, so I imagine investors do, too.

We spend a lot of time with founders before backing them. During diligence, we talk one to three times a day for three to five days, alongside extensive reference and back-channel checks. Because of that, most of our investments are in cities where we have strong networks, like SF, New York, and Atlanta.

We try to get a deep sense of who the person is, what motivates them, and what key attributes they possess. Mercedes and I looked across all the best founders we saw at our previous firms and identified seven core attributes. There isn’t one single persona; founders have different strengths and weaknesses. We look for founders who are world-class in at least two of those seven attributes. In our investment memos, we justify those choices with anecdotes and reference feedback. Nobody is the best at all seven 鈥� some attributes even contradict each other.

At the pre-seed and seed stages, whatever idea you pitch 鈥� while we want it to be a good idea because it shows your ability to plan and generate ideas 鈥� the likelihood that it’s what the company looks like in five to ten years is very slim. A lot of it is gauging the potential of the person to find the right market and product fit to build an iconic company.

It is tough, but it’s not that different from the crypto, Web3, or early AI waves. Tailwinds always attract fair-weather founders. The core tactics to figure out who really wants to build something interesting, who has unique insight, and who is tenacious enough to endure the ups and downs haven’t changed in the last decade.

I’ve seen you discuss AI as a concierge service, shifting from “do-it-yourself” tools to “do-it-for-me” agents. You’ve also mentioned that an AI agent shouldn’t just be a wrapper; it needs to significantly re-architect the cost structure. When looking at a seed-stage deck today, what stands out as evidence that a team actually knows how to fundamentally change that cost structure?

Those can actually be two separate things. If a traditional wedding planning concierge service costs $20,000, and you offer it for $1,000, you’ve blown the cost structure out of the water 鈥� even if you’re just a wrapper using $100 in API credits. You can be a wrapper, pay for APIs, and still charge a fraction of traditional costs because the legacy price anchor is so high.

What I look for in any company to be competitive is whether it is faster, cheaper, or easier than existing options. A 10% discount isn’t enough, but at 50% off, people will switch. If a tool reduces a weekly five-hour administrative task to five minutes, sign me up. The bar now is enabling people to do things they couldn’t do before or lacked the confidence to do. For instance, I can build a cap table in Excel, but it takes me forever. If a tool makes that effortless, I’m in.

So ideally, a startup delivers on at least two of those three pillars: faster, cheaper, or easier.

I’m not against wrappers, but founders must understand the underlying mechanics. If you scale and the wrapper gets too expensive, or the model degrades, you need to know how to split tasks across open-source, closed, Google, or other models to deliver the best product at the best price.

Technical founders obsessively optimize models for specific features across their product. Less technical founders often use a single model for everything, which doesn’t guarantee the best price or performance. My hesitation with wrappers isn’t that a team launched quickly; it’s when they don’t know how to continue innovating because they’re wedded to a single model.

The counter-argument to my own point is (AWS). When AWS came out, critics said, 鈥淎nyone can start a company over a weekend on AWS; it’s not defensible, there’s no moat, you don’t own servers.鈥澨�

Yet many great companies were built on it. It鈥檚 the same argument. People said the same things about the cloud and mobile waves 鈥� that mobile was a toy and no one would buy a $1,000 phone or pay for subscriptions. Looking back, those criticisms sound funny.

You mentioned you look for seven distinct founder attributes, and that a founder needs to be world-class in at least two or three. Without giving away the whole secret sauce, what is one attribute on that list that would surprise people?

The one that catches people off guard is what we call 鈥渦rgently dissatisfied.鈥� These founders can come across as disagreeable: they’re more focused on the goal than on making people feel good, and their standards can be genuinely difficult to work around.听

But the people who’ve worked with them tend to say the same thing: that the founder pushed me to accomplish things I didn’t think were possible. This shouldn鈥檛 be confused with ego. It’s about managing hustler, relentless energy and pointing it at the right problems. The best founders I’ve backed have this quality. They have a high bar for themselves and their teams 鈥� as in everything should have been done yesterday, and they should have acted accordingly.

On the flip side, given how fast the tech landscape is shifting right now, is there an attribute that used to be a ‘must-have’ for a Series A founder five years ago that you now consider a nice-to-have at the seed stage?

