Cerebras Systems (AI Infrastructure & Foundational Models): $1.1B

Nscale (AI Infrastructure & Foundational Models): $433M

Vercel & Periodic Labs (AI Infrastructure & Foundational Models): $300M each

AI Infrastructure & Foundational Models: ~$2.68B

AI for Legal, Finance, & Pro Services: ~$252M

Healthcare & Life Sciences AI: ~$229M

Cerebras Systems, makers of the "fastest AI infrastructure in the industry," announced a $1.1 billion Series G funding round at $8.1 billion post-money valuation. Fidelity Management & Research Company and Atreides Management co-led the round. It will be used to expand its technology portfolio in AI processor design and grow its U.S. manufacturing and data center capacity. Cerebras

Modal, an infrastructure provider for AI-native companies, raised $87 million Series B round at a $1.1 billion valuation. The round, led by Lux Capital, brings the company's total funding to $111 million and will be used to scale its platform, which helps developers run generative AI models, large-scale batch jobs, and serve models in production. Modal Blog

Rebellions Inc., a South Korean AI chip startup, raised $250 million in a Series C financing at a $1.4 billion valuation. The round included a strategic investment from Arm Holdings and participation from Samsung Ventures to help the company mass-produce its chips and accelerate product development for next-generation data center infrastructure. Bloomberg

SCINTIL Photonics, a French deep-tech startup specializing in silicon photonics for monolithic laser integration, closed a $58 million Series B round. The funding, led by Yotta Capital Partners and NGP Capital with participation from NVIDIA, brings its total raised to €67.5 million and will support its work in developing high-speed optical interconnects. Tech Funding News

Black Forest Labs, a one-year-old German AI startup focused on image generation models, is in talks to raise between $200 million and $300 million at a valuation of around $4 billion. The company, which previously secured backing from Andreessen Horowitz at a $1 billion valuation, is one of the few European firms developing its own foundational AI models. Financial Times

Periodic Labs, a startup founded by former OpenAI and Google DeepMind researchers, came out of stealth with a $300 million seed round. Backed by Andreessen Horowitz, DST, Nvidia, and others, the company aims to create "AI scientists" and autonomous robotic labs to automate scientific discovery, starting with a goal to invent new superconductors. TechCrunch

Vercel, the company behind Next.js, closed a $300 million Series F funding round at a $9.3 billion valuation. The round, co-led by Accel and GIC, will accelerate the growth of Vercel's AI Cloud, a platform for building, scaling, and securing AI-native applications and agents for enterprises. Business Wire

Phaidra, a Seattle startup using AI to improve data center energy efficiency, raised $50 million in a Series B round led by Collaborative Fund. The company, founded by DeepMind alumni, develops AI agents that coordinate electricity, cooling, and workload management systems to help data centers "run smarter, not just harder." GeekWire

Datawizz, a company building specialized, smaller AI models as a cost-effective alternative to large general-purpose models, raised $12.5 million in a seed round led by Human Capital. The platform trains expert models on enterprise data and automatically routes queries to reduce token consumption and improve unit economics for AI applications. SiliconANGLE

Axiom Math, a startup building an "AI mathematician" to solve complex mathematical problems and generate new proofs, has raised $64 million in seed funding at a $300 million valuation. The round was led by B Capital, with participation from Greycroft, Madrona, and Menlo Ventures. Forbes

Nscale, the UK-based AI data center startup, closed a $433 million pre-Series C SAFE financing just days after announcing a $1.1 billion funding round, bringing its total raised to over $1.7 billion. The round included funding from Nvidia, Nokia, and Dell, and will support Nscale's role as a key infrastructure partner for OpenAI's "Stargate" data centers in Norway and the UK. Tech.eu

Moonlake AI, a startup founded by two former Stanford PhD students, raised $28 million in seed funding from AIX Ventures, Nvidia Ventures, and Threshold Ventures. The company is developing AI software to create "interactive 3D worlds" that can serve as a bedrock of training data for advanced reasoning models in gaming, animation, and robotics. Forbes

