🎯Today's Venture Capital Pulse
Updated 38m agoWhat's happening: AI fuels record $119.5B venture fundraising despite fewer rounds
Venture capital fundraising jumped 16.9% to $119.5 billion in 2025, the strongest recovery since the 2022 market reset. The total number of rounds fell 41% to 4,859, concentrating capital in larger AI‑focused financings, with AI startups capturing 58% of Series D cash and median valuations rising across all stages.
Also developing:
By the numbers: OpenAI raises $110B in corporate funding
News•Dec 20, 2025
Sequoia Partner Spreads Debunked Brown Shooting Theory, Testing New Leadership
Sequoia Capital partner Shaun Maguire falsely accused a Palestinian student of orchestrating the December 13 Brown University shooting, despite authorities identifying a Portuguese gunman. His deleted X posts resurfaced via Fast Company, reviving criticism of his anti‑Muslim commentary. The controversy hits Sequoia as new managing partners Alfred Lin and Pat Grady assume leadership, testing their ability to curb outspoken partners. Stakeholders, including activist groups, are demanding decisive action, putting the firm’s governance and reputation under scrutiny.
By TechCrunch Venture Feed
Social•Dec 20, 2025
Agency, Not Tools, Drives Real Impact
Agency is the scarce resource. Tools are abundant. Information is cheap. Coordination is easy. None of that changes reality by itself. Agency does. Agency is deciding when there is no proof, acting when outcomes are unclear, and remaining accountable after the result shows...
By Hiten Shah
Social•Dec 20, 2025
Founders Fail When They Skip Understanding Market Needs
"Make something people want" sounds obvious, but not doing it is the most common mistake founders make. I explained why I made it in the essay where I coined the term. I didn't understand the market I was building for,...
By Paul Graham
News•Dec 19, 2025
Where Are Investors Placing Their Bets Next Year? AI, AI, AI.
At TechCrunch Disrupt, venture capitalists made it clear that artificial intelligence dominates their investment theses for 2027. Speakers from Index, Greylock and Felicis emphasized founder resilience, authentic product‑market fit, and the need for unique data flywheels to stand out in...
By TechCrunch Venture Feed
Social•Dec 20, 2025
Competitor's Domain Grab Reveals Fear and Amateurism
A startup told me a highly-funded competitor bought the .com of their name. I told them this is good news in a way. It means the competitor is (a) amateurish and (b) afraid of them, both of which suggest the...
By Paul Graham
Social•Dec 19, 2025
Future AI Millionaires Earn Equity, Not Founders' Shares
The AI Wealth Machine is like nothing we have ever seen before. 🔎Nvidia has created ~27,000 millionaires. 78% of employees. Half worth $25M+. Jensen Huang: "I've created more billionaires on my management team than any CEO in the world." 💥OpenAI is catching...
By Jason Lemkin
News•Dec 18, 2025
No Keynotes, No BS — Why This Year’s Best Tech Talks Happened over Cocktails at StrictlyVC
TechCrunch’s StrictlyVC series delivered a year‑long circuit of intimate, cocktail‑style events that gathered top venture capitalists, founders, and policymakers across San Francisco, Athens, London, Menlo Park, and Palo Alto. The gatherings featured high‑profile speakers such as Kirsten Green, Pat Gelsinger,...
By TechCrunch Venture Feed
Social•Dec 19, 2025
AI B2B Takes Off in 2026 After 2025 Foundations
We are literally >just< getting going in AI B2B. Really, most stuff didn’t even work before Claude 4 and the beginning of 2025. That’s why Lovable, Replit, Cursor, Gamma, etc. exploded. The models alone weren’t good enough — until early...
By Jason Lemkin
Social•Dec 19, 2025
From CFO to Creator: Building Mostly Media
The tables have turned... my friend and fellow creator Paul Stansik at ParkerGale Capital interviewed me on my business. How did I go from CFO to guy who creates stuff online? And is it worth it? We cover the origins...
By CJ Gustafson
News•Dec 18, 2025
CranioSense Receives $5.5M in Federal Grants
CranioSense, a neurotechnology startup, secured roughly $5.5 million in non‑dilutive federal funding from the NIH Blueprint MedTech Program and the DoD’s Joint Warfighter Medical Research Program. The grants will finance development and pivotal validation of its non‑invasive intracranial pressure monitoring system,...