The attributes themselves are pretty universal truths about what makes a great founder. What’s changed is the intensity and pace at which they have to show up. Five years ago, shipping an exceptional product, not just features, every six to twelve months was the bar. Now it’s every three to four months.听

So being a decisive execution machine still matters enormously, but what we’re evaluating is whether a founder can operate at this new compressed pace without sacrificing quality. That’s a harder thing to assess early, but it’s become one of the most important signals.

Right now, a huge portion of the VC ecosystem has completely retreated from consumer tech to chase B2B enterprise AI. Are you still actively looking at consumer behavior change as an investor? Do you think the rest of the market is miscalculating the size of the consumer AI market, and if so, why?

I think the retreat is short-sighted. Consumer software has historically produced some of the most important companies ever built, and it doesn’t make sense to vacate that entirely because the sector has been in a lull the past few years.听

The first principles of what makes a disruptive consumer company are exciting again because consumer behavior is rapidly changing with AI. We price in that risk. Fintech is another space where I’ve seen a meaningful pullback, and we’re still active there for the same reason. If everyone is running from a category, that’s usually worth paying attention to in case new tailwinds emerge.

You spent years as a product leader at places like and . We鈥檙e hearing a lot of talk about how AI will automate the tedious parts of product management 鈥� writing tickets, reviewing specs, tracking bugs. If AI absorbs the execution workload of a PM, what does a top product leader actually do day-to-day in 2026?

The job of a PM has always been consumer empathy: understanding what someone is trying to accomplish and why, and then making sure the product actually gets them there.听

AI only changes the artifacts you produce. A few years ago, you were writing specs. Now the best PMs I talk to are writing evals to define what 鈥済reat鈥� looks like for the agents they’re building and testing whether the agents actually deliver it.听

Someone somewhere still has to care deeply about the end user, ask the hard questions about what success means, and hold the bar. That’s still a human job.听

I love the analogy that AI wrappers are just the new AWS. But with AWS, the 鈥渕oat鈥� eventually became workflow stickiness and data accumulation. In a world where technical founders are constantly swapping models to optimize cost and performance, what does a 鈥渕oat鈥� actually look like for an early-stage company? If it’s not the underlying model, then what is it?听

I think it鈥檚 still workflows and data accumulation. I don鈥檛 think the moats changed much. The real question is how you retain your customers when competitors can clone you in three days. There are small non-durable moats you can lean on before you build out the data/workflows/network effects/integrations/etc moats.听

You made an interesting distinction between how technical and non-technical founders approach model selection. Given that, are you leaning heavily toward funding purely technical, AI-native architectures right now, or can a world-class product-and-distribution founder still win you over if they hire the right engineering talent?听

Never say never, but I am heavily biased towards a founder or founding team that has exceptional AI talent. I find that these folks enjoy being at the cutting edge, staying up to speed on the latest breakthroughs, and don鈥檛 mind blowing up their roadmap to move fast on a new functionality that enables them to build better products for their customers.听

You talked about AI shifting from ‘Do It Yourself’ to ‘Do It For Me,’ like giving everyone a concierge wedding planner or a financial analyst. When an agent moves from just giving advice to actually executing transactions and making decisions on behalf of a user, what is the biggest hurdle you see startups face? Is it a trust problem with the user, or is it an execution infrastructure problem?

Few people want 鈥淒o it entirely for me, and I have no idea what you did or how you did it鈥� right now. Most concierge services do the research, ask you questions to personalize the recommendations, and then filter down the options they present. If you have questions, you can dig into their reasoning, what they ruled out, etc. If you don鈥檛 like the options, they can go and find a new set. Rarely do wedding planners, travel agents, etc just go off and book everything for you without your input. I think that鈥檚 where we are with agents. It鈥檚 not just a trust problem, but more that people still want to make the decisions themselves 鈥� just not do all the research.听

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It鈥檚 a worry that spilled over into headlines last week, after an agent the open-source AI platform . Turns out rogue AI agents causing mayhem is no longer听 a hypothetical problem.

Seed investors apparently saw this coming, judging by the plethora of good-sized rounds for companies at the intersection of AI and security. Startups in this cohort have raised $855 million across more than 150 reported seed-stage rounds this year, per 兔子先生传媒 data. That puts investment on track for an all-time high.

A large cluster of deals in the $5M to $10M range

Here at 兔子先生传媒 News, we took a particular interest in seed rounds in the $5 million to $10 million range, an area where cybersecurity investment was particularly robust.

