Congratulations to the enterprise AI company that just raised another nine-figure round to solve a problem software is supposed to solve by itself: getting humans to use the product.

You know the one. Won’t name it. Don’t have to. You’ve read the press release — “autonomous,” “agentic,” “category-defining” in paragraph one, and then, a few paragraphs down, where the money is actually going: hiring an army of engineers to sit inside customer offices and manually make the “autonomous” thing behave.

Nothing says “we’ve built the future of work” quite like raising half a billion dollars to hire more people to do the work.

The business model, decoded

Here’s how it works, in case the deck was too artfully vague:

1. Sell the customer an “AI platform.”
2. Discover the platform doesn’t actually do the thing on its own.
3. Send in the forward deployed engineers: sharp young people with CS degrees who now spend six months hand-building the workflow the website implied already existed.
4. Bill the customer for “software.”
5. Book it as ARR.
6. Raise a bigger round because “ARR go up.”
7. Repeat, forever, with an increasingly large and increasingly expensive engineering org standing between the product and the promise it made.

This is not a flywheel. This is a payroll with a pitch deck.

And the industry has stopped even pretending otherwise — it’s fundraising on it, loudly.

pledged valued at $10 billion, with another $4 billion from ,, , and . The vehicle, DeployCo, has been with more than $4 billion in investment.

Meanwhile, job postings for “forward deployed engineer” are up somewhere between 800% and 1,000% year over year. Lightcast data reported by from January to August 2026. data carried by put listings up more than 800% from January to September 2025, and data from 643 in April 2025 to 5,330 in April 2026. Total comp is pushing past $300,000 in the U.S. list at $280,000 to $320,000 base pay and OpenAI at $185,000 to $300,000 base, plus equity. Fortune reported some Anthropic roles reaching $400,000 in total compensation.

Somewhere, a VC is calling this “operating leverage” with a completely straight face.

It is not operating leverage. It’s a staffing agency that learned to say “agentic.”

The tell

Ask the one question the pitch deck conveniently never answers: “If you pulled the embedded engineer out tomorrow, does the customer still get what they paid for?”

If the honest answer is “well, no, but the ARR is real” — that’s not product-market fit. That’s people-market fit, and people-market fit has a brutally unglamorous ceiling: You can only hire humans so fast, and you can never hire them cheap enough to earn a software multiple. Every new logo doesn’t get more profitable to serve. It gets another headcount request.

Two companies, same $20 million ARR. One needs 10 engineers to keep the lights on. The other needs 100. Both slides say, “AI software company.” The difference shows up in gross margin, cost to onboard the next customer, and whether that cost falls as the company scales.

The bill always comes due

Here’s the thing about people-market fit: it feels great right up until someone asks the unfashionable questions: What does it actually cost, fully loaded, to onboard the next customer? Does that number go down as the company scales, or does it just grow the org chart? What happens to gross margin if the first year growth slows and the headcount can’t hide behind hypergrowth anymore?

Companies funding their FDE armies with fresh nine-figure rounds are betting nobody asks these questions until after the round closes and the confetti is swept up. That’s a fine bet in a hype cycle. It’s a terrible one in a market that’s about to start reading the fine print.

Because eventually, someone always reads the fine print. A CFO builds a cost-per-deployment model. A CIO benchmarks time-to-value against three vendors instead of trusting one demo. An investor finally does the unglamorous work of separating software ARR from human-powered ARR on the same balance sheet.

The distinction buyers and investors can test is on the numbers. Software ARR should get cheaper to deliver as it scales. Human-powered ARR does not. OpenAI guaranteed the private-equity backers of its deployment vehicle an annual 17.5% return over five years, which is a different structure from a growth thesis.¹

So no, your AI isn’t autonomous. But your business model might be — autonomously transferring the cost of a services company onto a software valuation, for as long as the music plays.

Enjoy the round. Hope the org chart was worth it.

, the co-founder and CEO of , is an entrepreneur and product leader with more than 20 years of experience across cybersecurity and AI. He has built three generative AI companies, including one that reached unicorn status. Gurtu is known for turning advanced AI into scalable, real-world platforms, and previously contributed to successful exits, including acquisitions by , and , and a public company, . He holds a master’s degree from the and CISSP certification.

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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 deal roundup here.

Startup investors aren’t exactly hitting pause, but they did scale back on giant rounds this past week, with just two startup financings in the multiple hundreds of millions. The biggest round went to AI infrastructure provider , which picked up $750 million, followed by construction automation unicorn , which secured $200 million. Other sectors that attracted larger rounds this past week included biotech, insurance and AI.

1. , $750M, AI infrastructure: Modal Labs, a provider of cloud infrastructure for AI inference and other applications, secured $750 million in a Series D funding round led by at a $15.75 billion valuation. The New York-headquartered company said it recently exceeded an annual revenue run rate of $1 billion.

2. , $200M, construction tech: Austin-based Icon, a developer of robotic construction systems known for its 3D-printed homes, closed on $200 million in Series D funding led by�� and . The company says it is on pace for 4x revenue growth in 2026.

