☕ OpenAI releases two powerful open-source models, DeepMind unveils model that moves AI closer to AGI & OpenAI eyes $500B valuation in new share sale.
ElevenLabs launches AI music generator & More.
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40 minutes vs. 10. They may move like dial-up, but when it comes to lung flex, they’re elite.
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📬 What’s in store:
Today’s Picks: 40+ free investor databases, Balfour’s 4 fits, startup financial model, Reddit B2B growth guide, Sam Altman on idea-market fit, Zuck’s AI memo, valuation guide, ChatGPT in GTM.
OpenAI releases two powerful open-source models for AI reasoning.
ElevenLabs launches AI music generator cleared for commercial use.
DeepMind unveils Genie 3, a world model it says moves AI closer to AGI.
TSMC employees tried to steal trade secrets on iPhone 18 chip process.
OpenAI explores $500B valuation in new employee share sale.
OpenAI, Google, and Anthropic approved as official U.S. federal AI vendors.
Cognition offers Windsurf staff buyouts, signals IP was the real prize.
OpenAI models land on AWS for the first time, signaling shift in AI cloud dynamics.
VC & Startup Jobs: VC & investors backed startup hiring for remote roles.
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🗞️ What else is brewing
40+ Investor databases for easier outreach (free access).
Brian Balfour’s ‘four fits’ framework: The 4 misalignments that silently kill growth.
Excel Template: Early Stage Startup Financial Model For Fundraising.
Reddit marketing for B2B SaaS founders: A step-by-step guide.
Sam Altman - ‘Don't run toward ideas where there is an oversupply of founders relative to market demand.’
Decoding Zuck’s superintelligence memo.
The only startup valuation guide you need as a founder.
What GTM teams are doing with ChatGPT.
The best companies are dictatorships.
AI infrastructure’s second act: environments, evals, experience.
Startup legal document pack – essential legal docs for founders.
2025 mid-year LLM market update: foundation model landscape + economics.
The CRM template every founder needs before starting their fundraise.
STARTUPS RAISING MILLIONS
💰 Startup funding updates
Bhindi AI, a Singapore-based company developing an agentic AI platform turning the text-to-action to intent-to-action, raised $4M in Pre-Seed funding. The round was led by Cyber Fund.
Clay, a sales automation startup, has raised a $100 million Series C round at a $3.1 billion valuation, led by CapitalG. The 8-year-old company now totals $204 million in funding and counts OpenAI, Anthropic, Canva, and Intercom among its customers.
Resolvd AI, a NYC-based provider of a solution that automates complex reconciliation workflows, raised $1.6M in a Pre-Seed funding. Backers included Spice Capital, Betaworks and Factorial Capital and Angel investors included Olivier Pomel, Datadog CEO, Clement Delaunge, HuggingFace CEO; and Ben Tossell, founder of Ben’s Bites.
RunReveal, an Austin, TX-based security data platform provider, raised $7m in seed funding. The round was led by Costanoa Ventures with participation from Runtime Ventures, Modern Technical Fund, and Okta Ventures.
OffDeal, a New York-based investment banking platform provider, raised $12m in Series A funding. The round, which brought total funding raised to date to $17M, was led by Radical Ventures with participation from YC, Rebel Fund, and Centre Street Partners.
Raise Robotics, a San Francisco, CA-based startup that builds robots that automate hazardous tasks on vertical construction sites, raised $7.8m in seed funding. The round was led by MaC Ventures, with participation from Undivided Ventures and Cybernetix Ventures, Zacua Ventures, and Union Labs.
Pantomath, a Cincinnati, OH-based AI-powered automated data operations platform, raised $30m in Series B funding. The round was led by General Catalyst, with participation from Sierra Ventures, Bowery Capital, Epic Ventures and Hitachi Ventures, Cintrifuse Capital and Foster Ventures.
beatBread, a Los Angeles, CA-based music funding platform, secured an additional $124m in credit and equity capital. The funding was provided by Citi (through its Spread Products Investment in Technologies (SPRINT) team) Deciens Capital, Mucker Capital, Advantage Capital, GMO, Triple 8 Management, and additional strategic investors.
Wattch, an Atlanta, GA-based monitoring and controls provider for commercial and distribution-scale solar and battery storage, raised $6M in Seed funding. The round was led by Spero Ventures with participation from Christopher Klaus and Paul Grana.
OLarry, a Marin, CA-based AI-powered tax firm for new high-net-worth individuals and businesses, raised $10M in Series A funding. The round was led by TTV Capital and joined by Walkabout Ventures and Marin Sonoma Impact Ventures.
Lyric, a Sunnyvale, CA-based provider of an AI-powered supply chain decision making platform, raised $43.5M in Series B funding. The round was led by Insight Partners, with participation from Primary Venture Partners, Permanent Capital Ventures, VMG Partners, PSP Growth and NewBuild Venture Capital.
Grasshopper, a NYC-based digital bank services company, raised $46.6M in funding. The round was led by Patriot Financial Partners LP, with participation from Glendon Capital Management.
Uzum, a Tashkent, Uzbekistan-based provider of a digital ecosystem and digital platform, raised $70M in funding, at $1.5 Billion valuation. The round was led by Tencent and VR Capital, with participation from FinSight Ventures.
Joinable Labs, a San Francisco, CA-based time-to-intelligence acceleration platform provider, raised $2M in Seed funding. Backers included the founders of six AI and Web 3 unicorns, as well as venture firms Accomplice Blockchain, Tess Ventures, and VitalStage Ventures and other strategic angels.
