Good morning! This week, a 6-month-old startup with zero revenue raised $2B, burning cash faster than you generate it is a "growth strategy," and Congress actually passed crypto legislation.
As we continue to build at Context Ventures, we've launched Startup Intros with a simple mission: to help early-stage founders find the right investors, faster and smarter.
🎯 BLUF: Bottom Line Upfront
Anthropic's $100B fever dream: Investors chase company with 9-figure offers despite burning $5.6B to make $4B.
Perplexity hits 120x revenue multiple: Because apparently $150M revenue is worth $18B in 2025's AI casino.
Crypto finally gets rules: Congress passes stablecoin regs, settles SEC vs CFTC cage match, tells Fed no CBDCs.
Thinking Machines Lab breaks reality: Ex-OpenAI CTO Mira Murati raises $2B seed round at $10B valuation with zero product or revenue.
VC industry hits reality check: AUM growing to $1.8T by 2029, but only 38% growth vs previous 100%, with 800+ aging unicorns and no exits.
🤯 AI Valuations Gone Wild: When Revenue Multiples Enter the Stratosphere
🤖 Anthropic's $100B Moment: The Claude Effect
This week, Anthropic finds itself in an unusual position: investors are chasing the company with $100B valuation offers, even though the AI startup isn't actively fundraising. Just months ago, they were valued at $61.5B.
The Numbers: Revenue exploded from $3B to $4B annualized in just one month, with Claude Code alone generating $200M+. At $100B, they'd trade at 25x revenue, aggressive but more reasonable than OpenAI's 50x multiple.
The Catch? They burned through $5.6B in 2024 while remaining unprofitable. User metrics are flattening despite strong enterprise adoption, and the talent wars with Meta and OpenAI threaten momentum.
Why the Frenzy? Anthropic has positioned itself as the credible OpenAI alternative for enterprises. Their specialized products, such as Claude Code or Claude for Financial Services, demonstrate that they're targeting high-value verticals with premium pricing.
Burning $5.6B to generate $4B in revenue isn't a business model. It's a bet that scale will eventually lead to profitability. And the fact that investors are approaching them, rather than Anthropic seeking funding, suggests the market has more capital than sense.
🔍 Perplexity's $18B Reality Check: When Search Gets an AI Makeover
This week, Perplexity AI raised another $100M, pushing its valuation to $18B. However, here's the kicker: this wasn't even a new round, but rather an extension of their previous raise, as investors couldn't secure enough funding.
The Numbers: Revenue rocketed from $35M to $150M annualized, while valuation soared from under $1B to $18B in less than two years. That's a 120x revenue multiple for those keeping score.
The Strategy: Launched Comet, an AI-powered browser exclusive to premium subscribers, and inked a deal with Indian telecom giant Bharti Airtel, giving 360M+ users free Perplexity Pro for a year.
The Competition: Taking on Google in search is like bringing a knife to a gunfight, but Perplexity's betting that citation-rich AI answers beat traditional blue links.
At $150M in revenue and an $18B valuation, Perplexity is trading at multiples that make even Anthropic look reasonably priced. However, whether AI search is worth 120x revenue remains the billion-dollar question.
🏛️ Crypto Week: Congress Finally Gives Digital Assets the Rulebook They've Been Begging For
💵 The Stablecoin Slam Dunk
Trump signed the GENIUS Act into law on July 18, creating the first federal framework for dollar-pegged stablecoins. The highlights:
100% reserve requirement backed by cash or short-term Treasuries (no more Tether-style "trust us, bro" accounting)
Monthly public disclosures on what's actually backing your digital dollars
Consumer protections that give holders priority if an issuer goes bust
Full AML/sanctions compliance because Congress wants their cut of the action
🎯 The Great Regulatory Turf War Gets Settled
The CLARITY Act passed the House 294-134 and aims to finally answer the eternal question: Is it a security or a commodity?
CFTC gets the win for most digital commodities, while SEC keeps investment contracts
Three-tier token taxonomy lets tokens "mature" from securities to commodities once they're decentralized enough
Federal exchange registration means no more state-by-state licensing hell for crypto exchanges
🚫 The Anti-CBDC Middle Finger
The House narrowly passed (219-217) the Anti-CBDC Surveillance State Act, basically telling the Fed to keep its hands off programmable money:
No retail CBDC without explicit Congressional approval
Can't use it for monetary policy: sorry, negative interest rate dreams
Privacy protection because nobody wants their coffee purchases being tracked
After years of regulatory uncertainty, crypto finally gets adult supervision. Stablecoins gain legitimacy through strict rules, the industry receives clarity, consumers receive protection, and Congress gets to pretend it understands blockchain.
