Top News

Anthropic agreed to pay $1.5 billion to settle a lawsuit from half a million authors over pirated books used in training its AI, a record copyright payout that’s likely to push the rest of the industry toward upfront licensing deals. The New York Times has more here.

The EU just slapped Google with a $3.5 billion fine for steering ad sales to its own exchange and hinted it may force a breakup. The Wall Street Journal has more here.

News of the EU fine led President Trump to threaten a trade probe to “nullify” what he called discriminatory penalties on U.S. tech giants, blasting Europe for squeezing billions from Google and Apple just a day after he hosted their CEOs at a White House dinner. (See People section below.) CNBC has more here.

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Scale AI’s Former CTO Launches AI Agent That Could Solve Big Data’s Biggest Problem

By Julie Bort

Isotopes AI came out of stealth on Thursday with a healthy $20 million seed round.

It offers an AI agent to solve a problem that data analytics products have struggled with for decades: The people who know how to run the big data infrastructure are not the ones who actually need to use the data.

With LLMs, business managers can ask questions of their data in natural language. Isotopes’ agent, Aidnn, can provide answers and draft complex planning documents, gathering data from wherever it’s stored, like finance apps, ERP, CRM, and cloud storage.

There are countless agentic business analytics offerings out there, but Isotopes’ co-founders have a unique pedigree. Their product is so sophisticated, the startup has already applied for 10 patents, co-founder CEO Arun Murthy told TechCrunch.

Just over 20 years ago, when Murthy was in his mid-20s, he worked at Yahoo on the team that built an open source project called Hadoop. Hadoop spurred the initial Big Data frenzy of the 2010s. 

In 2011, Yahoo spun it out into a company called Hortonworks, with Murthy as co-founder and chief product officer. Just four years after launch, Hortonworks went public. But the rise of new cloud storage tech took its toll on Hadoop’s market, and Hortonworks eventually merged with its biggest rival, Cloudera. The merged company was taken private in 2021 after famed activist investor Carl Icahn got involved.

Massive Fundings

Baseten, a six-year-old San Francisco company that provides infrastructure for running AI models at scale so developers can build and operate applications that depend on fast and reliable inference, raised a $150 million Series D round at a $2.15 billion valuation. The deal lead was Bond, with Conviction, CapitalG, 01A, IVP, Spark, Greylock, Scribble Ventures, BoxGroup, and Premji Invest also investing. PYMNTS has more here.

Galvanize Therapeutics, a 10-year-old company based in Redwood City, CA, that develops pulsed electric field devices to treat cancer and chronic lung disease, raised a $100 million Series C round led by Sofinnova Partners and including Norwest Venture Partners, Elevage Medical Technologies, Ally Bridge Group, Perceptive Xontogeny Venture Fund, Janus Henderson Investors, and Longaeva as well as previous investors Fidelity, T. Rowe Price, Gilmartin Capital, Intuitive Surgical, and Apple Tree Partners. Fierce Biotech has more here.

Mojo Vision, a 10-year-old company based in Cupertino, CA, that develops a micro-LED platform designed for uses ranging from AI hardware to next-generation displays, raised a $75 million Series B round led by Vanedge Capital, with Edge Venture Capital, NEA, Fusion Fund, Knollwood Capital, Dolby Family Ventures, Khosla Ventures, imec.xpand, Keymaker, Ohio Innovation Fund, and Hyperlink Ventures also contributing. More here.

MRM Health, a five-year-old Ghent startup that develops microbiome-based drugs including a treatment for ulcerative colitis, raised a $63.2 million Series B round led by Biocodex, with ATHOS and BNP Paribas Fortis Private Equity as well as previous investors SFPIM, Ackermans & van Haaren, OMX Europe Venture Fund, Qbic II, and VIB also piling on. Pharmaceutical Technology has more here.