Unconventional, Inc., a new AI hardware startup founded by former Databricks AI head Naveen Rao, is in talks to raise $1 billion at a $5 billion valuation. The round is reportedly led by Andreessen Horowitz and aims to fund the development of a novel AI computer, including custom silicon chips and server infrastructure, to compete with Nvidia. TechCrunch

Anything, a San Francisco-based no-code platform for building AI-powered mobile and web applications, raised $11 million in Series A funding at a $100 million valuation. The round, led by Footwork, will help the company scale its platform that allows users to create production-ready apps from natural language prompts, aiming to move from "coding assistants to autonomous development teams." Tech Funding News

Paid, a London-based startup creating a monetization platform for AI agents, raised a $21 million seed round. Led by Lightspeed Venture Partners, the company provides infrastructure for "results-based billing," allowing developers of AI agents to charge customers based on the value their agents provide rather than on traditional per-user or usage-based fees. TechCrunch

Supernova, a Czech startup, secured a $9.2 million Series A round led by Taiwania Capital. The funding will support the launch of Portal, an AI-powered product development tool that introduces a category the company calls "vibe-coding" to automate and speed up strategic tasks across enterprise product workflows. Tech.eu

Dash0, an AI-native observability platform, raised $35 million Series A led by Cherry Ventures and Accel. The German startup’s platform helps developers troubleshoot issues in cloud applications by using an AI agent to analyze logs, metrics, and traces to find the root cause of problems. Sifted

Supabase, an open-source database service and Firebase alternative popular with AI developers, raised $100 million in Series E at a $5 billion valuation. Led by Accel and Peak XV, the funding comes just four months after a $200 million Series D and will be used to scale its platform, which provides Postgres databases with enterprise-grade tools like vector toolkits for AI applications. TechCrunch

Podonos, a startup building a human-in-the-loop evaluation and infrastructure layer for voice AI, has raised $2.4 million in pre-seed funding. The round, led by Serac Ventures, will help the company build out its platform that enables AI teams to test models for naturalness, emotion, and accuracy to improve performance in real-world applications. PRNewswire

Alvys, a developer of an AI-powered Transportation Management System (TMS) for freight operations, raised $40 million in Series B funding. The round, led by RTP Global, brings the company's total funding to $77 million and will be used to expand its AI capabilities for automating dispatch, load management, tracking, and billing. FreightWaves

DRUID AI, a Bucharest-based agentic AI platform for enterprise automation, raised $31 million in a Series C funding round led by Cipio Partners. The funds will support the company's global expansion and enhance its conversational AI platform used to automate HR, IT, finance, and customer-facing workflows. Tech Funding News

Mondoo, a pioneer in "Agentic Vulnerability Management," raised $17.5 million to expand its context-aware AI platform that prioritizes and remediates security vulnerabilities. The round, led by HV Capital, brings Mondoo’s total funding to 32.5 million and will be used to accelerate its US and EMEA market presence. BusinessWire 

Alex, a startup building an AI recruiter to automate initial job interviews, raised a $17 million Series A round led by Peak XV Partners. The company's voice AI tool conducts thousands of screening interviews daily for clients, including Fortune 100 companies and Big 4 accounting firms. TechCrunch

Notch.cx, an autonomous AI customer support platform, announced a $7 million Seed round, bringing its total funding to $15 million. Led by Lightspeed Venture Partners, the funding will fuel the growth of its platform, which autonomously resolves up to 87% of enterprise support tickets and has cut support costs by 50% for its clients. PR Newswire

Gain, a startup providing autonomous "AI Employees" for procurement, emerged from stealth with $12 million in seed funding led by The Garage. The company’s AI agents manage end-to-end procurement workflows, from vendor sourcing and negotiations to contract execution, charging customers on a pay-per-outcome basis. StartupHub.ai

Supernova, an AI-powered collaborative workspace for product teams, raised $9.2 million in a Series A funding round. The round was led by Taiwania Capital. Fortune

