NEWSLETTER | PODCAST | NEW MEDIA
Hey readers,
Welcome back to your weekly tech digest, a quick look at the biggest stories shaping the tech world this past week.
What did you miss? Anthropic filed publicly for a Nasdaq IPO under the ticker “ANT”, and the S-1 gives us the first audited look at frontier AI economics: $16.3B in revenue in the first half of 2026, up from $4.6B for all of 2025. The listing is expected in mid-November, with reports pointing to a raise of up to $100B at a $2T valuation, which would make it the largest IPO in history.
On the fundraising front, DeepSeek is closing a round of nearly $16B, Kalshi raised another $1B at a $40B valuation, and Re:Build raised $2.1B led by General Catalyst and JPMorganChase to expand U.S. manufacturing. Elsewhere, Cohere closed the first tranche of a Series E targeting up to $5B, and Disruptive announced a $10B fund to write checks of up to $1B into late-stage companies.
If that wasn’t enough, DoorDash agreed to acquire Instacart for $17B, the biggest consumer tech deal of the year so far.
Much to unpack, so let’s dive in 👇
This edition covers:
👀 The latest AI news
💰 Top startup news & funding rounds
💸 Latest VC funds
🤝 Acquisitions
🎤 Must-watch interviews from our podcast show
and much more.
The latest AI news
Anthropic filed publicly for a Nasdaq IPO on October 26 under the ticker “ANT” - read the IPO prospectus here.
Kalshi raised another $1B at a $40B valuation.
Cohere raised $5B led by Schwarz Group, with Nvidia and the Canadian government participating.
Top startup news & funding rounds
EliseAI, the AI automation platform for housing and healthcare operators, raised a $350M Series F at a $4B valuation.
Varda Space Industries, which manufactures pharmaceuticals in orbit, raised a $251M Series D at a $1.6B valuation, co-led by Lux Capital and Natural Capital.
PaleBlueDot AI, the customized GPU compute provider for AI workloads, raised a $200M Series C at a $3.2B valuation.
Biossil, the Toronto-based AI drug discovery platform, became a unicorn with a $153M round led by OpenAI.
SiMa.ai, the edge AI chip platform for humanoids, drones and cars, raised a $150M Series C at a $1.45B valuation, backed by Fidelity and Amplify Partners.
Valon, the AI mortgage servicing operating system, raised a $150M Series D at a $2.3B valuation, led by Andreessen Horowitz and Ribbit Capital.
Flai, which automates customer communication for car dealerships, raised a $27M Series A led by Base10 Partners, Toyota Ventures, First Round Capital, Y Combinator, and others.
Dream raised $17M in Seed funding from a16z to build AI world models for construction.
Serval raised a $150M Series C led by Sequoia Capital to make everyone a builder.
SuperMe raised $20M to let you pester AI clones of Silicon Valley’s savviest people about your career.
Mintive, which gives every team agents they can trust, raised a $7M Seed led by Cowboy Ventures.
Wabi, the AI agent that builds mini apps, raised $55M Series B.
Re:Build raised $2.1B led by General Catalyst and JPMorganChase to expand U.S. manufacturing and launch new industrial startups.
Firehawk Defense raised a $150M+ Series D at a $1.4B+ valuation, co-led by Advent International and Rochefort, to scale U.S. rocket propulsion and munitions production.
Collective raised $100M led by General Catalyst to run solo businesses’ taxes and payroll with AI.
Broccoli raised $52M across Series A and B led by Khosla Ventures to help home services businesses book more jobs.
Hyphenate raised a $45M Series A from Nexus and B Capital to bring AI agents into the CFO’s office.
Opentrons raised a $40M Series E led by Avego to build lab robots that run AI-designed experiments.
Infisical raised a $40M Series B at a $600M valuation led by Elad Gil to secure secrets for AI agents.
Latest VC funds
Seaya raised $670M for a new growth fund to back Europe’s next global tech leaders.
Disruptive, whose past bets include Palantir, Airbnb, and Spotify, announced a $10B fund.
Begin Capital raised $100M Fund II for AI infrastructure, chips and robotics.
Entourage closed $112M Fund II to back early-stage startups across Europe.
Acquisitions
DoorDash has agreed to acquire Instacart for $17B.
Thrive Holdings acquired ADT.
Corridor has been acquired by Cognition.
Guidewire acquired Hyperexponential for $1.7B in cash.
Salesforce acquired Rune Technologies for $375M.
Coveo acquired Anglera.
Clip of the week
Why did OpenAI acquire TBPN? Join the conversation
Must-watch interviews from our podcast show
Josh Elman has shaped products at some of the biggest consumer platforms in tech. He helped lead product at LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter, invested in startups at Greylock, and took senior operating roles at Robinhood and Apple. Now a Partner at Andreessen Horowitz, he joins us for his first external podcast interview since joining the firm.
Previous episodes include
Fiverr CEO: The New Rules to Stay Employed in the AI Economy | Micha Kaufman.
Fireworks CEO: AI Startups Are Scaling Into Bankruptcy (And How to Fix It) | Lin Qiao.
Coinbase CTO: The Strategy to Achieve 99% AI Written Code | Rob Witoff.
Canva Co-Founder: AI Is Useless Without This 1 Skill | Cam Adams.
Base44 Founder: The Strategy Behind Building a Million Dollar Company Solo | Maor Shlomo (Base44) & Mark Tluszcz (Wix).
Axios CEO: How to Get Ahead of Everyone Who’s Using AI | Jim VandeHei.
See all previous episodes here 👉
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