Weekly Tech Digest

Big moves this week - from Kalshi’s $1B prediction market surge and Huel’s €1B exit to Danone, to the latest tech stack tools for startups.

Mar 24, 2026

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Hey Readers!

Welcome back to your weekly digest - a quick roundup of the latest tech news to keep you informed and up to speed.

Just in the past week, we saw prediction markets hit new heights with Kalshi’s $1B raise while consumer health product Huel reached a €1B exit to Danone - marking a massive week for both decentralized finance and consumer health.

From Amazon’s acquisition of Rivr to shore up its robotics fleet to a wave of fresh capital hitting European and AI-focused VC funds, the ecosystem is moving faster than ever.

Plus, we’ve just updated the Startup AI Tech Stack to help you navigate a landscape where being “AI-first” is no longer a choice, but a requirement. Discover the latest tools before it’s too late!

To help you make sense of it all, we’ve rounded up the most talked-about startup stories from the past week - broken down into these categories:

🗝️ Read of the week
📊 Chart of the week
🔍 Top tech news
💰 Startup funding news
👀 New VC funds
🤝 Acquisitions
🎤 Must-watch interviews
🧷 Startups to watch (paid subscribers)

Let’s explore what you missed - subscribe to avoid missing future editions!

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🗝️ Read of the week: The Startup AI Tech Stack

When we published our first Startup Tech Stack edition almost two years ago, I think few of us anticipated just how quickly things would change. Back then, only a handful of platforms were AI-first, and even fewer had fully embraced it. Fast forward to today, and almost every platform is AI-first, all racing to dominate their market.

Given how fast things are changing, and the number of tools we rely on daily to run and grow our startups, we thought it was time for an updated version of the Startup Tech Stack, focused on the latest and most popular tools.

To help you navigate the market landscape, we’ve grouped the latest tools into the following categories:

Scaling with AI - everything to become AI-first: Build with AI, Agents & AI Employees, Dev Tools, Research, and Cloud.
GTM tools - everything to help you land customers: GTM/Sales, Design and Marketing.
Operations - everything to help keep the business running: Banking, KYC/Security, Payments, CX, Hiring, Legal, and Automations.
Saving time - everything to help you save time and get back a few hours: Productivity, Docs, and Fundraising.

Let’s explore the latest tools.

📊 Chart of the week: The 2026 unicorns tracker

2025 produced 190 unicorns. 2026 has already added 49 more. Here are the latest startups crossing the $1B mark - what they’re building and why investors are backing them.

This tracker will be updated monthly as your go-to source for the newest unicorns and the trends behind them.

Discover the latest unicorns of 2026.

🔍 Top tech news

Bluesky, the social network raised $100M Series B led by Bain Capital Crypto.
Prediction markets startup Kalshi raised $1B led by Coatue.
Air Street Capital raised Fund III, $232M, making the firm the largest European solo GP fund.

💰 Startup funding news

Swish - An Indian-based food delivery startup raised $38M Series B led by Hara Global and Bain Capital Ventures.
Consumer-focused privacy company Cloaked raised $375M Series B led by General Catalyst and Liberty City Ventures.
Real-time personalization technology and ranking infrastructure platform Sequen raised $16M Series A led by White Star Capital and Threshold Ventures.
U.S. autonomous drone delivery and logistics startup Zipline raised $200M.
AI-native fund administration platform Hanover Park raised $27M Series A led by Emergence Capital.
Software platform Hosted.AI that increases the efficiency of GPU infrastructure, raised $19M Seed led by Creandum.
Deeptune - training gyms for AI agents raised $43M Series A led by Andreessen Horowitz.
Cybersecurity startup Oasis raised $120M Series B led by Craft Ventures.
AI infrastructure Gimlet Labs raised $80M Series A led by Menlo Ventures.

👀 New VC funds

French-Italian 360 Capital raised $98M for a DeepTech fund.
Google-backed Gradient VC raised $220M for its latest AI seed fund.
Central and Eastern European fund Credo Ventures raised $88M for their latest fund.

🤝 Acquisitions

Huel was bought by Danone for €1B.
Grab has acquired Foodpanda Taiwan from Delivery Hero for $600M.
Amazon acquires Rivr, maker of a stair-climbing delivery robot.

🎤 Must-watch interviews

Subscribe to our podcast to hear from founders, investors, and operators behind some of the most enduring companies. Previous episodes include:

Why Hand-Typing Code Will End Your Career in 2026 | Dan Shipper.
The $1.7B Mistake That Ended a Founder’s Dream | Colin Angle.
Andreessen Horowitz General Partner: Venture Capital’s Future | David Haber.
He Built A $1.8B AI Company With No Experience | Max Junestrand.
Forget AI: Inside the Meltdown That Made Airalo #1 eSIM Unicorn | Ahmet Bahadir Ozdemir.
The Hidden Skill Behind Every Successful Founder | Lindsay Kaplan.
The Harsh Truth About Building a Startup in the AI Era | Anish Acharya.
The AI Version of You Will Outperform You | Emad Mostaque.
How Solana Survived When Most Other Coins Fell | Anatoly Yakovenko.