Another week, another pulse check on Tech.
From top insights and reports to new funds, VC jobs, resources, and the hottest deals, here’s everything you need to stay ahead 👇
this weekly recap is brought to you by Second Front:
The Dummies Guide to USG Software Authorization
The US government is one of the largest software buyers on earth, and most companies never sell a seat because the authorization maze stops them first. ATO, FedRAMP, Impact Levels: the vocabulary alone ends most attempts.
Second Front wrote the guide that clears it up
▫️ Plain-English breakdown of ATO, FedRAMP, and DoD Impact Levels
▫️ The path with a government sponsor, and without one
▫️ Where teams stall, and how to plan around it
Second Front’s Game Warden gets your product authorized and ready to ship on unclassified and classified networks across DoW, FedRAMP for civilian agencies, and GovRAMP for state, local, and education. One platform. Every level of government.
In-Depth Insights 🔍
How to crack YC investing🎯
YC-focused funds show median returns near 5x, but access depends on speed, founder relationships, and doing diligence before rounds fill. The strongest signal is how deeply founders learn from users, not early revenue, product polish, or market metrics. [Jason Freedman]
Agent Memory Is a Database Problem 💾
Persistent agent memory stores information across sessions, requiring reliable retrieval, user scoping, metadata, and lifecycle rules beyond what larger context windows provide. Working, procedural, semantic, and episodic memory serve different jobs, but durable systems depend on disciplined storage, filtering, updates, and expiry. [Developers Blog]
Grit Is Built Through Repeated Effort 💪
Angela Duckworth’s framework ties achievement to talent and sustained effort, with deliberate practice turning persistence into compounding skill. Interest, practice, purpose, and hope form the core, while companies can reinforce grit through hiring, culture, feedback, and recognition. [Alfred Lin, Sequoia]AI Intelligence Is Becoming the Primitive Layer 💡
Anish Acharya’s LP deck frames AI progress as a gap between model capability and economic diffusion, with applications capturing the value downstream. The key questions are where model commoditization leaves room for moats, how automation reshapes enterprises, and which consumer applications can sustain demand. [Anish A]
Chinese Open-Source Models Are Taking AI Traffic 📉
Chinese models now account for a growing share of OpenRouter traffic as startups adopt Qwen and DeepSeek for dramatically lower inference costs. The tradeoff is strategic risk, with policymakers scrutinizing data handling, model provenance, censorship, cybersecurity, and supply-chain exposure. [Startup Fortune]
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Interesting Reports 📊
Space Tech Funding Doubles Down on Later-Stage Bets 🚀
Space tech raised $11.3B across 244 deals in H1 2026, already beating all of 2025 with fewer rounds. 87.4% of capital went to venture-growth and late-stage deals, signaling demand for proven contracts and production capacity. [PitchBook]
European VC Valuations Climb as Exits Rebound 📈
European deal values rose 25% year over year, while late-stage valuations surged as AI, cleantech, and advanced manufacturing led funding. Down rounds fell to a record-low 11.8%, while median exits jumped 150.8% as public listing valuations surged. [PitchBook]
Europe’s $15T Pension Pool Barely Funds Venture 🏛️
Europe has $15T in pension and insurance assets, yet only about 0.1% has reached venture capital, leaving a massive pool outside startups. Raising that allocation to 2% could significantly increase annual funding for European companies and help more unicorns scale domestically. [Dealroom.co]
Recently Launched Funds 💸
Blackbird raised $750M across two venture funds targeting early-stage and growth-stage startups across Australia and New Zealand.
Navisalma launched as a deep-tech venture firm and is seeking to raise €450M for its debut fund to back frontier technology companies.
QuantumLight closed its second fund at €432M to back growth-stage companies across AI, fintech, SaaS, healthtech, and deep tech.
Permanent Capital Ventures closed its second fund at $200M to back Series A applied-AI companies with a focus on scaling go-to-market execution.
Cognition Venture Partners launched a new venture firm and is raising $170M to invest in cybersecurity startups serving the agentic AI era at Seed and Series A.
MassMutual Ventures launched its $150M Climate Technology Fund II to back early-stage climate-tech and AI companies improving real assets across North America.
FGV Capital closed Fund II at $35M to back early-stage companies at the intersection of fintech, financial access, and AI.
Capital F closed its debut fund at $17M to invest at pre-seed and seed in technology companies serving the $15T female economy.
The US VC Database Most Founders Never Build
2,000 active US VC firms. Pre-seed to seed. Every sector. All in one database.
VC Jobs 💼
Bessemer Venture Partners (San Francisco, CA): Senior VC Associate (apply here)
Northzone (London, England): VC Associate (apply here)
Sagana (Europe): VC Director (apply here)
New York Life Ventures (New York City, NY): Senior VC Associate (apply here)
Helios Energy Ventures (Remote): Senior VC Analyst (apply here)
Cometa (Mexico City, MX): VC Analyst (apply here)
Entourage (Ghent, Belgium): VC Internship (apply here)
T Capital (Germany): VC Analyst (apply here)
Draper Associates (Remote): VC Internship (apply here)
Acton Capital (Munich, Germany): VC Internship (apply here)
Hottest Deals 💥
Starcloud raised $250M in Series A extension funding to scale its space-based computing infrastructure. (read more)
Gatik raised $200M in Series D funding to accelerate autonomous freight deployment and expand its driverless logistics network. (read more)
Generalist AI raised $200M in additional Series B funding at a $3B valuation to advance its AI technology platform. (read more)
Emerald AI raised $150M in Series A funding to develop flexible power infrastructure for AI data centers. (read more)
Alice raised $140M in funding to accelerate growth and expand its technology platform. (read more)
AusperBio raised $120M in Series C funding to advance its biotechnology pipeline and global expansion. (read more)
Cityblock Health raised $116M in Series E funding to expand its technology-enabled healthcare platform. (read more)
Blank Street raised approximately $105M in funding to support continued expansion and growth. (read more)
Unrivaled raised $100M in Series C funding to expand its professional women’s basketball league. (read more)
Stability AI raised $76M in Series B funding to accelerate development of its generative AI platform. (read more)
WRTN Technologies raised $72.4M in funding at an $869M valuation to accelerate its AI platform and growth. (read more)
Airway Therapeutics raised $50M in funding to advance its respiratory therapeutics pipeline. (read more)
Deep Cogito raised $43M in Series A funding to advance its AI models and technology platform. (read more)
Quintessent raised $40M in Series A funding to advance its quantum technology platform. (read more)
Faro AI raised $37.3M in Series B funding to scale its AI-powered autonomous-systems technology. (read more)
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BREAKING: I’m Sharing the Pitch Decks That Built Unicorns
Before companies like Airbnb, Uber, or Revolut were widely recognised, they were just early-stage startups trying to explain themselves clearly enough to raise their first checks.
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