Why this size range? It started as a broader data dive focused on top themes for mid-sized seed rounds, an often overlooked subset in a startup funding climate dominated by AI megadeals.听

An initial perusal indicated cybersecurity warrants a standalone analysis. We found both a high number and a wide breadth of funded companies in the space, with missions ranging from identifying AI hallucinations to building adversary simulations to verifying agents in finance.

To illustrate, below is a sample list of 14 AI-focused security companies that raised seed financings this year in our target range.

Big seed and early-stage bets too

We also had some large rounds in the mix, indicating investors saw risk-reward compelling enough to write big checks for newly minted startups. Some of the biggest included:

• , a developer of identity intelligence technology for the AI era, secured $60 million in a seed financing this month.
• , a Silicon Valley startup working on an AI-native cybersecurity platform that doesn鈥檛 depend on the public cloud, raised $45 million in a March seed round.
• , an upstart developing an AI governance and security platform for enterprises, in March with $34 million in a seed round it described as massively oversubscribed.听

When investors place larger bets at seed, there鈥檚 usually at least one of two core reasons. The first is that the founder or founding team is impressive enough that backers are willing to invest primarily on the mission and people. The second is that the startup has demonstrated impressive traction with its earliest efforts.

For larger rounds, we鈥檙e seeing a number of the first category. Cylake鈥檚 founder and CEO, for example, is , founder of . JetStream, meanwhile, has drawn veterans of , and other security leaders.听

A solid year for overall security funding

Notably, the strong cybersecurity seed funding environment coincides with solid overall venture investment levels. In the first half of the year, per 兔子先生传媒 data, startups in the sector pulled in $10.6 billion in financing across stages, roughly in line with recent prior comps.

That said, seed may be where excitement is greatest. With hundreds of billions flowing into building AI infrastructure and applications in recent quarters, someone will have figure out innovative ways to keep myriad real-life and hypothetical AI security nightmares from coming true.听

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Notably, the quarter also marked the busiest one for General Catalyst since 2021 in terms of investing in rounds of $5 million or above. The firm鈥檚 next-busiest fintech investing quarter in rounds of that size was the fourth quarter of 2025, when it participated in 10 raises of $5 million or above.

Overall, fintech startups raised $28.6 billion globally in the first half of 2026, a 22.7% increase from the first half of 2025, but down 17.3% compared to the $34.6 billion raised in the second half of last year. (It鈥檚 important to note that H2 2025 marked the strongest six-month funding period for fintech startups since the second half of 2022.)

Over the past year, startup accelerator Y Combinator has routinely ranked as the most active investor in the fintech space. And overall, it was still the most active investor in the second quarter of this year, participating in 41 deals.

But this time, it ranked behind General Catalyst in terms of backing fintech rounds in the $5 million or more category. General Catalyst participated in 12 of those deals, while YC and each invested in 11.

In overall fintech dealmaking, General Catalyst still ranked far behind YC鈥檚 41, with 13 deals. participated in 12, Index Ventures in 11, and in 10.

Top lead investors at $100M or more

For megarounds 鈥� those deals of $100 million or more 鈥� we once again saw private equity firms topping the list of lead or co-lead investors. , , , and topped that list, according to 兔子先生传媒 data.

The largest rounds in Q2 were raised by a geographically diverse bunch of fintech startups. They include:

• Expense management startup was the fintech sector鈥檚 largest recipient of capital in the second quarter, raising a massive $750 million Series F round in June co-led by Ontario Teachers鈥� Pension Plan, Iconiq Capital and GIC that valued the company at over $50 billion post-money.
• , a London-based cross-border payments and foreign-exchange fintech majority-owned by , was a close second 鈥� landing $748 million in a private equity financing led by Centerbridge Partners in April.
• Also in April, Indian consumer lending startup raised $220 million in a Series E round co-led by , and that valued it at more than $1.5 billion.
• Paris-based insurtech landed a $545 million Series G led by Prosus that valued it at $6.2 billion.

Top fintech investors at seed

When it comes to investing in seed rounds, unsurprisingly, Y Combinator again topped the list 鈥� by far, with 33 fintech deals. Next up was with seven investments at the seed stage, and then with six.

The investor base shifted when we looked at who led or co-led post-seed rounds in the second quarter. General Catalyst topped that list, with five deals. , , , Index Ventures, and all tied with three investments each.

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• Fintech Funding Surges 23% In H1 2026 As Investors Concentrate Their Bets On AI And Financial Infrastructure

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In 2026, conversations about Black founders and venture capital have focused on access to funding. But as AI reshapes startup economics, the bigger challenge is no longer simply getting a first check, it’s raising enough capital at the seed stage to successfully reach Series A.

