Latest news with #defenseTech
Yahoo
2 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Startups Weekly: Fast and furious
Welcome to Startups Weekly — your weekly recap of everything you can't miss from the world of startups. Want it in your inbox every Friday? Sign up here. Some startups accrued value at lightning speed this week, and we got confirmation that defense tech is red hot. Many startup stories this week occurred in Y Combinator's orbit in some way. Also, Israel once again lived up to its 'Start-Up Nation' reputation. That was fast: No-code website-building platform Wix acquired 6-month-old, bootstrapped vibe-coding startup Base44 — both Israeli companies — for $80 million in cash. That was fast, too: In just three months, Ramp's valuation jumped to $16 billion following its Series E, up from $13 billion when the spend management startup did a secondary sale earlier this year. Friends and foes: New details emerged on Meta's $14.3 billion deal to acquire 49% of startup Scale AI, including a potential dividend payout. We also learned that OpenAI was dropping Scale AI as a data provider following the deal. Frenemies: The U.S. Department of Defense awarded a contract worth up to $200 million directly to OpenAI, which could further strain the startup's relationship with Microsoft. ICYMI: Out of all the teams presenting at YC's recent Spring 2025 Demo Day, here are 11 startups that investors have been talking about. Didn't happen: People are also still talking about the police shutting down the YC Demo Day after-party that controversial AI startup Cluely tried to throw; or as its CEO told TechCrunch, 'the most legendary party that never happened.' Most funding news was driven by either defense tech, AI, or both, but there were also some surprises. Plus, one VC firm is aiming high for its next fund. Good intuition: Applied Intuition, a company making software for autonomous vehicles, secured a $600 million Series F and tender offer at a $15 billion valuation. New tune: Munich-based defense tech startup Helsing closed a €600 million investment led by Prima Materia, the VC firm of Spotify's founder Daniel Ek, which valued Helsing at €12 billion. New unicorn: Israeli observability startup Coralogix became a unicorn after raising a $115 million Series E, which it will use to double its headcount in India, where 100 of its 550 employees are currently based. Toldja: Mach Industries, a 2-year-old defense tech startup, confirmed having raised a $100 million round of funding led by Khosla Ventures and Bedrock at a $470 million valuation. Money flows: Aspora, a startup formerly known as Vance and focused on facilitating remittances from the Indian diaspora, closed a $50 million Series B co-led by Sequoia and Greylock at a $500 million valuation. Change of heart: Sword Health, an AI-powered digital health startup that began as a virtual physical therapy solution, locked in $40 million at a $4 billion valuation in a funding round led by returning investor General Catalyst. It also pushed back its IPO plans to at least 2028. Multiplier effect: Multiplier Holdings announced having raised $27.5 million across seed and Series A rounds after joining the growing trend of buying legacy service businesses — in its case, accounting firms — and scaling them with AI. Stock where you shop: Grifin, a startup whose app helps users buy stock from brands they shop at, such as Walmart, secured $11 million in a Series A round. Out of Sweden: Polar, a payment infrastructure platform for developers and AI-first businesses, raised a $10 million seed round led by Accel. Its CEO previously co-founded Tictail, which was acquired by Shopify in 2018. Bullish: Global VC Endeavor Catalyst is seeking to raise $300 million for its fifth fund. This would be its largest yet, as it looks to deepen its bet on fast-growing startups in emerging markets. An early investor in Chime, founder-turned-VC Alexa von Tobel is ready for Fintech 3.0. 'The next wave of innovation won't come from superficial tweaks but from fundamental deep product reinvention — tools that meet the needs of a changing economy and a more diverse, digitally native population,' she told TechCrunch in an interview. Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
Yahoo
4 days ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Two-year-old defense tech Mach Industries confirms $100M raise led by Khosla, Bedrock
Rising-star defense tech Mach Industries has announced a new $100 million round of funding at a $470 million valuation. TechCrunch first reported this deal was in the works last month. New investor Keith Rabois from Khosla Ventures joins existing investor Geoff Lewis of Bedrock Capital to lead the round. Existing investor Sequoia also participated. The fresh funding brings the startup's total raised to about $185 million to date. The round represents a modest step up from the company's previous valuation. When Mach announced its Series A funding in October 2023, investors assigned the company a $335 million post-money valuation. This means the latest round's $470 million post-money to pre-money valuation is essentially flat, representing just $35 million in additional value over the past year and a half. Mach Industries' rise in the defense tech world has been nothing short of meteoric, even if its latest funding round suggests investor enthusiasm is cautious. It was founded in 2023 by then 19-year-old CEO Ethan Thornton, who dropped out of MIT to work full time on the company. In June 2023, he landed Sequoia's Stephanie Zhan and Shaun Maguire as investors who led Mach's $5.7 million seed round. Geoff Lewis, founder of Bedrock Capital, led Mach's $79 million Series A a few months later. Within the last year, Mach has grown from about 20 employees to 140, Thornton tells TechCrunch. The startup has designed three weapons systems: a super light jet-powered vertical takeoff and landing unmanned aerial vehicle called Viper that requires no runway; a high-altitude glider plane that can strike targets from miles away at the edge of the atmosphere, named Glide; and Stratos an in-air satellite with sensors and communication capabilities that can operate at extreme altitudes. The company has also secured significant contracts and infrastructure investments. Earlier this year, Mach was selected by the Army Applications Laboratory to develop a vertical takeoff precision cruise missile and announced plans for its first factory — a 115,000-square foot facility in Huntington Beach, California. Mach's goal is to create weapons with 'the ability to carry out strikes at very long ranges,' Thornton said. But the fast growth of his young company has been a whirlwind experience. He remembers moving into the company's first office in Cambridge, Massachusetts, just two years ago, when the company was so pinched for cash that he and founding team member Ashton Bennett hand-built the office furniture, college-dorm style. 