Willo, a Glasgow-based recruitment technology platform, secured £3 million (~$3.8 million) from Mimecast co-founder Peter Bauer. The new funding will help accelerate the rollout of its "Willo Verified Profiles," a feature that automatically verifies candidate credentials to combat a surge in AI-generated job applications. Tech.eu

Arqh, a Zurich-based AI company building a decision-intelligence engine for complex logistics, closed a $3.8 million pre-seed round. Led by Founderful, the funding will support the expansion of its engineering and research teams to further develop its "Hybrid Brain" that translates operational goals into optimal plans. Tech.eu

TrustNXT, a Munich-based cybersecurity startup, closed a €1.6 million pre-seed round co-led by D11Z Ventures and High-Tech Gründerfonds. Spun off from Basler AG, the company's platform embeds cryptographic trust labels into visual data to safeguard images and videos from AI-generated manipulation. Tech Funding News

Cyvl, an AI infrastructure intelligence platform, raised $14 million in a Series A round led by Sentinel Global. The company uses sensor-fitted vehicles to create high-fidelity 3D maps of cities, transforming the data into actionable insights for automating roadway inspections, asset management, and repair planning. Business Wire

StackGuardian, a European cloud-native startup, raised $10 million in a Series A round led by TIN Capital. The company will use the funds to expand its AI-driven infrastructure automation and orchestration platform, which helps enterprises deliver secure and compliant self-service infrastructure. PR Newswire

Clarifeye, a startup founded by former Dataiku executives, closed a €4 million (~$4.3 million) funding round led by EQT Ventures. The company is developing a "knowledge server" using a GraphRAG architecture that allows domain experts to structure their tacit knowledge into AI-readable systems, closing the context gap for enterprise GenAI. Clarifeye

Tato, an AI-native project intelligence platform built to improve the delivery of large-scale IT and ERP implementations, announced a $5 million seed round led by Ridge Ventures. The platform captures and structures project communications from calls, chats, and apps into a real-time knowledge base to proactively surface risks and decisions. PR Newswire

Hupside, a Northern Virginia-based AI startup developing tech to measure human creativity, closed a $1.7 million pre-seed round led by Ruxton Ventures. The company's "Hupchecker" tool uses closed-source AI models to evaluate originality and help companies understand how their teams can use AI more effectively. Technical.ly

Oneleet, an all-in-one security compliance platform, raised $33 million to expand its engineering team and AI capabilities. The company, which has reached $9 million in ARR, provides a suite of tools, including penetration testing, code scanning, and threat modeling, to help businesses move beyond "compliance theatre" and improve their actual security posture. TechCrunch

Clarifeye, a Paris-based platform enabling organizations to build expert AI agents, raised a €4 million (~$4.3 million) pre-seed round led by EQT Ventures. The company, founded by ex-Dataiku leaders, helps encode domain-specific reasoning and know-how into GenAI systems to overcome the limitations of generalist models. Tech.eu

Composite, a startup building a cross-browser agentic AI tool, raised $5.6 million in seed funding led by Nat Friedman and Daniel Gross's venture firm, NFDG. The company's browser extension automates tedious professional tasks across different web-based tools, regardless of which browser is being used. TechCrunch

DualEntry, an AI-first platform that automates key financial tasks for mid-sized businesses, raised $90 million in a Series A funding round, bringing its valuation to $415 million. With investors like Lightspeed and Khosla Ventures, the company aims to disrupt the legacy ERP market with tools like 'NextDay Migration' that promise to transfer entire financial histories in 24 hours. Finimize

Eve, an AI assistant for plaintiff-side lawyers, raised $103 million in a new financing round at a $1 billion valuation. The round was led by Spark Capital with participation from Andreessen Horowitz and Lightspeed, and will help the company scale its platform, which is used by over 450 law firms to automate pre-litigation tasks. Bloomberg