3. , $135M, RNA therapies: Boston-based Soufflé Therapeutics, a developer of RNA therapies, raised $135 million in Series B funding led by as part of a large syndicate of investors.

4. , $103M, gene therapies: Menlo Park, California-based Estuary Biotherapeutics, a developer of genetic medicines for patients with serious kidney diseases, launched with $103 million in financing. The funding includes $93 million in a Series A round led by as well as $10 million in previously undisclosed seed capital.

5. , $100M, AI tools: Labelbox, a developer of technology to train and evaluate AI models and to help deploy agents that improve with experience, picked up $100 million in Series E funding. led the financing for the 8-year-old, San Francisco-based company.

6. , $90M, health AI: Redwood City, California-based Suki, a provider of AI tools that turn clinical conversations into intelligence for documentation, coding and other healthcare workflows, announced a $90 million Series E financing from backers including and .

7. , $82M, caregiver platform: Abby Care, a platform for family members to become certified, paid caregivers and deliver care at home, closed on $82 million in Series C funding, per a . led the financing for the 5-year-old, San Francisco-based startup.

8. , $70M, insurance: Stand, a provider of insurance for homes in areas at higher risk of natural disasters, secured $70 million in Series C funding at a $1 billion valuation. led the financing for the 3-year-old, San Francisco-based company.

9. , $65M, semiconductor systems: Mueon Corp., a semiconductor systems company building a modular platform for AI and hyperscale computing, completed a $65 million Series A funding round. led the financing for the Portland, Oregon-based company.

10. , $60M, AI spend management: New York-based North.cloud, provider of an infrastructure spend intelligence and automation platform, raised $60 million in a Series B round led by .

Methodology

We tracked the largest announced rounds in the ������Ƶ database that were raised by U.S.-based companies for the period of Oct. 10-16, 2026. Although most announced rounds are in the database, there may be a small time lag, as some rounds are reported late in the week.

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Overall, investors put $38.5 billion into reported seed- through growth-stage financings for countries in the region in Q3, per ������Ƶ data. Of that, a majority went to AI-focused companies, echoing the trends we’ve seen globally.

Deal counts, meanwhile, were relatively flat. That indicates concentration of capital into favored startups remains pronounced but is not intensifying.

Table of contents

• An AI-driven quarter
• China leads by far in country-by-country breakdown
• Late stage
• Early stage
• Seed
• A big quarter for China
• Methodology
• Glossary of funding terms

An AI-driven quarter

Around 55% of investment — an estimated $21 billion — went to AI-focused companies. Total funding is down substantially from the prior quarter, which was boosted by a $7.4 billion financing for China’s , but still the second-highest tally on record.

For Q3, a couple of extra-large rounds bolstered the AI investment tally. The largest went to Beijing-based foundational model company , which secured $3.5 billion in July at a reported $35 billion valuation.

, the AI spinout of China-based short video platform , was the second-biggest fundraiser. The generative video startup raised around $3 billion in a July financing that included and .

China leads by far in country-by-country breakdown

China was the leading Asian destination for venture investment by a very wide margin.

Per ������Ƶ data, roughly $27 billion — or 70% of all Asian startup funding in Q3 — went to China-based companies. India was a distant second, with $2.9 billion, followed by Singapore, with $2.5 billion.

For perspective, below we charted third-quarter startup funding tallies for the six countries with the largest totals.

Late stage

Most capital went to late- and growth-stage funding rounds.

Per ������Ƶ data, investment at this stage totaled around $20 billion in Q3. That’s down a bit from the prior quarter but nearly double year-ago levels and the second-strongest showing in four years.

Multiple jumbo rounds kept the total high. The largest was Moonshot AI’s aforementioned $3.5 billion Series F.

Several others raised financings in the multiple hundreds of millions. Shenzhen-based , a provider of robotics hardware and software, for instance, picked up $400 million in a September Series C. And Hong Kong-based , an e-commerce fintech platform, secured $300 million in Series C funding as it eyes an IPO.

Early stage

Early-stage investment drifted lower in Q3 but remained at historically high levels.

Per ������Ƶ data, financing for startups at the Series A and Series B stages totaled $13.6 billion for the just-ended quarter. That’s a decline of 28% from the prior quarter but up 65% from year-ago levels.

Seed

Reported seed funding hit its highest level in years, boosted by investor enthusiasm around AI.

In total, investors poured $4.9 billion into reported seed and angel deals across Asia, per ������Ƶ data. That’s up around 22% from the prior quarter and more than double year-ago levels.

A big quarter for China

Overall, Q3 was a robust period for venture funding to China-based companies, with far smaller sums going to other Asian startup hubs. Funding to startups based in India and Singapore was down significantly quarter over quarter, while Israel’s investment totals declined slightly.

We’ll keep an eye out in the coming months to see if this divergence of fortunes persists.

