However, since then venture funding has kicked into another gear.

Through April, less than $800 million was raised by startups in the autonomous driving industry, per Crunchbase data. However, since May 1 nearly $2.7 billion has come pouring into the sector — mainly through a handful of big deals that seem to show investor interest is not stuck in reverse.

Some of those deals that helped lead the turnaround include:

• Self-driving car startup Wayve led the reversal in early May, when the London-based startup raised $1.05 billion in a SoftBank-led round — marking one of the largest funding deals on record for a British startup.
• Two weeks ago, auto giant General Motors agreed to pump another $850 million into San Francisco-based Cruise — which is just restarting its driving programs in Phoenix, Dallas and Houston.
• Finally, just last week Toronto-based autonomous trucking developer Waabi raised a $200 million round co-led by Khosla Ventures and Uber. The company is looking to deploy its driverless trucks as soon as next year.

Those rounds now put venture funding in the sector on track to have its best year since 2021 when investment hit an incredible $12.7 billion — something that seemed unfathomable just about seven weeks ago.

Startups in the sector have already raised nearly $3.5 billion so far this year, putting it on pace to best the $5.7 billion last year and the $5.9 billion in 2022.

Ups and downs

Of course, big money and big valuations were once the norm for the industry.

In 2021, Cruise scooped up the largest round of any venture-backed U.S. startup — upsizing a round to $2.75 billion and valuing the company at more than $30 billion. Other startups in the sector such as Nuro, Horizon Robotics and Momenta also all scooped up rounds of $500 million or more.

However, the tide of venture started turning in early 2022 and autonomous driving startups felt the full effects. Incidentally, Cruise was one of the most affected, when SoftBank did not release a promised $1.35 billion as part of an agreed-upon deal when the autonomous carmaker completed a commercial deployment of vehicles. Instead, General Motors acquired SoftBank’s equity ownership stake in Cruise for $2.1 billion.

Eventually more bad news came to the space as Ford Motor-backed Argo AI shuttered after raising $3.6 billion in funding from investors such as Volkswagen Group and Lyft. In early 2023, autonomous trucking startup Embark Trucks, once valued at $5 billion, announced it was laying off most employees and winding down operations.

Then late last year, Cruise suspended its self-driving taxi program across the country after losing its permit to operate in San Francisco due to an incident with a pedestrian.

Not dead yet

Through all those travails, however, the industry is making a comeback.

It is hard to pinpoint one reason why, although there seems to be excitement over driverless trucks — perhaps as the industry has seen a driver shortage. Aside from the recent Waabi round, in Q3 last year Pittsburgh-based Stack AV — founded by the same folks behind Argo AI — raised a cool $1 billion from the SoftBank Group.

The other driving force could be (you guessed it!) AI.

Many startups like Wayve and Korea-based 42dot have pushed the AI angles of their companies hard, calling themselves mobility AI companies or something similar. In Wayve’s case, its technology works through embodied AI, where the vehicle is powered by artificial intelligence software and interacts with and continuously learns about the world. That differs from earlier attempts which relied more on lidar, radar and 3D.

It also may be a case where many of these large automakers who have invested billions of dollars in the space are just not willing to cut their losses yet. The space was heavily infused by corporate capital, and perhaps those investors are not ready to answer to disappointed shareholders quite yet.

Whatever the reasons, investors have picked up the pace when it comes to putting money into autonomous driving startups. We’ll see if it’s smooth or bumpy roads ahead.

Related Crunchbase Pro query:

• Autonomous Vehicles Startup Funding

Related reading:

• Autonomous Vehicle Funding Stuck In Neutral
• British Self-Driving Car Maker Wayve Revs Up With Whopping $1B SoftBank-led Round

Illustration: Li-Anne Dias

Using Crunchbase data, we set out to track the funding trajectories of these seed- and pre-seed companies, starting with the very AI-centric winter 2024 batch, which wrapped up its demo day in early April. We grouped companies by industry and recorded who has announced funding.  We also looked at which investors are most active in backing these startups.

Although not all of the latest YC companies that raised seed funding have publicly announced it yet, a few have. Those with disclosed investments include a number bringing AI-enabled tools to sectors like legal tech, recruiting, code development and medical recordkeeping. They’ve attracted funding from active seed investors like Pioneer Fund and SV Angel 1, as well as prominent venture capital firms like Benchmark, Khosla Ventures and General Catalyst.

An AI-centric batch

Half of this recently launched batch is building with AI, said Garry Tan, CEO of Y Combinator, in a post announcing its second post-COVID cohort that gathered in person in the Dogpatch neighborhood of San Francisco.

Tan took the helm over a year ago and moved YC up to the city. (He left his firm Initialized Capital, an early-stage firm he co-founded in 2012 with Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian.)

Being in-person and in the city has apparently created a stronger community.

“Hundreds of founders are meeting daily for office hours and events, bumping into legendary people, and surrounding themselves with people who will go deep on subjects and celebrate hard work,” said Lindsay Amos, director of communication, via email. “There is no other place in the world with the same density of great startup founders per square mile as the area around the YC office — and this is fostering innovation and growth.”

San Francisco is experiencing a resurgence due to AI, which is borne out by Crunchbase data.

According to  Jared Friedman, YC group partner, these companies skew younger — 30% of the last batch are college students or grads. Two years ago they were around 10%. “Because of AI, it’s the best time in a decade for college students to start startups,” he said.

