Today's Venture Capital Pulse
Nvidia joins $1B Series F, pushing Vast Data valuation to $30B
Vast Data secured a $1 billion Series F round, lifting its valuation to $30 billion. The round was led by Drive Capital and Access Industries and included investors such as Nvidia, Fidelity and NEA. The startup reported over $4 billion in cumulative bookings and more than $500 million in annual recurring revenue.
Also developing:
By the numbers: Japanet Holdings quadruples VC fund to $200M
Joyful Health Scores $17M Series A Financing
Joyful Health, an AI-driven financial infrastructure startup for healthcare revenue operations, announced a $17 million Series A financing round led by CRV. The round brings the company’s total capital raised to $22 million, with existing seed backers XYZ Venture Capital, Designer Fund, Inflect Capital and Go Global Ventures participating. Joyful Health’s platform links fragmented revenue‑cycle systems to deliver a unified financial truth, enabling claim‑level investigation, denial intelligence, and automated recovery workflows. The funding will accelerate product development and market expansion across provider networks.
Worki Raises $2.75 Million in Pre Seed Funding
Worki, a healthcare‑technology startup, announced a $2.75 million pre‑seed round aimed at easing the administrative burden of workforce operations in modern medicine. The capital will support the development of AI‑powered tools for scheduling, compliance, and analytics across clinical staff. In the...
Worki Raises $2.75 Million in Pre Seed Funding
In this episode of Speaking of RegTech, host Chris Russell highlights Worki's recent $2.75 million pre‑seed round led by Redesign Health and Healthliant Ventures. Worki’s WorkEase platform connects existing HR systems like Workday, Oracle, and ServiceNow with AI‑driven tools that create...
Slash, a Ramp Competitor Founded by Teenagers, Raises $100M at $1.4B Valuation
Slash Financial announced a $100 million Series C round that lifts its valuation to $1.4 billion. The fintech, founded by 19‑year‑old Victor Cardenas and Kevin Bai, now 24, offers business‑banking, corporate cards, transfers and crypto services. It reports $300 million in annualized revenue and...
When a LP Defaults
Limited partnership (LP) defaults on capital calls remain uncommon, affecting fewer than 5% of private‑equity funds, but heightened market stress is increasing scrutiny. Alexander Branton, CIO of Nodem Capital, outlines the contractual mechanisms that govern defaults, including enforcement rights and...
AgriFood Signals: Nestlé & Soil Capital Regen Partnership, Unilever Buys Grüns, John Deere Lawsuit
Nestlé announced a partnership with Soil Capital to embed regenerative farming practices across its European sourcing, while Unilever acquired U.S. greens‑supplement brand Grüns to broaden its wellness portfolio. In a separate legal development, John Deere settled a right‑to‑repair lawsuit for...
IEEE Entrepreneurship Connects Hardware Startups With Investors
IEEE Entrepreneurship has launched a series of Hard Tech Venture Summits in 2024 to connect hardware‑focused startups with investors, service providers, and mentors. The two‑day events, held in locations such as Menlo Park, Boston, and Toronto, combine pitch competitions, round‑table...
Post‑Correction Venture: Fewer Managers, Bigger Funds, Cycle Rebounds
What happens to venture after a major correction? "Fewer managers, but bigger." — David Clark (CIO, VenCap International plc ) called this back in 2023, and the data is proving out. As an LP in top franchise firms like Andreessen...
SBQuantum Secures $4M USD Seed Round, Names New CEO and Expands to the US
Sherbrooke‑based quantum sensor maker SBQuantum closed an oversubscribed $4 million USD seed round led by Quantonation and Quantacet, marking its first private investment. The company appointed Eric Giroux as its new CEO to accelerate commercial growth, leveraging his defense‑sector background. SBQuantum also launched...
Thursday April 16, 2026 — Field Note
AI startup Luminai announced a $38 million Series B round to expand its intelligence platform across health‑system operations. The funding, led by PHTI, backs a partnership with the Cleveland Clinic, which serves roughly 15 million patients annually, focusing initially on referral‑management workflows. Luminai...
