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.

Another week, another infusion of big AI rounds. For this past week, the largest fundraiser by a long shot was , a developer of AI customer experience tools that picked up $950 million. Other big rounds went to companies in sectors including satellite development, biotech, and, yes, more vertical AI and AI infrastructure.

1. , $950M, customer experience AI: Sierra, a provider of AI-driven tools for customer experience management, raised $950 million in fresh funding at a $15 billion valuation. and led the financing for the three-year-old, San Francisco-based company.

2.听, $455M, space tech: Astranis, a developer of advanced satellites for high orbits, secured $450 million in equity and debt investment. The financing included a $300 million Series E equity round led by and and up to $155 million in credit through .听

3.听, $250M, biotech: Natick, Massachusetts-based Anagram Therapeutics, a developer of a pill for people living with exocrine pancreatic insufficiency due to cystic fibrosis, pancreatic cancer and related disorders, closed on $250 million in new funding from .听

4.听, $200M, AI software development: Blitzy, developer of an autonomous software development platform, picked up $200 million in fresh funding at a $1.4 billion valuation. Northzone led the financing for the Cambridge, Massachusetts-based company.听听

5. , $160M, insurance: Corgi Insurance, provider of an AI-native insurance platform for startups, secured $160 million in Series B funding. led the financing, which set a $1.3 billion valuation for the San Francisco-based company.听

6. , $140M, renewable energy: Portland, Oregon-based Panthalassa, which aims to perform AI inference computing at sea using power generated from ocean waves, raised $140 million in a Series B financing led by .

7. , $125M, insurance: Reserv, a provider of third-party administrator services to the insurance industry, closed on $125 million in a Series C funding round led by . Launched in 2022, New York-based Reserv has raised over $200 million in known funding to date, per SA国际传媒 data.

8.听, $107M, AI infrastructure: DeepInfra, a cloud platform for high-throughput AI inference, landed $107 million in Series B funding. and led the financing for the four-year-old, Palo Alto, California-based company.

9. , $60M, vertical AI: San Jose, California-based Tessera Labs, developer of an AI platform for enterprise ERP systems and data, secured $60 million in a funding round led by .听

10. , $56M, gaming: Astrocade, developer of an AI platform for creating, building and playing games, announced $56 million in new funding. The funding for the Los Altos, California-based company includes a Series B led by and a Series A led by , Astrocade said.听

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Two newly founded AI labs, both based in London and both with researchers from , raised large rounds out of the gate and made their Unicorn Board debuts. The two companies, and , both raised large initial fundings out of the gate, though take very different approaches to training AI.听 They were joined by another new unicorn in the foundation AI sector: , an open-source model company from China with on-device smaller models.听

Six companies working on humanoid robotics 鈥斕齠ive from China and one from Japan 鈥� also received billion-dollar-plus valuations last month. Quite a few of these companies are building models for robotic intelligence using simulated data.听

The financial services, defense, developer tools, energy and healthcare sectors each added two or three new unicorns in April.听

Of the 28 companies, 12 are U.S.-based and eight are from China. The UK counted two new unicorns last month, while Germany, Spain, Switzerland, India and Japan each added one.听

April鈥檚 new unicorns

Here are April鈥檚 new unicorn companies. Of the 28 companies, 26 are AI-related.听

Foundational AI听

• , a London-based AI lab using reinforcement learning rather than human-generated data, raised a $1.1 billion seed round led by and . The less than 1-year-old company was founded by of AlphaGo and . It was valued at $5.1 billion in its first funding.听
• London-based , a new AI intelligence lab with the goal of continuous learning improvement, raised a $500 million Series A led by and . Founded by DeepMind researchers and 鈥檚 1 previous AI lead, the less than 1-year-old company was valued at $4.5 billion.听
• Beijing-based , an on-device foundation model developer, raised funding led by and . Its open source MiniCPM is deployed in automotives, smartphones, PCs and home devices. The 3-year-old company was valued at $1 billion.听

搁辞产辞迟颈肠蝉听

• Shanghai-based is a robotics AI company building a foundational model as well as hardware. It uses simulated training to create a model for grasping and spatial awareness. The 1-year-old company raised a Series A round and was valued at $2 billion.
• Shanghai-based humanoid robotics company raised a $513 million seed round led by and HSG. The 1-year-old company was valued at $1.9 billion.听
• Beijing-based , a hardware and software developer of models for robotics using simulated data, raised a $220 million Series B. The 3-year-old company was valued at $1.5 billion.听
• Shenzhen-based , a builder of humanoid and quadruped robots, raised a $200 million Series B led by and . The 2-year-old company robots will be deployed for traffic, security and retail. It was valued at $1.5 billion.听
• Shenzhen-based , a commercial robotics company for delivery and commercial cleaning, raised a $146 million funding led by and . The 10-year-old company was valued at $1.5 billion.听
• Tokyo-based , a humanoid robotics company to address public safety and urban maintenance, raised a Series A led round. The 1-year-old company co-founded by was valued at $1 billion.

