October 24th Newsletter

The U.S. government shutdown hit Day 22, marking it the second-longest in history. Nvidia and TSMC debuted their first U.S.-made Blackwell chip wafer in Arizona, backing a $500B domestic AI push. A major AWS outage on Monday disrupted Amazon, Meta, and OpenAI, exposing cloud centralization risks. Coinbase acquired Echo for $375M to boost crypto services, while President Trump pardoned convicted Binance founder CZ. Wikipedia traffic was revised down 8% due to AI bots. Apple landed exclusive U.S. F1 streaming rights in a $150M/year deal starting 2026, aligning with its $630M F1 film strategy.

Top 5 AI Highlights

[1] 🧠 OpenAI launched Atlas, an AI browser with chat and agent features challenging Chrome. With the launch of Atlas, WSJ shared their latest take on AI Browsers, in which Comet is the best for smart tabs and citations, followed by Atlas’s privacy tools and Dia’s shopping skills. Read more from TechCrunch and WSJ.

[2] 🚨 Amazon is expanding its AI hardware with a Flock partnership connecting millions of Ring cameras to law enforcement, despite $5.8M privacy fine concerns, and testing AI glasses for drivers with hands-free navigation, package scanning, and real-time alerts. Read more from TechCrunch. 

[3] 🏗️Meta and Blue Owl Capital launched a $27B joint venture to build the Hyperion AI data center in Louisiana. Blue Owl owns 80%, Meta retains 20% and will manage construction. Completion expected by 2030. Read more from CNBC.

[4] ☁️ Anthropic, valued at $183B, agreed with Google for a cloud deal worth tens of billions, granting access to TPUs. Google has already invested $3B, while Amazon committed $8B. Read More from YahooFinance. 

[5]  📊 OpenAI’s “Project Mercury” recruits 100+ ex-bankers (from JPMorgan, Goldman, etc.) at $150/hour to train AI on building Excel models, aiming to automate junior banker grunt work like IPOs and restructurings. Read more from Bloomberg.

Founder’s Corner

The gap between the median seed valuation and the top 5% valuation is now 4x

What We Read This Week

• Karpathy predicts no AGI until 2035, argues that today’s AI lacks reasoning, reliability, and utility. He urges a shift from hype to “augmented intelligence” as real progress will take a decade. (YouTube). 

• Target will eliminate 8% of corporate staff (1,800 roles) as part of a restructuring under incoming CEO Michael Fiddelke to address declining sales and simplify operations. Read more from (CNBC).

• Amazon is deploying 750,000+ robots to cut future hiring, backed by a $400M AI push. Advanced arms like Sparrow and Bluejay drive its race toward near-lights-out warehouse automation.(NYTimes).

• Rivian is laying off 600+ employees (~4.5% of its workforce) to cut costs ahead of the 2026 R2 SUV launch amid broader EV market headwinds. (WSJ). 

• Netflix eyes Q4 strength after KPop Demon Hunters hit 325M views, adding ~500M watch hours. Wall Street stays bullish despite AI concerns, with stock targets up to $1,500. (HollywoodReporter).

• Google launches “Grounding with Maps” in Gemini API, enabling apps to access real-time geospatial data from 250M+ places, powering smarter travel, retail, and real estate AI with personalized, location-aware responses. (Google).

AI Fundraising news (Oct 17 — Oct 23)

• Acelab: AI-powered platform helping architects and designers research building materials, raised a $13.5M Series A

• Anchor Browser: AI infrastructure enabling autonomous web task execution, raised a $6M Seed

• Anrok: AI-driven global sales tax compliance platform for digital businesses, raised a $55M Series C

• Armstrong: SF-based developer of robots for restaurant kitchens, raised $12M

• Astra Nova: No-code tools for blockchain-based entertainment experiences, raised $48.3M

• Bexorg: AI and brain science for CNS drug discovery, raised a $23M Series A

• BoodleBox: Collaborative AI platform for higher education, raised a $5M Seed

• Bronto: Manages and analyzes log data for AI applications, raised a $13.9M Seed

• Bricklayer AI: Agentic cybersecurity platform protecting digital enterprises, raised a $5M Seed

• Chemify: AI and robotics-powered molecular design automation startup, raised a $50M Series B

• ChipAgents: Agentic AI platform to automate chip design, raised a $21M Series A

• Chipmind: AI agents accelerating microchip development, raised a $2.4M Preseed

• Counsel Health: AI triage and medical chatbot platform routing health cases to physicians, raised a $25M Series A

• Defakto: Identity and access management for AI agents, raised a $30.75M Series B

• Dialogue AI: AI-powered market research platform, raised a $6M Seed

• Estuary: Real-time enterprise data synchronization for AI analytics, raised a $17M Series A

• Expedition Medicines: Generative AI drug discovery startup using quantum covalent chemistry, raised a $50M Series A

• ExaCare AI: Operations automation platform for post-acute care facilities, raised a $30M Series A

• Fal.ai: Media AI model provider for developers, raised around $250M

• Findem: AI-powered talent acquisition platform, raised a $51M Series C

• Finster AI: AI software automating research for banks and asset managers, raised a $15M Series A

• Fourier Health: Uses AI to summarize and organize patient data, raised an $8.4M Seed

• General Intuition: AI lab using gaming content for training, raised $133.7M Seed

• Graph AI: AI-driven pharmacovigilance and regulatory safety monitoring company, raised $3M Seed

• Hyro: AI agents automating healthcare call center and clinical workflows, raised $45M

• Keycard: Enterprise AI agent identity and access management platform, raised a $38M combined Seed and Series A

• LangChain: Open-source framework connecting AI apps to real-time data, raised a $125M Series B

• Luster: AI tool coaching customer-facing teams before calls, raised a $3M Seed

• Magic: AI platform unifying reservation and purchase data for restaurants, raised a $10M Seed

• Moonshot AI: Generative AI for online store optimization, raised a $10M Seed

• MythWorx: Developer of low-power AI models mimicking human reasoning, raised a $5M Seed

• Natural: Payments infrastructure for AI agents, raised a $9.8M Seed

• Nexos.ai: Enterprise AI adoption and integration platform, raised a $34.8M Series A

• OpenAI: Acquired Software Applications Incorporated, which builds an AI-powered macOS user interface and had raised $6.5M

• OpenEvidence: AI medical reference and assistant tool for clinicians, raised a $200M Series C

• Paygentic: Payments and billing platform for AI-native businesses, raised $2M

• Prisma Photonics: AI-based infrastructure monitoring using optical fiber networks, raised $30M

• Riff: Vibe-coding platform based in Oslo, raised a $16M Series A

• Sage Care: AI agents for healthcare provider scheduling, raised $20M

• Second Nature: Conversational AI that trains sales and service teams, raised a $22M Series B

• Serval: Automates IT service management with agentic AI, raised a $47M Series A

• Sesame: Conversational AI and smart glasses startup, raised a $250M Series B

• Software Applications Incorporated: AI-powered user interface for macOS, raised $6.5M

• Strella: AI moderator enabling automated customer research, raised a $14M Series A

• Streetbeat: AI agents for wealth management firms, raised a $15M Series A

• Sumble: AI sales intelligence service, raised a $30M Series A

• UnifyApps: AI-driven enterprise automation and chatbot integration platform, raised a $50M Series B

• Uniphore: AI software automating enterprise workflows and data operations, raised a $260M Series F

• Wonder Studios: AI creative studio producing digital content, raised a $12M Seed

• Wolf Games: Generative AI gaming startup based in Los Angeles, raised a $9M Series A