Related ������Ƶ query:

Related reading:

• ������Ƶ Data: Q3 2026 Posted A Record Count Of Billion-Dollar Rounds As The Global AI Race Heats Up

Methodology

The data contained in this report comes directly from ������Ƶ, and is based on reported data. Data is as of Oct. 5, 2026.

Note that data lags are most pronounced at the earliest stages of venture activity, with seed funding amounts increasing significantly after the end of a quarter/year.

Please note that all funding values are given in U.S. dollars unless otherwise noted. ������Ƶ converts foreign currencies to U.S. dollars at the prevailing spot rate from the date funding rounds, acquisitions, IPOs and other financial events are reported. Even if those events were added to ������Ƶ long after the event was announced, foreign currency transactions are converted at the historic spot price.

Glossary of funding terms

Seed and angel consists of seed, pre-seed and angel rounds. ������Ƶ also includes venture rounds of unknown series, equity crowdfunding and convertible notes at $3 million (USD or as-converted USD equivalent) or less.

Early-stage consists of Series A and Series B rounds, as well as other round types. ������Ƶ includes venture rounds of unknown series, corporate venture and other rounds above $3 million, and those less than or equal to $15 million.

Late-stage consists of Series C, Series D, Series E and later-lettered venture rounds following the “Series [Letter]” naming convention. Also included are venture rounds of unknown series, corporate venture and other rounds above $15 million. Corporate rounds are only included if a company has raised an equity funding at seed through a venture series funding round.

Technology growth is a private-equity round raised by a company that has previously raised a “venture” round. (So basically, any round from the previously defined stages.)

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This tracker includes layoffs conducted by U.S.-based companies or those with a strong U.S. presence and is updated at least bi-weekly. We’ve included both startups and publicly traded, tech-heavy companies. We’ve also included companies based elsewhere that have a sizable team in the United States, such as , even when it’s unclear how much of the U.S. workforce has been affected by layoffs.

Layoff and workforce figures are best estimates based on reporting. We source the layoffs from media reports, our own reporting, social media posts and , a crowdsourced database of tech layoffs.

We recently updated our layoffs tracker to reflect the most recent round of layoffs each company has conducted. This allows us to quickly and more accurately track layoff trends, which is why you might notice some changes in our most recent numbers.

If an employee headcount cannot be confirmed to our standards, we note it as “unclear.”

For the third quarter of 2026, global cybersecurity- and privacy-focused startups pulled in a total of $6.8 billion, per ������Ƶ data. That’s up about 50% from the prior quarter and tied for the highest quarterly tally in years, as charted below.

The funding bump was due to larger rounds, not more of them. Round counts actually declined sequentially across all stages last quarter, ������Ƶ data shows.

Biggest cybersecurity fundraisers

AI startups accounted for the overwhelming majority of cybersecurity funding, with a particular focus on identity security. Overall, at least at the intersection of artificial intelligence and cybersecurity closed rounds of $100 million or more this past quarter.

Of those, the largest funding recipient by far was enterprise identity security provider�� , which picked up $1 billion in a July growth round led by . Founded in 2001, the Ohio company isn’t exactly a startup, but it has attracted the bulk of its venture funding in the past 10 years and its pivot to AI is also of a more recent vintage.

Dallas-based tied for second place with a $400 million September Series F led by . The startup, which offers tools for enterprises to see and govern how people and AI agents interact with applications and data, also secured a post-money valuation of $6.4 billion.

, operator of an enterprise data security platform focused on AI agents, also announced a fresh $400 million -led investment in September, just three months after raising $600 million. The latest infusion set a $12 billion valuation for the New York startup.

For a bigger-picture view of leading fundraisers, below we used ������Ƶ data to put together a list of the 10 largest round recipients.

Exits, too

We also saw some good-sized acquisitions of cybersecurity startups this past quarter, even as the IPO market was fairly sluggish.

led the M&A pack with its $2.4 billion purchase of anti-fraud technology provider in August. The acquisition is part of a broader effort by Visa to beef up its fraud detection and prevention capabilities for the AI age.

Among private unicorns, meanwhile, Cyera proved it can find a way to spend a good chunk of the capital it raised. It acquired , an enterprise access management platform built for AI agents, in a deal reportedly valued around $1 billion.

As for public offerings, , which offers digital security services to consumers, was the lone sizable venture-backed market debut. The Boston-based startup completed an acquisition of an Australian public company, , in July, and then renamed the combined company Aura.

Overall, an upbeat quarter

Overall, ������Ƶ funding data points to an upbeat environment for cybersecurity startup funding. This doesn’t seem particularly surprising given the steady drumbeat of worrisome news about the risks posed by rapidly advancing AI technology.

It’s not an especially reassuring time for most of us. But for cybersecurity founders, there’s certainly an ever-expanding array of hazards to keep at bay. We’ll keep watching in the current quarter to see if investment momentum continues to build.

Related ������Ƶ queries:

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Twenty-one of last month’s new unicorns are U.S. headquartered. Six new unicorns joined the board from China and three from the U.K., while Canada, Saudi Arabia, Japan, Israel, Italy, Finland, Germany and Bulgaria each added one new unicorn.