Financial services听

• , which automates research for investment banks, raised a $160 million Series D led by . The 4-year-old New York-based company was valued at $2 billion.
• Bangalore-based , a consumer and small business lending service, raised a $220 million Series E led by , , and . The 8-year-old company was valued at $1.5 billion.听
• , a banking and expense management service targeting small businesses and solopreneurs, raised a $100 million Series C led by , and . The 5-year-old San Francisco-based company, founded by college dropouts at the time, was valued at $1.4 billion.听

顿别蹿别苍蝉别听

• Space defense company raised a $600 million Series D led by and . The company has built software for space operations and an autonomous orbital vehicle called Jackal. The 4-year-old, Colorado-based company was valued at $2.2 billion.听
• Defense aviation company raised a $200 million Series C led by Khosla Ventures. The 7-year-old El Segundo, California-based builder of autonomous aircraft was valued at $1 billion.听

Developer tools听

• , a web search provider for AI agents used by and , raised a $100 million Series B led by Sequoia Capital. The 2-year-old Palo Alto, California-based company was valued at $2 billion.听
• , an agentic software coding tool for enterprises, raised a $150 million Series C led by . The 3-year-old San Francisco-based company was valued at $1.5 billion.听

贰苍别谤驳测听

• , developer of small nuclear reactors to provide direct power for AI data centers, raised a $340 million Series B funding. The 2-year-old El Segundo, California-based company was valued at $2 billion.听
• , a long duration energy storage battery provider, raised a $58 million Series C led by . The 12-year-old Bayern, Germany-based company that supports energy needs for grids, data centers and industry, was valued at $1.2 billion.听

Health care听

• Shanghai-based , a developer of a model for healthcare that includes computer vision and large language models, raised a $73 million Series A round. The 12-year-old company has built an assistant for doctors for screening, diagnosis and patient care, and was valued at $1 billion.听
• Switzerland-based , a developer of a peptide product to address enamel repair without needing surgery, raised a private equity funding led by . The 6-year-old company was valued at $1 billion.听

Data platform

• has built a semantic layer between data and agents necessary to interpret data and provide guardrails for AI. The 4-year-old San Francisco-based company raised a $120 million Series C led by and was valued at $1.5 billion.听

Manufacturing

• Shanghai-based , a collaboration tool to make factories more efficient, raised a $146 million Series D funding. The 10-year-old Shanghai-based company was valued at $1.3 billion.

Agentic AI

• , which builds agents trained on company data, raised a $80 million funding led by . The 1-year-old San Francisco-based company was valued at $1.3 billion.听

础别谤辞蝉辫补肠别听

• Madrid-based , which is building data from satellites tracking changes in the earth for various commercial needs, raised a $130 million Series B led by . The 6-year-old company was valued at $1 billion.听

Marketing & sales听

• , a provider of booking and customer service for the services industry using AI, has raised a Series B funding led by and . The 4-year-old New York-based company was valued at $1 billion. The company has raised $125 million in funding from seed through its Series B.听

叠颈辞迟别肠丑苍辞濒辞驳测听

• , an AI biotechnology infrastructure platform speeding up drug discovery, raised a $40 million Series E. The 8-year-old Waltham, Massachusetts-based company was valued at $1 billion.听

Waste management听

• converts unused food products into energy. It raised a Series C funding led by strategic partner . The 19-year-old Concord, Massachusetts-based company was valued at $1 billion.听

Related SA国际传媒 unicorn lists:听

• (1,756)
• (611)
• (128)
• (187)
• (118)
• (102)
• (896)
• (516)
• (239)
• (38)
• (477)

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• Billion-Dollar AI Rounds Push April To Third-Highest Startup Funding Month In A Year
• This Is A Momentous Year For Early-Stage Unicorns听
• The Rising Investors Behind The New Unicorn Class听
• While OpenAI Shattered Records, Robotics and Semiconductor Startups Quietly Added The Most New Unicorns In February听

Methodology

The SA国际传媒 Unicorn Board is a curated list that includes private unicorn companies with post-money valuations of $1 billion or more and is based on SA国际传媒 data. New companies are as they reach the $1 billion valuation mark as part of a funding round.听

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.听

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

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

Please note that all funding values are given in U.S. dollars unless otherwise noted. SA国际传媒 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 SA国际传媒 long after the event was announced, foreign currency transactions are converted at the historic spot price.

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This increase was driven by large rounds to AI lab and Jeff Bezos鈥檚 , which is focused on AI manufacturing. The two companies raised $15 billion and $10 billion, respectively, together accounting for 45% of venture capital in April.听

Large rounds across multiple sectors

Billion-dollar rounds were also raised by Swedish green steel production plant , New York-based AI data operations provider , and London-based AI lab , which was founded by former employees.

Rounds $500 million and above were raised by Michigan-based modular electric pickup truck manufacturer , Colorado-based space defense company , Shanghai-based humanoid robotics startup , another London-based frontier lab, , and London-based , a global payments platform majority-owned by .

AI led

Artificial intelligence funding in April reached $37 billion, accounting for 66% of global venture investment last month.听

AI model companies raised the lion’s share of capital at $26.7 billion. Physical AI in robotics, aerospace, drones and autonomous vehicles represented around $5.3 billion. And AI infrastructure in semiconductor and data centers raised $1.8 billion.听

The U.S. once again dominated startup funding, with American companies raising $39 billion, or around 70% of global venture capital.

Public markets and GDP growth

The first quarter of this year showed the dominance of AI in both the public and private markets, and that continued into April.

As the hyperscalers , and topped analyst revenue expectations and continued heavy AI expenditures, around half of the 2% U.S. GDP growth in Q1 was due to AI buildout, per an estimate from Oliver Allen, an economist with .

That was mirrored on the private-market side. Global venture investment is up 139% year over year through April, per SA国际传媒 data, with nearly 60% of that capital going to just five companies backed by deep-pocketed public technology companies, private equity and venture investors.

Related SA国际传媒 query:听

Related reading:

• Q1 2026 Shatters Venture Funding Records As AI Boom Pushes Startup Investment To $300B听

Methodology

The data contained in this report comes directly from SA国际传媒, and is based on reported data. Data reported is as of May 4, 2026.听

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. SA国际传媒 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 SA国际传媒 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. SA国际传媒 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. SA国际传媒 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.听

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.)

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We鈥檙e not talking about confidential filings either. Sure, they signal serious intent and contain valuable information for regulators. But for the rest of us, it鈥檚 the public S-1 filing that signifies an IPO is actually imminent.