'Like, we went to Home Depot, bought a bunch of plywood, bought a bunch of 2x4s, and built all the furniture ourselves,' he told TechCrunch via video conference from a room that now features commercial office furniture. 'I'd say we're still equally scrappy, but now it's very, very exciting to have a full factory and a team [that's] equal parts industry veterans who've done this before' and those new to the defense industry. The founder also says he's aware of the gravity of building weapons during a time of unprecedented advances in AI and global political unrest. He points to Ukraine's drone 'Spider Web' attack on Russian bombers as an example of the new kind of pinpointed, AI-powered warfare that has already arrived. Thornton believes that along with other young defense tech contenders, his company is building weapons for this new reality more affordably than traditional defense contractor offerings. He emphasizes that his work is done in conjunction with layers of national defense decision makers. 'The work we do is done in direct contact with the State Department, with the Department of Defense, with congressional members,' he says. Moving forward, Mach will use the new funding to build out manufacturing capabilities and develop several new products in R&D that Thornton won't publicly discuss yet, including some kind of new propulsion engine. Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
TechCrunch
5 days ago
- Business
- TechCrunch
Spotify's Daniel Ek just bet bigger on Helsing, Europe's defense tech darling
When Daniel Ek isn't busy running Spotify or building his new AI-driven health tech enterprise, he's making massive bets on the future of European warfare, seemingly. The billionaire, who primarily lives in Stockholm, just led a €600 million investment in Helsing, a four-year-old, Munich-based defense tech company that is now valued at €12 billion, according to the Financial Times. The deal makes it one of Europe's most valuable privately held companies; it also highlights Europe's scramble to build its own military muscle as the world grows messier and the U.S. turns inward. The numbers help tell the story. Helsing raised $450 million just shy of a year ago; now, it's back with this even bigger round led by Ek's investment firm Prima Materia. It's part of a broader defense tech boom that's seeing money flood into companies like the U.S. giant Anduril, which just raised $2.5 billion led by Founders Fund, and European drone makers Quantum Systems and Tekever. (In recent weeks, they announced €160 million and €70 million, respectively, in rounds that put them both into so-called unicorn territory.) TechCrunch has reached out to Helsing for more details about how it plans to use the new funding. As for what, exactly, Helsing does, Wired said last year to think of it as turning modern warfare into something that looks more like a video game, except with very real consequences. The company's main product takes massive amounts of data from military sensors, radars, and weapons systems, then uses AI to create intuitive, real-time visualizations of what's happening on the battlefield. Instead of soldiers making life-or-death decisions based on phone calls and hand-drawn maps, everyone is seeing the same information, whether from a frontline trench or a command center miles away. But what started as an AI software company has grown much more ambitious. Helsing is now building its own strike drones and aircraft and said it's working on a fleet of unmanned mini submarines in order to irmprove naval surveillance. The timing isn't coincidental. As American investor Eric Slesinger told TechCrunch this spring, 'European governments waited way too long to rethink what the arrangement on their own security meant.' The wake-up call came with Russia's invasion of Ukraine, which made it clear that Europe couldn't rely on American protection alone. The U.S. election late last year of President Donald Trump — who is far more interested in advancing American interests — has since put a much finer point on things. Techcrunch event Save $200+ on your TechCrunch All Stage pass Build smarter. Scale faster. Connect deeper. Join visionaries from Precursor Ventures, NEA, Index Ventures, Underscore VC, and beyond for a day packed with strategies, workshops, and meaningful connections. Save $200+ on your TechCrunch All Stage pass Build smarter. Scale faster. Connect deeper. Join visionaries from Precursor Ventures, NEA, Index Ventures, Underscore VC, and beyond for a day packed with strategies, workshops, and meaningful connections. Boston, MA | REGISTER NOW Now European leaders are talking about spending big on defense while achieving strategic autonomy, meaning their ability to handle their own security. Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis recently summed up the movement in a separate interview with TechCrunch: 'We're going to spend a lot of money on defense as Europe. The defense landscape is changing, which is no longer just going to be about planes, tanks—this is all going to be much more digitally and AI driven.' A couple of years ago, that realization was the impetus for the NATO Innovation Fund, the world's first multi-sovereign venture capital fund backed by 24 NATO allies. But the capital pool is just one of several signs that Europe has grown serious about building its own defense tech ecosystem rather than relying on the U.S. for protection. Ek, who first invested in Helsing back in 2021, before the outbreak of the Ukraine war, has perhaps seen for a while where thing are heading. As he said in a press release about Monday's funding: 'As Europe rapidly strengthens its defense capabilities in response to evolving geopolitical challenges, there is an urgent need for investments in advanced technologies that ensure its strategic autonomy.' Other investors in Helsing's new round include earlier backers Lightspeed Ventures, Accel, Plural, General Catalyst and Saab, and new investors BDT & MSD Partners. The company has now raised €1.37 billion altogether.
