Top News

Two can play at that game! After having had to endure seemingly daily reports of Meta hiring away its people, OpenAI just poached four senior engineers from Meta, Tesla, and xAI, including Tesla’s former VP of software engineering. Wired has more here. 

SpaceX is reportedly in talks to raise new capital at a $400 billion valuation, with insiders saying the deal may include a tender offer for employees. Bloomberg has the scoop here. 

Speaking of high flyers, Bloomberg says French AI startup Mistral is reportedly in talks to raise $1 billion in equity and hundreds of millions in debt to fuel its data center buildout. TechCrunch has more here. 

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LangChain is About to Become a Unicorn, Sources Say

By Marina Temkin

LangChain, an AI infrastructure startup providing tools to build and monitor LLM-powered applications, is raising a new round of funding at an approximate $1 billion valuation led by IVP, according to three sources with knowledge of the deal.

LangChain began its life in late 2022 as an open-source project founded by Harrison Chase, who was then an engineer at machine learning startup Robust Intelligence. After generating significant developer interest, Chase transformed the project into a startup, securing a $10 million seed round from Benchmarkin April 2023. That round was followed a week later by a $25 million Series A led by Sequoia, reportedly valuing LangChain at $200 million.

The startup was an early darling of the AI era. When LangChain first emerged, LLMs lacked access to real-time information and the ability to perform actions such as searching the web, calling APIs, and interacting with databases. The startup’s open-source code solved those problems with a framework for building apps on top of LLM models. It became a hugely popular project on GitHub (111K stars, over 18,000 forks).

The LLM ecosystem has since expanded significantly, with new startups including LlamaIndex, Haystack, and AutoGPT now offering comparable features. Furthermore, leading LLM providers including OpenAI, Anthropic, and Google have evolved their APIs to directly offer capabilities that were once key differentiators for LangChain’s core technology.

So the company has added other products, including LangSmith, a separate, closed-source product for observability, evaluation, and monitoring of LLM applications, specifically agents. This product has soared in popularity, multiple people tell us.

More here. 

Massive Fundings

Huspy, a six-year-old Dubai startup whose online platform enables UAE homebuyers to search for properties, secure mortgage financing, and complete real estate transactions, raised a $59 million Series B round led by Balderton Capital, with Founders Fund, Peak XV Partners, ExBorder Partners, Turmeric Capital, COTU Ventures, BY Ventures, Dara Management, and KE Partners also piling on. More here.

PetroApp, an eight-year-old Riyadh startup that provides a digital platform that allows businesses and drivers in Saudi Arabia to manage, pay for, and track fuel purchases across a network of gas stations, raised a $50 million round led by Jadwa Investment, with Bunat Ventures also joining in. More here.

Xpanceo, a four-year-old Dubai startup that is developing smart contact lenses that let users access digital apps and information directly through their eyes, raised a $250 million Series A round at a $1.35 billion post-money valuation. Opportunity Venture (Asia) Ltd. was the deal lead. Tech in Asia has more here.

Big-But-Not-Crazy-Big Fundings

Arago, a one-year-old Paris startup that develops photonic AI chips designed to cut energy use by a factor of ten, raised a $26 million seed round co-led by Earlybird, Protagonist, and Visionaries Tomorrow, with Generative IQ and C4 Ventures also participating. Tech.eu has more here. 

Ekho, a three-year-old New York startup that builds an end-to-end online platform for OEMs and auto dealers that lets consumers browse, finance, register, and purchase cars and other vehicles online, raised a $15 million Series A round led by Activant Capital, with J.P. Morgan and Winnebago Industries as well as previous investors Y Combinator, RiverPark, and Westcott Investment Group also anteing up. More here.

Filics, a six-year-old Munich startup that builds autonomous robots that help warehouses and factories move pallets and goods more efficiently, raised a $15.8 million round. Sandwater, Alven, F-Log Ventures, Amazon Industrial Innovation Fund, Bayern Kapital, Capnamic, and 10x Founders invested in the deal. EU-Startups has more here.

Gradient Labs, a three-year-old London startup that develops AI agents that help banks and fintech companies detect fraud, manage risk, and automate compliance processes, raised a $13 million Series A round led by Redpoint Ventures, with Localglobe, Puzzle Ventures, Liquid 2 Ventures, and Exceptional Capital also investing. FinTech Global has more here.

Kuru, a one-year-old New York startup that builds decentralized finance tools on the Monad blockchain that help crypto traders and protocols manage liquidity, execute complex trades, and access on-chain pricing data, raised an $11.6 million Series A round. Paradigm was the deal lead. CoinDesk has more here.

Smaller Fundings

Biorce, a two-year-old Barcelona startup whose software helps hospitals and research centers organize and analyze patient data from multiple sources to accelerate clinical trial recruitment and research, raised a $5.9 million round. Norrsken VC was the deal lead. Silicon Canals has more here.

