March 14th Newsletter

The market continued its decline this week. On Monday, the Nasdaq fell 4%, the S&P 500 fell 2.7% and the Dow Jones fell 2.1%. Trump warned of a "period of transition" and refused to rule out a recession. Goldman Sachs has lowered its S&P 500 target to 6,200 due to increased policy uncertainty from tariffs. February’s U.S. inflation cooled to 2.8%, but new tariffs may drive future price hikes. Employee confidence fell to its lowest in a decade amidst all the volatility. Ukraine has agreed to a U.S.-proposed 30-day ceasefire, but its implementation now depends on whether Russia will accept it, with Putin voicing doubts. In tech, Amazon, Google, and Meta pledged to triple global nuclear power by 2050, ensuring reliable energy for AI growth. Additionally, the FTC requested a trial delay against Amazon over deceptive Prime practices due to staffing and budget shortages. Spotify's 2024 report shows payment of $10 billion in royalties, doubling industry value in a decade, with independent artists and labels taking home a major share with $5 billion. 

Starting this week, we moved the public comps to a monthly cadence and will include it as a part of our monthly AI financing report.

Monthly AI Financing Report: Since January, we started sharing a monthly report of the top AI financing activity gathered from public and proprietary sources. See the latest release of February update here.

Top 5 AI Highlights

[1] 💾CoreWeave, a cloud computing provider specializing in AI-focused data centers, is set to debut on NASDAQ in the coming weeks amid volatile market conditions. Its IPO prospectus revealed 2024 revenue surged over 700% to $1.92 billion, with Microsoft contributing more than 60%. A five-year, $11.9 billion deal with OpenAI guarantees revenue stability, with OpenAI acquiring a $350 million stake. Backed by Nvidia and Microsoft, CoreWeave is emerging as a critical player in the GPU-cloud industry, potentially valued above $35 billion. More from CNBC.

[2]  Last Friday, Apple released a statement that it will delay the release of a “more personalized” Siri until 2026. John Gruber, a longtime Apple watcher who has been covering the company since 2002 on his Daring Fireball weblog, noted in his article "Something Is Rotten in the State of Cupertino" that Apple is now showcasing features in controlled demos that have yet to become fully functional, effectively entering the realm of vaporware. Gruber’s analysis serves as a cautionary tale for executives responsible for shipping products/features, suggesting that companies should only announce products/features they are confident they can deliver to maintain customer trust. Read more on Reuters and John Gruber’s Daring Fireball.

[3] 🤖 OpenAI has launched a platform to build AI agents, Responses API. Stripe and Box are testing the tool, which enables AI agents to search the web, analyze files, and automate tasks, with Agents SDK coordinating complex workflows. Even so, competition is growing in the agents space, especially from Manus AI, a Chinese startup developing autonomous agents for research and workflow automation. Manus claims superior performance over OpenAI’s deep research but faces reports of errors and inconsistencies. With increased competition, OpenAI sees 2025 as the “year of agents,” betting on improved reasoning models to boost adoption. More from TV, WSJ, OpenAI, and TC

[4] 🔥 Meta is rapidly expanding its AI initiatives, integrating AI-powered business agents into WhatsApp, Instagram, and Facebook. The upcoming Llama 4 model will enhance AI’s voice capabilities, while Meta explores monetization through premium AI services and ads. However, the company faces legal scrutiny over its AI training methods, with a federal judge allowing a lawsuit to proceed over alleged copyright infringement in its AI model development. Additionally, Meta is developing an AI engineering agent and testing an in-house AI training chip to reduce reliance on Nvidia. If the chip succeeds, Meta could drastically lower AI infrastructure costs. More from CNBC, FT, SMT and YF.

[5] ⚡ Microsoft is intensifying its AI strategy by developing in-house reasoning models that could directly rival OpenAI, despite being a key backer of OpenAI. Microsoft's AI division has trained the MAI model family, reportedly performing on par with OpenAI and Anthropic’s leading models. The company is already testing alternatives to OpenAI in its Copilot AI and may launch MAI as an API this year, signaling a major shift toward AI independence and competition with its longtime partner. More from Reuters.

