Happy Monday!

I was in Los Angeles last week, not for the Oscars, but for Upfront Summit. I’ve always enjoyed attending the Upfront Summit and have learned a lot each time—this year was no exception. Huge props to Mark Suster and his team for putting together such an incredible gathering with some star-studded speakers.

Here are a few great things to read/watch this week:

🌴 Upfront Summit 2025 Recap — A few key takeaways for me:

• Venture capital should NOT be an asset management business.

• OpenAI’s $150B round is essentially a public round, despite being private.

• Valuation has become a badge of glory for founders—which isn’t necessarily a good thing.

• AI has been the saving grace for the venture asset class.

• The promise of AI-driven innovation transforming industries is keeping spirits high.

• El Segundo, CA is emerging as THE defense tech hub.

• The cost of intelligence is dropping by ~8x per year.

• Uber is the world’s largest independent contractor platform, handling 33M bookings per day and $160B in annual bookings. Uber’s biggest concern: Insurance.

• Celebrities are getting deeper into venture:

  • Metrodora Ventures (Chelsea Clinton)

  • Serena Ventures (Serena Williams)

  • Prince Harry investing in BetterUp, Ethic, and Archwell Audio

  • Will.i.am investing in OpenAI, Anthropic, Stability

💰 Why Is Warren Buffett hoarding $300B in cash? — Within Berkshire’s hunting ground of large, high-quality businesses in industries Buffett understands, prices have risen too high (Apple is now valued $3.63T at 38.37 P/E ratio) for the stock picker to feel confident an investment would lead to worthwhile returns. The cash pile itself is making money. Berkshire reported $8 billion in interest and other investment income in its insurance operations in the first nine months of 2024, along with $3.8 billion in income from dividends. Read more on WSJ.

💰 US Crypto Strategic Reserve — President Trump announced on Truth Social yesterday that he will issue an Executive Order on Digital Assets, directing the Presidential Working Group to advance a Crypto Strategic Reserve—including Bitcoin, Ethereum, Ripple, Solana, and Cardano. I mentioned this in my Bloomberg interview in February, but it’s probably nothing 😛.

⚡ Blackstone’s Data-Center Ambitions & AI Power Strains — QTS is building 10 hulking bunkers around Fayetteville, Georgia that’s more than 600 acres big. The complex is expected to consume as much electricity as about a million US households — leaving utility Georgia Power rushing to build the infrastructure to meet demand. Blackstone, which bought QTS in 2021 and turned it into the fastest-growing data-center landlord. It’s now a major driver of returns for the private equity giant, ~$50 billion in data centers and some $50 billion of prospective developments in the pipeline. QTS isn’t a household name to most people. But CEO Chad Williams, who founded the Kansas-based business two decades ago, has aims to make it the biggest business of its kind. QTS alone now has some 2.5 gigawatts of signed power capacity. Read more on Bloomberg.

🇨🇳 Wan 2.1: Sora of China — Alibaba is making waves with the release of Wan 2.1, an open-source AI video generation model that rivals OpenAI’s Sora, Runway, and Pika. This move aligns with Alibaba’s broader strategy to strengthen its cloud computing and AI capabilities, backed by a planned $52 billion investment over the next three years. It’s pretty cool. Alibaba is now valued $315B at 19.32 P/E ratio.

evolving.ai

A post shared by @evolving.ai

Last week a total of 17 startups raised $633.3M in funding, 1 M&A:

• $166.3M goes to 7 Enterprise startups

• $46.1M goes to 3 FinTech startups

• $5M goes to 1 HR startup

• $27.6M goes to 1 InsurTech startup

• $10.1M goes to 2 Healthcare startups

• $350.7M goes to 1 BioTech startup

• $22M goes to 1 Pet Care startup

• $5.5M goes to 1 Defense Tech startup

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Edith
X, LinkedIn

Funding (300 miles radius from Silicon Valley)

Enterprise

• Metronome (usage-based billing platform) raised $50M Series C led by NEA

• Mimic Networks (enterprise ransomware defense) raised $50M Series A led by Google Ventures, Menlo Ventures

• Regie (AI-native sales engagement) raised $30M Series B led by Foundation Capital, Scale Venture Partners

• Workhelix (AI deployment impact) raised $15M Series A led by AIX Ventures

• Rad Security (AI cloud cybersecurity) raised $14M Series A led by Cheyenne Ventures

• Journify (first-party data activation) raised $4M Seed led by Silicon Badia

• Breakout (AI sales rep) raised $3.3M Seed led by Village Global

FinTech

• Auditoria (agentic AI for corporate finance teams) raised $38M Series B led by Innovius Capital

• Quanta (AI-powered accounting service for software businesses) raised $4.7M Seed led by Accel

• Swirepay (AI-powered payment and reconciliation) raised $3.4M Seed led by TiE Angels

HR

• FirstWork (AI powered workforce management for frontline workers) raised $5M Seed led by Gradient

InsurTech

• CompScience (AI-powered workplace risk mitigation) raised $27.6M Series B led by Sands Capital Ventures

Healthcare

• Charta Health (AI-powered medical billing and coding workflow) raised $8.1M Seed led by Bain Capital Ventures

• SimCare AI (AI-driven healthcare training & simulation) raised $2M Seed led by Drive Capital, Y Combinator

BioTech

• Eikon Therapeutics (drug discovery) raised $350.7M Series D

Pet Care

• Loyal (longevity drugs for dogs) raised $22M Series B led by Valor Equity Partners, Collaborative Fund

Defense Tech

• DeepNight (AI-driven night vision) raised $5.5M Seed led by Initialized Capital

IPO & M&A (300 miles radius from Silicon Valley)  

• GI Partners acquired Egnyte (content collaboration plaform)

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