Lexroom, an Italian startup using generative AI for legal research, drafting, and advisory workflows, closed a $19 million Series A round. The investment was led by Base10 Partners and will be used to accelerate the company's international growth, with expansion already underway in Germany and Spain. Tech.eu

Zania, a GRC (Governance, Risk, and Compliance) software platform, raised $18 million in Series A funding led by NEA. The company is building autonomous AI teammates to execute complex risk and compliance work, replacing traditional dashboards with agents that perform tasks like evidence collection and control testing. Zania Blog

Maximor, a finance automation platform using AI agents, raised a $9 million seed round led by Foundation Capital. The company's platform plugs into ERPs, payroll, and billing systems to automate repetitive accounting work and produce audit-ready outputs, freeing up finance teams for more strategic work. GlobeNewswire

Gelt, an Israeli startup using AI for continuous tax planning for high-net-worth individuals, raised $13 million in a Series A round. The funding brings its total capital to $21.2 million and will be used to expand its proactive tax strategy platform into new markets. Ctech

Legora, a Stockholm-based collaborative AI platform for lawyers, is reportedly in talks to raise over $100 million at a valuation of approximately $1.7 billion. The funding round, expected to be led by Bessemer Venture Partners, would more than double the company's valuation from its $80 million raise earlier this year. Tech Funding News

Assort Health, a startup building specialty-specific voice AI agents for healthcare, raised a $76 million Series B round led by Lightspeed. The funding brings Assort's total capital to $102 million and will be used to expand its platform, which automates patient interactions like appointment scheduling. Fortune

Neura Health, a NYC-based virtual neurology clinic, raised $11.4 million in Series A funding. The round was led by The American Heart Association's Go Red for Women Venture Fund. Fortune

Integra Therapeutics, a Barcelona-based company commercializing a gene-writing platform, closed a €10.7 million (~$11.5 million) pre-Series A round. Led by the EIC Fund, the funding will advance its platform, which combines CRISPR precision with transposase technology to create safer therapies for genetic and oncological diseases. Tech Funding News

Confido Health, an agentic AI platform for healthcare operations, raised $10 million in Series A funding led by Blume Ventures. The company's AI-powered voice agents replace traditional phone trees to answer, resolve, and document patient calls for scheduling, refills, and payments in a single interaction. GlobeNewswire

BoobyBiome, a London-based startup focused on infant health, closed a £2.5 million (~$3.2 million) seed round led by Empirical Ventures. The company translates breast milk microbiome research into health solutions, including a supplement for formula-fed and preterm infants. Tech Funding News

DataJoint, a computational database and AI platform for research in neuroscience, oncology, and systems biology, closed a $4.9 million seed round. The funding was co-led by Nina Capital, Inoca Capital Partners, and Capital Factory and will be used to scale its platform, which streamlines data management and complex AI/ML workflows for research labs. PR Newswire

Simple, an AI-powered health and weight-loss coaching app, closed a $35 million Series B funding round led by Kevin Hart's HartBeat Ventures. The company, which has reached $160 million in ARR with 700,000 subscribers, uses its AI coach "Avo" to provide tailored advice and personalized plans for nutrition, fasting, and movement. TechCrunch

Praxipal, a Berlin-based startup building an AI workforce for healthcare front desks, secured $6.7 million in seed funding led by HV Capital. The company’s AI receptionist, Luna, automates patient communications by handling calls, scheduling, and inquiries to ease workloads amid staffing shortages. Tech.eu

Midi Health, a women's health startup providing virtual care for menopause, raised $50 million in a Series C round led by Advance Venture Partners. The funding brings its total to about $150 million as the company surges to a $150 million revenue run rate and begins building its own AI search engine for women's health. Business Insider Africa

Lupa, an AI-powered operating system for veterinary clinics, raised $20 million in a Series A funding round led by Singular. The platform replaces legacy tools to automate clinic operations and includes an AI receptionist, saving vets an estimated 60 minutes per day and bringing the company's total funding to $25 million. TechNews 180