Enterprise companies still dominate, with more than two-thirds of the companies in enterprise SaaS. Around 11% are consumer oriented — with AI as the driver for many of the consumer offerings.

After the peak of 2021, the size of YC batches have come down. But YC still launches the largest number of companies in a single cohort — 260 companies in the winter batch.

Seed funding

Interacting in person benefits founders and their rate of progress, said Jason Gray, founder of seed investor Pioneer Fund, an active investor in YC companies, via email.

Pioneer has a network of portfolio companies and venture partners that add up to 1,500 YC alumni with relationships to founders either as a friend, former colleague or customer, according to Gray.  This allows for front loading due diligence.

On the common misconception that YC companies raise funding in advance of demo day, Gray said “while it does happen, it’s not the norm.” He added that “many founders focus on traction until demo day and are selective about which investors they allocate to before then.”

YC hosts an investor evening as well as sharing pitches online. “The in-person element does drive some urgency, which we believe is a benefit to both founders and investors,” said Gray. “Minimizing the distraction of fundraising for founders is in everyone’s best interest.”

The median raise, according to YC, is around $1.3 million post-demo day.

Based on an analysis of Crunchbase data, over all time Andreessen Horowitz, Khosla Ventures and Sequoia Capital are the most active multistage investors in YC companies by deal count. On the seed fund side, Liquid 2 Ventures, SV Angel, Pioneer Fund, FundersClub, Soma Capital and Garry Tan’s previous fund Initialized Capital are most active.

Of the winter 2024 cohort, meanwhile, funded companies include:

• Stockholm-based Leya, an AI assistant for lawyers using proprietary data alongside cited legal sources. The company raised a $10.5 million seed led by Benchmark with partner Chetan Puttagunta joining the board. Belgium-based Hummingbird Ventures and SV Angel participated. Leya is working with 70+ European legal firms and has plans to expand to the U.S.
• San Francisco-based Greptile, built an API that uses large language models to answer questions about a company’s code base. It raised a seed funding of $4.1 million led by Initialized Capital.
• San Francisco-based YonedaLabs, built by a team from Cambridge University, is creating a foundation model for chemists which can predict outcomes without having to run costly trials. The company raised a $4 million seed round led by Khosla Ventures with participation from 500 Emerging Europe, 468 Capital and Fellows Fund among others.
• San Francisco-based Pythagora, built by a team from Croatia, raised $4 million to help build apps with  natural-language interactions. The tool is open-sourced and said to be used by 30,000 developers. Investors include Inovo, 500 Emerging Europe, Moonfire Ventures, Rebel Fund and UpHonest Capital.
• Spacecraft software company Basalt Tech, based in San Francisco, raised a $3.5 million seed funding led by Initialized Capital.
• Paris-based Malibou helps small businesses manage payroll and compliance. It raised a $3.1 million seed led by European venture firm Breega.
• San Francisco-based Hona AI, an AI data platform for healthcare records, raised a seed funding of $3 million led by General Catalyst.
• San Francisco-based Apriora, an AI interviewer to screen job candidates, raised $2.8 million led by 1984 Ventures with participation from HOF Capital and Pioneer fund.
• Manifold Freight, a Seattle-based logistics aggregator of spot freight, raised a $2 million seed round from New Stack Ventures and YC. The founders were engineers at digital freight company Convoy which closed last fall.

Related Crunchbase Pro lists and searches

Pro subscribers can export these lists to track progress over time within their Crunchbase Pro accounts.

• Y Combinator Winter 2024 batch tracked here.
• Y Combinator Unicorn Portfolio Companies
• Y Combinator Exited Unicorn Portfolio Companies

Illustration: Dom Guzman

This is a weekly feature that runs down the week’s top 10 announced funding rounds in the U.S. Check out last week’s biggest funding rounds here.

After a few slow weeks, things picked up slightly concerning big funding deals. Most surprisingly is the fact the week was led by an autonomous driving startup — an industry left for dead by some. AI, biotech, space tech and cybersecurity also saw good-sized raises. Perhaps things are heating up as we head into summer.

1. Cruise, $850M, autonomous cars: In for a penny, in for a pound. That clearly seems to be how General Motors feels about Cruise. The auto giant agreed to pump another $850 million into the San Francisco-based startup. Cruise’s saga has been well documented. In 2021, Cruise snagged the largest round of any venture-backed U.S. startup when it upsized a round to $2.75 billion, valuing the company at  more than $30 billion. However, the tide started to turn in early 2022, when SoftBank did not release a promised $1.35 billion to Cruise as part of an agreed-upon deal when the autonomous carmaker completed a commercial deployment of vehicles. Instead, General Motors acquired SoftBank’s equity ownership stake in Cruise for $2.1 billion. Then, late last year, Cruise suspended its self-driving taxi program across the country after losing its permit to operate in San Francisco due to an incident with a pedestrian. That announcement came almost exactly a year after another autonomous vehicle startup — Ford Motor-backed Argo AI — shuttered after raising $3.6 billion in funding from investors such as Ford Motor, Volkswagen Group and Lyft. Cruise is now restarting its driving programs in Phoenix, Dallas and Houston. Clearly GM is betting — big — the autonomous driving and robotaxi market comes back.

