🧠 Dopamine Dealflow

• SpaceX (Hawthorne, CA) – Invested $2B into xAI, Elon Musk’s AI company behind Grok. Part of a $5B equity round led by Morgan Stanley.

• NetBox Labs (New York, NY) – Raised $35M Series B, led by NGP Capital, to scale its network infrastructure management platform.

• MOTOR Ai (Berlin, Germany) – Raised $20M Seed, led by Segenia Capital and eCAPITAL, for its Level 4 autonomous driving tech using cognitive intelligence.

• Datavations (New York, NY) – Raised $17M Series A, led by Forestay Capital, to power AI analytics in building materials + home improvement retail.

• Unblock (Global) – Raised $13.5M, led by Goldcrest Capital and Collaborative Fund, turning stranded energy into computing infrastructure.

• Zip Security (San Francisco, CA) – Raised $13.5M Series A, led by Ballistic Ventures, building AI-native IT security + compliance ops.

• Duranta (Seattle, WA) – Raised $7M Seed, led by Base10, building software for landscapers + lawncare pros.

• Asepha (Toronto, Canada) – Raised $4M Seed, led by Glasswing Ventures, modernizing pharmacy ops with AI.

• Opper AI (Stockholm, Sweden) – Raised €2.5M Pre-Seed from Luminar Ventures + others to build LLM infrastructure tools.

• TASS Vision (Tashkent, Uzbekistan) – Raised €1.3M, led by Purple Ventures, for edge-AI analytics in physical retail.

• Simulations Plus (Lancaster, CA) – Invested $1M in Nurocor, enhancing biopharma R&D automation.

• MogoPlus (Sydney, Australia) – Raised AU$1.5M, led by New Model VC to expand open data & credit insights AI.

• Inntelo AI (London, UK) – Raised £500K+ Pre-Seed, to enhance guest comms in hotels via AI.

• Aim (Prague, Czech Republic) – Raised €300K, backed by Miton, building AI agents for briefing biz content.

• Bastazo (Oklahoma City, OK) – Raised Undisclosed Seed, led by Cortado Ventures, building AI-first cybersecurity for critical infra.

• Island (Dallas, TX) – Raised Series E, led by Coatue, bringing enterprise browser security to a $5B valuation.

• BondCliQ (New York, NY) – Secured Lead Investment from FactSet to boost bond market data integration.

• Dreampath Diagnostics (Palo Alto, CA) – Received Undisclosed Growth Investment from Summit Partners for pathology digitization.

• TeraWatt Technology (Fremont, CA) – Closed First Tranche of Series C, backed by Khosla Ventures, Temasek, JBIC and others for next-gen Li-ion batteries.

💸 VC Funds Raised & Raising

• Mantis VC, co-founded by The Chainsmokers' Alex Pall and Drew Taggart alongside investor-entrepreneurs Jeffrey Evans and Milan Koch, has raised $100 million for its third fund. The firm continues to leverage its unique blend of celebrity influence and strategic connections to support innovative early-stage tech startups, with a focus on B2B ventures.

• Stone Point Capital raised $11.5B for its tenth fund, doubling down on financial services private equity.

• GPx, a new fund from Brian Singerman and Lee Linden, is targeting $500M+ to back emerging managers through both a fund-of-funds and late-stage co-investment strategy.

• Lorient Capital raised $500M for its third fund, continuing its focus on healthcare services and growth-stage platforms.

• Nzyme, backed by Kibo Ventures, raised ~$175M to acquire and scale Spanish B2B tech companies.

Founders: Want to be featured on @tradedvc? → traded.co/submit/vc

📰 Other News

Meta may ditch open-source AI for good
Behemoth, its top model, underperformed—so Meta’s superintelligence lab is now debating a pivot to closed models. A massive philosophical shift could be brewing.

🖥️ Google is merging Android and ChromeOS
A Google exec confirmed the OS combo is coming. It’ll boost dev velocity and tablet UX—finally unifying the mobile-desktop experience.

🔬 mRNA vaccine hits antibiotic-resistant bacteria
Israeli scientists used COVID-era tech to create an mRNA vaccine for the plague—and it achieved 100% protection in animal models.

⚡ DARPA laser-beamed 800 watts across 8.6km
Wireless power just got a demo of the future. Lasers, not wires, may soon link airborne relays with precision and power.

💻 AWS launches Kiro, the anti-vibe coding IDE
Kiro skips straight to specs, using a conversational AI to help devs design before they code. Plug it into VS Code, and you’re building like it’s 2030.

Zuck’s AI supercluster goes live in 2026
Meta’s planning a $100B compute moonshot. Fueled by frustration with OpenAI and Google, Zuck is stacking talent and silicon to compete at full throttle.

VC Spotlight: Mantis VC’s $100M Fund III

Mantis VC—yes, the one co-founded by The Chainsmokers (Alex Pall & Drew Taggart)—just closed $100M Fund III, pushing their total AUM to $225M across three funds. Backed by the likes of Summit Peak, TriplePoint, Allocate, Mark Cuban, and Michael Rubin, this isn’t just celebrity capital—it’s real LP weight.

Since 2019, Mantis has backed 170+ startups including Chainguard, Kalshi, Underdog, and Dandy—plus early exits in Coinbase and Rupa Health. Their debut fund? Top decile.

Fund III Strategy:

• Check sizes: $500K–$2M

• Sectors: AI, cybersecurity, frontier tech, infra, healthtech

• Ethos: cultural velocity + cap table action.

Why They Hit Different:

• They co-host LA Tech Week (10 years strong) with Lightspeed.

• Built-in founder street cred from viral hits to GTM playbooks.

• They actually show up—from GTM events to recruiting cold DMs.

Platform Moves:

• Steve O’Brien partnered with Palantir to supercharge ops.

• Saveena Mandadi launched a CISO advisory committee.

• Gaurav Bhogale (AI), Caroline Menkes (Healthtech) bring deep vertical muscle.