By FinSMEs
Social•Dec 19, 2025
Organize Diligence and Keep Competition to Prevent Retrades
One of the most frustrating things for a founder selling their business: A retrade. Retrading is when a buyer tries to renegotiate the terms of a transaction late in a process due to "new" information that arose during final diligence....
By Michael Lyon
Social•Dec 19, 2025
Remove Mediocrity Quickly to Preserve High‑Performing Teams
A truly high performing team gets brought down by even one mediocre player The better the team, the faster you have to root the mediocre out
By Jason Lemkin
Podcast•Dec 18, 2025•43 min
Legacy, Innovation, and the Future of ASEAN Agri-Food W/ Ho Ren Hua, CEO of Thai Wah PCL
In this episode, Sarah Chen‑Spellings talks with Ho Ren Hua, CEO of Thai Wah, about transforming a 77‑year‑old family starch business into a regional agri‑food and bio‑materials platform anchored in sustainability. He outlines the “F4” framework (Farm, Factory, Family, Food) and shows how...
By Billion Dollar Moves
Social•Dec 19, 2025
Guard Your Focus: Turn It Into a Competitive Asset
Focus used to be a habit. Now it’s an asset that must be defended. AI constantly invites expansion. Founders who don’t guard focus end up running a portfolio instead of a company.
By Hiten Shah
Social•Dec 19, 2025
TikTok US Valued at $14B Amid Political Sale Push
The deal values TikTok U.S. at around $14 billion, a source confirmed to Axios. (ChatGPT says it’s really worth between $50 and $100B) Oracle, Silver Lake and Abu Dhabi-based MGX will collectively own 45% of the U.S. entity, which will...
By Chris Fralic
Blog•Dec 17, 2025
How Big Is AI Spending, Really? | Using ChatGPT for Competitive Analysis. | Measuring Real Efficiency in Venture Exits.
The episode breaks down three major trends: AI infrastructure spending is already 1.6% of U.S. GDP and could near 3% by 2030, dwarfing past tech booms but still far from wartime mobilisations; female‑founder funding in Europe is rising in absolute...
By Sahil S
Social•Dec 19, 2025
FinnyAI's AI Boosts Advisor Revenue, Drives $7.7M Asset Gains
Congrats to @FINNYAI on their $17M Series A! The $90T+ wealth management industry still prospects with tools built for other industries, with advisors spending ~60 hours on cold outreach to convert one client. Finny's AI matches advisors with high-intent prospects,...
By YCombinator
Social•Dec 19, 2025
SpaceX's $1.5T IPO: Who Will Fund It?
"The SpaceX IPO at $1.5 Trillion 1⃣Who will buy? 2⃣Could the valuation get walked back? 3⃣ Will the Big Vision justify it? 4⃣Could Google anchor the IPO for $10B+?" The latest with @rodriscoll @HarryStebbings + me https://t.co/YBJayKYQrp
By Jason Lemkin
Social•Dec 19, 2025
Salient Scales to $25M ARR, Zero Churn,
In just two years, Salient has hit $25M ARR—with zero customer churn and 100% of pilots converting to paid deals. They're automating loan servicing for auto lenders (including 5 of the top 10), cutting costs by 50% and delivering 30x better...
By YCombinator
Social•Dec 19, 2025
Unified AI Regulation Needed to Shield Small Startups
America doesn’t win by making every startup navigate 50+ regulatory regimes. Fragmented AI rules become a moat helping big tech only. A coherent federal framework is how you protect safety and keep US AI advancing. This EO is a meaningful...
By Garry Tan
Social•Dec 19, 2025
Founders' Decision Speed Limits Startup Growth, AI Highlights
Every startup eventually hits the same wall. The company can only move at the speed the founder is willing to make irreversible decisions. AI exposes this because everything else can move instantly.
By Hiten Shah
Social•Dec 19, 2025
VCs Rarely Publish “State Of” Reports Outside AI
Did any VC or LP write a "State Of" report on anything other than AI?