Sage Haven Launches AI-Moderated Chat App for Kids
Sage Haven, a public‑benefit startup founded by sisters Kate Doerksen and Anne Pizzuti, has launched an AI‑moderated messaging and voice‑calling app for children after a beta phase and a $3 million pre‑seed round. The app assigns each child a dedicated phone...
InsightFinder Raises $15M to Help Companies Figure Out Where AI Agents Go Wrong
InsightFinder, an AI observability startup founded by NC State professor Helen Gu, secured a $15 million Series B round led by Yu Galaxy, bringing total funding to $35 million. The capital will fund its first sales and marketing hires as it scales the...
Luminous Ventures Raises $733M for Dual‑Currency Early‑Stage Funds
Luminous Ventures announced the final close of its sixth USD early‑stage fund at $460 million and the first close of its third RMB fund at 1 billion yuan ($146.7 million), bringing total commitments to more than $733 million. The dual‑currency raise, the largest of...
From Instacart’s Rise to Investor Lessons
For this episode of Uncapped I got to sit down with my close friend @Max, cofounder of Instacart 🥕 We talked about the key moments of Instacart...how it got started, critical wins, tough losses, competitive dynamics, earned insights, going public, and...
London-Based Startup Lua Raises €4.9 Million to Scale Its Human-Agent Collaboration Platform
London‑based startup Lua announced a €4.9 million ($5.8 million) Series A led by Norrsken22 to accelerate its human‑agent collaboration operating system. The round also includes Flourish Ventures, 20VC, P1 Ventures, Phosphor Capital, Y Combinator and several high‑profile angels. Lua’s platform lets technical and non‑technical...
Lucille Health Secures Multi-Million-Dollar Investment for Nutrition Shakes
Lucille Health, a senior‑focused nutrition startup, announced a multi‑million‑dollar pre‑seed round backed by venture firms including Able Partners, Springdale Ventures, and Good Culture founder Jesse Merrill. The funding will accelerate the launch of its high‑protein, fiber‑rich shake, formulated with Harvard...
Nine-Figure Raises Dominate in Powerful Q1 for RegTech Deals
The RegTech sector posted a record‑strong first quarter of 2026, raising close to $3 billion globally and $2 billion in the United States across 103 deals. Funding surged 28% year‑over‑year, driven by AI‑focused security firms that alone secured over $1 billion in January,...
36 Companies Max for 1x Return in Concentrated Fund
this makes sense all else held equal, concentrated fund = less risky bets we've found that 36 companies is the max number of companies we can fit into a fund while claiming that a single company at 1B exit can return 1x...
Seed Is the New Growth
European limited partners are shifting away from traditional growth‑stage venture funds toward seed‑stage AI‑native startups, driven by a collapse in late‑stage capital and the rapid efficiency gains AI delivers. Late‑stage VC funding in Europe fell 66% between 2021 and 2023,...
Fund II Second Close Strengthens Unconventional Ventures’ Bet on Overlooked Founders
Unconventional Ventures announced the second close of its Fund II, bringing in new limited partners such as Wire Group, Investinor, FÆRCH OG DØTRE and Merete Lundbye Møller. The raise comes amid global economic uncertainty and tighter capital markets, underscoring the...
SpaceX IPO Fuels Employee Spin‑offs and New Startups
SpaceX IPO wealth creation: how many SpaceX (and xAI) staff will generate enough $ from an IPO to go and seed their own startups? Tesla, SpaceX alumni story well know: lots of startups out there Does this create some big wave of...
ET Capital Launches Cambridge Venture Index Fund 2 to Broaden Access to Deeptech Investing
ET Capital has launched the Cambridge Venture Index SEIS/EIS Fund 2 (CVIF2), targeting up to 20 early‑stage, science‑based companies emerging from the Cambridge and Oxford ecosystems. The fund builds on CVIF1, raised in 2025, and applies proprietary synthetic‑venture modeling that...
Edafa Venture Acquires Egypt's Cyclex in Six-Figure Deal
Edafa Venture, a Saudi‑Egyptian investment firm, acquired Egyptian waste‑recycling startup Cyclex in a six‑figure deal completed in the second half of 2025. Cyclex transforms non‑hazardous solid waste into marketable products, positioning itself as a key player in Egypt’s emerging circular‑economy...