AI has fundamentally lowered the cost of building software companies. Founders can launch products faster, automate operations and accomplish with five employees what once required teams of 30. Yet while AI has reduced the cost of building a startup, it has not reduced the cost of scaling one. Companies still need resources to acquire customers, hire experienced talent, invest in go-to-market strategies, and generate the revenue and growth metrics institutional investors expect before leading a Series A round.

For Black founders, who continue to receive a disproportionately small share of venture capital, the inability to secure fully funded seed rounds has become one of the greatest barriers to building venture-scale companies.

AI is making seed capital more valuable, not less

One of the biggest misconceptions about AI is that startups simply need less money. In reality, AI has shifted when capital matters most. Because startups can now build products more efficiently, investors are increasingly rewarding founders who demonstrate real traction instead of polished ideas. Seed funding is no longer financing an experiment, it is financing proof.

That means founders need enough capital to move beyond building a product and toward building a business. Today’s Series A investors are looking for recurring revenue, customer retention, capital efficiency and repeatable growth. Those milestones require time, execution and sufficient capital.

The startups that reach them are increasingly those that raised enough capital early to stay focused on customers instead of constantly fundraising.

The numbers tell a stark story

The challenge is particularly acute for Black entrepreneurs. According to 兔子先生传媒 data, U.S. startups with a Black founder or co-founder received just $942 million in venture funding in 2025, only 0.32% of all venture capital invested in the nation. That represents one of the lowest funding shares in years and a dramatic decline from 2021, when Black founders raised $5.2 billion during the post-George Floyd investment surge.

While 2026 has shown encouraging signs, with Black-founded startups raising approximately $643 million by late May, the strongest quarter since mid-2022, the improvement was driven largely by a handful of unusually large financings, including a $350 million AI round. Across the broader ecosystem, Black founders remain significantly underrepresented in venture funding.

The issue isn’t simply that too little capital is available. It’s that many Black founders raise partial seed rounds that leave them without enough operating flexibility to achieve the milestones required for institutional Series A financing.

The real gap is between seed and Series A

Historically, venture capital rewarded bold ideas and rapid expansion. Today’s market rewards disciplined execution. Investors expect startups to demonstrate product-market fit, meaningful revenue growth, and efficient operations before committing Series A capital. That has made the journey between seed and Series A longer and more demanding.

Black founders who raise only enough money to survive often find themselves trapped in a cycle of continuous fundraising. Instead of focusing on customers, product development and hiring, they spend valuable months chasing additional capital just to extend their runway.

In an AI-driven market where product cycles move faster than ever, that lost time can determine whether a startup becomes a category leader or gets left behind.

Oversubscribed seed rounds are a competitive advantage

This is why oversubscribed seed rounds are taking on new importance for Black founders. Traditionally, oversubscription was viewed primarily as a signal of investor demand. Today, it is becoming a strategic advantage.

Additional capital gives Black founders flexibility to weather slower fundraising markets, invest aggressively when opportunities emerge, and continue executing without returning to investors every few months. It also allows founders to pursue growth intentionally rather than reactively.

Capital efficiency remains important, but efficiency is most valuable when paired with enough capital to execute.

The AI economy requires longer vision

The venture industry often celebrates AI for making entrepreneurship more accessible. In many ways, that’s true. The barriers to launching a company have never been lower. But lowering the cost of starting a company does not eliminate the capital required to build an enduring one.

Closing the Series A funding gap is therefore not simply about increasing investment in Black founders. It’s about ensuring founders have enough money to reach the milestones that unlock future institutional capital. That鈥檚 how you create more Black unicorns.

For Black founders, the conversation should no longer focus solely on access to capital. It should focus on whether they have enough capital to compete. In the AI economy, the Black-led companies that endure won’t simply be those that build the fastest, they will be the ones with the resources to keep building long enough to win.

and are the co-founders of (Black Ops VC), an early-stage venture capital firm. Norman is a managing partner at Black Ops VC. He is also the CEO of , an AI-powered market research platform used by industry giants such as and that鈥檚 designed for the media and entertainment spaces to gather audience feedback on video content, and a partner at , an accelerator that provides intense programming, resources and capital to overlooked founders.

