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 Vanta:
You’ve adopted AI. Now what about governance?
AI adoption is outpacing regulation and the governance programs meant to manage it. Security and risk leaders must enable AI while answering a harder question: how much risk are you taking on?
Jane Frankland, cybersecurity leader, author, and advisor on cyber survivability, joins GRC experts from Vanta on how to build and scale an AI governance program.
Learn how to:
Build AI governance into your security and risk program
Discover and assess AI systems and agents, then act based on your risk tolerance
Understand and communicate risk credibly as adoption grows
Prepare for the EU AI Act, ISO 42001, and NIST AI RMF
In-Depth Insights 🔍
903 European Seed Funds You Can Actually Contact 📧
The database covers 903 seed investors across major European markets, filtered for firms with a working route for founders. It includes 287 direct emails, 386 submission links, and 230 firms offering both, plus sector and location data.
Venture Capital’s Incentives Look Strange Even to AI ⚠️
LLMs analyzing today’s VC structure tend to optimize for AUM and fees rather than backing strong companies or generating cash returns. The result points to a deeper issue: incentives can favor capital concentration and fee growth over long-term company outcomes. [The Odin Times]
How Startup Funding Rounds Actually Get Done 🤝
Most startups raise through standout growth, a process that creates a pre-empt, or cold outreach without established investor relationships. A real pre-empt starts with a written term sheet and usually follows months of relationship building over a surprise verbal offer. [Aaron Harris]
Specialized AI Deciders Are Replacing Expensive Generation 🎯
New models make simple classification decisions in milliseconds by scoring probabilities instead of generating full responses. On production email data, they roughly doubled accuracy while cutting inference costs by as much as 100x. [Tomasz Tunguz]
Meta’s Muse Is Moving Faster Than ChatGPT Did at Launch 📱
Muse reached an estimated 642,000 US daily mobile users by day 12, roughly three times ChatGPT’s pace, alongside 2.8 million downloads. It also shipped a Mac app, hit No. 1 on the US App Store, opened its connector platform, and faced an Amazon shopping block over security concerns.
OpenAI Packages the Agent Harness Into an API 🤖
The Agents API gives developers access to the same core harness used by Codex, without a platform fee beyond token costs. Early customers report lower latency, lower task costs, fewer failures, and evaluation scores rising from 0.71 to 0.85.
Software Moats Are Giving Way to Shipping Speed 🏰
Switching costs, data lock-in, and long contracts are becoming weaker as AI makes migrations easier and buyers favor flexible pricing. With median gross revenue retention falling from 88% to 84%, product velocity is becoming a more important defense. [Auren Hoffman]
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Interesting Reports 📊
VC Funds Are Getting Bigger, But Returns Are Splitting 🔍
Top-decile IRRs for 2017 to 2019 VC vintages have fallen while TVPI climbed, showing a wider gap between headline value and realized cash. Megafunds now capture 64% of capital raised, while DPI remains just 9% for those vintages even nine years in, keeping liquidity a central LP concern. [Carta]
Tech Hubs Are Spreading Beyond The Usual Cities 🌍
Dealroom assessed 325 ecosystems across 77 countries across investment, innovation, talent, and outcomes, grouping cities by their ecosystem profiles.
The Bay Area led Global Champions, Mumbai topped Rising Stars, and smaller hubs such as Cambridge and Boulder ranked among the strongest for startup density. [Dealroom.co]
Opus 5.5 Cuts The Cost Of Fundraising Workflows 📈
Opus 5.5 reportedly matches Fable 5.1 quality while running 40% cheaper and 30% faster than Opus 5, with input pricing at $4 per million tokens.
It also caught errors in an invented-number accuracy test that two earlier models missed, alongside a free investor-update prompt and six paid fundraising workflows.
Recently Launched Funds 💸
Dvash Group & Hebrew University launched a $50M independent VC fund focused on deeptech, quantum technologies, dual-use technologies and cybersecurity, investing in external ventures as well as companies emerging from Hebrew University.