Aya Closes $7 Million Series A to Scale On-Demand Fashion Model
Saudi‑based fashion e‑commerce startup Aya closed a SAR 26 million ($7 million) Series A round, led by RAED Ventures with participation from Nuwa Capital, Sanabil Investments (PIF), Joa Capital and Khwarizmi Ventures. Founded in 2024, Aya’s demand‑driven platform tests more than 700 designs each...
X‑Energy Targets up to $814 Million in IPO as Amazon Backs Advanced Nuclear Push
X‑Energy has filed an S‑1 seeking to raise as much as $800 million, with a share price range of $16‑$19 that could net $814 million. Amazon, a lead investor, has contributed $500 million and promised to purchase up to 5 GW of the startup’s...
Acumen Backs Omia to Expand Support for Smallholder Farmers in Northern Uganda
Acumen has committed an impact‑linked convertible note to Omia Agribusiness Development, a Northern Uganda firm that supplies smallholder farmers with inputs, training, and market access. The capital will fund working‑capital needs, high‑margin growth opportunities, and expansion into additional districts. The...
Nas Daily Founder Nuseir Yassin Secures $27 Million Series A for AI Solo‑Entrepreneur Platform
Nuseir Yassin, the creator behind Nas Daily, raised $27 million in a Series A round led by Khosla Ventures to fund Nas.com, an AI‑driven platform that lets solo founders launch storefronts and marketing campaigns with a single product photo. The round also...
Eka Ventures Brings AUM to $200m with Sophomore Health, Wellbeing and Sustainability VC Fund Close
UK‑based Eka Ventures has closed its second venture capital fund, raising £80 million (approximately $102 million). The new capital brings the firm’s total assets under management to about $200 million, making it the largest early‑stage impact VC in the United Kingdom focused on...
Mistral Venture Partners Sets up Shop in Alberta
Mistral Venture Partners, a Canada‑wide VC firm, is establishing a permanent foothold in Alberta by hiring a full‑time staff member based in Calgary. The move builds on the firm’s history of investing in local early‑stage enterprise startups such as Bidaya...
This Simulation Startup Wants to Be the Cursor for Physical AI
Antioch, a New York‑based simulation startup, raised an $8.5 million seed round that values the company at $60 million. The funding, led by A* and Category Ventures, backs a platform that builds high‑fidelity digital twins of robots with realistic sensor feeds. By...
Turning Down $10M Led to GitLab’s IPO Success
Sid Sijbrandij, co-founder of GitLab, was offered $10 million for his company. His dad said sell. His accountant said sell. His response: 'I really like working, so I don't mind working. And I think we can do better Six years later,...
As the AI Era Strains Human Verification, Danish Startup Flare Bags €3.6 Million to Support Knowledge Validation
Copenhagen‑based Flare announced a €3.6 million (≈ $3.9 million) pre‑seed round to develop a trust infrastructure for knowledge validation as AI‑generated claims outpace human fact‑checking. The round was led by 20VC and included angels from Stack Overflow, GitHub, Reddit, Meta and other tech...
This Episode Will Make some of You Squirm...
In this episode of the Liquid Lunch Project, hosts Matthew Meehan and Professor Luigi Rosa Bianca interview Dr. Thomas J. Powell, a constitutional law professor and founder of the Founder’s Office, which helps small‑to‑medium businesses raise capital and build sustainable...
Resolve AI Raises $40M at $1.5B Valuation
Resolve AI announced a $40 million Series A extension, pushing its valuation to $1.5 billion and bringing total capital raised to over $190 million. The startup, founded by observability veterans Spiros Xanthos and Mayank Agarwal, offers an AI‑driven platform that automates incident...
UK Set to Launch £500m ‘Sovereign AI’ Fund
The UK government is unveiling a £500 million (≈$635 million) Sovereign AI fund, designed to act as an internal venture capital vehicle, provide access to AI supercomputers, and facilitate procurement and regulatory guidance for domestic AI firms. Technology Secretary Liz Kendall framed...
