Announcing our Series D and $1B ARR
Fireworks AI closed a $1.505B Series D at a $17.5B valuation after surpassing $1B in annualized revenue. The company processes 40 trillion tokens daily, with 95%+ from customer-specialized models.
Categories: Willison, Funding (AI)
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Results
Sobota 18. júla 2026
Databricks hits $188 billion valuation in new strategic funding round
Databricks announced a strategic funding round led by Coatue at a $188 billion valuation, up from $134 billion in February 2026, with proceeds earmarked for its Unity AI Gateway, Genie AI coworker, and Lakebase serverless database.
Walden Robotics Launches with $300 Million to Put General-Purpose Robots to Work Today
Cambridge-based Walden Robotics (spun out of Toyota Research Institute) launched from stealth with $300M at a $1.1B valuation. One of their robots is already working 8-hour shifts at a Toyota North American factory.
Munich robotics startup Microagi raises $55m, Germany's largest ever seed round
Munich-based Microagi raised $55M in Germany's largest-ever seed round, led by Hummingbird Ventures. The startup builds a data platform helping manufacturers deploy humanoid robots into live production environments.
Simon Willison built an LLM cliché highlighter tool to identify AI-generated writing patterns
Simon Willison on July 17, 2026 released a browser-based tool that highlights ten recurring patterns in LLM-generated writing — from 'no X, no Y' chains to phrases like 'sit with that' — as a response to the homogenization of AI-assisted content.
Štvrtok 16. júla 2026
Indian AI coding startup Emergent becomes a unicorn with $130M Series C
Emergent, an Indian AI platform that lets non-technical users build full-stack production apps, raised $130M in Series C at a $1.5B valuation — a fivefold jump in six months. Over 12 million apps have been built on the platform.
Streda 15. júla 2026
Chai Discovery Raises $400M Series C at $3.8B Valuation for AI Drug Discovery
AI biotech startup Chai Discovery closed a $400M Series C at a $3.8B valuation — triple its valuation from seven months prior. The Chai-3 platform improves antibody binding affinity and is used by Eli Lilly and Pfizer. OpenAI is among existing investors.
Utorok 14. júla 2026
DeepSeek Mulls New Funding Round at $71 Billion Valuation
Chinese AI leader DeepSeek is exploring a new funding round at a $71 billion pre-money valuation — just weeks after closing its $7.4 billion June 2026 round. The 42% valuation jump reflects surging global demand for its models.
Pondelok 13. júla 2026
Helsing raises $1.8 billion in Europe's biggest defense-startup round
European defense AI company Helsing closed a $1.8B Series E at an $18B valuation — the largest-ever funding round for a European defense tech startup. Investors include Goldman Sachs Alternatives, Dragoneer, Lightspeed, and JPMorgan.
Štvrtok 9. júla 2026
General Intuition raises $320M to train robots on video game data — ambition to be the 'GPT of physical AI'
Robotics startup General Intuition raised $320M at a $2.3B valuation. CEO Pim de Witte believes robotics is undergoing a similar inflection point as NLP after GPT-3, with video game data being the key instead of real-world robot telemetry.
Lovable Reportedly in Talks to Double Its Valuation to $13.2B
Lovable, the AI-powered vibe-coding platform, is reportedly in talks for a new funding round that would double its valuation to $13.2 billion.
Prime Intellect Raises $130M Series A to Help Enterprises Build Their Own AI Agents
Prime Intellect, a startup providing compute and specialized tooling for enterprises building their own AI agents, raised a $130M Series A at a $1 billion valuation.
Streda 8. júla 2026
AI chip maker SambaNova raises $1B at $11B valuation, 5 months after last mega round
SambaNova Systems raised $1 billion at an $11 billion valuation led by General Atlantic. JPMorgan Chase named it as an inference infrastructure partner deploying SN40 and SN50 systems for on-premise AI workloads.
AI Law Startup Norm Raises $120M Series C, Hits $1.2B Unicorn Valuation
Norm, an AI-native law firm using its own AI agents supervised by human attorneys for enterprise clients, closed a $120M Series C led by Khosla Ventures at a $1.2B unicorn valuation.