By Michael Eisenberg
Social•Dec 19, 2025
LLM Startup Boom Mirrors 2009 Mobile, 2003 Web
It’s the golden age for startups that turn latent LLM capability and intelligence into actual adoption Will be like working on mobile apps in 2009 or the web in 2003
By Garry Tan
Social•Dec 19, 2025
Beware: Classic Valuation Trick Still Misused
i've seen this too and it's the oldest trick in the valuation maxxer bad practice book
By Nathan Benaich
Social•Dec 18, 2025
AI-Native B2B Firms Surge, Seat‑based SaaS Lag
The Great B2B Bifurcation of 2025 Palantir +142%. HubSpot -51%. Despite the fact both businesses end the year pretty strong. Some patterns from the top 25 B2B / SaaS public companies: What's working: 🔼AI-native infrastructure (Palantir, Cloudflare, MongoDB) 🔼Mission-critical + high switching costs (CrowdStrike, Palo...
By Jason Lemkin
Social•Dec 18, 2025
Thiel’s Kind Dismissal Leads to SpaceX’s Biggest Bet
"Peter Thiel fired Elon Musk. Be -- he was kind about it. And he left Elon with all his economics (12% of PayPal). Be kind. He did what he had to do, but he was kind. And then Elon...
By Jason Lemkin
Social•Dec 18, 2025
Product Strength Beats Capital as True Business Bludgeon
Capital is not a bludgeon The best product is the bludgeon
By Garry Tan
Social•Dec 18, 2025
Truth Social Merges with Billion‑dollar Fusion Startup TAE Technologies
Meanwhile in M&A, TRUTH SOCIAL (last 12 months $400M losses) is merging with TAE Technologies - a fusion power company - that has raised over $1B betting on a beam-driven field‑reversed configuration (FRC), where high-energy neutral particle beams sustain...
By Chris Fralic
Social•Dec 18, 2025
LPs Concentrate, Co‑invest Rises; Small Funds Must Differentiate
ICYMI: Re-sharing Dan Gray's badass survey on the state of fundraising👇. He puts data behind how the current fundraising low wasn't just a "hard year" for smaller funds, but a structural shift in LPs changing behavior. Key takeaways from 48...
By Beezer Clarkson
Social•Dec 18, 2025
CFO Insights Signal Accelerating Finance Stack Growth
When the CFOs speak, I listen - gotta love real talk from the people actually building modern finance stacks. Here's a supercut from a year's worth of insights on Run the Numbers, with special shoutout to Brex . I expect...
By CJ Gustafson
Social•Dec 18, 2025
Scale Faster: Hire Leaders Better Than Yourself
How do founders that have never done it before scale to $10m, $100m, $1B in ARR? They hire people better than them This is the mistake most Stretch VPs make. They don’t hire folks better & later more experienced than...
By Jason Lemkin
Social•Dec 18, 2025
Trump Media's $6B Fusion Deal Signals Struggling Tech
Trump Media to Merge With Fusion Energy Firm in $6 Billion Deal. Technologies that cannot make it on their own partner with a Trump entity? Happened in critical minerals (MP materials / Vulcan), in batteries (50% in Mitra Chem for...
By Vinod Khosla
Social•Dec 18, 2025
Tech Titans, Mega Funding, and AI Disruption Weekly
The only podcast you have to listen to every week. No politics. Just tech. - Will SpaceX IPO for $1.5TRN - Will Cursor Kill Figma - Lightspeed Raises $9BN - OpenAI: Disney’s $1BN Investment & New CRO Spotify 👉 https://t.co/kSlARc4lQP Youtube 👉 https://t.co/GUg2n68etS Apple Podcasts 👉 https://t.co/osOaTumZQS My 6...
By Harry Stebbings
Social•Dec 18, 2025
Start Building Today for a 2026 Exit
2026 might feel far away but exits don’t happen overnight. Most founders who sell in 2026 start preparing now. Not because they’re desperate but because they want options. You don’t need to rush and you don’t need to sell tomorrow. Just build...