By this latter measure, the past few weeks have been pretty busy for venture-backed startups. , the designer of speedy AI inference chips, filed publicly last week for an offering expected to raise around $2 billion. The Silicon Valley company, which withdrew plans for an IPO last fall, is reportedly seeking a valuation upwards of $35 billion this time around.

That alone would be enough to set IPO market watchers abuzz. Per SA国际传媒 data, it stands to be the largest initial share offering of a U.S. semiconductor company to date.

However, Cerebras wasn鈥檛 the only venture-backed company seeking a multibillion-dollar IPO valuation.

Power players

Another, albeit smaller, contender is nuclear power startup , which is making its debut today. The Rockville, Maryland-based company priced shares at $23 each late Thursday, above the projected range, raising around $1 billion. Shares closed up 27% in first-day trading Friday.

Meanwhile, on the geothermal power front, is also looking to take its clean energy ambitions to the public market. The Houston-based company filed last week for a offering that could bring in around $250 million.

Biotech IPOs heating up

Biotech is also heating up. Last week delivered a big debut from , a Waltham, Massachusetts-based developer of oral and injectable treatments for obesity and metabolic disease that $718 million in its Nasdaq offering. , a Fremont, California-based startup applying proteomics to early disease detection, made its market entry as well, securing a current market cap around $1.6 billion.

More biotech debuts are on deck too. Austin-based , a venture-backed developer of a nerve stimulation device for stroke survivors, filed last week for an offering. The prior week brought S-1 filings from Boston鈥檚 , a developer of medicines for depression, anxiety and other neuropsychiatric disorders, and , a Denmark-based biotech which focuses on treatment of blood coagulation disorders.

Space and defense on the rise

Of course, everyone knows the Texas-based company on deck to publicly file for a space tech offering of unprecedented magnitude. for an IPO a few weeks ago, with media reports pegging its target valuation around $1.75 trillion. If the company forges ahead with reported plans for a June market debut, a public filing should follow in the next few weeks.

In the interim, another, much, much smaller offering in the defense tech space is on track to hit the market much sooner. , a Herndon, Virginia-based developer of radio frequency intelligence for military customers, filed earlier this month for a offering. It comes amid a period of heightened investor appetite for defense tech, with an expectation of more debuts in the space likely in coming months.

Now we just need some software

Of course, it鈥檚 not an IPO market that is welcoming to all venture-backed startup sectors. One area noticeably absent from the impending offering list is enterprise software. While SaaS has long been a mainstay of the IPO pipeline, the sector has taken a hit of late amid investors’ concerns of AI disruption.

That said, it鈥檚 still encouraging to see a swathe of other sectors dipping a toe in IPO waters.

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Related reading:

• After Swarmer鈥檚 Soaring Debut, Here Are 12 Other Potential Defense Tech IPOs
• IPOs Are Holding Up In 2026, But SaaS Debuts Aren鈥檛 Happening

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led the raise, which included participation from , , , and St. Elmo Venture Capital, the investment arm of customer . It brings the Raleigh, North Carolina-based startup鈥檚 total raised to $5.35 million since its 2023 inception.

The idea for Cloneable traces back to a bottleneck its founders encountered years earlier while working in the field.

In 2019, as wildfires ravaged California, co-founders , and 鈥� founding employees at drone company 鈥� were deployed to help inspect critical infrastructure. Their team sent out 150 drone pilots to survey thousands of miles of transmission lines.

But reviewing that data proved far less scalable.

When Reich visited a utility command center weeks later, she saw hundreds of workers manually scrubbing through video footage, while only a handful of experts knew what to look for.

“It was an ‘aha’ moment,” she recalled. 鈥淲e realized this cannot be the way. If we know what the expert is looking for, why can’t we just clone that expertise?鈥�

The startup鈥檚 founders realized that heavy industries 鈥� energy, oil and gas and agriculture 鈥� face a 鈥渒nowledge crisis鈥� as experienced workers retire faster than they can be replaced.

鈥淔or every young worker entering the energy workforce, 2.4 experienced ones are walking out the door toward retirement. And it’s happening right as energy demand is set to double by 2050,鈥� Reich, the company鈥檚 CEO, told SA国际传媒 News.

Cloneable aims to capture and preserve that kind of institutional knowledge.

In February 2025, it launched Cloneable Field for automated infrastructure inspection targeting the energy sector.听 Alongside the fundraise, the company is now launching an agentic product that codifies expert knowledge and deploys it as scalable AI agents.

The funding will also support expansion into infrastructure-heavy industries such as public utilities, vegetation management, construction, rail, mining, agriculture and manufacturing.

鈥淭hese are markets chronically underserved by point solutions,鈥� Reich said. 鈥淣o one has combined in-field data collection with agentic automation at the scale these industries require.鈥�

That includes workers鈥� judgment and institutional knowledge not captured in documentation or general AI models, according to Reich. 鈥淐loneable automates workflows that have traditionally been considered too complex for automation,鈥� she said.

The company claims that a process that typically takes a human engineer eight hours, such as structural calculations for a project where a firm is going to replace, upgrade or install 25 utility poles can be completed by a Cloneable agent in under two minutes.

鈥淎 single engineer can process roughly 4,500 to 5,500 poles a year before they hit a capacity ceiling,鈥� Reich said. 鈥淥ur agent runs at 2 million to 3 million poles a year. For a mid-size engineering firm with five to 10 people spending half their time on this work, that’s $115,000 to $312,000 a year in labor that’s not being redirected to higher-value work.