Jeh Aerospace, an Atlanta, GA-based aerospace manufacturing startup, raised $11M in Series A funding. The round was led by Elevation Capital, with participation from existing investor General Catalyst.
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NEW VCs IN THE MARKET
🏦 Venture Capital updates
Expanse, a Chicago, Illinois based asset management firm built with a family office perspective, is announcing their $18M inaugural fund. Founded by Connor Crown in 2023, Expanse is an asset management firm built with a family office perspective. Its long-term capital deployment strategy and diversified portfolio deliver multi-generational asset appreciation in any economic environment.
KEY STORIES IN TECH
📜 Latest in tech
OpenAI releases two powerful open-source models for AI reasoning:
OpenAI launched gpt-oss-120b and gpt-oss-20b, two open-weight reasoning models that rival top open models like DeepSeek-R1 and Qwen, marking its first open model release since GPT-2.
The models are available under the Apache 2.0 license, support tool use (like Python, web search), and use MoE and RL training, but hallucinate more than OpenAI’s o-series and do not support image/audio input.
This move positions OpenAI to regain favor among developers and U.S. regulators, amid rising pressure from Chinese labs and Meta’s wavering open-source strategy.
ElevenLabs launches AI music generator cleared for commercial use:
ElevenLabs has released a new AI model that generates music for commercial use, expanding beyond its core text-to-speech tools.
The company secured licensing deals with Merlin and Kobalt, ensuring that artists voluntarily opt-in and share revenue when their music is used for AI training.
The launch comes amid legal scrutiny of similar startups like Suno and Udio, which were sued over training models on copyrighted music without permission.
DeepMind unveils Genie 3, a world model it says moves AI closer to AGI:
DeepMind introduced Genie 3, a general-purpose world model that can generate interactive 3D environments from text prompts, supporting agent training for real-world scenarios.
The model remembers previous frames for consistency, helping agents learn physics-like reasoning through simulated trial and error — a step toward human-like intelligence.
While still limited in runtime and complex interactions, DeepMind believes models like Genie 3 are key to enabling embodied AI agents and advancing toward artificial general intelligence.
TSMC employees tried to steal trade secrets on iPhone 18 chip process:
TSMC fired several employees and is pursuing legal action after they were caught attempting to steal trade secrets about the company's 2-nanometer chip development and production process.
This 2nm process is the same technology expected to be used for manufacturing the A20 chips for the future iPhone 18 lineup, with Apple getting priority access.
Taiwanese prosecutors are investigating the former workers, who were discovered after TSMC detected "unusual access patterns" during routine monitoring and now may face criminal prosecution for their actions.
OpenAI explores $500B valuation in new employee share sale:
OpenAI is in early talks to let employees sell shares in a deal that could value the company at $500B, up from its current $300B valuation.
The move follows a surge in ChatGPT usage and revenue, with OpenAI hitting a $12B run rate and 700M weekly active users.
The potential sale comes amid growing investor interest and fierce competition for AI talent, with firms like Meta and SoftBank making aggressive moves.
OpenAI, Google, and Anthropic approved as official U.S. federal AI vendors:
The U.S. General Services Administration approved ChatGPT (OpenAI), Gemini (Google), and Claude (Anthropic) for federal agency use under pre-negotiated contracts.
This is part of the Trump administration's new AI blueprint, which aims to boost exports and reduce regulation to maintain an edge over China.
The plan shifts away from Biden-era safeguards, prioritizing AI tools that are “truthful, accurate, transparent, and free from ideological bias.”
LAST COFFEE SIP
☕Other news
Cognition offers Windsurf staff buyouts, signals IP was the real prize:
Just three weeks after acquiring Windsurf, Cognition laid off 30 employees and is offering nine-month salary buyouts to the remaining 200 staff.
Employees who stay face intense demands, including six-day office weeks and 80+ hour work schedules, with the CEO saying there's “no work-life balance” in their mission.
The move highlights that the acquisition was likely driven more by Windsurf’s IP than its team, despite earlier promises of valuing the talent.
OpenAI models land on AWS for the first time, signaling shift in AI cloud dynamics:
OpenAI’s new open-weight reasoning models are now available on Amazon’s Bedrock and SageMaker platforms — marking the first time AWS has hosted OpenAI models.
The move helps AWS compete directly with Microsoft Azure, OpenAI’s long-time cloud partner, and gives AWS customers easier access to OpenAI’s models for building AI applications.
For OpenAI, this partnership strengthens its negotiating position with Microsoft and further distances itself from Meta, whose open-source model strategy is starting to soften.
HIRING ALERT: STARTUPS & VC ROLES
💼 Today’s VC & startup job opportunities
All-In-One VC Interview Preparation Guide: With a leading investors group, we have created an all-in-one VC interview preparation guide for aspiring VCs. Don’t miss this. (Access Here)
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Healthcare Analyst - General Investment Management | UK - Apply Here
Investment Manager - SGInnovate | Singapore - Apply Here
Associate- Portfolio Management - Stepstone Group | USA - Apply Here
Chief of Staff - Grey Line Partner | USA - Apply Here
Capital Formation Associate - B Capital Group | USA - Apply Here
Investment Principal - Cota Capital | USA - Apply Here
Investment Fellow - Indian Fund | India - Apply Here
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