By Andrew Gazdecki
Social•Dec 18, 2025
2025 Portfolio Milestones Unveiled in Video Recap
Just sent a video-filled 2025 recap to our LPs. Here's a peek at a few slides highlighting portfolio cos and their milestones. https://t.co/VDqBus6eDe
By Ryan Hoover
Social•Dec 18, 2025
Top CROs Have Already Built 2026 Teams
The best CROs have mostly recruited the teams they need for 2026 already Half the job is recruiting
By Jason Lemkin
Social•Dec 18, 2025
Lux Funds Frontier; Others Waste on Quantum Hype
1000%. From my partner @Farshchi Lux funds the frontier but some people are funding really stupid shit including Quantum and Photonic compute (photonic interconnect and data relay makes good sense, not compute) nor data centers in space for terrestrial use
By Josh Wolfe
Social•Dec 18, 2025
Shopify Subscription App Generates Predictable $30K Monthly Profit
Recurring revenue is king. Live on @acquiredotcom: Shopify subscription app helping merchants turn one-time buyers into predictable monthly revenue. > $29K ARR > $32K TTM revenue > $30K TTM profit > 190 paying merchants Full listing: https://t.co/zCumfIm8mD https://t.co/wYOQ3FwbAz
By Andrew Gazdecki
Social•Dec 18, 2025
VCs Fuel Silicon Valley's Aggressive Startup Roll‑up Wave
Inside the VC Roll-up Craze That Has Taken Silicon Valley by Storm https://t.co/isY66sgWKh
By Eric Newcomer
Social•Dec 18, 2025
Pulse AI Launches Free Public Document Intelligence Platform
After processing 1B+ pages for global banks, top private equity firms, Fortune 50s, and large insurers, @Pulse__AI is opening its document intelligence platform to everyone. Production-grade parsing is now publicly available via the platform and API. 20K free pages for all. Congrats...
By YCombinator
Social•Dec 18, 2025
World Models Poised to Rival LLMs, General Intuition Leads
World models will be as important as LLM's. Next big market and General Intuition has the best data set for this...
By Vinod Khosla
Social•Dec 18, 2025
Mercury CEO Immad Akhund Live for Startup Q&A
Immad Akhund @immad - CEO / co-founder of Mercury is live answering startup questions now. Ask yours in the comments here: https://t.co/EkZAmrfjOS
By Elizabeth Yin
Social•Dec 17, 2025
Patience Finds Buyer, Speed Closes Deal
He sold SwiftNet in 30 days on @acquiredotcom. After months of calls that went nowhere, Nikita Danilov finally met the right buyer. His secret? > Patience in finding the right buyer > Speed once aligned Don’t rush the process. But when it’s time, move...
By Andrew Gazdecki
Social•Dec 17, 2025
Celebrating Excellence at Clarity Pediatrics
Go go Clarity Pediatrics
By Hunter Walk
Social•Dec 17, 2025
Live in 10: 24‑Hour Startup Advice Hotline Launch
I am going live in 10 minutes to kick off our 24 hour startup advice hotline. We have some amazing mentors joining us to help founders navigate sticky situations. Join here: https://lnkd.in/g2parB8i
By Elizabeth Yin
Social•Dec 17, 2025
Private Cap Tables Are Riddled with Unnecessary Inefficiency
There’s soooo much inefficiency in private company cap tables. Sometimes it’s a feature but for most stakeholders it’s not.
By Ryan Hoover
Social•Dec 17, 2025
Seek Evidence, Not Consensus, to Shrink Startup Risk
Founders often wait for consensus when they should be waiting for evidence. Agreement feels safer, but it does not reduce risk. Evidence does. Risk shrinks fastest when opinions are forced to meet the real world.
By Hiten Shah
Social•Dec 17, 2025
Ask Tara Viswanathan: Startup Success and Building America
On the 24 hour startup advice hotline, our first guest will be @TaraViswanathan who sold her company Rupa Health for a ton of $$$ & is starting a new co to help America build. What should I ask her? (Join...
By Elizabeth Yin
Social•Dec 17, 2025
Fix Fundamentals Early; Growth Won’t Hide Inefficiencies Later
Growth hides inefficiency the way adrenaline hides pain. It feels good while it lasts. When growth slows, everything surfaces at once. Teams that fix fundamentals early experience fewer emergencies later.
By Hiten Shah
Social•Dec 17, 2025
Narrative Gives Meaning to Shipping; Otherwise It's Noise
Shipping answers the question “what changed.” Narrative answers “why this matters.” Without the second, the first just feels like noise.
By Hiten Shah