Lunos AI, a New York-based startup building an AI-driven platform for B2B accounts receivable (AR), launched with a $5 million pre-seed round. Led by General Catalyst and Cherry Ventures, the company will use the funds to scale its team and develop its conversational AI agents that handle payment communication, negotiation, and reconciliation. Tech Funding News

Fonmap, an Istanbul-based fintech platform democratizing access to Turkey's alternative investment funds, raised new funding, bringing its total to $3 million. The company's mobile app allows users to invest in venture capital and real estate funds without paperwork. Tech Funding News

Feedzai, a platform for financial crime and fraud prevention, raised $75 million in new funding at a valuation of more than $2 billion. The company also announced it has signed a framework agreement with the European Central Bank to provide the central fraud detection mechanism for the upcoming digital euro. SiliconANGLE

Tie, an AI-powered identity platform for e-commerce brands, raised $10 million in Series A funding led by Innovating Capital. Formerly known as Revenue Roll, Tie's platform helps brands identify up to 95% of anonymous website visitors to engage them with personalized, real-time messaging, bringing its total funds raised to $17 million. PR Newswire

Argu.ai, a Tel Aviv startup founded this year that lets users turn camera systems into real-time video monitoring agents with simple prompts, raised a $2 million pre-seed round from Miami-Dade Innovation Authority, 1948 Ventures, Andreessen Horowitz, and Mekorot. More here.

MAI, an AI platform that automates performance marketing for e-commerce companies, launched with a $25 million seed round led by Kleiner Perkins. The company’s AI agents autonomously manage and optimize Google Ads spend for small and mid-sized businesses, driving an average of 40% more sales for clients. PR Newswire

AudioShake, a startup that uses AI to separate audio recordings into their individual components, raised $14 million in a Series A round led by Shine Capital. The company is building infrastructure to make sound as flexible as text or images, enabling new use cases in music, film, and multimodal AI training. PR Newswire

Neptune Robotics, a maker of AI-powered underwater robots that clean the hulls of large ships, raised $52 million to accelerate its global expansion. The funding will help the Singapore-based company expand to 30 countries and move toward a planned US IPO in 2027. Bloomberg

Augmented Industries, a Munich-based industrial AI company, raised €4.5 million (~$4.8 million) in pre-seed funding led by b2venture. The company's AI software enables technicians to rapidly create work instructions and troubleshooting guides, aiming to boost productivity and reduce downtime for manufacturers. Tech.eu

InOrbit.AI, a provider of robot orchestration software, closed a $10 million Series A funding round. Co-led by L'Attitude Ventures and Globant Ventures, the investment will accelerate the development of its AI platform that manages fleets of smart robots in manufacturing, logistics, and retail environments. Robotics and Automation News

Arqh, a Zurich-based AI startup, secured a $3.8 million pre-seed round led by Founderful. The company is building a "decision intelligence" engine that combines language models with a proprietary optimization engine to help logistics teams escape spreadsheets and make better real-time operational decisions. Tech Funding News

Lastro, a Brazilian startup, raised R$85 million ($17 million) in a Series A round led by Prosus. The company provides an AI platform named Lais that empowers real estate agents and brokers, and has already assisted over two million people in their property searches. Lais.ai

Viboo, a Swiss building automation software company, secured €3.3 million (~$3.5 million) in seed funding led by Realyze Ventures. Its AI-powered cloud platform connects to smart thermostats to learn heating patterns and proactively control them, delivering an average of 27% in energy savings for commercial buildings. Tech.eu

Hupside, a DC-based startup providing a platform to measure and scale human originality, raised $1.7 million in pre-seed funding led by Ruxton Ventures. The company's "Hupchecker" assessment generates an "Original Intelligence Quotient" (OIQ) to quantify how individuals think beyond conventional and AI-generated ideas. FinSMEs

Optimuse, an Austrian deep tech startup, raised €4 million (~$4.3 million) in seed funding. The company uses AI to simulate and optimize heating, cooling, and building envelope systems early in the planning process, helping to make building design smarter, cheaper, and greener. Tech.eu