2. AlphaSense, $650M, artificial intelligence: AI-driven market intelligence platform AlphaSense raised $650 million in funding co-led by Viking Global Investors and BDT & MSD Partners at a $4 billion valuation — a 75% increase from just nine months ago. As part of the deal, AlphaSense acquired expert research startup Tegus for $930 million. Last September, the company locked up a $150 million Series E led by Bond Capital at a $2.5 billion valuation — an increase of nearly 30% from its $100 million round at a $1.8 billion valuation in April last year. The New York-based startup’s market intelligence and search platform — powered by AI and natural language processing — helps clients form corporate and investment strategies. In total, the company has now raised $1.4 billion since its founding, per Crunchbase.

3. Santa Ana Bio, $125M, biotech: Biotech bounces back this week with a couple nine-figure rounds. First up is Alameda, California-based Santa Ana Bio, an immunology company developing therapies for patients with autoimmune and inflammatory diseases, which emerged from stealth with a $125 million Series B round led by GV. Founded in 2021, the company has raised $168 million, per Crunchbase.

4. Alzheon, $100M, biotech: Alzheon was the next biotech to raise big this week. The startup raised a $100 million Series E led by Alerce Medical Technology Partners. The Framingham, Massachusetts-based firm is developing medicines for Alzheimer’s disease and other neurodegenerative disorders. Founded in 2013, the company has raised $237 million, per Crunchbase.

5. Apex, $95M, space: Spacecraft manufacturing company Apex locked up a $95 million Series B led by XYZ Venture Capital and CRV to ramp up its production of satellite buses. The Los Angeles-based space tech startup is helping streamline the approach to satellites with the ability to mass produce spacecraft buses — the main body and structural component of satellites — to help growing demand from customers like the U.S. Department of Defense. The new cash will allow the company to increase production to meet customer demand — following the launch of Apex’s first bus in March. Funding to VC-backed space tech startups seems to be on the uptick this year, per Crunchbase data. Last year, space tech startups raised $5.8 billion. However, through less than half of this year, such startups have already seen $3.3 billion roll into their coffers. Founded in 2022, the company has raised $122 million, per Crunchbase.

6. Cyberhaven, $88M, cybersecurity: Cybersecurity funding has shown some life recently and this week showed more proof of that trend. San Jose, California-based Cyberhaven, a data detection and response platform, raised an $88 million Series C led by Adams Street Partners and Khosla Ventures. The round comes after a year in which the company saw a 200% growth in new bookings. Founded in 2016, the company has raised nearly $137 million, per Crunchbase.

7. InduPro, $85M, biotech: Seattle-based InduPro, developing therapeutics for the treatment of cancer and autoimmune diseases, closed an $85 million Series A co-led by The Column Group and Vida Ventures. Founded in 2022, this is the company’s first announced round, per Crunchbase.

8. (tied) Enveda Biosciences, $50M, biotech: Boulder, Colorado-based Enveda Biosciences, a biotechnology company using AI to engineer medicines from plants, announced a new $55 million round. No lead investor was announced, but Microsoft is a new investor in the company. Founded in 2019, Enveda says it has raised $230 million.

8. (tied) Canary Technologies, $50M, hospitality: San Francisco-based Canary Technologies, a management platform for hotels, closed a $50 million Series C led by Insight Partners. Founded in 2017, Canary has now raised nearly $100 million, per the company.

10. Posh AI, $45M, artificial intelligence: Boston-based Posh AI, a conversational AI platform for the banking industry, raised a $45 million round led by Curql. Founded in 2018, the company has raised nearly $73 million, per Crunchbase.

Big global deals

Another large AI round occurred in Europe.

• Paris-based Mistral AI finally secured its much talked about round that values the OpenAI and Anthropic competitor at $6 billion, per a report in the Financial Times. According to the report, Mistral AI raised $500 million in equity and $140 million in debt.

Methodology

We tracked the largest announced rounds in the Crunchbase database that were raised by U.S.-based companies for the seven-day period of June 8 to June 14. Although most announced rounds are represented in the database, there could be a small time lag as some rounds are reported late in the week.

Illustration: Dom Guzman

Startups and their investors are lining up to fill that demand. Since last year, companies working on charging stations and associated technologies have raised billions in seed- through growth-stage financing.

There’s nothing mysterious about the driving force behind the funding, observed Loren McDonald, CEO of research firm EVAdoption. We’re still in the early stages of a massive shift from refueling with gas to recharging with electricity. And since electricity is a lot more ubiquitous than giant tanks of gasoline, there’s far more potential territory to cover.

“Fundamentally, everywhere there’s electricity we can add chargers,” said McDonald. He’s fond of the saying “charging is parking,” given that “literally every time a car sits it can be charged.”

Where startups see a competitive edge

There’s no particular geography or business model that dominates funding for EV charging-related startups.

Good-sized rounds are going to companies with a variety of focus areas, including installing charging stations, operating charger networks, developing software to optimize usage, and helping EV owners get power from green sources. They’re also spread across every inhabited continent.

Using Crunchbase data, we aggregated a sample set of 65 private companies funded in 2023 and 2024 with a focus on EV charging. Collectively, they’ve raised over $4.9 billion in equity funding to date, including both venture and grant funding.

Where’s capital going?

Below, we list 10 of the most heavily funded to illustrate a cross section of business models that are attracting investor interest.