Connect Ventures held the first close of Fund V at $55M, targeting pre-seed founders across Europe working at the intersection of AI, hardware and real-world automation.
NewSchool VC closed Fund I at €10M, backing early-stage technology companies from its European base.
Project Ventures launched its inaugural £5M fund to invest £100K–£300K in pre-seed and seed DeepTech and AI startups, with a strong connection to the Imperial College London ecosystem.
Myriad Defence & Final Frontier launched a €100M defence-tech VC fund targeting early-stage companies across the New Nordics and Ukraine.
Mirae Asset & SparkLabs launched a venture capital fund targeting startups across Central Asia, providing dedicated VC capital to the region.
Pulse Fund closed its maiden fund at $63M, backing early-stage scalable climate companies across energy transition, infrastructure, food and agriculture, and mobility.
Misumi Ventures launched a $50M independent Silicon Valley VC fund investing in seed and early-stage frontier hardware, robotics, aerospace, medtech, clean energy, eVTOL, automation and industrial AI.
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 💼
Revent (Munich, Germany): VC Associate (apply here)
Backtrace (Munich, Germany): VC Lead (apply here)
UVC Partners (Munich, Germany): VC Analyst (apply here)
Seedcamp (London, England): VC Analyst (apply here)
10x Founders (Munich, Germany): VC Associate (apply here)
Entourage (Ghent, Belgium): VC Investor (apply here)
YZR Capital (Munich, Germany): VC Manager (apply here)
Allocator One (Vienna, Austria): VC Manager (apply here)
Auxxo (Berlin, Germany): VC Internship (apply here)
Sowefund (Paris, France): VC Associate (apply here)
Hottest Deals 💥
TEKEVER raised $580M in Series D funding to expand its AI-powered autonomous systems business and accelerate international growth, strategic acquisitions and industrial capabilities. (read more)
Island raised $400M in Series F funding, led by Evolution Equity Partners, at a $6.4B valuation to scale its enterprise browser and AI-agent control platform. (read more)
Snorkel AI raised $350M in funding at a $3.5B valuation to scale its AI data platform and enterprise data-generation capabilities. (read more)
Enveda raised $311M in Series E funding to advance its AI-driven natural-molecule drug discovery platform and clinical-stage pipeline. (read more)
Precision Neuroscience raised $250M in Series D funding to advance its brain-computer interface platform through clinical development, regulatory work and commercialization. (read more)
Hubble Network raised $200M in Series C funding at a $1.6B valuation to expand its satellite-to-Bluetooth connectivity network. (read more)
Basecamp Research raised $140M in Series C funding, led by S32, to advance its biological AI models and AI-designed therapeutics pipeline. (read more)
Numeral raised $100M in Series C funding, led by Insight Partners, to scale its AI-powered sales-tax compliance platform. (read more)
Go.AI raised $85M in Series A funding, led by Updata Partners, to accelerate its on-premises AI infrastructure for regulated industries. (read more)
Ultraviolette Automotive raised $85M in Series E funding, led by Yali Capital and TDK Ventures, to scale EV production, launch new products and expand internationally. (read more)
Ema raised $77M in Series B funding, led by Creaegis, to expand its enterprise AI Employee platform across HR, IT and finance workflows. (read more)
BigHat Biosciences raised $75M in Series C funding, co-led by DFJ Growth and Premji Invest, to advance its AI-driven antibody therapeutics platform. (read more)
Anaconda Biomed raised $56M in financing, led by Omega Funds, to advance its neurovascular device portfolio, clinical development and regulatory approvals. (read more)
Confido raised $55M in Series B funding, led by Insight Partners, to scale its AI-powered finance and planning platform for CPG brands. (read more)
Ande raised more than $52M across Seed and Series A financing, backed by Lightspeed, Redpoint, Bain Capital Ventures and others, to build its AI-native corporate entertainment platform. (read more)
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What Is Your Startup Actually Worth? Most Founders Find Out Too Late
Most founders go into fundraising with a number in their head.
2,500 Angel Investors. All SaaS. All Searchable.
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✅ 2,500+ Angel Investors Backing AI & SaaS Startups
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