She added: 鈥淭his could be the difference in entire towns being connected to fiber or not over the next 12 months.鈥�

From the field to the back office

The startup says it grew ARR 100x between February and the end of 2025. It has dozens of customers, including , , , and , as well as , which is expanding the 鈥渆xpert cloning鈥� model to livestock and food supply.

Unlike generic AI that requires coding or clean data, Cloneable鈥檚 platform 鈥渟hadows鈥� experts. AI watches an expert perform a workflow, such as a complex utility-pole design. It then captures audio and documentation from the expert in real time. Next, it turns that contextual experience into an AI agent capable of executing the same task.

鈥淥ur differentiation is a decade of lived experience in how these industries actually operate, and the proprietary data and workflows we’ve captured from being inside these companies,鈥� Reich said, adding that everything is highly specific 鈥� from tools to how they鈥檙e configured per customer.

Large foundation model companies focus on the model itself, she said.

鈥淲e’re focusing on a framework that leverages different model types, including small, specific ones,鈥� she said. 鈥淲e clone our customers鈥� knowledge and experience into a small model, which makes it extremely cost-effective to do their work. We’ve built it so all the agent needs to know is: my company, my rules, my industry, my tools.鈥�

Cloneable makes money from its field offering through seat-based licenses per field collection device. With its new agent, charges are per-token and usage-based.

Solving for both data and the agents to act on it

, a partner at Congruent Ventures, said her firm鈥檚 investment in Cloneable was the culmination of many conversations with founders about AI adoption in legacy industries.

鈥淲e’ve seen companies focus either on data capture with complex, expensive, purpose-built hardware 鈥� or on agentic AI for the back office where they struggle to get the high-fidelity data needed to power those agents,鈥� she wrote. 鈥淐loneable has solved both.鈥�

She said the firm is betting on Cloneable鈥檚 team to bring AI to industries where horizontal solutions 鈥渁ren鈥檛 deep enough.鈥�

Related SA国际传媒 query:

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On the positive side, EVs are gaining ground. In 2025, sales increased by more than 20% year on year, rising to 21 million units, per .

On the other hand, early EV optimists assumed we鈥檇 be much further along by now. And while sales are up, the is slowing, driven by affordability constraints, trade friction and shifting government incentives.

The broad trend: Funding to EV-related startups reflects a similar mix of optimism and restraint. Investors are backing big rounds for a handful of upstart brands like customizable pickup truck maker and micromobility spin-out . Yet funding remains far below prior peaks and exit activity appears muted.

The numbers: Companies in SA国际传媒鈥檚 electric vehicle category are on track to see higher investment this year relative to last. Around $3.6 billion has gone to companies in the space so far in 2026, spread across about 50 rounds.

However, we鈥檙e still nowhere near the 2021 cyclical peak, when nearly $19 billion went to global EV startups. For perspective, we charted investment and deal count since 2020 below.

Noteworthy deals

The largest round tied to the EV space this year went to , which isn鈥檛 an electric vehicle brand but rather a developer of autonomous driving technology that has been tested on EVs. The London-based company raised $1.2 billion in a February financing at an $8.6 billion valuation.

Another standout fundraiser was Troy, Michigan-based Slate Auto, a developer of lower-cost electric pickup trucks that can be customized as SUVs. The -backed company raised $650 million in Series C funding last week and says it plans to deliver its first vehicles to customers later this year.

The Rivian spin-out Also, focused on electric bikes and skinny four-wheeled models capable of carrying cargo, is also scaling up, securing $200 million in Series C funding in March. The startup also plans to partner with to develop autonomous delivery vehicles.

China-based startups are also scaling up. , a developer of autonomous electric trucks,听 secured $310 million early this year, while , the flying car subsidiary of EV brand , picked up $200 million in fresh financing.

Exits

While private funding still flows to EV-related startups, exit activity has been comparatively slow.

On the IPO front, Chinese EV car brand made its Hong Kong debut last month. And India-based electric scooter and charging provider went public last spring.

U.S. startups, however, have been sitting out the IPO market in recent quarters, with the exception of a $9 million micro- early this year from solar electric vehicle brand .

As for M&A, we haven鈥檛 seen sizable disclosed-price purchases of private, venture-backed EV companies in recent quarters, per SA国际传媒 data. Another deal in the wings, meanwhile, is a planned SPAC merger transaction involving Swedish autonomous electric freight shipping startup .

Outlook

The EV funding environment, neither especially weak nor particularly robust, contrasts sharply with the investment climate for autonomous driving startups, which hit a record amount this year. Perhaps, over time, we鈥檒l see some momentum spilling over to EVs, as you can鈥檛 have autonomous vehicles technology become widespread without somebody supplying the actual vehicles.

Related SA国际传媒 query:

Related reading:

• Sector Snapshot: Autonomous Vehicle Funding More Than Triples In 2026 To Hit Record Amount

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In a quarter when nearly two-thirds of global venture capital went to just four companies, it鈥檚 easy to lose track of the many other companies getting funding to tackle interesting problems. Nonetheless, we spotted five companies in just the past month working on issues from cleaner ferries and trains to foundational AI for plants. Let鈥檚 take a closer look.

$55M for a mineral rights-backed credit card

Natural resources can be incredibly valuable financial assets, but you can鈥檛 exactly buy your weekly groceries with oil or water rights.

That鈥檚 an issue that a Dallas-based fintech startup aims to solve. recently raised $50 million in a debt round from to provide a credit card to U.S. households holding mineral rights to natural resources such as oil, natural gas, solar, wind or water.