Flai, a startup developing omni-channel AI agents for car dealerships, closed a $4.5 million seed round led by First Round Capital. The company builds tailored AI to handle customer phone calls, emails, and texts, aiming to help dealerships capture leads and manage service appointments without losing customers to busy phone lines. TechCrunch

Workday announced its acquisition of SANA Labs, a Stockholm-based AI startup specializing in personalized enterprise learning and knowledge management, for $1.1 billion. The deal marks one of Europe's largest AI exits and will integrate SANA's platform into Workday's enterprise software suite. Tech Funding News

Castmagic, a content repurposing platform for creators, acquired Flowsend, an AI workflow engine known for transforming audio and video into high-quality written assets. The acquisition strengthens Castmagic's foundation in high-accuracy transcription and brand voice technology. Castmagic Blog

Hedepy, a Czech online psychotherapy provider, acquired Poland's HearMe.pl, a platform for workplace mental health. The deal creates the largest online psychotherapy platform in Central and Eastern Europe, serving over 80 corporate clients with 120 professionals. Tech Funding News

Meta announced its intent to acquire Rivos, a chip startup backed by Intel that designs high-performance chips based on the open-source RISC-V architecture. The acquisition will bolster Meta's in-house semiconductor efforts and accelerate work on its custom Meta Training and Inference Accelerator (MTIA) chips to reduce its reliance on external suppliers like Nvidia. Reuters

Rose Rocket, an AI-native transportation management platform (TMS), acquired Centro, a company that transforms unstructured email into structured data for supply chain systems. The acquisition will accelerate Rose Rocket's AI capabilities, particularly in its email-to-order workflows and its AI email assistant, TED. PR Newswire

Global Infrastructure Partners (GIP), now part of BlackRock, is in advanced talks to acquire Macquarie-backed Aligned Data Centers in a deal that could be valued at about $40 billion. The transaction, one of the biggest of the year, underscores the immense investor appetite for data center infrastructure driven by the AI boom. Bloomberg

Perplexity has acquired the team behind Visual Electric, a Sequoia-backed AI design startup. The team will join a new "Agent Experiences" group at Perplexity, while the Visual Electric product, an AI image editor on an infinite canvas, will be shut down. TechCrunch

Uber acquired Segments.ai, a Belgian data labeling startup, to expand its nascent AI services business. The Y Combinator-backed startup's team will join Uber's data-labeling unit to bolster its capabilities in lidar and multi-sensor data annotation, helping it compete with players like Scale AI. Bloomberg

OpenAI acquired Roi, an AI-powered personal finance application, in an acqui-hire. Only Roi's CEO will join OpenAI, and the app will shut down its service on October 15. The deal is the latest in a series of acqui-hires for OpenAI and signals a strategic push to build out its team for personalized consumer AI products. TechCrunch

Concept Ventures closed its oversubscribed Fund II at $88 million, making it Europe's largest dedicated pre-seed fund. The London-based firm, an early backer of AI unicorn ElevenLabs, will use the fund to back up to 50 early-stage companies with average checks of nearly $1 million. Tech Funding News

Expeditions, an early-stage investor focused on European security and deep tech startups, secured over €100 million for its second fund, surpassing its initial target and aiming for a final close of €150 million. The fund's limited partners include the NATO Innovation Fund and early executives from Skype, Wise, and Bolt. Tech Funding News

Toyota committed over $1.5 billion to its startup investment ecosystem, creating a new strategic investment subsidiary, Toyota Invention Partners, with $670 million in capital and launching a second $800 million fund for its growth-stage venture arm, Woven Capital. The initiatives will target startups in AI, automation, climate tech, and energy. TechCrunch

Better Tomorrow Ventures closed its third fund at $140 million to continue investing in early-stage fintech startups. The firm remains bullish on the sector, citing the massive opportunity for digitization and the application of AI in labor-intensive areas like accounting, underwriting, and compliance. TechCrunch