The top investment recipients are building and operating EV charging networks. It’s an expensive undertaking, of course, which helps explain their high fundraising.

On top is Paris-based Electra, which operates a network of bookable charging spots, commonly in commercial locations. The 3-year-old company pulled in $330 million in a January Series B, bringing its total funding to $550 million.

Reston, Virginia-based Electrify America, which operates a North American public fast-charging network, has also been a heavy fundraiser, although its primary financing of $450 million was back in 2022. The company is planning to complete a major expansion of its network this year.

Meanwhile, 10-year-old FreeWire Technologies, based in Newark, California, has raised over $259 million in known financing to date to continue investing in its energy management technology and network of ultra-fast charging stations.

Seed and early-stage active too

The seed and early-stage investment scene around EV charging is also pretty lively.

To illustrate, we put together a sample list of 13 companies that raised seed or Series A financing this year or last. Rather than build and operate large charging networks, these upstarts are mainly focused on smaller niches.

Brooklyn-based Voltpost, for instance, is working on retrofitting lampposts to function as electric vehicle charging platforms. Orange Charger, out of Silicon Valley, is focused on charging infrastructure for apartment complexes. And ChargeLab, based in Toronto, is working on an operating system and app for EV chargers.

For every company that gets funded, meanwhile, there are a plethora of other, often newer startups seeking to make their fortune around some niche of the EV charging market, McDonald observed. Areas of particular interest include charging for multifamily housing, tools to manage power demand in neighborhoods with high EV adoption, and software to help optimize charging at times when electricity costs are lower.

It helps that there are plenty of subsectors to choose from, McDonald added, noting that “It’s a massive opportunity that also requires different approaches to the market for almost every use case.”

EVs on the rise, even as public investors remain wary

Notably, venture-backed companies in the EV charging sector that went public and aren’t named Tesla have mostly not performed so well.

EVGo, ChargePoint, Wallbox and other venture-backed charging companies that went public during the SPAC and IPO boom of 2020 to mid-2022 are mostly trading at a tiny fraction of their former highs.

Some declines may be attributable to a shift in investor mindset, as the go-go optimism around the 2021 market peak took a bearish turn. However, some of the criticism is also specifically directed at charging businesses, including technical problems as well as not-so-impressive usage rates at many charging stations.

Looking ahead, the hope is that as EV adoption grows, under-utilization issues will take care of themselves. Among EV boosters, there’s little doubt that they’ll ultimately displace gas-powered cars. And when they do, startups want to make sure there will be no shortage of charging places.

Related Crunchbase Pro lists:

• EV Charging-Related Private Companies Funded In 2023 And 2024
• Sample List Of Heavily-Funded EV Charging-Related Startups
• Sample Of EV Charging-Related Seed- And Series A-Funded Startups

Illustration: Dom Guzman

May was a big month to raise, well, really big. Four rounds hit $1 billion or more and companies needed to raise at least $200 million to make this list. Not surprisingly AI led the way — as it always seems to do — with a trio of a billion-or-more rounds.

1. xAI, $6B, artificial intelligence: Elon Musk’s generative AI startup, xAI, officially announced its long-awaited fundraise — making it the second-most-valuable generative AI company in the world behind only competitor OpenAI. The $6 billion round included investment from the likes of Valor Equity Partners, Andreessen Horowitz, Sequoia Capital and Fidelity Management & Research, among others. The new funding values the company at $24 billion post-money, well behind OpenAI’s $86 billion valuation but well ahead of the $18 billion that fellow generative AI rival Anthropic is now valued at after its last raise. The xAI round had been rumored for months. Musk’s company was announced just last July and released its ChatGPT competitor, Grok, last November. It introduced its latest AI model, called Grok-1.5,  earlier this year. Grok is trained off data from another one of Musk’s companies, X, formerly Twitter.

2. CoreWeave, $1.1B, artificial intelligence: Another big AI-related funding round. AI cloud infrastructure startup CoreWeave locked up a $1.1 billion round led by Coatue that values the company at $19 billion, per The Wall Street Journal. The valuation represents an almost threefold increase from the company’s valuation just five months ago, when it was valued at $7 billion following a secondary sale, and a huge jump from its $2 billion valuation in a Series B extension last May. With the latest funding, the company has now raised some $4.6 billion, per Crunchbase data.

3. (tied) Scale AI, $1B, artificial intelligence: Are you sensing a trend this month with big AI rounds? Scale AI raised $1 billion in a round led by Accel that values the data labeling and evaluation startup at a stunning $13.8 billion. The valuation is nearly double the $7.3 billion the San Francisco-based startup hit after a $325 million raise in April 2021. The new financing included some of the biggest names in tech, with Nvidia, Meta and Amazon all investing. Scale AI plays a key role in creating large language models and accurately labeling text, images, video and voice data. The startup also creates and fine-tunes data sets.

3. (tied) Wiz, $1B, cybersecurity: Finally, something that is not AI. Cloud security startup Wiz locked up the biggest cybersecurity round of the year thus far as it raised $1 billion at a $12 billion valuation. The round — announced just as the industry’s RSA Conference was getting underway in San Francisco early last month — could be another sign of investors coming back to the cybersecurity space. Cyber startups are coming off their best funding quarter in three quarters, and in late April Microsoft-backed data security firm Rubrik had a successful IPO. Wiz’s latest round was co-led by Andreessen Horowitz, Lightspeed Venture Partners and Thrive Capital. Founded in 2020, Wiz says it has raised $1.9 billion so far. Originally founded in Israel, Wiz has been busy of late. In April, it acquired New York-based cloud detection and response startup Gem Security. The company says the new cash infusion could be used for more deal-making. Also based in New York, the startup says it achieved $350 million in annual recurring revenue last year. It has talked openly about hitting $1 billion in ARR as it heads to an IPO.