Through September, 311 companies have joined the board so far this year, putting 2026 on track to be the second-highest year for new unicorn creation, following only the venture peak year of 2021, when counts topped 600.

Several companies already on the board stand out for significant valuation increases via new raises last month. They include San Francisco-based , developer of AI for software engineering, which saw its value climb to $48 billion, up from $26 billion only four months earlier. Data center provider was valued at $31 billion last month, up from $10 billion a year ago. And Paris-based frontier lab was valued at $24.4 billion in its more recent funding, up from $13.7 billion a year ago.

New unicorns in September

Here are September’s 38 new unicorn companies:

Semiconductors

• , an Austin-based semiconductor manufacturing startup, closed a $500 million Series A at a $3.7 billion valuation, led by . The 3-year-old company builds compact chip factories and develops their manufacturing equipment internally, aiming to make semiconductor production more accessible.
• , an Irvine, California-based semiconductor company, raised a $275 million Series C, valuing it above $3 billion and bringing total funding to $415 million. , and led the round. The 2-year-old company develops digital signal processing chips for high-speed optical connectivity in AI infrastructure.
• , a Hangzhou-based AI chip developer, announced a $149 million Series C. Its IoT inference chips combine memory and computing to reduce power consumption and data movement. The 5-year-old company was valued at $1 billion.
• , a Beijing-based AI chip company, raised $298 million at a valuation of $2.2 billion. The 4-year-old company develops AI computing chips using the open RISC-V architecture.

• , a San Jose, California-based developer of specialized AI chips and software, raised a $150 million Series C at a $1.45 billion valuation, co-led by and , bringing total funding to $500 million. The proceeds for the 8-year-old company will support its software platform and next-generation hardware for robots, vehicles and drones.

Financial services

• , a Texas-based prediction-market platform, announced a strategic partnership with , which will take an equity stake following OG’s separation from . The less than 1-year-old company was valued at $5 billion. The investment amount was not disclosed; the partnership will route Robinhood event-contract trading through OG’s regulated exchange and clearing infrastructure.
• Saudi Arabia-based , a digital payments company, raised a $329.5 million Series A at a $1.85 billion valuation. Investors included , and . The 3-year-old company has processed more than $117 billion in 2 years.
• , a Nevada-based financial software company, raised a $250 million Series E at a $1.43 billion valuation led by founder and chairman . The 8-year-old company provides an AI-based investment management platform for asset and wealth managers.
• , a Miami-based remittance platform for Latino immigrants operating through , secured $200 million in financing: an $87 million Series C equity round led by valued at $1.4 billion and $113 million in debt from ’s Customer Value Fund. The 5-year-old company plans to expand to lending and add to its Latin American reach.

Space technology

• Munich-based space company raised a $450 million Series C, co-led by , and at a valuation of $2 billion. The financing for the 5-year-old company will advance its reusable Nyx spacecraft for an International Space Station mission and support development of its Storm rocket engine.
• , a Seattle-based satellite connectivity company, raised a $200 million Series C at a $1.6 billion valuation, led by , bringing total funding to approximately $300 million. The 5-year-old company enables standard Bluetooth devices to connect directly to satellites for tracking and sensor-data applications.
• Oxfordshire, U.K-based , a satellite company, secured $346 million, co-led by and, valued at $1 billion. The 11-year-old company manufactures satellites and provides infrastructure, connectivity, Earth observation and intelligence services.
• Bulgaria-based , a satellite company, raised $205 million in a round co-led by and , reaching a $1 billion valuation. The 11-year-old company has raised financing that will expand standardized spacecraft production, including new manufacturing capacity in the U.S. and Europe.

Biotechnology and medical devices

• , a Framingham, Massachusetts-based developer of treatments for Alzheimer’s disease and other neurodegenerative disorders, raised around $79 million. The �� 13-year-old company was valued at $1.9 billion. Investors were not disclosed.
• Shanghai-based , an AI drug discovery company, raised $290 million at a $1.5 billion valuation following its spinoff from . , , and co-led the round. Anew develops tools for biomolecular prediction and drug discovery; ByteDance retained a 56% stake.
• , a New York-based brain-computer interface developer, closed a $250 million Series D, bringing total funding to $430 million and reaching a valuation of approximately $1 billion. and led the round. The 5-year-old company is building a brain–computer interface that is minimally invasive and removable.
• Toronto-based , a biotechnology company, raised $153 million at a $1 billion valuation led by the , with participation from and other investors. The 3-year-old company uses AI to identify abandoned drug candidates that could succeed under different treatment approaches. The financing will expand clinical development and support additional drug acquisitions.

AI and internet infrastructure

• , a San Francisco-based AI cloud infrastructure company, raised a $300 million Series B at a $3 billion valuation, led by . The 3-year-old company distributes AI inference workloads across different types of chips to improve performance and efficiency. It announced in March that its customers include one of the leading frontier labs.
• Helsinki-based , an AI cloud company, raised a $189 million Series B led by . The financing valued the 6-year-old company above $1 billion with total funding over $450 million. The company manages physical data centers along with its cloud platform.
• London-based , an internet infrastructure company supporting content delivery for large streaming, gaming and software companies, raised $570 million in its first external financing led by . The 15-year-old company was valued at $1.9 billion.