Along with serving as general partner at Black Ops VC, Green is the founder and CEO of , an AI-powered CRM and inventory management platform specifically designed for art galleries, dealers, auction houses and collectors.听

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• 6 Startup Investors On What It Will Take To Fund More Black Founders
• 鈥楾his System Wasn鈥檛 Built For Me鈥�: Black Founders Became Investors To Change Venture Capital

Illustration:

Mexico鈥檚 startups led the LatAm pack in Q2 鈥� by a wide margin. The country鈥檚 startups raised $944 million in the second quarter, up 131% compared to $409 million in last year鈥檚 Q2, and up 136% from the $401 million raised in this year鈥檚 first quarter, per 兔子先生传媒 data. For comparison鈥檚 sake, that鈥檚 almost as much as Latin American startups as a whole raised in the second quarter of 2025.

Notably, Mexico-based companies accounted for the region鈥檚 three largest fundraising deals in the quarter ended June 30.

Meanwhile, Brazil-headquartered startups raised $350 million in Q2 2026, down 11% from the $363 million raised in Q2 2025, but up 20% from the $270 million raised in Q1 2026.

In general, a continued boom in late-stage and growth funding helped buoy the region for the period, 兔子先生传媒 data shows. Startups in Latin America raised a combined $1.36 billion across seed- and growth-stage deals in the second quarter, up 47% year over year and 22% from the first quarter.

For perspective, we charted out total investment, color-coded by stage, for the past 10 quarters below.

Of that total, $991 million went into late-stage and growth deals, up 84% year over year and 30% compared to the first quarter of 2026.

Round counts declined sequentially and year-over-year across angel, seed and early stages. (We expect the Q2 deal count to rise somewhat over time, however, as seed rounds in particular are commonly reported weeks or months after they close.)

Table of contents

• Late-stage boom
• Investor POV
• The US-LatAm connection
• Methodology
• Glossary of funding terms

Late-stage boom

There were five nine-figure raises in Latin America in the second quarter, and as mentioned earlier, three of those were by Mexico City-based companies. Interestingly, several of the deals were led by U.S.-based firms.

• In June, payments startup raised $500 million at a valuation exceeding $2.5 billion in a private-equity deal with undisclosed investors.
• In April, digital bank raised $405 million in a Series C round led by Miami-based at a $5 billion valuation.
• And in February, , a startup that operates a pre-owned car marketplace, raised $300 million in a Series F financing co-led by Laguna Beach, California-based and Menlo Park-based . Notably, the round was reported to be a16z鈥檚 largest investment in Latin America and the first in the region for its growth fund.

Other large deals in Latin America in the same period included a $195 million round for Argentinian digital bank in March, led by Germany鈥檚 at a $3.2 billion valuation. And, Sao Paulo-based legaltech startup raised a $100 million Series B led by San Francisco-based

Investor POV

Several investors who spoke with 兔子先生传媒 News described a somewhat slower pace in the region. , co-founder and general partner of New York-based , said the firm remains active, although its investments so far this year have been in U.S. and European companies. It has seen less early-stage fintech activity in Latin America but expects to make new investments in the region, given its current pipeline.

The region鈥檚 underlying fundamentals remain intact and fintech adoption continues to grow, he said.

, principal at Alexandria, Virginia-based , said her firm鈥檚 pace in Latin America has also slowed, largely because it is increasingly investing around global themes rather than individual geographies. As QED focuses more heavily on stablecoins and artificial intelligence, many of the most compelling startups it encounters operate globally, with Latin America representing one of several important markets, she said.

Within Latin America, QED generally invests at the later Series B stage.

, managing partner at Mexico City-based , said the firm鈥檚 investment pace has remained consistent.

Brazil and Mexico continue to attract the bulk of all three firms鈥� activity, but the investors noted that promising companies are also emerging elsewhere in the region.

Armaza cited portfolio successes including Uruguay-based , which was acquired this year by U.S. public company ; Argentina鈥檚 , which raised a $55 million Series C in January; and Venezuela鈥檚 , which serves CFOs and corporate treasury teams.

鈥淚 think this is an underrated LatAm story right now: The periphery is also producing big successes,鈥� he said.

The US-LatAm connection

The investors are also tracking an increasingly fluid relationship between Latin America and U.S. technology hubs.

Hi Ventures, which is now focused almost exclusively on AI applications, has expanded its strategy to include Latin American founders building companies in the San Francisco Bay Area. About half of its portfolio is based in San Francisco, including companies led by founders originally from Mexico, Brazil, Chile and Argentina.