5. Motional, $475M, autonomous vehicles: Hyundai showed it is willing to spend big on Boston-based self-driving startup Motional. In May, the carmaker agreed to invest $475 million directly into the startup while also buying 11% of joint venture partner Aptiv’s equity stake in the company for another $448 million. Motional, formerly nuTonomy, was in the news just a couple of months ago for reportedly securing a bridge loan to extend its runway until another funding round. It seems like this situation bears watching.

6. Uniquity Bio, $300M, biotech: While AI dominated, biotech also saw some big rounds in May. The biggest in May was from a brand-new company launched by Blackstone Life Sciences — a unit of private equity giant Blackstone Group — along with a sizable $300 million investment. The new startup is a clinical-stage drug development company focused on immunology and inflammation. Uniquity already has FDA acceptance of its Phase 2 investigational new drug application for one of its medicines.

7. Vercel, $250M, developer platform: Vercel, a platform that allows companies to develop web applications in the cloud, locked up a $250 million Series E at a valuation of $3.25 billion. The round was led by Accel, with participation from other existing investors including CRV, GV, Notable Capital (previously GGV Capital), Bedrock, Geodesic Capital, Tiger Global, 8VC and SV Angel 1. The new round is an upround from Vercel’s 2021 raise, when it secured $150 million in a Series D funding at a $2.5 billion valuation led by GGV Capital. The San Francisco-based company allows developers to use an open-source framework to create web applications, and tries to simplify the process to migrate websites to cloud infrastructure to help with accessibility. Vercel has a number of big-name customers such as Under Armour, Unity and Nintendo. The company says it recently surpassed $100 million in annualized revenue and more than 1 million monthly active developers. Founded in 2015, the company has raised $568 million, per Crunchbase.

8. AltruBio, $225M, biotech: AltruBio secured a $225 million Series B led by BVF Partners. The San Francisco-based startup is developing therapeutics for the treatment of ulcerative colitis and other immunological diseases. The new cash will be used to support ongoing and planned Phase 2 clinical trials in ulcerative colitis. Founded in 2000, AltruBio has raised nearly $328 million, per Crunchbase.

9. (tied) BridgeBio Oncology Therapeutics, $200M, biotech: Biotech saw a big spinoff in May, as BridgeBio Pharma launched subsidiary BridgeBio Oncology Therapeutics as its own company with $200 million of new funding. The Palo Alto, California-based spinoff aims to grow its oncology portfolio. The financing was co-led by Cormorant Asset Management and Omega Funds.

9. (tied) Sigma, $200M, analytics: Cloud analytics startup Sigma raised a $200 million Series D co-led by Spark Capital and Avenir Growth Capital. Similar to Vercel, it was an upround from the company’s last financing. The San Francisco-based company says the valuation was a 60% increase from its $300 million Series C led by D1 Capital Partners and XN in 2021 and it was reported the new valuation was $1.5 billion. Founded in 2014, the company has raised $581 million, per Crunchbase.

9. (tied) Zenas BioPharma, $200M, biotech: Waltham, Massachusetts-based Zenas BioPharma raised a $200 million Series C preferred stock round led by Delos Capital, New Enterprise Associates, Norwest Venture Partners and SR One. The biotech firm specializes in inflammation- and immunology-directed therapies and will use the fresh cash to support the ongoing lead product candidate, obexelimab. Founded in 2020, the company has raised $318 million, per Crunchbase.

Big global deals

xAI and CoreWeave were the biggest raises of the month, but No. 3 came from the U.K.

• London-based self-driving car startup Wayve raised $1.05 billion in a SoftBank-led round.

Methodology

We tracked the largest rounds in the Crunchbase database that were raised by U.S.-based companies for the month of May 2024. Although most announced rounds are represented in the database, there could be a small time lag as some rounds are reported late in the month.

Illustration: Dom Guzman

Here we go again with valuations in the AI startup space.

While the first quarter saw only a single $1 billion round and a few big valuation jumps, this month has certainly brought both back to the forefront and shown that investors are still willing to say yes to a deal no matter the cost.

Just a few weeks ago, AI cloud infrastructure startup CoreWeave locked up a $1.1 billion round led by Coatue that values the company at $19 billion, per The Wall Street Journal.

The new value represented an almost threefold increase from the company’s valuation just five months ago, when it was valued at $7 billion following a secondary sale, and nearly a 10x jump from its $2 billion valuation in a Series B extension last May.

Then last week it was reported that Paris-based Mistral AI — a competitor to OpenAI and Anthropic — was closing in on a round of about $600 million from existing investors General Catalyst and Lightspeed Venture Partners that would value it at $6 billion.

That’s triple what Mistral’s value was just last December when it raised approximately $415 million at a $2 billion valuation, per a Bloomberg report.