AI training

• , a San Francisco-based AI training-data company, raised more than $100 million led by at a $4 billion valuation, an eightfold increase from its valuation in September 2025. The 4-year-old company recruits and vets specialists who create training and evaluation data for AI developers. that participants included two frontier AI laboratories and two co-founders.
• , a San Francisco-based provider of expert-created AI training data, reached a $3.2 billion valuation in September, earlier, according to . The funding amount and lead investor were not publicly disclosed. The 1-year-old company’s datasets capture professional reasoning in fields such as software engineering, law and finance. AfterQuery was part of the Winter 2025 batch.

Robotics and autonomous driving

• , the Shanghai-based operator of Hello’s robotaxi business, raised about $100 million at a valuation close to $3 billion. fund led the round. The financing to the 1-year-old company will support a 10,000-GPU computing cluster, AI model development and commercialization of Level 4 autonomous driving.
• , a Sunnyvale, California-based robotics perception company, raised a $165 million Series C at a $1.6 billion valuation, led by . Founded by former and engineers, the 5-year-old company combines custom chips, sensors and spatial software to help robots perceive their surroundings. The financing will accelerate deployments across logistics, manufacturing and inspection applications.

Health insurance

• , a San Francisco-based health benefits company, announced a $200 million Series C at a $2.7 billion valuation. led the financing. It also includes $400 million in secondary financing for existing investors. The 7-year-old company provides a benefits platform using AI to make healthcare more affordable for small and midsize employers. The company services 5,000 businesses.
• , a San Francisco-based health benefits platform, raised a $108 million Series C at a $1 billion valuation. Investors included , , and . The 5-year-old company helps employers provide individualized health budgets for employees to select their own medical plans.

Energy and EV infrastructure

• China-based , a battery-swapping and charging company, agreed to a strategic transaction that gives a 30% stake. Geely will contribute its Yiyi battery-swapping operation and a $95 million investment. The 9-year-old company was valued around $2.4 billion.
• , an Austin-based developer of off-grid power systems for AI data centers, raised a $120 million Series A at a $1 billion valuation, led by . The less than 1-year-old company builds modular systems for renewable energy and battery systems as data-center operators seek access to electricity.

AI applications

• raised $150 million led by , at a valuation just over $2 billion. The 3-year-old company, headquartered in London with offices in Los Angeles and Mumbai, built an enterprise audiovisual content platform for media, advertising, sports and healthcare customers. The financing will support research, commercial expansion and a larger Silicon Valley presence.
• , a New York-based AI ranking and personalization company, raised a $90 million Series B at a $1.44 billion valuation, led by . The 2-year-old company’s software helps enterprises respond to customer behavior in real time, improving the relevance of recommendations.

Cybersecurity

• Rome-based , a cybersecurity company protecting connected devices and autonomous machines, raised $270 million at a $1.7 billion valuation, led by . The financing to the 8-year-old company will support U.S. and Asia-Pacific expansion and development of AI security models.
• Tel Aviv-based , a consumer cybersecurity company, raised $40 million at a $1.1 billion valuation, bringing total funding to $167 million. co-founder joined existing investors including and , among others. The 8-year-old company protects consumers against phishing, scams, malicious websites and AI-generated fraud.

AI models

• Beijing-based , a language-model startup, raised $120 million reaching a valuation of $1.4 billion. Investors include , , and . The less than 1-year-old company raised $400 million across three rounds so far this year, before releasing its first public model.
• , a San Francisco-based developer of open-weight foundation models, announced a $150 million Series B led by , and , valuing the company above $1 billion. The financing will support the 3-year-old company’s Trinity models and products for customizing and operating them.

Manufacturing and construction software

• , an AI company for manufacturing with dual headquarters in Tokyo and Chicago, raised a $114 million Series D at a $1.2 billion valuation, bringing total funding to $234 million. Investors included and . The 9-year-old company’s platform organizes design and procurement and production; the financing will deepen its technology and accelerate North American expansion.
• , a Georgia-based construction software company, secured a growth investment of $250 million led by , valuing it above $1 billion. The 17-year-old company manages construction projects, with the investment supporting its AI capability build out and commercial growth.

Defense technology

• , a Washington, D.C.-based defense company, emerged from stealth with $250 million raised across three rounds at a valuation above $1 billion. The 2-year-old company develops long-range cruise missiles with manufacturing in Texas, Germany and Israel. Backers who have led across three rounds include , , , 1, and .

Food

• , the New York-based parent of consumer food brands David Protein and HallPass, raised a $250 million Series B at a $2.25 billion valuation. and co-led the round. The financing to the 2-year-old company will expand retail distribution, develop new products and support additional brands.