鈥淔or the millions of mineral rights owners in the United States, these rights are one of the most valuable assets the family owns. But these families are just like the rest of Americans and often are carrying revolving credit card balances at more than 25% [interest],鈥� Frontlands CEO said in a statement. 鈥淗istorically, owners have had few options to access the value trapped inside their mineral rights without selling.鈥�

Its AI system combines machine learning, production data, royalty payment histories, lease terms, commodity price forecasts, geologic data and traditional to automate the underwriting process, the company says. While it鈥檚 historically been difficult for traditional lenders to assess natural resources as collateral, Frontlands says its process typically delivers a same-day credit decision.

The company鈥檚 recent credit facility is in addition to a announced in December from venture investors including , , and .

Frontlands said its average credit line in early markets 鈥� Texas, Pennsylvania, New Mexico, North Dakota, Wyoming and Oklahoma 鈥� is more than $30,000. It plans to launch its credit card product this summer in partnership with Texas-based sponsor bank .

Frontlands said it also expects to raise a Series A round later this year.

鈥淥ur goal isn鈥檛 to pile on more debt,鈥� Cotter said in a statement. 鈥淏ut the opportunity to help our customers move away from high-interest credit card debt 鈥� and provide a path toward greater financial stability 鈥� is compelling.鈥�

Investment in fintech startups hit a multiyear high in 2025, SA国际传媒 data shows, though remains well below the peak. Many of the best-funded companies in recent quarters have brought AI to bear on traditionally more manual or cumbersome processes in the financial services industry.

Related SA国际传媒 query:

$32M for 鈥榝lying鈥� electric commuter ferries

As of this writing, oil prices are hovering around $100 a barrel 鈥� down from an even greater peak a few weeks earlier, but still among the highest levels seen in years, as the U.S.-Iran war disrupts global energy markets.

So Swedish electric vessel maker 鈥檚 recent funding of 鈧�30 million (about $32 million) seems timely. The Stockholm-based company makes electric 鈥渇lying鈥� boats that are used as commuter ferries. They differ from traditional vessels by using computer-controlled hydrofoils to lift the hull above the water, an approach the company says dramatically reduces drag and cuts energy use by up to 80% 鈥� enabling faster, smoother, zero-emission travel compared to conventional diesel ferries that push through the water.

鈥淔rom a physics perspective, ships have been essentially the same for hundreds of years,鈥� Candela founder and CEO said in a statement. 鈥淲e’re redefining waterborne transport by effectively creating a new category of vessel. This allows cities and municipalities to finally take full advantage of waterways 鈥� while escaping the fossil-fuel cost trap that has long prevented them from being used efficiently.鈥�

Its P-12 vessels have already been deployed as commuter ferries in Stockholm, Gothenburg, Oslo and Trondheim.

The new funding was led by 鈥檚 arm and included previous investors , , and .

The capital will primarily be used to fund a second factory in Poland. Candela says it has more than 65 vessels on order and planned deployments across markets including India 鈥� where a fleet of 10 of its P-12s will reportedly cut travel times from Navi Mumbai Airport to the city center from around two hours to 35 minutes 鈥斕齮he Middle East and Southeast Asia.

The startup鈥檚 funding defies an overall downturn in clean-tech funding. Funding for clean-tech related startups totaled $26.9 billion in 2025, down 23% year over year and the lowest annual amount since 2020, SA国际传媒 data shows.

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$30M to electrify trains with batteries and microgrids

Let鈥檚 now turn from waterways to train tracks, with another company that recently raised significant funding aimed at giving centuries-old transportation systems a green overhaul.

, a Philadelphia-based startup, said last month that it raised $30 million in seed funding led by Australian mining company and Israeli venture firm to develop a new way of powering freight rail that avoids the high costs of traditional electrification.

The startup positions its technology as a way to decarbonize one of the world鈥檚 most efficient but still fossil-fuel-dependent transport systems. It鈥檚 targeting a major pain point for the rail industry: its heavy reliance on diesel. In North America alone, the six largest freight rail operators spend roughly $11 billion annually on diesel fuel, while full electrification of rail networks could cost more than $1 trillion, according to Voltify.

Instead of relying on overhead wires, Voltify says it鈥檚 building a system that combines battery-equipped railcars with technology that allows trains to recharge while moving. The goal is to help rail operators cut emissions and fuel costs without requiring massive infrastructure overhauls.

Its approach 鈥� using mobile batteries and distributed charging via microgrids 鈥� aims to sidestep those costs by retrofitting existing trains and building localized energy systems rather than rebuilding entire rail networks.

CEO and co-founder that the company has signed a paid pilot agreement with a Class 1 railroad, though she declined to name the customer, citing a confidentiality agreement.

She noted in a that raising funding for a transportation company in the current market was difficult. 鈥淪ecuring capital in the hardware space and traditional industries is challenging,鈥� she wrote. 鈥淚t is not the 鈥榠n鈥� space; there is no FOMO at play, so we need to focus on metrics and execute quickly. With some of the top 5 largest rail companies globally and a large order pipeline, we are determined to keep moving at lightning speed.鈥�

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$7M for foundation AI for biology

Funding to foundational model AI startups surged last quarter, reaching $178 billion, per SA国际传媒 data. But the vast majority of that funding went to AI giants like and that are building general-purpose GenAI models.

Such models are fundamentally lacking for hard sciences, argues , a startup based in Paris and Berkeley, California, that last month raised $7 million in seed funding to develop foundation AI for biology trained on DNA, RNA and data from other 鈥溾�� fields, rather than human text.

The company鈥檚 first family of transformer models is called Botanic and is trained on data from 43 plant species. Living Models noted that it鈥檚 starting with the commercial crop industry, a massive global market that has abundant data, well-established research infrastructure, and fewer regulatory concerns and faster commercialization timelines than the pharmaceutical industry.

鈥淧lant biology combines three properties that make it an ideal first domain for biological foundation models: genomic data is abundant and largely unrestricted, the commercial need is acute and quantifiable, and the feedback loop between computational prediction and real-world validation is well established through existing breeding infrastructure,鈥� the company said in a statement.