Finally, reports have swirled in recent weeks, including one from Bloomberg, that Elon Musk’s generative AI startup, xAI, is closing in on a $6 billion funding round from the likes of Sequoia Capital and others that would value it at $18 billion pre-money.

Musk’s startup is only 10 months old and reportedly was originally seeking around $3 billion at a $15 billion pre-money valuation, but bumped that up due to intense investor interest.

This is no commentary on the quality of any of those companies, but when a startup can see a 10x jump in valuation in a year, or a 3x pop in about five months, it may make some quickly grab a calendar to see if this is 2020 or 2021.

It also should make some question if we truly have learned from all the mistakes investors made in that time.

Things that caught our eye and other stuff:

• This may not be pure AI, but Sam Altman made another interesting investment this week. The OpenAI co-founder — who is also an active investor in other companies— backed robocar network startup Glydways through his Apollo Projects firm. Joining Altman in the round was Japanese automaker giant Suzuki Motor. The South San Francisco-based autonomous vehicle and infrastructure developer raised a total $76 million. The round values Glydways at $350 million to $400 million, per Bloomberg.
• Healthcare continues to see its share of AI startups. This week, New York-based SmarterDx raised $50 million in Series B funding led by Transformation Capital. The startup uses AI to understand patients’ clinical journeys and help hospitals process claims correctly in a more rapid fashion. Founded in 2020, SmarterDx has raised $71 million to date, per the company.

Related Crunchbase Pro query

• Rounds Raised By Startups Using AI

Related reading:

• OpenAI Competitor Mistral AI Raising At $6B Valuation — Report
• AI Cloud Infrastructure Startup CoreWeave Raises Huge New Round At Reported $19B Valuation
• Eye On AI: Valuations Are Not Slowing Down

Illustration: Dom Guzman

This is a weekly feature that runs down the week’s top 10 announced funding rounds in the U.S. Check out last week’s biggest funding rounds here.

The week was slower than last as far as startups raising huge mega rounds. Then again it had to be after 13 companies raised more than $100 million last week. Nevertheless, there were still some big raises, including a $1 billion round.

1. Wiz, $1B, cybersecurity: Cloud security startup Wiz locked up the biggest cybersecurity round of the year thus far as it raised $1 billion at a $12 billion valuation. The round — announced just as the industry’s RSA Conference was getting underway in San Francisco this week — could be another sign of investors coming back to the cybersecurity space. Cyber startups are coming off their best funding quarter in three quarters, and late last month Microsoft-backed data security firm Rubrik had a successful IPO. Wiz’s latest round was co-led by Andreessen Horowitz, Lightspeed Venture Partners and Thrive Capital. Founded in 2020, Wiz says it has raised $1.9 billion so far. Originally founded in Israel, Wiz has been busy of late. Just last month it acquired New York-based cloud detection and response startup Gem Security. The company says the new cash infusion could be used for more deal-making. Also based in New York, the startup said it achieved $350 million in annual recurring revenue last year. It has talked openly about hitting $1 billion in ARR as it heads to an IPO.

2. Zenas BioPharma, $200M, biotech: Zenas BioPharma continues the trend of big biotech weeks every week. The Waltham, Massachusetts-based startup raised a $200 million Series C preferred stock round led by Delos Capital, New Enterprise Associates, Norwest Venture Partners and SR One. The biotech firm specializes in inflammation- and immunology-directed therapies and will use the fresh cash to support the ongoing lead product candidate, obexelimab. Founded in 2020, the company has raised $318 million, per Crunchbase.

3. Bluejay Therapeutics, $182M, biotech: Following up on the biotech trend, Bluejay Therapeutics locked up a $182 million Series C co-led by Frazier Life Sciences and an unnamed life science-focused institutional investment firm. The San Mateo, California-based startup will use the fresh cash to advance the development of its treatment for chronic hepatitis D and treatments for chronic hepatitis B. Founded in 2019, the company has raised $223 million, per Crunchbase.

4. Zippy Shell, $180M, logistics: Privately held moving and storage firm Zippy Shell locked up a big $180 million deal from global investment firm The Carlyle Group. The new investment also included a new debt facility led by JP Morgan Chase. Zippy provides an alternative to traditional storage and moving options by delivering containers that are dropped off at a customer’s location and then moved to a storage site or destination for unloading. The new cash will be used to refinance its existing debt and fund growth initiatives, including network and fleet expansion. Founded in 2010, the company has raised $365 million, per Crunchbase.

5. Attovia Therapeutics, $105M, biotech: Fremont, California-based Attovia Therapeutics, which is developing biotherapeutics focused on immune-mediated diseases, closed a $105 million Series B led by Goldman Sachs Alternatives. The new round comes just 11 months after the company raised a $60 million Series A. Founded in 2023, Attovia has raised $165 million, per the company.

6. Meati, $100M, alternative protein: Boulder, Colorado-based Meati, which creates cutlets and steaks from mycelium, raised $100 million in a C-1 round led by Grosvenor Food & AgTech. Founded in 2016, the company has raised nearly $375 million, per Crunchbase.

7. R3 Vascular, $87M, medical device: Mountain View, California-based R3 Vascular, a developer of medical devices for treating peripheral arterial disease, closed an $87 million Series B led by affiliates of Deerfield Management. Founded in 2019, the company has raised $105 million, per Crunchbase.