Related ������Ƶ unicorn lists:

• (1,901)
• (666)
• (321)
• (198)
• (119)
• (102)
• (998)
• (547)
• (258)
• (39)
• (489)

Related reading:

• ������Ƶ Data: Q3 2026 Posted A Record Count Of Billion-Dollar Rounds As The Global AI Race Heats Up
• 29 Companies Joined The ������Ƶ In August, Led By AI Software And Semiconductors

Methodology

The ������Ƶ ������Ƶ is a curated list that includes private unicorn companies with post-money valuations of $1 billion or more and is based on ������Ƶ data. New companies are as they reach the $1 billion valuation mark as part of a funding round.

The unicorn board does not reflect internal company valuations — such as those set via a 409a process for employee stock options — as these differ from, and are more likely to be lower than, a priced funding round. We also do not adjust valuations based on investor writedowns, which change quarterly, as different investors will not value the same company consistently within the same quarter.

Funding to unicorn companies includes all private financings to companies that are tagged as unicorns, as well as those that have since graduated to .

Exits analyzed here only include the first time a company exits.

Please note that all funding values are given in U.S. dollars unless otherwise noted. ������Ƶ converts foreign currencies to U.S. dollars at the prevailing spot rate from the date funding rounds, acquisitions, IPOs and other financial events are reported. Even if those events were added to ������Ƶ long after the event was announced, foreign currency transactions are converted at the historic spot price.

Illustration:

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 deal roundup here.

As the AI startup boom progresses, investors appear to be leaving few niches unfunded. That was apparent in this week’s lineup of large funding rounds, which featured AI infrastructure providers, a foundational model developer, a content protection platform for the AI age, and other AI-focused startups among the top investment recipients.

The biggest investment, $2 billion, went to , a spinout focused on cloud and power infrastructure that is hoping to benefit from the AI buildout. Other large rounds went to , developer of a fast-growing new model, and , a quantum computing startup.

1. , $2B, cloud and power infrastructure: Axiom Solutions International, a private cloud and power infrastructure company spun out of manufacturing services provider , secured $2 billion in new financing. and provided the strategic investment by purchasing shares of Austin-based Axiom from Flex at an initial enterprise value of $37.5 billion. Flex says it plans to separate Axiom into an independent publicly traded company early next year.

2. , $870M, foundational AI: TypeSafe AI, developer of Jev, a recently launched AI model with a large and growing early following, raised $870 million in new funding with as the largest investor, according to a . also participated in the round, which reportedly set a $7.5 billion valuation for San Francisco-based TypeSafe.

3. , $475M, quantum computing: Pasadena, California-based Oratomic, a startup working on fault-tolerant quantum computers, raised $475 million in fresh funding led by , , , , and . The company previously raised $300 million in a July financing.

4. , $400M, data and content protection: SignSplit, a provider of tools for protecting, licensing and contributing real-world human data and other forms of human contribution, emerged from stealth with $400 million in seed funding. backed the round, setting a $1 billion valuation for the New York-based company, which was founded in 2024.

5. (tied) , $250M, AI for engineering: Vinci, developer of an AI computational platform for hardware engineers to design products, closed on $250 million in Series B funding at a $1.5 billion valuation. , and led the round for the Palo Alto, California-based company.

5. (tied) , $250M, micro-manufacturing: Emeryville, California-based Atomic Machines, a startup working on AI-native digital manufacturing systems to build micro-machines directly from code, emerged from stealth and said it has raised $250 million to date from a long list of investors.

7. , $225M, energy distribution: Voltus, provider of a distributed energy platform aimed at bolstering grid flexibility, picked up $225 million in Series D funding. , and led the financing for the San Francisco-based startup.

8. (tied) , $200M, fusion: Knoxville, Tennessee-based Type One Energy, a developer of fusion energy technology, secured $200 million in Series B financing led by and .

8. (tied) , $200M, insurance: Ledgebrook, an AI-powered specialty insurance platform, closed on $200 million in equity financing co-led by and . The round brings total funding to date for Boston-based Ledgebrook to around $315 million, per .

8. (tied) , $200M, AI evaluation: Arena, provider of a platform for evaluating AI models, pulled in $200 million in Series B funding and said it has exceeded a $100 million annual revenue run rate. and led the round, which set a $3.1 billion valuation for the company.

Methodology

We tracked the largest announced rounds in the ������Ƶ database that were raised by U.S.-based companies for the period of Oct. 3-9, 2026. Although most announced rounds are in the database, there may be a small time lag, as some rounds are reported late in the week.

Per ������Ƶ data, a majority of the most active venture investors in Q3 participated in more deals compared to the prior quarter. This includes many of the usual busiest dealmakers, like , and .

The top lead venture investors also largely stepped up the pace this past quarter, even as the highest-spending among them appeared to put less capital to work. At seed stage, meanwhile, the typical top dealmakers largely held their ranks.

For a more detailed look, below we chart and analyze the most active investor ranks across multiple metrics, including venture dealmakers, high spenders, lead backers and seed funders.