May Ventures, a new VC fund based in Münster, Germany, launched with over €30 million raised for its €50 million target fund. The firm will focus on an "AI-native" mission to invest in early-stage AI startups in the DACH region, using AI agents in its own deal sourcing and portfolio support. EU-Startups

Notion Capital, a London-based VC, announced the close of a new €114 million growth fund, Notion Capital Opportunities III SCSp. The fund will expand the firm's focus on AI-driven B2B software and FinTech, targeting scale-stage companies across Europe. EU-Startups

Wave Function Ventures, an early-stage deep tech fund founded by SpaceX alum Jamie Gull, closed its first fund with $15.1 million. The firm will make seed and pre-seed investments in around 25 startups across hardware-intensive sectors, including humanoid robotics, nuclear energy, and aerospace. TechCrunch

California Governor Gavin Newsom signed into law SB 53, a landmark AI safety bill that establishes first-in-the-nation transparency requirements for large AI companies like OpenAI and Google. The legislation mandates disclosure of safety protocols and creates whistleblower protections for employees. TechCrunch

OpenAI announced the release of Sora 2, its next-generation audio and video generator, alongside a new, linked social app also called Sora. The TikTok-style app allows users to generate videos and share them in an algorithmic feed, and includes a "cameos" feature for users to insert their own likeness into AI-generated scenes. TechCrunch

Accenture Ventures made a strategic investment in Rehuman, a UK-based insurtech startup. Rehuman's AI-driven platform and digital wallet help insurance brokers manage client relationships and allow policyholders to securely store policies, interpret coverage details, and compare options. Life Insurance International

Wikimedia Deutschland announced the Wikidata Embedding Project, a new database that uses vector-based semantic search to make Wikipedia's knowledge more accessible to AI models. The project, undertaken with Jina.ai and IBM-owned DataStax, aims to provide high-quality, fact-oriented data for fine-tuning and retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) systems. TechCrunch

Meta announced it will begin using data from user interactions with its AI products, including conversations with its AI chatbot, to sell targeted ads across its social media platforms. The company's privacy policy will be updated globally, except in regions like the EU, where privacy laws prevent this type of data collection. TechCrunch

Thinking Machines Lab, a stealth AI startup co-founded by former OpenAI CTO Mira Murati, has revealed its first product, Tinker. The tool automates the creation of custom frontier AI models by making it easier for researchers and developers to fine-tune open-source models like Llama and Qwen. WIRED

Salesforce launched Agentforce Vibes, an enterprise "vibe-coding" product that allows developers to describe their needs in natural language and have an AI agent write the code. The tool includes an autonomous AI agent named Vibe Codey that connects to a company's existing Salesforce account to reuse code and follow guidelines. TechCrunch

Slack is launching a real-time search API and a Model Context Protocol server, giving third-party AI agents unprecedented access to workplace conversational data. The move positions the Salesforce-owned platform as a foundational layer for enterprise AI, betting that control over unstructured conversational data will be key to making AI agents truly useful. Slack will not charge developers fees or take a revenue share, aiming instead to drive deeper platform engagement. VentureBeat

A study revealed that some AI startups are using creative accounting to inflate Annual Recurring Revenue (ARR), a metric prized by VCs. The report found that founders are counting short-term pilots, one-time deals, and contracts with easy opt-out clauses as recurring revenue, creating a disconnect between reported growth and actual business stability. Fortune

The AI boom's next wave is increasingly being fueled by debt, drawing comparisons to the dot-com bubble. While the initial surge was funded by cash from large tech companies, the current phase involves significant borrowing to finance the massive splurge on computing and networking infrastructure required for advanced AI. The Wall Street Journal

Andreessen Horowitz published a report, "AI x Commerce," analyzing how AI will disrupt different categories of consumer purchasing behavior. The analysis breaks commerce into five segments—from "impulse buys" to "life purchases"—and speculates on how AI agents, consultants, and coaches will reshape shopping, research, and transactions. a16z