Bloomberg
10-06-2025
- Business
- Bloomberg
How Space Tech Is Shaping US Defense Spending
Spire Global sends satellites, which are about the size of a loaf of bread, into space to track atmospheric data to help drive data-driven decisions. The company has contracts with the Canadian Space Agency and has secured a 10-year contract with the US Space Force last month. Theresa Condor, Spire's CEO joined the C-Suite on Bloomberg Open Interest to talk about the role of tech in defense spending. (Source: Bloomberg)
Forbes
10-06-2025
- Business
- Forbes
Anduril Cofounder Trae Stephens Is Now A Billionaire
Trae Stephens, also a partner at Founders Fund, ranked 19 on the 2025 Forbes Midas List. Last week, Anduril announced that it had raised a mega funding round led by Founders Fund, valuing the company at more than $30 billion, doubling its valuation in less than a year. The deal also minted a new defense tech billionaire: company chairman Trae Stephens. The Forbes Midas List alum, who is also a partner at Founders Fund — which led the round with a $1 billion investment, its largest ever — owns more than 3% of Anduril, according to Forbes' estimates, pushing his net worth beyond $1 billion. Stephens and Anduril declined to comment. Booming investor appetite for military startups has helped make Stephens the latest entrant to a group of billionaires who have built fortunes selling weapons systems to the government. His Anduril cofounder Palmer Luckey is worth $3.6 billion, Forbes estimates, while Alex Karp, the cofounder and CEO of military software firm Palantir is worth $11.9 billion. Since launching in 2017, Anduril has been at the forefront of a new generation of venture-backed startups making weapons, drones and software for the military — an ecosystem that is increasingly being embraced by the Trump administration. Last month, Anduril emerged as a frontrunner alongside SpaceX and Palantir to develop a weapons system for Trump's proposed $175 billion Golden Dome for America plan, which aims to combat missile threats. Stephens has taken an atypical route to becoming a Silicon Valley billionaire. After stints in multiple political offices and the intelligence community, he was an early employee at Palantir, which was cofounded by Peter Thiel. The famed investor convinced him to join Founders Fund in 2014 as a partner. There, he met Luckey during a retreat hosted by the investment firm, and the two developed the idea behind Anduril: applying a Silicon Valley strategy to a military-facing business. At Founders Fund, Stephens has also backed other defense tech companies, including Gecko Robotics (valued over $600 million), which makes hardware and software to protect defense infrastructure, and Varda Space Industries (valued more than $500 million), which tests drugs and manufactures things like fiber optic cables in space. He also led the series A funding round into supply chain logistics startup Flexport (most recently publicly valued at $8 billion). That 'check that I wrote was maybe the best one, aside from' Anduril, he previously told Forbes. Beyond Anduril and Founders Fund, Stephens, who ranked No. 19 on the 2025 Midas List, also is the cofounder of Sol, a startup making eyeglasses with Kindle-style lenses for "immersive reading' that last raised a seed funding round led by YC Combinator chief Garry Tan in 2023. Stephens, who previously worked on President Donald Trump's transition team during his first term, was also considered for a senior Defense Department role this year, but it didn't materialize (citing one source, Semafor previously reported that some administration officials were concerned about Stephens' investments; Stephens declined to comment at the time). At Anduril, which generated $1 billion in revenue last year, Stephens is aiming to scale up production of its suite of military products. The company, which sells drones, augmented reality helmets, sensors and software to connect them, raised $1.5 billion last year to build a factory in Ohio, called Arsenal-1, to rapidly scale up its production of aerial and maritime drones. And last month, Anduril announced it was partnering with Meta to make an AI-powered headset for the military. The fresh $2.5 billion in funding, a series G round, will also be used to acquire new companies, and expand operations in Australia and Europe, spokesperson Shannon Prior told Forbes last week.