Utorok 7. júla 2026
Station F Launches Second F/ai Accelerator Cohort — First Cohort Raised $34 Million
Station F's second F/ai accelerator cohort kicks off in September 2026, after the first cohort collectively raised $34 million in pre-seed funding, establishing the Paris hub as Europe's premier AI startup launchpad.
Pondelok 6. júla 2026
AI Boom Mints 90 New Unicorns in H1 2026 — Double the Pace of 2025
Nearly 90 startups reached unicorn status in H1 2026, more than double 2025's pace. Promethus (co-founded by Bezos) raised a $12B Series B — the largest single startup round in history.
Piatok 3. júla 2026
Crusoe in Talks to Raise $3 Billion in Round That May Triple Firm's Value
Crusoe, the AI data center company with compute contracts for Meta and Oracle, is in talks to raise $3 billion in a round that may triple its valuation from $10 billion to $30 billion, as it contracts 4.9 GW of computing power with 40+ GW in pipeline.
China's Kling AI Raises $2 Billion to Expand AI Video Operations
Kling AI, a spinoff from Chinese short-video giant Kuaishou Technology, raised an initial $2 billion in venture capital to expand its AI video generation operations.
Štvrtok 2. júla 2026
Venice AI Becomes a Unicorn with $65M Series A as Its Privacy-First AI Platform Takes Off
Privacy-focused AI platform Venice AI raised a $65 million Series A at a $1 billion valuation — its first external fundraise — after organically growing to over 3 million active users offering access to 200+ AI models with zero data retention.
Utorok 30. júna 2026
Robot hand company settles Tesla trade secret suit and announces $11M raise
Proception, founded by a former Tesla Optimus technical lead, settled a year-old trade secret lawsuit with Tesla and simultaneously announced an $11 million seed round led by First Round Capital.
Nedeľa 28. júna 2026
Mistral AI raises $830M debt facility for data center expansion at €11.7B valuation
Mistral AI raised $830M in debt (not equity) at an €11.7B valuation. A new 10 MW inference-focused data center at Les Ulis opens in Q3 2026.
Piatok 26. júna 2026
General Intuition's $2.3B bet that video games can train AI agents for the real world
Spatial-AI startup General Intuition raised a $320M Series A led by Khosla Ventures at a $2.3B valuation, training world models on gameplay clips from Medal's 17M monthly users.
Trase Raises $107M Seed Round Led by ARCH Venture Partners to Build Agentic OS for Regulated Industries
Trase, founded by Grant Verstandig, raised a $107M seed led by ARCH Venture Partners to build an agentic operating system for regulated industries like healthcare and defense. Total funding now $117.5M.
Scaled Cognition Raises $100M Series A Led by Khosla Ventures to Build Reliable Enterprise AI
Scaled Cognition raised $100M Series A led by Khosla Ventures at a ~$750M valuation, with Genesys joining as both investor and customer. The company sells its Agentic Pretrained Transformer (APT) model and simulation platform for high-stakes enterprise deployments.
Alan Announces €480 Million Financing Round to Make Prevention Insurance the New Global Standard
French digital health insurer Alan closed a €480M Series G led by Prosus at a €5.5B valuation. Q1 2026 ARR exceeded €800M with 53% YoY growth. One of Europe's largest 2026 health-tech rounds.
Runpod Raises $100M Led by Summit Partners at $1B Valuation
GPU cloud Runpod closed a $100M growth round led by Summit Partners at a $1B valuation. ARR doubled in six months to $240M. The company turned down acquisition offers above $500M to stay independent.
Patronus AI Lands $50M to Build Digital Worlds That Stress-Test AI Agents
Patronus AI raised a $50M Series B led by Greenfield Partners and unveiled Digital World Models — large-scale simulation environments to stress-test AI agents before production. Revenue grew 15x year over year.
Sail Research Emerges from Stealth with $80M to Slash AI Agent Inference Costs
Sail Research emerged from stealth with a combined $80M seed + Series A at a $450M valuation, led by Kleiner Perkins with Sequoia, Redpoint. The company optimises infrastructure for long-running AI agents and already processes trillions of tokens weekly.
Vishal Sikka's Hang Ten Systems raises $32M seed to challenge IT services with agentic AI
Former Infosys CEO Vishal Sikka emerged with Hang Ten Systems, raising a $32M seed led by Mayfield. Early customers include Siemens Gamesa and Fresenius; Yahoo co-founder Jerry Yang is on the board.