Most active venture investors

We’ll start with the most active investors in post-seed rounds. By this measure, topped the ranks with 45 deals. The famed accelerator typically ranks high because it participates in follow-on rounds for startups it incubates.

Next on the list were Andreessen Horowitz, Insight Partners and Sequoia Capital. Overall, as charted below, at least 22 investors participated in 10 or more known venture rounds this past quarter.

Busiest lead investors

Among lead investors in venture rounds, Insight, Andreessen and ranked highest with 18, 16 and 12 rounds, respectively.

Another three investors — , Sequoia and — had 10 lead deals each in Q3.

Spendiest lead investors

We also attempted to get a sense of which lead investors put the most capital work in Q3. To approximate this, our ranking looks at investors whose lead rounds had the highest aggregate value.1

By this metric, Valor and Atreides tied for the No. 1 slot, with $7.7 billion in led or co-led deals for the quarter. The two had some overlap, with at least listing both firms as lead investors. This included ’s $3.9 billion Series F and ’s $375 million Series C.

Next in the ranking were Andreessen Horowitz and , with $6.5 billion and $6.3 billion in led or co-led Q3 deals. Andreessen’s tally largely stemmed from a $2 billion round for and a $1.7 billion financing for .�� Nvidia’s standout deal was a $5 billion round for .

Seed investors

Seed investors also kept busy in Q3. Among them, the busiest by far was Y Combinator, which participated in at least 221 known seed rounds this past quarter, per ������Ƶ data.

also ranked high, with 31 reported seed rounds, followed by and with 24 and 23 reported deals, respectively.

Overall, another busy, AI-driven quarter

Overall, our active investor rankings paint the picture of another busy quarter for startup funding, with AI driving the bulk of dealmaking.

Mostly, it’s familiar names topping our various rankings. However, we are seeing a few firms significantly scaling up their investments, with Atreides and Valor in particular stepping up their game of late.

Related ������Ƶ query:

Related reading:

• North America’s Startup Funding Falls In Q3 As AI Giants Eye The Public Markets
• ������Ƶ Data: Q3 2026 Posted A Record Count Of Billion-Dollar Rounds As The Global AI Race Heats Up

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A better model could arrive tomorrow, but replacing the first assistant would require changing how the company operates. That is where I believe an important AI moat is developing: inside customer workflows.

Recent acquisitions and partnerships illustrate three implications for founders, investors and boards.

Workflow access creates strategic value

’s agreement to acquire for approximately $22.6 billion in equity value gives it software used to design, manufacture and service physical products, placing it inside customer decisions throughout a product’s lifecycle.

Meanwhile, the – partnership illustrates a similar logic: Combining frontier AI with established chip-design tools and expertise, supported by licensing and revenue sharing.

My reading is that these transactions highlight the strategic value of owning the environment in which AI performs useful work. Companies already embedded in complex industries bring customer relationships, domain expertise and trusted processes that AI developers need to commercialize their technology.

For founders, that suggests building a position inside a specific customer workflow. For established businesses, it creates an opportunity to turn existing workflow access into bargaining power.

Completing recurring work builds defensibility

reported that its agents handle more than 15 million conversations weekly, including refunds, insurance renewals and healthcare bookings, alongside announcing an employee tender at a $22 billion valuation. The operational adoption is particularly relevant to the moat discussion. Once a product connects to internal systems, follows permissions, handles exceptions and reliably completes tasks, replacing it involves migration, testing, retraining and operational risk.

This can strengthen retention and create opportunities to serve additional workflows. Integration alone offers limited protection, however. Customers need to depend on the product and measure the value it delivers. Investors should therefore examine how much recurring work flows through the platform, which processes rely on it, and what switching would actually require.

Companies can acquire their way into workflows

’s of combines an AI assistant and enterprise search technology with established workflow automation. At completion, Moveworks had 5.5 million employee users, with approximately 250 customers already using both companies’ technologies.

The strategic opportunity is to connect employee requests directly to the systems and processes that resolve them across IT, HR and other functions. This creates a clear corp dev agenda: identify the customer workflows the company wants to enter, understand the barriers, and assess whether an acquisition or partnership can accelerate entry.

An attractive target may bring technology, customer relationships, integrations and an established role in daily operations.

Diligence should test how deeply customers depend on the product, whether those relationships will survive the transaction and whether the combined offering can deliver measurable improvements. As AI capabilities improve, acquiring the right position inside customer operations could become a powerful route to durable growth.

is a strategic adviser to tech companies, investors, CEOs and boards, specializing in strategy, growth and M&A. He is a guest contributor to ������Ƶ News and a university lecturer on strategy, finance and entrepreneurship. Learn more at and connect with him on .

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������Ƶ startup funding reached $25 billion last quarter, well above the $14 billion invested in Q3 2025 and up slightly from the $24 billion invested in Q2. Quarterly funding was up 77% year over year, per ������Ƶ data.

While the U.K. continued to lead startup funding totals last quarter, Germany and France both posted their strongest quarters since the boom years of 2021 and early 2022. Last quarter’s funding totals were boosted heavily by a $3.5 billion investment in Paris-based , the largest venture round ever for a Europe-based company.