BridgePort, a one-year-old New York startup that provides middleware that helps institutions process and settle off-exchange crypto trades by connecting fragmented systems and automating post-trade workflows, raised a $3.2 million seed round led by Further Ventures, with Virtu, XBTO, Blockchain Founders Fund, Fun Fair Ventures, and Humla Ventures also engaging. More here.

Cariqa, a three-year-old Berlin startup that helps electric vehicle charging providers manage payments, pricing, and user access across different charging networks, raised a $4.7 million seed round co-led by Anthemis Group and Contrarian Ventures, with Anthemis Group Female Innovators Lab, Earth, Golden Egg Check, and Techstars also participating. More here.

Chloris Geospatial, a five-year-old Boston startup that provides satellite-based software that helps governments, companies, and carbon traders measure how much carbon is stored in forests and how it changes over time, raised an $8.5 million Series A round led by Future Energy Ventures, with AXA IM Alts, At One Ventures, Cisco Foundation, Counteract, and Orbia Ventures also contributing. More here.

Fantasy Life, a four-year-old New York startup founded by fantasy football guru Matthew Berry that provides fantasy sports players and sports bettors with real-time news, analytics, and content to improve their picks and strategies, raised a $7 million seed round co-led by LRMR Ventures and SC Holdings, with Eberg Capital, Bolt Ventures, Wasserman Ventures, and SUM Ventures. Sports Business Journal has more here.

OneText, a two-year-old New York startup that lets shoppers buy products directly via text message, raised a $4.5 million seed round from Khosla Ventures, Coatue, Citi Ventures, Y Combinator, and Good Friends. TechCrunch has more here. 

Pimloc, a nine-year-old London startup that helps businesses and public institutions automatically detect and blur faces, license plates, and other sensitive content in video footage to comply with privacy regulations, raised a $5 million round co-led by Amadeus Capital Partners and Edge Ventures and including Zetta Venture Partners, MD One, and Symvan Capital. SiliconANGLE has more here.

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New Funds

Boldstart Ventures, a 15-year-old firm with offices in New York and Miami that backs technical founders in areas like enterprise software and AI, just closed a $250 million seventh fund to continue betting on what it calls the "autonomous enterprise." The Wall Street Journal has more here. 

Darkstar, a 15-month-old Estonian VC firm, is breaking a longstanding VC taboo by investing in purely military applications, with the goal of helping rearm Europe using combat-proven solutions emerging from Ukraine. It has just held a first close of €15 million (approximately $17.5 million), with backers including European entrepreneurs, family offices, and Estonian state-backed LP SmartCap, says TechCrunch. More here.

Sticker Ventures, a Tel Aviv VC firm founded this year, has closed a first tranche of approximately $25 million for a planned $50 million fund focused on backing Israeli consumer startups. CTech has more here. 

Exits

Linqto, a ten-year-old company based in San Jose, CA, that offered pre-IPO investment access to retail investors, has filed for bankruptcy after an internal probe revealed customers may never have actually owned the securities they were sold, triggering SEC and DOJ investigations and locking thousands out of their accounts. The Wall Street Journal has more here. 

Going Public

ReserveOne, a one-year-old company headquartered in New York and backed by players like Kraken, Blockchain.com, and a who's-who of Wall Street and crypto insiders, is going public via a SPAC merger. It expects to raise over $1 billion to manage a portfolio of cryptocurrencies that is "aligned" with the U.S. strategic crypto reserve. Reuters has more here. 

People

Apple COO Jeff Williams, a 26-year veteran who helped launch the iPod, iPhone, and Apple Watch, is retiring later this month, with longtime ops exec Sabih Khan stepping into the role and Apple’s design team set to report directly to Tim Cook. TechCrunch has more here. 

Sequoia Capital partner Shaun Maguire has sparked a backlash across Silicon Valley against not only himself but his firm after tweeting that Muslim NYC mayoral candidate Zohran Mamdani is an "Islamist" who "comes from a culture that lies about everything." The Wall Street Journal has more here. 

Essential Reads

Someone has been using AI to impersonate Secretary of State Marco Rubio in calls and messages to foreign ministers, a governor, and a member of Congress, highlighting how easily cheap voice-cloning tools can now be used to target senior officials. The Washington Post has more here. 

Detours

As dating apps roll out AI tools to help users charm their way to a match, singles are finding themselves unsure if they’re flirting with a real person or a chatbot.

Independent online bookseller Bookshop.org took a swipe at Amazon to celebrate the start of Prime Day, Amazon’s annual sale, which, despite its name, is actually four days this year.

A Sonoma restaurant just earned two Michelin stars faster than any Bay Area restaurant in history. Good thing the chef obsessively checked his email three times, or he would've missed the whole thing. 

Retail Therapy

Bentley's new EV concept comes complete with a dog bed. 

A 142.7 proof Canadian whiskey.