Framework Ventures Raises $400M Fourth Fund, Expands Beyond Crypto into AI and Robotics
Crypto-native VC Framework Ventures closed a $400M fourth fund and explicitly broadened its scope to 'frontier technology' including AI, robotics and energy. Roughly half the fund is already deployed.
Štvrtok 25. júna 2026
Runlayer raises $30M Series A to govern enterprise AI agents
Runlayer raised $30M from Felicis and Khosla Ventures to give enterprises unified control over deployed AI agents and visibility into shadow AI.
Coval raises $28M Series A to define safety for autonomous voice agents
Coval, founded by ex-Waymo engineer Brooke Hopkins, raised $28M led by Norwest to scale simulation infrastructure for voice and chat AI agents.
Assort Health raises $120M Series C at $1.2B valuation for healthcare AI
Assort Health closed a $120M Series C led by Menlo Ventures, making it one of the largest deployments of AI agents in healthcare.
Taktile raises $110M Series C to automate high-stakes financial decisions
Goldman Sachs led a $110M Series C for Berlin/NYC startup Taktile, whose Agentic Decision Platform automates loan approvals and insurance claims.
Streda 24. júna 2026
AI Factory Startup Hadrian Denies Reported $1 Billion Funding Round
Defense startup Hadrian Automation has denied a Bloomberg report claiming a $1B funding round at a $7.5B valuation. The company was valued at $1.6B in January, so the reported number would more than quadruple it.
Utorok 23. júna 2026
SpaceX inks compute deal with Reflection AI, an open source AI lab
Open-source AI lab Reflection (founded by ex-DeepMind researchers) will pay SpaceX $150M/month through 2029 — up to $6.3B total — for GB300-based compute at the Colossus 2 data center near Memphis.
Abu Dhabi's MGX Raises About $50 Billion to Accelerate AI Deals
MGX has raised close to $50B from sovereign wealth funds and institutions to accelerate AI infrastructure and frontier-tech bets, with capital already flowing to OpenAI and xAI.
Groq Raises $650 Million to Expand Data Centers After Nvidia Asset Sale
Groq raised $650M to expand data-center capacity and pivot from chip maker into AI compute provider, following an asset sale to Nvidia.
SpaceX Readies Its $20 Billion Bond Debut to Fund AI Ambition
SpaceX launched its first-ever USD investment-grade bond offering, expected to total ~$20B, signaling a major borrowing spree to back its AI compute (Colossus) ambitions after its $75B IPO.
Anthropic Backer Menlo Ventures Lands $3 Billion in Its Largest-Ever Haul
Anthropic backer Menlo Ventures closed $3B across two vehicles — Menlo Ventures XVII (seed/Series A) and Inflection IV (growth) — its largest haul ever, with its Anthropic stake reportedly worth ~$14B.
Nedeľa 21. júna 2026
VLC creator's Kyber raises $5M to control robots with low latency
VLC lead Jean-Baptiste Kempf launched Kyber, an SDK to control robots, drones and remote IT with minimal latency. Lightspeed — backer of Anthropic and Mistral — led a $5M round.
Piatok 19. júna 2026
World model maker Odyssey nabs $1.45B valuation backed by Amazon and other big names
Odyssey raised a Series B led by Natural Capital with Amazon and AMD Ventures backing world-model tech. AWS becomes its preferred cloud; existing backers include Jeff Dean and Garry Tan.
Alphabet announces proposed $80B equity capital raise to expand AI infrastructure and compute
Google's parent plans an $80B equity raise to fund the next wave of AI data-center buildout and compute.
Bezos-backed Prometheus raises $12B at $41B valuation
The physical-AI startup from Jeff Bezos and Vik Bajaj raised $12B from JPMorgan, Goldman and BlackRock; the goal is an 'artificial general engineer' that designs physical systems.
Mistral in talks to raise €3B at €20B valuation — Europe doubles its bet
The French AI lab is reportedly negotiating roughly €3B ($3.5B), which would nearly double its September 2025 €11.7B valuation. Mistral positions itself as Europe's sovereign alternative to US labs.