鈥淲e increasingly think of the ecosystem as one connected innovation network rather than separate geographies,鈥� Antoni said.

Armaza has observed a similar trend among both repeat and first-time entrepreneurs who are relocating to San Francisco or New York to build U.S. or global companies from the outset.

鈥淭he talent is still LatAm talent, but the company formation is increasingly happening here,鈥� he said.

The New York-based firm鈥檚 sector focus remains on early-stage companies developing financial and commercial infrastructure.

At QED, meanwhile, stablecoins, tokenization and digital assets have become a substantially larger part of the investment strategy than they were several years ago, particularly at the infrastructure layer. The firm is also interested in the intersection of AI and fintech, including applications that improve financial operations and customer experiences or broaden access to financial services.

Overall investment in Latin America remains far below its 2021 peak and has returned to roughly 2019 levels in both capital deployed and deal volume.

But today鈥檚 market differs from 2019 in one significant respect, Antoni noted: AI allows founders to build companies and reach meaningful milestones with considerably less capital. That shift may particularly benefit Latin American entrepreneurs accustomed to operating with limited resources.

鈥淭he region has always produced resourceful founders, and today鈥檚 environment rewards capital efficiency rather than aggressive spending,鈥� he said.

The threshold for securing funding, particularly at the Series A stage and beyond, has nevertheless risen considerably. Investors are still deploying capital, Antoni said, but more selectively.

Armaza noted that global investors have historically cycled in and out of Latin America, particularly firms without dedicated regional teams or local roots. But the region鈥檚 largest rounds in 2026 have attracted firms including , Andreessen Horowitz, , Allianz X and .

鈥淭his tells you that the best capital in the world finds great companies, regardless of macro sentiment,鈥� Armaza said.

Recent public-market activity by Brazilian fintech companies could further boost the funding prospects for later-stage startups. Gadala-Maria said the fact that two of fintech鈥檚 three IPOs have come from Brazil serves as an important signal that Latin America can produce durable, high-quality fintech companies capable of reaching sufficient scale to enter the public markets.

The newly public companies also provide comparables that investors can use to evaluate the next generation of later-stage Latin American fintech companies, potentially giving them greater confidence in underwriting those businesses. QED has several Latin American portfolio companies that could pursue public listings if market conditions and timing were favorable, Gadala-Maria said.

Related reading:

• Where Argentina And Spain Are Scoring Startup Goals

Methodology

The data contained in this report comes directly from 兔子先生传媒, and is based on reported data. Data is as of July 9, 2026.

Note that data lags are most pronounced at the earliest stages of venture activity, with seed funding amounts increasing significantly after the end of a quarter/year.

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.

Glossary of funding terms

Seed and angel consists of seed, pre-seed and angel rounds. 兔子先生传媒 also includes venture rounds of unknown series, equity crowdfunding and convertible notes at $3 million (USD or as-converted USD equivalent) or less.

Early-stage consists of Series A and Series B rounds, as well as other round types. 兔子先生传媒 includes venture rounds of unknown series, corporate venture and other rounds above $3 million, and those less than or equal to $15 million.

Late-stage consists of Series C, Series D, Series E and later-lettered venture rounds following the 鈥淪eries [Letter]鈥� naming convention. Also included are venture rounds of unknown series, corporate venture and other rounds above $15 million. Corporate rounds are only included if a company has raised an equity funding at seed through a venture series funding round.

Technology growth is a private-equity round raised by a company that has previously raised a 鈥渧enture鈥� round. (So basically, any round from the previously defined stages.)

Illustration:

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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• 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

Illustration:

Overall, investors poured $42.8 billion into startup funding rounds across all of Asia in Q2 2026, per 兔子先生传媒 data. That鈥檚 by far the highest quarterly total in more than three years, as charted below.

Investment rose sharply at both seed and early stage, driven by megarounds for foundational AI startups. Capital was highly concentrated among a few favored names, with deal counts actually hitting a multiyear low in Q2, even as investment skyrocketed.

Table of contents

• AI leads the surge
• China leads, followed by India and Singapore
• Late stage gets a boost
• Early stage was on fire too
• Seed holds strong
• An up quarter
• Methodology
• Glossary of funding terms

AI leads the surge

Artificial intelligence-focused startups scooped up more than 60% of all venture funding to Asia-based startups in Q2. Altogether, those companies pulled in just over $26 billion, by far the highest sum on record.