The global seed industry is also dominated by a handful of incumbents, it noted: , , , and 鈥斕齝ompanies that already spend billions of dollars a year on breeding research.

鈥淏iology is an information problem at every scale, from a single cell to an entire ecosystem. The genomic data exists across many domains; what’s been missing is a model architecture capable of learning from it at scale,鈥� , Living Models鈥� CTO and co-founder, said in a statement. 鈥淲e start with plants because the data is rich and the breeding cycle is a clear bottleneck, but the same approach applies wherever sequence data meets slow, empirical discovery.鈥�

The company鈥檚 recent funding was led by , , and . Other included and

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$2.1M for a brain-stimulating consumer wearable

Billions of dollars a year are spent on therapy and other mental-health treatments, yet measuring progress can be elusive.

That鈥檚 one of the issues that San Francisco-based aims to take on with a neuromodulation wearable headset that it says can reduce stress, improve attention span and mood, and more quantitatively measure mental health scores.

Mave鈥檚 device uses transcranial direct current stimulation, or tDCS, a noninvasive technique that delivers a low electrical current to the brain through electrodes placed on the scalp, with the aim of modulating neural activity. The technology is when used by adults as directed in controlled settings.

The company last month raised $2.1 million in seed funding led by , with participation from individual investors including Autopilot AI lead .

Crucially, Mave says it does not plan to pursue medical-device approval for its product, which sells for $495. Instead, it is positioning the gadget as a wellness tool that consumers can use on a daily basis to improve their mental well-being and better measure the outcomes of talk therapy or other treatments.

鈥淚f you ask a psychologist how do you know if a person is making progress, their response to it is very standard, which is that it鈥檚 not about progress. It鈥檚 about process [鈥 But for somebody with depression who is spending a lot of time in therapy, progress is important. So how do you know whether they鈥檙e making progress or not? And even these basic questions were not being answered,鈥� co-founder .

Mave鈥檚 funding comes amid an overall downturn in investment for wellness and fitness-related companies, although select wearables makers including and have raised significant funding in recent years.

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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 kept up the busy dealmaking pace this week with a number of big rounds. Top among them was a $1.75 billion Series D for , developer of autonomous vessels. Other big funding recipients hailed from sectors including fitness wearables, energy tech, cybersecurity and AI infrastructure, among others.

1. , $1.75B, autonomous ships: Austin-based Saronic, a defense tech startup focused on autonomous sea vessels, raised $1.75 billion in Series D funding, bringing total funding to around $2.6 billion. led the round, which set a $9.25 billion valuation for the听 company, more than double its Series C level in 2025.

2. , $575M, fitness wearables: Whoop, a provider of wearable fitness technology and a subscription platform that tracks physiological data, secured $575 million in Series G funding. led the financing,which set a $10.1 billion valuation for the Boston-based company.

3. , $450M, nuclear energy: El Segundo, California-based nuclear energy startup Valar Atomics, raised fresh capital at a valuation of $2 billion, according to a citing unnamed sources. The financing reportedly included $340 million in equity funding and $110 million in debt.

4. , $300M, battery technology: EnerVenue, a developer of grid-scale energy storage technology, says it closed on a $300 million extension of its Series B preferred round led by . The Fremont, California-based company also appointed a new chief executive officer, Henning Rath.

5. , $250M, cybersecurity: Sarasota, Florida-based AI-enabled cybersecurity startup Tenex picked up $250 million in Series B funding led by . The company said it plans to use the funds to hire more than 250 people and supplying them with AI technology that makes them 鈥渢en times more efficient.鈥�

6. , $200M, micromobility: Also, an electric mobility company spun out of , raised $200 million in a Series C round 鈥媌acked by , , and . The Palo Alto, California-based startup鈥檚 product lineup includes bikes, small autonomous EVs for deliveries, and associated gear.

7. , $170M, space tech: Starcloud, a space infrastructure startup focused on building orbital data centers, secured $170 million in Series A funding led by and . The financing sets a $1.1 billion valuation for the Redmond, Washington-based company, making it the fastest alum to achieve unicorn status after demo day, which was 17 months ago.

8. , $130M, cloud infrastructure: New York-based cloud and AI infrastructure startup ScaleOps landed $130 million in Series C funding. led the financing, which set听 a valuation of over $800 million for the 4-year-old company.

9. , $100M, biotech: Boulder, Colorado-based Ambrosia Biosciences, a developer of next-generation oral therapeutics for obesity and related cardiometabolic diseases, picked up $100 million in Series B funding led by , and .

10. , $94M, money transfer: OpenFX, provider of a platform to move money across borders, secured $94 million in Series A funding from backers including , , , and .

Methodology

We tracked the largest announced rounds in the SA国际传媒 database that were raised by U.S.-based companies for the period of March 28-April 3. 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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Within seconds, my voice left my home in Haifa, traveled through submarine fiber networks to Europe, was processed in a data center, possibly routed through additional vendor clouds across continents, and then made its way back, only to activate a switch sitting 10 inches from my face. The techie nerd in me gets excited every time this happens. But 鈥� I could have just raised my hand and pressed it.

We live in both incredible and absurd times. Our growing tendency to deploy global systems,听across multiple vendors, and continuous compute to solve problems that were already solved locally is something I feel we need to discuss.

To be clear, I am very much in favor of automation and agentic AI. I am educating myself with agentic AI courses to keep up with the times and use the latest capabilities. In many cases, they are transformative to businesses and consumers. Especially at scale, in repetitive processes, in data-heavy environments, or in cases where accessibility matters, AI agents do unlock real value.