8. Aardvark Therapeutics, $85M, biotech: San Diego-based Aardvark Therapeutics, which is developing therapies for metabolic diseases, inflammation and more, closed an $85 million Series C financing led by Decheng Capital. Founded in 2017, the company has raised nearly $130 million, per Crunchbase.

9. Base Power, $68M, energy: Austin, Texas-based Base Power, a developer of battery-powered home energy services, raised $68 million from the likes of Thrive Capital and Valor Equity Partners. It is the company’s first raise, per Crunchbase.

10. Privateer, $57M, space tech: Kihei, Hawaii-based satellite-tracking software developer Privateer raised a $56.5 million round led by space-focused venture capital firm Aero X Ventures and acquired the analytics firm Orbital Insight. The round is the company’s first announced raise, per Crunchbase.

Big global deals

The biggest round of the week was actually one of the largest funding deals on record for a British startup ever.

• London-based self-driving car startup Wayve raised $1.05 billion in a SoftBank-led round.

Methodology

We tracked the largest announced rounds in the Crunchbase database that were raised by U.S.-based companies for the seven-day period of May 4 to May 10. Although most announced rounds are represented in the database, there could be a small time lag as some rounds are reported late in the week.

Illustration: Dom Guzman

Numerous prominent brands — including General Motors, American Airlines and Six Flags — went through bankruptcy. Today, they’re multibillion-dollar companies.

Now it looks like some famous failed unicorns are looking to do the same. Over the past few quarters, at least five have reemerged from the bankruptcy reorganization process, or are close to doing so.

Of those, the most closely watched is WeWork, the co-working giant with a one-time $47 billion valuation that filed for bankruptcy in November following a disastrous run as a public company.

New York-based WeWork announced last Tuesday that it is close to finishing negotiations with creditors and expects to emerge from Chapter 11 by the end of the month. Its restructuring plan calls for eliminating $4 billion of outstanding debt and includes up to $450 million in new funding from SoftBank and other stakeholders. WeWork also rebuffed a bid by founder Adam Neumann to buy back the company.

WeWork isn’t the only former unicorn hustling through Chapter 11. Others include:

IronNet: Cybersecurity provider IronNet, which went public during the 2021 SPAC boom and saw its share price and business collapse a couple years later, announced in February that it emerged from Chapter 11 as a private company. The reorganization plan eliminated about $38 million in company debt and added a new asset-based loan of $15 million.

Nu Ride/Lordstown Motors: Embattled electric-truck maker Nu Ride (formerly Lordstown Motors) emerged from bankruptcy in March, moving its corporate headquarters from Lordstown, Ohio, to New York City and changing its ticker symbol to NRDE. Per TechCrunch, the company has “little left to its name,” having sold the factory it once owned to Foxconn and assets tied to its electric pickup truck to an investment vehicle controlled by founder Steve Burns.

Starry: Boston-based Starry, an internet service provider and developer of fixed wireless technology, didn’t fly high for long after going public via SPAC in early 2022 at an initial $1.8 billion valuation. Less than a year later, following steep layoffs and a share price decline of more than 99%, Starry filed for bankruptcy. Last August, Starry emerged from Chapter 11 with restructured finances and a focus on five markets: Boston, New York City, Los Angeles, Washington, D.C., and Denver.

Rockley Photonics: Pasadena, California-based Rockley Photonics, a maker of photonics-based health monitoring technology, emerged from Chapter 11 last June, with $35 million in fresh financing. Rockley raised more than $200 million in venture funding before going public via SPAC in mid-2021 at an initial valuation of $1.2 billion. The company filed for bankruptcy about a year-and-a-half later, and was promptly booted from the New York Stock Exchange.

Second chances

For these companies, which already went public and fizzled badly, a comeback won’t be a win for their initial backers. However, there is potential to salvage business models and technologies that have a shot of viability without so much burdensome debt on their balance sheets.

WeWork, in particular, seems like it could have a real shot at a second chance, given that office space rents have declined in many desirable metros, and teleworkers may be looking for workspace options besides their own homes.

Related reading:

• In Sectors From Diagnostics To Spacetech, More Struggling SPACs Are Going Private
• Have You Heard About The Herd Of Failed And Struggling AI-Focused Unicorns?
• Amazon Aggregator Thrasio Files For Bankruptcy Protection After Raising Billions From Investors

Illustration: Dom Guzman

Nvidia and existing investor Microsoft, both active investors in the AI space, also joined in the Series C funding. Wayve has now raised $1.3 billion, per Crunchbase. It did not disclose a valuation for the latest funding.

The company was founded by PhD students at the University of Cambridge in 2017 and has been testing its technology on British roads since 2018. It employs approximately 300 people, according to The New York Times.

Its self-driving car technology works through embodied AI, or a system in which a real-world object such as a robot — or, in this case, a vehicle — powered by artificial intelligence software interacts with and continuously learns about the world as it travels through that environment. That approach differs from systems developed by companies such as Alphabet-owned Waymo, which rely heavily on technology such as lidar, radar, cameras and high-definition 3D maps.

Wayve’s business model is to sell its technology to other car manufacturers and robotics companies, TechCrunch noted.

“We want to enable all the auto manufacturers around the world to work with our AI, of course, across a wide variety of sources,” CEO and co-founder Alex Kendall told TechCrunch. “More importantly, we’ll get diverse data from different cars and markets, and that’s going to produce the most intelligent and capable embodied AI.”