Founder’s Corner

Venture funds still have significant dry powder

What We Read This Week

• Startup Lila Sciences aims to revolutionize scientific discovery with AI-driven experiments, accelerating breakthroughs in medicine, energy, and materials. (NYT)

• Sakana’s AI-generated research paper passed peer review but was withdrawn for transparency, sparking debate on AI in research. (Sakana)

• Sony is developing AI-powered PlayStation characters, prototyping an interactive “Aloy” from Horizon Forbidden West using GPT-4, Llama 3, and proprietary tech. (The Verge)

• Nearly 25% of U.S. tech job postings in 2025 require AI skills, reshaping hiring across industries. (WSJ)

• A year after the Amazon transaction fell through, iRobot nears bankruptcy amid plummeting Roomba sales. (Fortune)

• TSMC proposes a joint venture to run Intel’s foundry, courting Nvidia, AMD, and Broadcom. Intel also announced Lip-Bu Tan to be their new CEO. (CNBC)

• Estonia’s Bolt is challenging Uber and Lyft in Canada by offering drivers higher earnings, with CEO Markus Villig saying its $10B+ annualized gross bookings enable it to operate on slimmer margins. (Linkedin)

• Fintech firm Klarna prepares for a $15B IPO while restructuring teams and cutting costs, with hundreds of employees in “limbo.” (LinkedIn)

AI M&A and Fundraising news (Mar 7 — Mar 13)

• Augmenta: AI platform automating electrical system design, raised a $10M Seed Extension.

• AvatarOS: AI avatars with 3D characteristics for real-time interaction, raised a $7M Seed.

• Bria: AI platform for visual creativity and image generation, raised a $40M Series B.

• Carpool Logistics: Automotive logistics AI platform for vehicle shipping, raised a $12M Series A.

• Cartesia: Real-time voice AI, raised a $64M Series A.

• Casual Labs: AI-powered real-time weather forecasting, raised a $6M Seed.

• Celestial AI: Photonic Fabric™ optical interconnect technology, raised a $250M Series C.

• Crogl: AI agent for cybersecurity alert analysis, raised a $25M Series A.

• Cybereason: AI-powered cybersecurity threat detection, raised $120M.

• Darwin AI: AI governance for state and local government agencies, raised a $5M Seed.

• Elea: AI-powered pathology platform, raised a $4.4M Seed.

• Enter: AI agents for legal defense automation in Brazil, raised a $5.5M Seed.

• Eve Autonomy: Autonomous transportation services for manufacturing, raised a $6.65M Series B.

• EverestLabs: AI-powered recycling and data analytics platform, raised a $9.67M Seed.

• FarmWise: AI-driven farming robots for autonomous cultivation, raised a $21.72M Series B.

• Firsthand: AI agents for marketers and publishers, raised a $26M Series A.

• Freed: AI scribe automating clinical notetaking, raised a $30M Series A.

• Genome Health: AI health technology platform for cancer treatment, raised a $10.39M Series A.

• Infinite Uptime: AI-driven predictive maintenance for factories, raised a $35M Series C.

• Jigsaw: AI tools for OCR, translation, and data extraction, raised $1M.

• Lila Sciences: AI for scientific experiment automation, raised a $200M Seed.

• Nirvana Insurance: AI-driven commercial trucking insurance, raised an $80M Series C.

• Norm AI: AI agents for compliance, raised a $48M Series B.

• Nunu.ai: AI gaming application for multimodal test games, raised an $8M Seed.

• Onyx: AI answer bot platform for custom assistants, raised a $10M Seed.

• OpusClip: AI-powered video repurposing for social media, raised a $20M Series B.

• Plata: AI-powered financial platform for personal finance, raised a $160M Series A.

• PreciTaste: AI-driven kitchen automation software, raised a $6.36M Seed.

• Reflection AI: AI technology for building superhuman coding agents, raised a $105M Series A.

• Sola Security: AI-powered no-code security studio, raised $30M.

• WorkFusion: AI automation platform for financial crime compliance, raised a $15.43M Series A.

• Worth AI: AI platform for risk management and business valuation, raised a $25M Seed.