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  • nScale hits $14.6B · Replit triples to $9B · Quince hits $10.1B · Talkspace acquired for $835M · AMI Labs Raises $1B

nScale hits $14.6B · Replit triples to $9B · Quince hits $10.1B · Talkspace acquired for $835M · AMI Labs Raises $1B

A record-breaking week for AI infrastructure as nScale, Nexthop AI, and Mind Robotics collectively raised over $3 billion to build the compute, networking, and robotics layers of the AI stack. Yann LeCun's AMI Labs closed Europe's largest seed round ever at $1.03 billion, placing a $3.5 billion bet on world models as the credible alternative to today's LLM-dominated paradigm.

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🧑‍🍳 Let’s Get Right Into It…

🚀 nScale closed a $2B Series C at a $14.6B valuation, backed by NVIDIA, Citadel, and Dell, to build hyperscale AI data centers across Texas, the UK, Norway, and Germany.

🛍 Quince raised $500M at a $10.1B valuation, led by ICONIQ, to scale its manufacturer-to-consumer AI retail platform past $1B in annual revenue.

💻 Replit secured $400M in a Series D at a $9B valuation, led by Georgian Partners, tripling its valuation in six months as vibe-coding adoption accelerates globally.

🧠 AMI Labs, Yann LeCun’s world model AI lab, raised $1.03B at a $3.5B valuation, the largest seed round in European AI history.

🏥 Talkspace is being acquired by Universal Health Services for $835M, giving UHS access to 6,000 therapists and 200M insured Americans.

🌐 Nexthop AI raised $500M at a $4.2B valuation, led by Lightspeed and Andreessen Horowitz, to build networking hardware and software for AI data centers.

🧑‍🚀 Top Deals You Can’t Miss

1️⃣ nScale$2B Series C at a $14.6B valuation, building Stargate-scale AI data centers globally with NVIDIA, Citadel, and Dell.

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2️⃣ Talkspace$835M acquisition by Universal Health Services, the largest behavioral health platform acquisition to date.

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3️⃣ Quince$500M Series E at a $10.1B valuation, as the manufacturer-to-consumer retail platform surpasses $1B in annual revenue.

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🧠 Dopamine Dealflow

🌳 Series B+ & Growth

  • nScale, a London, United Kingdom-based hyperscale AI data center operator, raised $2 billion in Series C funding. Aker ASA and 8090 Industries led the round and were joined by Citadel, Dell, NVIDIA, Point72, Lenovo, and Nokia.

  • Nexthop AI, a Santa Clara-based AI networking hardware and software company, raised $500 million in Series B funding. Lightspeed Venture Partners led the round and were joined by Andreessen Horowitz and Altimeter.

  • Quince, a San Francisco-based manufacturer-to-consumer retail platform using AI demand forecasting, raised $500 million in Series E funding. ICONIQ led the round and was joined by Basis Set Ventures, Wellington Management, Baillie Gifford, Notable Capital, and DST Global.

  • Replit, a San Francisco-based AI-powered software development platform, raised $400 million in Series D funding. Georgian Partners led the round and were joined by Coatue, Andreessen Horowitz, Craft Ventures, and Y Combinator.

  • Sunday, a U.S.-based autonomous household robotics company, raised $165 million in Series B funding. Coatue Management led the round and was joined by Tiger Global, Benchmark, and Bain Capital Ventures.

  • Wonderful, an Amsterdam-based enterprise AI agent platform, raised $150 million in Series B funding. Insight Partners led the round and were joined by Index Ventures, IVP, Bessemer Venture Partners, and Vine Ventures.

  • Chowbus, a Chicago-based restaurant technology platform focused on Asian cuisine operators, raised $81 million in Series E funding. Prysm Capital and Left Lane Capital co-led the round.

🚀 Series A

  • Mind Robotics, a Normal, Illinois-based industrial robotics AI company spun out of Rivian, raised $500 million in Series A funding. Accel and Andreessen Horowitz co-led the round.

  • KAST, a Singapore-based stablecoin neobank with global payment rails, raised $80 million in Series A funding. QED Investors and Left Lane Capital co-led the round.