A handful of companies accounted for a big chunk of the total. Of those, China-based large language model developer was the fundraising leader by a wide margin, raising $7.4 billion at a reported $50 billion valuation in June.

Two other companies tied for second, each raising $2.5 billion. One, foundational AI startup , is based in China. The other, AI data center developer , is headquartered in Singapore.

China leads, followed by India and Singapore

Alongside the AI surge, the other standout investment trend for Q2 was the sharp rise in funding to China-based startups.

Overall, Chinese companies pulled in just over $30 billion in venture funding across stages during the quarter. Investment was up a staggering 424% over year-ago levels and rose 76% from the prior quarter.

The next-largest funding destinations were Singapore, which attracted about

$3.6 billion, and India, with $3.3 billion. Below, we charted the funding share among the six Asian countries with the highest levels of startup investment in Q2.

Late stage gets a boost

The Q2 funding gains weren鈥檛 limited to a particular stage, as both early- and later-stage dealmaking saw increased investment.

Late stage pulled in the largest share. Per 兔子先生传媒 data, nearly $21 billion went to late-stage and technology growth rounds for startups in Asia in the just-ended quarter, the highest total in more than four years.

Funding was more than triple year-ago levels. Gains have steadily mounted over the past five quarters, as charted below.

Early stage was on fire too

Early stage investment also soared, hitting its highest point since 2021.

Overall, an estimated $18.4 billion went to early-stage rounds in Q2, roughly triple year-ago levels and up 57% from the prior quarter.

Seed holds strong

Seed, meanwhile, also held strong, with $3.7 billion in reported investment at this stage in Q2, roughly flat with the prior quarter. (As always, we expect the final number for Q2 to come in higher, as deals may be entered into the dataset weeks or months after the close.)

An up quarter

Broadly, the second quarter tallies paint an upbeat picture for Asia鈥檚 startup funding scene, at least compared to a year or two ago. That said, investors continue to be quite selective about who they fund, meaning that while chosen founders are attracting big checks, others may still be struggling to secure backing, even at much smaller sums.

Related 兔子先生传媒 query:

Methodology

The data contained in this report comes directly from 兔子先生传媒, and is based on reported data. Data is as of July 10, 2026.

Note that data lags are most pronounced at the earliest stages of venture activity, with seed funding amounts increasing significantly after the end of a quarter/year.

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.

Glossary of funding terms

Seed and angel consists of seed, pre-seed and angel rounds. 兔子先生传媒 also includes venture rounds of unknown series, equity crowdfunding and convertible notes at $3 million (USD or as-converted USD equivalent) or less.

Early-stage consists of Series A and Series B rounds, as well as other round types. 兔子先生传媒 includes venture rounds of unknown series, corporate venture and other rounds above $3 million, and those less than or equal to $15 million.

Late-stage consists of Series C, Series D, Series E and later-lettered venture rounds following the 鈥淪eries [Letter]鈥� naming convention. Also included are venture rounds of unknown series, corporate venture and other rounds above $15 million. Corporate rounds are only included if a company has raised an equity funding at seed through a venture series funding round.

Technology growth is a private-equity round raised by a company that has previously raised a 鈥渧enture鈥� round. (So basically, any round from the previously defined stages.)

Illustration:

Within the region, U.K. startups gained significant share in Q2, raising more than $10 billion. That marked the third-largest funding quarter for the U.K. on record, and came in at less than $500 million below its peak quarter in 2021.

European startup M&A activity also picked up in Q1 and continued that momentum in Q2, even as public-market exits stayed subdued.

Table of contents

• Large rounds drive gains
• H1 2026 up 50%
• UK momentum builds
• By stage
• Looking ahead
• Methodology
• Glossary of funding terms

Large rounds drive gains

Four companies raised venture fundings of a billion dollars or more last quarter, accounting for 25% of all startup investment in the region in Q2, 兔子先生传媒 data shows.

Those billion-dollar-plus rounds were raised by an AI-centric group: -owned AI drug developer , which was spun out of ; green steel production manufacturer ; , which is developing robots for home and industrial applications; and , an AI lab founded by former DeepMind researchers.

However, most of the growth in funding year over year and quarter over quarter was driven by rounds of $100 million and over. The majority of funding 鈥� 65% 鈥斕齱ent to a group of 42 companies that raised rounds of $100 million-plus. Sectors that stood out for these companies include听 biotech, quantum, financial services, AI labs, aerospace, semiconductor, robotics and energy.