But not every problem belongs in that category. And I feel an increasing number of AI-based applications and workflow automations tend to fall in the 鈥渟hower vent鈥� category.

You may think this isn鈥檛 an issue: What does it matter if we bring the tech revolution to solve ridiculous tasks, just because we can?

But there are drawbacks and risks to the automate-everything ethos.

Three risks of automating without discipline

Operational risk: more points of failure, less control: That simple command depends on multiple systems working in sync, your device, your network, Google鈥檚 infrastructure and potentially a third-party vendor cloud.

If any layer fails, the system fails. The same pattern is emerging in agentic AI workflows: multistep pipelines across LLMs, orchestration tools and external APIs. These add dependencies and complexities.

To give another example from my personal life: When my parents got their existing home, they built it as a 鈥渟mart home.鈥� It worked great, until a 鈥渟mart lightswitch鈥� malfunctioned and the smart home company asked for $1,500 to send a special 鈥渟mart home engineer鈥� to fix what would have been a $5 DIY. This is equivalent to hiring AI engineers and automation experts to support a workflow that could have been handled by a junior, nontechnical person in 10 minutes.

And that brings me to the next point.

Economic risk: hidden and compounding costs: Voice commands and AI workflows feel inexpensive at small scale, but they rely on paid infrastructure: compute, API calls, tokens, orchestration layers and vendor integrations.

In many cases, especially at scale, when implemented for those “ridiculous” tasks, the cost of automation can approach, or exceed, the value of the task being automated. We must ensure we invest in AI and automation where it makes economic sense.

Environmental and strategic risk: scaling inefficiency: Data centers create hundreds of millions of tons of CO鈧� emissions annually, estimated to grow to . AI is becoming a growing percentage of that. So these are megatons of CO鈧� emissions, and growing.

While each small agentic AI workflow can account for a few grams of CO鈧� emissions, at scale, these inefficiencies compound into real environmental impact. More importantly, this reflects a strategic issue: optimizing for the sake of it. This mindset can mean we often lose focus on solving meaningful problems.

is a strategic adviser to tech companies and investors, specializing in strategy, growth and M&A, a guest contributor to SA国际传媒 News, and a seasoned lecturer. Learn more about his advisory services, lectures and courses at . for further insights and discussions.

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Venture firms that set up shop in the Texas capital city included , , and 1, among others. famously moved 鈥檚 headquarters to Austin in 2021, while also purchasing a house and establishing a residence there.

But as more employees returned to in-office work, Austin slowly seemed to fall out of favor with the tech community, some of whom said it had been overhyped as a startup hub.

There were reports of tech workers who had moved to the city during the pandemic and , saying they were going back to places like the Bay Area. Musk back to California in 2023.

Funding tops pandemic peak

Undeterred by the 鈥渢ourists,鈥� the startup and venture community in Austin kept plugging away. And those efforts are reflected in a surge in funding to startups headquartered there last year, with 2025 posting an all-time high for Austin venture investment, SA国际传媒 data shows.

Investment into Austin-based startups spiked 64.8% to $7.19 billion in 2025 as more investors poured money into companies based in the region, according to SA国际传媒 . That鈥檚 compared with the $4.37 billion raised by Austin-area startups in 2024 and tops even the $6.1 billion raised in 2021, at the height of the venture funding frenzy.

Notably, deal counts actually decreased from 312 in 2024 to 272 year over year, signaling an increase in later-stage deals. Indeed, the data corroborates that with $4 billion of the total raised in 2025 classified as late-stage rounds.

Last year鈥檚 totals were also more than double 鈥� 130% higher 鈥� than the $3.1 billion raised in 2023. That money was raised across 403 deals, signaling much smaller round sizes at the time and a more mature market.

A tech scene decades in the making

, managing partner of , doesn鈥檛 believe that the Austin funding performance in 2025 was anomalous.

Rather, he calls it 鈥渢he payoff from decades of compounding.鈥�

鈥淭alent density in venture categories such as software, fintech, health tech, defense and听 robotics has reached a critical mass, driven by waves of Bay Area relocations, both full HQ moves and satellite offices, that brought technical, product and operational talent into the market,鈥� Flager said.

That talent eventually left to build new companies, he said, and the cycle repeated.

鈥淥n the capital side, the stack has matured across all stages, from pre-seed through growth, with local firms that have now cycled through multiple funds and understand the market deeply,鈥� Flager said. 鈥淟ayer in a business-friendly regulatory environment, a relatively lower cost of living, as well as a lower effective tax rate, and Austin becomes an attractive place to start and scale a company.鈥�

Former Austin Mayor saw so much potential in the city鈥檚 startup scene that he began a career in venture investing after his tenure ended in early 2023. (He now works for New York-based ).

Part of the city’s success as a startup hub stems from its reputation as a haven for mavericks and risk-takers, Adler has said.

鈥淢ost cities in the world, you try something, you fail; it’s hard to have access to the capital the second time,” he told co-founder in a in 2022. “In Austin, the civic folk heroes are the people that tried something and it didn’t quite work out and they worked on it until it did.鈥�

, founder of , a solo GP venture firm based in nearby San Antonio, said that it feels like Texas and the Austin metro area specifically are becoming more attractive to manufacturing- and engineering-heavy businesses.

鈥淪ome of that may be thanks to Tesla, and some of it may simply reflect the physical advantages of the state,鈥� he told SA国际传媒 News. 鈥淓ither way, this [surge in financing] feels less like hype returning and more like capital concentrating around a narrower set of serious, technically differentiated companies.鈥�

Deal sizes grow

That diversity among funded startups is reflected in last year鈥檚 investment totals for Austin, which were boosted by several large, late-stage deals across a broad range of industries.

The largest was a $1 billion Series C round for energy provider in October. New York-based led that financing, which valued the 2-year-old company at $4 billion.