But the real winner? Lawyers, who now have 500+ pages of new regulations to bill against.
⚡ Startup Quick Hits
🤯 Thinking Machines Lab's $2B Seed Shatters All Records: Former OpenAI CTO Mira Murati's 6-month-old startup raised the largest seed round in history at a $10B pre-money valuation. Led by Andreessen Horowitz, with NVIDIA, Accel, ServiceNow, Cisco, AMD, Jane Street, and even Albania's government piling in. With no product or revenue yet, it's a pure bet on the team of ex-OpenAI talent building "collaborative general intelligence."
✨ Lovable Hits Unicorn Status with "Vibe Coding": The Swedish AI startup raised $200M Series A at a $1.8B valuation just 8 months after launch, led by Accel. With 2.3M users, $75M ARR, and clients like Klarna and Hubspot, they're democratizing app creation for the "last 99%" who can't code. That's a ~24x revenue multiple for those counting.
📝 Substack Finally Joins the Unicorn Club: The newsletter platform raised $100M Series C at a $1.1B valuation, led by BOND and The Chernin Group. With 5M paid subscriptions and 50+ creators making $1M+ annually, they're betting on creator autonomy over algorithmic feeds. The 70% valuation jump from 2021 shows even boring businesses get AI-era multiples.
⚡ VC Quick Hits
🎵 The Chainsmokers Drop $100M Fund Like It's Hot: DJ duo's Mantis VC raised a $100M third fund, 25% larger than their last, while other VCs struggle to maintain fund sizes. They're skipping the typical celebrity VC playbook of consumer deals for B2B startups, leveraging their Fortune 500 party circuit connections for customer intros, because nothing says "enterprise sales" like EDM.
🎭 Ex-Sequoia Partner Raises $355M After Failed Klarna Coup: Matt Miller left Sequoia after trying (and failing) to oust Michael Moritz from Klarna's board, but still secured $355M for his new fund Evantic, with Sequoia as an LP. Despite the drama, he's targeting $400M total for B2B Series B/growth deals across the Atlantic, proving that in VC, there are no permanent enemies, only permanent carry.
📈 VC AUM to Hit $1.8T by 2029, But the Party's Slowing Down: North American VC assets will grow 38% over five years to $1.8T, way slower than the previous five years when AUM doubled. After ballooning from 1,900 to 3,417 firms during ZIRP, the industry's now stuck with 800+ aging unicorns and no exits, turns out you can't eat paper gains.
💸 In Other Funding News
Here's a roundup of notable recent funding rounds across various sectors:
🤖 AI & Machine Learning
BrightAI: Raised $51.2M Series A led by Inspired Capital Partners and Khosla Ventures to leverage AI capabilities to transform physical entities into digital counterparts.
SuperAnnotate: Raised $14M Series B led by Dell Technologies Capital for their AI data platform that simplifies dataset creation and model evaluation.
Collate: Raised $10M Series A led by Venrock to build agentic data intelligence that automates processes and fosters collaboration among data teams.
Blaxel: Raised $7.3M Seed led by First Round Capital for their toolbox and infrastructure to create, iterate, and scale agents fast.
Coverflow: Raised $5M Seed led by AIX Ventures for AI-driven insurance automation, including policy checking and AMS updates.
Nexxa.ai: Raised $4.4M Pre-Seed to provide specialized AI for heavy industries.
Willow Voice: Raised $4M Seed led by YC to build an AI voice input platform.
Novaflow: Raised $500K Pre-Seed to automate data analysis for life science researchers.
Stratus AI: Raised Pre-Seed funding for their AI-powered aviation safety platform.
Cleanshift: Raised Pre-Seed to redefine commercial cleaning through AI-powered SaaS and full-service operations.
💼 Enterprise Software
Unify: Raised $40M Series B led by Battery Ventures for their warm outbound platform, promising 25% more pipeline with half the effort.
Alembic: Raised $35M to develop digital marketing tools and provide insights to help companies' marketing teams.
TigerGraph: Raised funding led by Cuadrilla Capital for their distributed native graph database supporting advanced analytics and ML.
D-Tools: Raised $2M for system integration software designed to streamline back-office management.
theklicker: Raised $1M Series B for their e-commerce tool providing a directory of products for efficient online shopping.
🌱 Climate & Energy
Nitricity: Raised $63M to create renewable nitrogen fertilizer production with zero carbon emissions.