H1 2026 up 50%

Funding to Europe-based startups in H1 was up 50% year over year to total $42 billion, 兔子先生传媒 data shows. Still, the region鈥檚 startup investment for the first half of the year remained well below the 2021 H1 peak, when VC funding in Europe totaled $60 billion.

It鈥檚 also drastically lower than the $392 billion raised in North America鈥檚 record-setting H1, with that region鈥檚 funding up 158% year over year.

Europe鈥檚 funding deal count subsided last quarter, but mostly at the seed stage. Late-stage rounds were up a bit, while early-stage deals dipped slightly year over year. (It鈥檚 worth noting, seed stage rounds are often added to the 兔子先生传媒 data set after the close of the quarter, so those numbers will increase over time.)

UK momentum builds

The United Kingdom widened its venture-funding lead last quarter, as startups based in the country raised $10.4 billion 鈥� not far from the peak in 2021 at $10.8 billion.

The region鈥檚 No. 2 startup market, Germany, trailed with $3.2 billion raised by its startups in Q2, and France followed in third place with $2.4 billion. Sweden was Europe鈥檚 fourth-largest startup market last quarter, with its companies raising $2 billion.

兔子先生传媒 data shows funding to Europe鈥檚 AI-focused companies reached more than $10 billion in Q2 鈥� the largest quarterly amount so far 鈥� but slightly below the Q1 percentage, when those companies raised more than half of the region鈥檚 startup investment.

By stage

Europe鈥檚 late-stage funding totaled $12.1 billion in Q2, up 90% year over year. Large Series C and D rounds were raised by Germany-based robotics developer Neura Robotics; Netherlands-based , which makes inspection tools for semiconductor manufacturing; U.K.-based quantum computing startup ; and Germany-based satellite launcher .

Early-stage funding reached $8.6 billion across 250-plus Europe-based startups last quarter, 兔子先生传媒 data shows. Large Series A and Series B rounds were raised by London-based Isomorphic Labs, London-based AI self-learning lab , Germany-based fusion energy company , London-based semiconductor developer , and London-based quantum processor provider .

European seed funding totaled $3.2 billion last quarter, with a billion dollars of that raised by just one company: Ineffable Intelligence.

Other large seed rounds were raised by , a London-based AI lab for science; Italy-based autonomous driving technology producer ; and Stockholm-based defense tech company .

M&A increase

While IPO activity for European startups was muted, M&A showed strong momentum following increased activity in Q1. A total of 154 Europe-based, venture-backed companies were acquired for a cumulative $11.5 billion or more in Q2, 兔子先生传媒 data shows. That includes three companies acquired for more than $1 billion each in biotech, industrial AI and micromobility.

Looking ahead

European startup investment has now steadily increased since the fourth quarter of 2024, with increased momentum in the just-ended quarter, driven by larger rounds of $100 million and over. The region鈥檚 startup ecosystem shows particular strength in deep tech and financial services as well as the formation of new AI labs, and M&A activity has fueled liquidity for the next batch of startups.

Now the question remains: Will it be enough to keep Europe competitive with the frontrunners, the U.S. and China?

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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
• North American Startup Funding Shattered Records In First Half Of 2026, Driven By AI

Methodology

The data contained in this report comes directly from 兔子先生传媒, and is based on reported data. Data is as of July 6, 2026.

Note that data lags are most pronounced at the earliest stages of venture activity, with seed funding amounts increasing significantly after the end of a quarter/year.

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.

Glossary of funding terms

Seed and angel consists of seed, pre-seed and angel rounds. 兔子先生传媒 also includes venture rounds of unknown series, equity crowdfunding and convertible notes at $3 million (USD or as-converted USD equivalent) or less.

Early-stage consists of Series A and Series B rounds, as well as other round types. 兔子先生传媒 includes venture rounds of unknown series, corporate venture and other rounds above $3 million, and those less than or equal to $15 million.

Late-stage consists of Series C, Series D, Series E and later-lettered venture rounds following the 鈥淪eries [Letter]鈥� naming convention. Also included are venture rounds of unknown series, corporate venture and other rounds above $15 million. Corporate rounds are only included if a company has raised an equity funding at seed through a venture series funding round.

Technology growth is a private-equity round raised by a company that has previously raised a 鈥渧enture鈥� round. (So basically, any round from the previously defined stages.)