Table of contents

• Billion-dollar fundings
• Venture expands beyond the UK
• Late-stage rise
• Early stage
• Seed
• Looking forward
• Methodology
• Glossary of funding terms

Billion-dollar fundings

Four ������Ƶ companies raised billion-dollar-plus fundings, representing close to 40% of the region’s startup capital raised last quarter.

They include Mistral, which also announced its new open-source model Large 4, an LLM it claims outperforms competing open source models on several vectors.

Data center provider raised a convertible note of $3.36 billion that it says it will convert once it goes public, which it has filed plans to do.

Two defense tech startups also raised billion-dollar-plus rounds last quarter: raised a Series E of $1.8 billion, and raised $1.2 billion.

AI drove 75% of ������Ƶ funding this past quarter — totaling $18.8 billion — the highest proportion on record.

Investments in physical tech in Europe in defense, data centers, energy, aerospace and robotics accounted for roughly half of ������Ƶ funding in Q3.

Venture expands beyond the UK

The U.K. led the region’s quarterly funding totals with $7.5 billion even as Germany and France gained market share for venture capital funding in Q3 with $5 billion and $4.8 billion invested, respectively.

The fourth-largest market, Sweden, saw $1.5 billion in venture capital invested while the Netherlands and Spain posted their strongest quarter since the COVID boom years with $1.4 billion and $1.2 billion invested in their startup markets, respectively.

Late-stage rise

A total of $17.3 billion — 70% of Europe’s Q3 venture capital — was invested in late-stage deals in 83 companies.

Outside of the billion-dollar rounds, large late-stage fundings between $400 million to $700 million were raised by Stockholm-based health scanning provider ; Lisbon-based autonomous drone developer ; Spain-based , which offers model compression technology for enterprise AI adoption; Amsterdam-based AI deployment startup ; Bayern-based space transportation company ; and Stockholm-based AI web application builder .

Early stage

Europe’s early-stage funding totaled $5.7 billion into just over 200 companies in Q3, down quarter over quarter and flat year over year.

The largest Series A funding deals, each $200 million or over, were raised by Eindhoven-based AI semiconductor startup and Zürich-based autonomous construction company .

Large Series B rounds were raised by Munich-based fusion energy company and London-based optical computing provider .

Seed

Europe’s seed funding fell quarter over quarter and was flat year over year. Around $2 billion was invested in more than 750 companies at seed stage in Q3.

London-based managed inference company raised the largest seed round at $100 million, followed by Munich-based AI for robotics startup , which raised $55 million.

Looking forward

Europe’s momentum in 2026 continued in Q3, which was the second quarter this year when venture totals topped $20 billion. Those are figures not seen in the region’s startup scene since Q3 2022. Along with growth in AI funding, late-stage funding noticeably increased last quarter with many of the leading rounds sourced across multiple ������Ƶ countries.

Europe represented 16% of global venture capital in Q3, although the true impact of its technology and startups is higher, with many of the region’s startups expanding or moving to the U.S. to capitalize on the rapid growth of AI there.

At the same time, Europe’s ambition to build leading deep-tech companies and meet demand for sovereign AI will be tested in the quarters ahead by its ability to mobilize the substantial capital these businesses need.

Related ������Ƶ queries:

Related reading:

• ������Ƶ Data: Q3 2026 Posted A Record Count Of Billion-Dollar Rounds As The Global AI Race Heats Up
• Reporter’s Notebook: Europe’s Sovereign AI Push Needs Customers As Well As Capital

Methodology

The data contained in this report comes directly from ������Ƶ, and is based on reported data. Data is as of Oct. 5, 2026.

Note that data lags are most pronounced at the earliest stages of venture activity, with seed funding amounts increasing significantly after the end of a quarter/year.

Please note that all funding values are given in U.S. dollars unless otherwise noted. ������Ƶ converts foreign currencies to U.S. dollars at the prevailing spot rate from the date funding rounds, acquisitions, IPOs and other financial events are reported. Even if those events were added to ������Ƶ long after the event was announced, foreign currency transactions are converted at the historic spot price.

Glossary of funding terms

Seed and angel consists of seed, pre-seed and angel rounds. ������Ƶ also includes venture rounds of unknown series, equity crowdfunding and convertible notes at $3 million (USD or as-converted USD equivalent) or less.

Early-stage consists of Series A and Series B rounds, as well as other round types. ������Ƶ includes venture rounds of unknown series, corporate venture and other rounds above $3 million, and those less than or equal to $15 million.

Late-stage consists of Series C, Series D, Series E and later-lettered venture rounds following the “Series [Letter]” naming convention. Also included are venture rounds of unknown series, corporate venture and other rounds above $15 million. Corporate rounds are only included if a company has raised an equity funding at seed through a venture series funding round.

Technology growth is a private-equity round raised by a company that has previously raised a “venture” round. (So basically, any round from the previously defined stages.)

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