£100M Boost for UK Healthtech as British Business Bank Backs Apposite Growth Fund
The British Business Bank has pledged a £100 million (≈$127 million) cornerstone commitment to Apposite Healthcare Growth I, marking its largest fund investment to date and its first partnership with Apposite Capital. The fund will back UK health‑technology scale‑ups across medical products,...
Can Private Data Platforms Sustain Eka Ventures’ Pre‑Seed Edge?
Do VCs with private data platforms find the best pre-seed deals? Eka Ventures was early with proprietary tools, but can it keep its edge? https://preseednow.com/p/eka-ventures-camilla-dolan
Slash Raises $100M Series C, Hits $1.4B Valuation
🚨 JUST IN: @slashapp raised $100M Series C at $1.4B to build a Ramp competitor $250M ARR. 60 employees. Valuation quadrupled since May. The headline is the round. The story is everything else 🧵 https://t.co/SzLfFk3ZuB
Caterpillar Acquires Monarch Tractor, Adding $251M VC‑Backed AI Platform to Its Portfolio
Caterpillar Inc. announced the acquisition of Monarch Tractor, a California startup that raised roughly $251 million to develop electric and autonomous off‑road vehicles. The deal, disclosed in mid‑April, gives the heavy‑equipment maker access to Monarch’s MK‑V “data platform on wheels” without...
Trump Jr.’s Advisory Role Sparks 22x Valuation Surge
"To put numbers on it: when Trump Jr. joined Kalshi as a paid adviser in January 2025, Kalshi was valued at roughly $500 million. By December 2025, it was valued at $11 billion — a 22x increase in under a...
Founder Refunds 94% of $140M After Collapse
When @nadertheory realized Basis wasn't going to work out, he returned 94 cents on the dollar to the investors from whom he had raised $140 million ... https://t.co/s6by3FCRrC
This Long Beach Startup Says It Has a Patch for California's Power Problems
Long Beach‑based Critical Loop secured $26 million in new funding, bringing its total to $49 million, to accelerate deployment of battery‑and‑grid‑management systems that deliver power in days rather than years. The startup’s controller instantly switches between the public grid, on‑site batteries, solar...
Investors Rush to Fund Founder After Product Halt
He emailed investors: "We're stopping work on the product. Expect MRR to decline." They called back in 20 minutes. Not to pull funding. To ask how much more money he needed. https://t.co/TlhbiiLl2Q
Now Tracking Revenue Growth Across Every Fund Portfolio
i can't believe i didn't have this before, but i can now see (and show) revenue growth across each fund's portfolio https://t.co/Jgmf7wORWv
How to Build a $1bn African Investment Firm
In a candid interview, Richard Okello, co‑founder of Johannesburg‑based Sango Capital, explains how his firm grew to manage just under $1 billion in assets since its 2011 launch. He frames African investing as a high‑speed boat ride through choppy waters, emphasizing...
FinTech Fund Helps CarryHQ Secure AngelList Sale
Big congrats to @ankurnagpal and the team at @carryhq_ on the sale to @AngelList. Glad that we could support you from @thefintechfund 🙌 https://t.co/ToMKqLpS99
Aleph Bets on Early-Stage, Capital‑efficient Contrarian Investing
And this is why @aleph remains focused on early stage investing and cares about capital efficiency. Today, that is 100% Contrarian and non-consensus.
Capsule Security Raises $7m to Secure AI Agents at Runtime
Capsule Security emerged from stealth with a $7 million seed round led by Lama Partners and participation from Forgepoint Capital International. The startup’s runtime‑first platform aims to secure AI agents while they execute tasks, preventing prompt‑injection attacks, data leaks, and unintended...
SA Firm Raises R85m to Scale AI Stethoscope for TB Screening
South African medtech firm AI Diagnostics secured roughly R85 million (about $4.6 million) in a pre‑Series A round led by The Steele Foundation for Hope. The capital will accelerate rollout of its AI‑enabled Ostium digital stethoscope, which screens for tuberculosis using lung‑sound analysis...
Men’s Personal Care Brand Unbound Raises Rs 8 Cr Led by Fireside Ventures
Men’s personal care brand Unbound announced it has raised ₹8 crore (approximately $960,000) in a round led by Fireside Ventures. The capital will be used to launch its inaugural line of skin, hair and body care products tailored for modern Indian...