  • Mega, a New York-based AI growth platform replacing marketing agencies for SMBs, raised $11.5 million in Series A funding. Goodwater Capital led the round and was joined by Andreessen Horowitz, Atreides, SignalFire, and Kearny Jackson.

🌱 Seed & Early Rounds

  • AMI Labs, a Paris-based world model AI research lab, raised $1.03 billion in Seed funding. Cathay Innovation, Greycroft, Hiro Capital, HV Capital, and Bezos Expeditions co-led the round.

  • Dark Watch, a Stuart, Florida-based hospitality safety intelligence platform, raised $3.5 million in Seed funding. Eagle Venture Fund led the round and was joined by His Kingdom Resources and Blu Ventures.

🤝 Strategic, M&A & Undisclosed

  • Talkspace, a New York-based virtual therapy platform, was acquired for $835 million by Universal Health Services.

  • Ripple, a San Francisco-based crypto payments company, launched a $750 million share buyback via tender offer at a $50 billion valuation.

  • Bilt Rewards, a New York-based rent loyalty platform, acquired Sion for $30 million to expand its payments and loyalty infrastructure.

💸 VC Funds Raised & Raising

  • Coefficient Capital, a New York-based consumer investment firm, raised $500+ million across Fund II and its Apex Fund.

  • Entrepreneurs First, a London-based pre-company talent investor, raised $200 million for a new global fund backing founders across Europe, Asia, and North America.

  • Pax Ventures, a San Francisco-based venture firm founded by ex-a16z partner Michelle Volz, raised $50 million for Fund I targeting the U.S. industrial base.

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📚 Read of the Day

Yann LeCun’s AMI Labs Raises $1.03 Billion Seed to Build World Models

Europe’s largest seed round ever places a $3.5 billion bet on an alternative path to AGI.

AMI Labs, a Paris-based AI research lab co-founded by Yann LeCun and Alexandre Lebrun, raised $1.03 billion in seed funding at a $3.5 billion valuation, the largest seed round in European AI history.

The round was co-led by Cathay Innovation, Greycroft, Hiro Capital, HV Capital, and Bezos Expeditions, with participation from Temasek, NVIDIA, Eric Schmidt, Mark Cuban, and Xavier Niel.

LeCun, Meta’s Chief AI Scientist and a Turing Award winner, founded AMI Labs to build world models — AI systems that reason about the physical world and predict outcomes rather than simply predicting the next word.

The Product Pitch

AMI Labs is targeting a core limitation of today’s AI: language models cannot understand the physical world. World models learn causal relationships between actions and outcomes, enabling robots, autonomous systems, and AI agents to plan and reason in real environments.

The Backstory

LeCun has been one of the most vocal critics of LLM-only paths to AGI, arguing that language alone cannot produce human-level reasoning. AMI Labs represents his direct architectural bet against the prevailing OpenAI and Google paradigm.

Why It Matters

A $1 billion seed round for a research lab with no product signals that LPs and strategics are placing long-horizon bets on new AI architectures. For investors, the prize is not an application layer but the foundational cognitive infrastructure that could power the next generation of intelligent systems.

📰 Other News You Don’t Want To Miss

💸 Elon Musk Announces X Money Will Enter Early Public Access in April 2026 — Musk confirmed the launch timeline for X’s payments platform, featuring peer-to-peer transfers, Visa-backed debit cards, and up to 6% APY on deposits.

🤖 Qualcomm’s Partnership With Neura Robotics Signals Deeper Robot Chip Push — Qualcomm’s IQ10 processors will power Neura’s next generation of humanoid and industrial robots.

🚕 Zoox Begins Mapping Dallas and Phoenix for Robotaxi Launch — Amazon’s autonomous vehicle unit expands pre-launch mapping as it awaits federal approval for commercial operations.

🚗 Slate Auto Replaces CEO Ahead of Affordable EV Launch — Former Amazon executive Peter Faricy takes over leadership months before the startup’s first vehicle rollout.

 GM Revives the Chevy Bolt to Navigate EV Demand Uncertainty — The automaker is repositioning its affordable EV as a hedge against slowing demand across the electric vehicle market.

OVER AND OUT, BACK TO THE GRIND ⚙️

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