Peregrine Hydrogen: Raised $7M as a climate technology company focused on hydrogen solutions.
38 Degrees North: Raised funding led by Climate Adaptive Infrastructure for solar, utility-scale, and battery storage projects.
WattCarbon: Raised Seed led by Cerulean Ventures to build the world's first decarbonization procurement platform.
Enact: Raised $2M to simplify solar purchases through their platform used by thousands of professionals in 20+ countries.
🏥 Healthcare & Biotech
Fellow Health: Raised $24M Series B led by 5AM Ventures for peer-reviewed, clinical semen analysis solutions that patients can perform at home.
Tavrn: Raised $15M Series A led by Left Lane Capital to provide AI-powered medical chronologies to attorneys and insurance companies.
Sequome: Raised $11M for their biotechnology platform that decodes and designs sequences for developing sequence medicines.
🔧 Infrastructure & Dev Tools
Oxide Computer Company: Raised $69M to make server racks for on-premises compute infrastructure.
Felt: Raised $15M led by Energize Capital to build a new collaborative experience in an under-explored creative medium.
Cogent Security: Raised $11M Seed led by Greylock for creating the first AI taskforce for vulnerability management.
StrongestLayer: Raised $5.2M Seed led by Sorenson Capital for their AI-based cybersecurity platform focused on email security and human risk mitigation.
Zyphe: Raised Seed led by Azimut Holding, Everywhere Ventures, Roi Ventures, and āltitude for their decentralized identity verification platform.
🚁 Aerospace & Defense
Vultron: Raised $22M Series A led by Greycroft for their Agentic Operating System transforming federal growth.
Chariot Defense: Raised $8M Seed led by General Catalyst and XYZ Venture Capital to create advanced hardware and software framework.
Array Labs: Raised Seed funding to create high-quality 3D imagery for better understanding the world.
🤖 Robotics & Industrial
Bedrock Robotics: Raised $80M Series A led by 8VC to enable the construction sector to grow at the rate modern civilization requires.
Total Deals: 35, totaling $2.71B
Please note that we're still working on building our data pipelines to identify pre-seed rounds as they come.
💸 New Venture Funds
Verified Capital raised $175M for its first fund focused on AI, SaaS, infrastructure, marketplaces, and payments.
Cambrian Ventures raised $20M for its second fund, backing pre-seed and seed-stage fintech startups despite the fintech slowdown.
🤝 M&A Activity
Meta acquired Play.ai, a 2-year-old voice AI startup that raised $21M seed last November, to integrate advanced voice features into future products.
Cursor acquired Koala engineers as the AI-powered CRM startup shuts down just 5 months after raising $15M Series A from CRV.
Zendesk acquired HyperArc to enhance its AI analytics capabilities on the customer service platform.
Pronto.ai acquired SafeAI to combine their autonomous driving systems for off-road industrial vehicles with SafeAI's multi-sensor tech for construction and mining.
Uber is investing $300M in Lucid for electric robotaxi development, betting on the future of autonomous ridesharing.
📈 IPO Watch
Via filed confidentially for an IPO after raising $110M in 2023 at a $3.5B valuation, potentially giving us a second unicorn debut this quarter alongside Figma.
Grayscale filed confidentially for IPO, joining the crypto firm parade to public markets following Circle's successful debut.
Heartflow filed for Nasdaq listing after 17 years of building AI-powered 3D heart models for diagnosing blockages, backed by Wellington, USVP, and Fidelity.
🌟 Editor's Note
At Startup Intros, our mission is to bring the latest founder-investor news straight to your inbox, keeping you ahead in the fast-paced world of Silicon Valley. Our free weekly newsletter delivers curated insights, deals, and trends to help you navigate the startup ecosystem.
Stay tuned for our upcoming paid daily newsletter, packed with deeper dives, plus weekly spotlights on top VCs, investors, and founders, and practical tips for raising your next round.
💭 Parting Thoughts
Between 120x revenue multiples, $100M signing bonuses, and VCs literally chasing companies with money they don't want, Silicon Valley has officially entered its "hold my beer" era. Just remember: when Albania's government is investing in your AI startup, it might be time to take some chips off the table.
Till next time,
Dev Chandra
CEO @ Startup Intros
Associate @ Context VC
LinkedIn: /in/devchandra
Tim Hsia
Investor @ Context VC
Co-Founder @ Startup Intros
LinkedIn: /in/timhsia
P.S. Raised this week, and we missed you? Want to be featured? Have tips or funding questions? Reply or DM us as we’re here to help.
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