The entertainment industry in Los Angeles is facing a severe downturn, with a 30% drop in employment since 2022. A Wall Street Journal report details how the post-strike production slowdown, combined with the looming threat of generative AI making animation and VFX jobs obsolete, is causing an exodus of the city's creative middle class. The Wall Street Journal

Forbes explores how interactive 3D worlds, generated by AI for gaming and simulation, could solve the data scarcity problem for training next-generation AI models. Startups like Moonlake AI are building platforms to create these environments, providing a potentially infinite source of high-quality data for robotics and advanced reasoning systems. Forbes

AI VC Funding Hits Record Levels Amid Bubble Fears: Venture capitalists have poured a record $192.7 billion into AI startups globally so far in 2025, according to data from PitchBook. In the first quarter alone, AI deals accounted for 57.9% of all venture funding. The massive influx of capital is creating a bifurcated market where large, established AI players raise billions while non-AI startups struggle. The trend has prompted senior investors from firms like GIC and TPG to warn of a "hype bubble" and "frothy" valuations in the early-stage venture space. Reuters | Bloomberg

Fermi (FRMI), an energy real estate investment trust co-founded by former U.S. Energy Secretary Rick Perry, surged 54% in its Nasdaq debut, closing with a valuation near $15 billion. The company, which aims to build hyperscale data centers powered by modern energy sources, raised $682.5 million in its IPO, signaling strong investor appetite for AI infrastructure plays. Reuters

Elon Musk's business empire has been hit by a wave of senior departures from Tesla and xAI over the past year. An exodus of top executives and key team members from divisions including US sales, Optimus robotics, and AI has been driven by burnout from a "24/7 campaign-style work ethos" and disillusionment with Musk's strategic pivots and political activism. Financial Times

Fermi (FRMI), an energy real estate investment trust co-founded by former U.S. Energy Secretary Rick Perry, surged 54% in its Nasdaq debut, closing with a valuation near $15 billion. The company, which aims to build hyperscale data centers powered by modern energy sources, raised $682.5 million in its IPO, signaling strong investor appetite for AI infrastructure plays. Reuters

OpenAI's valuation soared to a record $500 billion following a secondary share sale that allowed employees to sell about $6.6 billion in stock. The deal propels the ChatGPT maker past SpaceX to become the world's most valuable startup and has fueled a rally in AI-related chip stocks. Yahoo Finance

Marissa Mayer, former CEO of Yahoo, is dissolving her consumer AI startup, Sunshine, after seven years. The company's assets will be sold to Dazzle, a new AI personal assistant firm founded by Mayer, with Sunshine's employees expected to join the new venture. WIRED

OpenAI's new social app, Sora, saw a flood of AI-generated deepfakes of CEO Sam Altman in its first 24 hours of invite-only access. The bizarre and often satirical videos, which place Altman in surreal scenarios, highlight both the power of the new Sora 2 video model and the ethical and safety questions surrounding user-generated deepfake technology. TechCrunch

OpenAI has wrapped up a secondary share sale that valued the company at a record $500 billion. Employees sold $6.6 billion worth of shares to investors, including Thrive Capital and SoftBank, cementing OpenAI's status as the world's most valuable private company, surpassing SpaceX. CNBC

OpenAI Shifts Sora IP Policy After Hollywood Backlash: In response to concerns from entertainment companies, OpenAI is changing its policy for the Sora video generation app. CEO Sam Altman announced that the company will provide rightsholders with "more granular," opt-in-like controls over the use of their characters and IP. The move is a significant walk-back from its previous opt-out model and comes as OpenAI explores a potential revenue-sharing model with content owners. The Hollywood Reporter

Top AI labs, including Google DeepMind, Meta, and Nvidia, are increasingly shifting focus to "world models"—AI systems trained on video and robotic data to better understand and navigate the physical world. This push beyond large language models aims to achieve "superintelligence" and unlock applications in robotics, self-driving cars, and industrial automation. Financial Times