Despite few billion-dollar funding deals on the scale of the Wayve raise, venture funding to AI-related startups increased slightly in Q1 2024 compared to Q4 2023, Crunchbase data shows. All told, around $12.2 billion was invested in venture-backed AI startups in 1,166 deals in Q1 —  a 4% uptick in dollar terms from last year’s final quarter, which saw $11.7 billion go to similar startups in 1,072 deals.

Related Crunchbase Pro query:

• Rounds Raised By Startups Using AI

Related reading:

• AI Funding Stays Strong Despite Few Billion-Dollar Rounds

Illustration: Li-Anne Dias

This is a weekly feature that runs down the week’s top 10 announced funding rounds in the U.S. Check out last week’s biggest funding rounds here.

At this point it’s fair to say the big, nine-figure round is back. Since February, this list has been made up of typically six or seven such rounds after months with usually just a couple such rounds every week. This week, there are eight $100 million-or-more rounds (almost nine!), including some massive raises. Investors are not afraid to write the big check right now for the right startup.

1. Cyera, $300M, cybersecurity: While it is true cybersecurity funding has significantly slowed, it certainly has not dried up. Data security startup Cyera raised a $300 million Series C led by Coatue at a $1.4 billion valuation. The round nearly triples the New York-based startup’s valuation from its $100 million Series B last June which valued it at $500 million. Founded in 2021, Cyera has raised $460 million to date, per the company. Cyera offers a platform that helps security teams at companies understand what data they have and how it’s used, as well as how to secure it — all of which has become more important with companies relying on data to drive AI initiatives. The startup also uses AI in its platform to assess risks a companies’ data represents regarding security, privacy and regulatory compliance.

2. Monad Labs, $225M, blockchain: New York-based Monad Labs locked up the biggest Web3 funding round of the year thus far, collecting a $225 million funding round led by Paradigm. Monad is a layer-1 blockchain that is compatible with the Ethereum Virtual Machine but can process transactions using the same set of rules faster. The round is reminiscent of the 2021-22 era when layer-1 protocols like Aptos Labs raised big. Founded in 2022, the company has raised $244 million, per Crunchbase.

3. Torl BioTherapeutics, $158M, biotech: It was just about a year ago that Los Angeles-based biopharmaceutical company Torl BioTherapeutics closed a $158 million Series B led by Goldman Sachs Asset Management. Well, the cancer-treating biotech is back this week after it closed a B-2 financing at another $158 million led by Deep Track Capital. The startup will use the new cash in the development of novel, antibody-based therapeutics to fight cancer. Founded in 2018, Torl has raised more than $350 million, per the company.

4. Guesty, $130M, hospitality: People love to travel and they seem to love to stay at short-term rentals. Guesty, a property management software platform for those rentals, raised a big $130 million Series F led by KKR India Asset Finance this week to help property managers keep up with that demand. The Covina, California-based startup operates in more than 80 countries and will use the fresh cash to continue its U.S. expansion. Founded in 2013, the company has raised nearly $411 million, per Crunchbase.

5. Platform Science, $125M, transportation: San Diego-based Platform Science, an edge application platform for transportation fleets, raised $125 million. The company did not name a lead investor, but investors in the round included Daimler Trucks and RyderVentures among others. The startup’s platform helps equip enterprise commercial fleets with mobile devices and applications for better flexibility, visibility and productivity. Founded in 2015, the company has raised nearly $323 million, per Crunchbase.

6. (tied) Collaborative Robotics, $100M, robotics: Santa Clara, California-based Collaborative Robotics locked up a $100 million Series B led by General Catalyst. Collaborative has raised over $140 million since being founded in 2022, per the company.

6. (tied) FloQast, $100M, accounting: Los Angeles-based FloQast, a finance and accounting operations platform, closed a $100 million Series E led by Iconiq Growth at a post-money valuation of $1.6 billion. Founded in 2013, the company has raised nearly $303 million, per Crunchbase.

6. (tied) Seaport Therapeutics, $100M, biotech: It is no surprise, as the dangers of depression and anxiety become more apparent in society, that more startups are looking to conquer the illnesses. Boston-based Seaport Therapeutics launched this week to do just that. The biotech startup raised a $100 million Series A co-led by Arch Venture Partners and Sofinnova Investments. The biotech company focuses on medicines for depression, anxiety and other neuropsychiatric disorders.

9. Nectero Medical, $96M, biotech: Tempe, Arizona-based Nectero Medical, a clinical-stage biotech startup developing therapies to treat aneurysmal disease, closed a $96 million Series D led by Norwest Venture Partners. Founded in 2017, the company has raised nearly $116 million, per Crunchbase.

10. Grow Therapy, $88M, healthcare: New York-based Grow Therapy, a software developer for the mental health industry, closed an $88 million Series C led by Sequoia Capital. Founded in 2020, the company has raised $178 million, per Crunchbase.

Big global deals

The second-biggest round of the week went to a European startup specializing in loans and investments.

• Spain-based Aquisgran, a financial services firm, raised a venture round worth nearly $277 million.

Methodology

We tracked the largest announced rounds in the Crunchbase database that were raised by U.S.-based companies for the seven-day period of April 6 to 12. Although most announced rounds are represented in the database, there could be a small time lag as some rounds are reported late in the week.

Illustration: Dom Guzman