Looking back, February in particular was a busy month for venture funding. That month alone saw the second-, third- and fourth-largest rounds in Austin for the year. They included:

• A February Series C round in which autonomous surface vessels maker raised $600 million at a $4 billion valuation. led the round for the defense tech startup.
• Also in February, , which provides endpoint management, security and monitoring, raised $500 million in Series C extensions at a $5 billion valuation 鈥� more than doubling its value from just 12 months prior. The funding came in separate tranches led by and 鈥檚 , with participation from other investors.
• Robotics company in February raised $415 million in Series A financing led by听 and accelerator (A $520 million extension to that Series A was raised in February 2026, taking the total round to over $935 million.)

The findings correspond with Flager鈥檚 observations.

鈥淎 good chunk of the capital raised in Austin was driven by several large deals. Similar to what we saw across the U.S. in 2025, venture funding in Austin was more concentrated than it has been in the past,鈥� he told SA国际传媒 News. 鈥淩oughly 38% of the capital deployed went to the top five venture financings in Austin. I believe the top 10 deals nationally accounted for more than 40% of the capital raised last year. We’ll see if this trend continues into 2026 and beyond. The start of the year suggests it will.鈥�

, founding partner of , agrees, noting that from a dollars perspective, the surge in financings was driven by a handful of outsized capital-intensive deals in newer categories such as defense and deep tech.

鈥淭hese companies require a combination of technology, land for manufacturing facilities, and talent for manufacturing tasks. Austin has unique skillsets for that,鈥� he said. 鈥淚t has a density of three things: talent in deep tech with , and many others moving to Texas in light of favorable business conditions with expertise in these industries; expansive land around Central Texas that is inexpensive, especially compared to California; and lower cost manufacturing-related labor especially given the surge in manufacturing jobs such as at Tesla in recent times.鈥�

Burgeoning industries

Once upon a time, Austin was better known as home to software and CPG companies. And while those types of companies certainly still exist, a number of other industries are growing increasingly robust, as the local investors have pointed out.

As with many top tech markets, Flager said Austin has long been strong for application and infrastructure software, which is currently being challenged by AI. In his view, that talent has migrated to building 鈥渜uality鈥� vertical agentic software and AI-native businesses.

鈥淲e are seeing these companies grow quickly and build scale, while using less capital 鈥� which is exciting,鈥� he added. 鈥淭he domain experts who built and scaled application software companies here over the last two decades are spinning out to build the next generation of native AI businesses.鈥�

The market overall is also broadening in interesting ways. Defense and autonomy have emerged as breakout categories, with Austin becoming one of the stronger markets in the country for dual-use and autonomous systems companies, noted Flager.

鈥淭he combination of software and hardware skills now in Texas, along with a business-friendly regulatory environment, has allowed Austin to take a leadership position in these important and developing markets,鈥� he said. 鈥淓nergy tech is also a natural fit given Texas’ grid scale and the surging power demands of AI infrastructure.鈥�

Finally, robotics and advanced manufacturing are also gaining momentum, driven by deep engineering talent and the ability to scale manufacturing near Austin cost-effectively, allowing engineers, executives and other factory employees to coexist and collaborate in close proximity.

Srinivasan noted that his firm is seeing strong activity in vertical AI companies, or companies that serve vertical markets with AI that is tuned on specialized proprietary vertical data, often targeting the services and labor expenditures by their customers.

鈥淭hese companies deliver 鈥楽ervices as Software鈥� with close to software gross margins and pricing models that are based more on usage and outcomes as opposed to the traditional seat-based models,鈥� he said.

Srinivasan also expects the city to continue to see large funding deals in defense and deep tech, given the combination of local strengths and robust global demand for such products.

Continued momentum

Investors and companies continue to be drawn to Austin. In late December, San Francisco-based venture firm in the city. One of the firm鈥檚 founders, , also announced that he had personally moved to Austin. The firm鈥檚 other founder, , had lived and worked in the city since 2022.

In late March of this year, Musk to build two semiconductor factories totaling 100 million square feet in Austin to supply advanced chips for and Tesla. The venture, known as Terafab, aims to manufacture 1 trillion watts of computing power per year, he said. Media outlets valued the initiative at nearly

Also this week, Barcelona-based AI health tech startup announced it will open an office and hire in Austin.

CEO told SA国际传媒 News that with the company鈥檚 New York office already established, the next step was not just expansion, 鈥渂ut choosing the right place to build.鈥�

鈥淎nd we chose Austin for one reason above all: talent,鈥� he said. 鈥淎s an AI health tech company, our success depends on attracting exceptional people across engineering, data and life sciences. Austin has rapidly become one of the most competitive talent markets. The city is one of the fastest-growing in the United States. This brings together deep tech expertise, entrepreneurial energy and a growing concentration of healthcare innovation. Ideal for our goal of building an R&D hub. 鈥�

Coelho also points out that Biorce has witnessed a 鈥渢rend鈥� of people moving from the Bay Area to Austin, noting that 鈥渢he quality of life has gained notoriety.鈥�

鈥淏ut for us, this isn鈥檛 about following a trend,鈥� he added. 鈥淚t鈥檚 about building where the best people are 鈥� and where they want to be.鈥�

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• Texas Startup Funding Declines, Led By Dip In Austin-Area Investment
• Lower Costs, Laid-Back Lifestyle Continue To Draw Tech Companies To Austin, Texas
• The 10 Biggest Rounds Of February: Saronic And NinjaOne Lead Big Month
• NinjaOne Snags $5B Valuation In Massive $500M Round
• Amid Record Robotics Funding, Apptronik Raises $520M Series A Extension To Boost Production Of Humanoid Robot Apollo

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