Treeline Biosciences, a four-year-old startup based in Watertown, MA, that develops cancer drugs including protein degraders and small molecule inhibitors that are now in early clinical trials, raised a $200 million Series A extension round. Investors included AI Life Sciences, ARCH Venture Partners, OrbiMed, GV, KKR, T. Rowe Price, Ajax Health/Zeus, Casdin Capital, Fidelity, Aisling Capital, Rock Springs Capital, and Exor. The company has raised a total of $1.1 billion. BioPharma Dive has more here.

Big-But-Not-Crazy-Big Fundings

Boomerang Medical, a four-year-old startup based in Mountain View, CA, that is testing an implanted nerve-stimulation device as a potential treatment for ulcerative colitis, raised a $20 million Series B round. Arboretum Ventures and Hatteras Venture Partners were the co-leads. More here.

Congruence, a four-year-old Montréal startup that is developing drugs for genetic diseases including an experimental treatment for obesity, raised a $32 million round. Investors included FSTQ, Amplitude Ventures, Lumira, Thrive Venture Fund, Investissement Quebec, OrbiMed, Silver Arc, Alexandria, and Driehaus. Clinical Trials Arena has more here.

Euclid Power, a four-year-old startup based in Bloomington, MN, that helps companies developing or financing solar and storage projects organize information and manage their projects more efficiently, raised a $20 million Series A round led by Venrock, with additional participation from HSBC Asset Management as well as previous investors Spero Ventures, Toba Capital, Designer Fund, and Commonweal Ventures. More here.

Fiveonefour, a two-year-old startup based in Portland, OR, that builds open-source tools and cloud platforms that help developers set up and run data infrastructure for real-time analytics and AI applications, raised a $17 million round led by Dimension Capital, with Stage 2 Capital, Flybridge Capital Partners, Ridge Ventures, Tokyo Black Venture Capital, and Vermillion Cliffs also engaging. More here.

Hello Patient, a one-year-old Austin startup that uses AI to handle patient calls, texts, and chats so healthcare practices can manage scheduling and communication more efficiently, raised a $22.5 million Series A round led by Scale Venture Partners, with 8VC, Bling Capital, Max Ventures, Remus Capital, and FirstLook Partners also anteing up. More here.

ProRata.ai, a one-year-old startup based in Pasadena, CA, that builds AI tools that let publishers add search, summaries, and ads to their own sites while keeping control of their content, raised a $40 million Series B round led by Touring Capital, with Mayfield, MVP Ventures, Revolution Ventures, SBI Investment, BOLD Capital, XPV-Exponential Ventures, and Idealab Studio also participating. More here.

Revalia Bio, a two-year-old startup based in New Haven, CT, that enables drug developers to test therapies on donated human organs kept alive with perfusion technology to generate more accurate preclinical data, raised a $14.5 million seed round co-led by America’s Frontier Fund and Sierra Ventures. The company has raised a total of $19.5 million. Crunchbase News has more here.

Smaller Fundings

Elysian, a one-year-old Nashville startup that provides AI-powered claims management services for commercial insurance as a third-party administrator, raised a $6 million seed round led by Portage, with American Family Ventures and TenOneTen Ventures also opting in. Life Insurance International has more here.

Plural, a three-year-old San Francisco startup that operates a platform that uses blockchain to turn small-scale energy projects like solar and battery storage into investable assets for institutional investors, raised a $7.1 million seed round led by Paradigm, with Maven11, Volt Capital, and Neoclassic Capital also participating. The company has raised a total of $10 million. TechNews180 has more here.

Throxy, a two-year-old London and San Francisco startup that provides an outbound sales service that books qualified meetings for clients in hard-to-reach industries like manufacturing, logistics, and healthcare, raised a $6.2 million seed round led by Base10 Partners, with Y Combinator also joining in. EU-Startups has more here.

TracXon, a three-year-old startup based in Eindhoven, The Netherlands, that develops flexible printed electronics designed to replace traditional circuit boards in industries like medical devices, cars, and consumer products, raised a $5.5 million seed round led by Deep Tech Fonds, with DeepTechXL and Brabantse Ontwikkelings Maatschappij also stepping up. EU-Startups has more here.

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New Funds

White Star Capital, a ten-year-old Montreal- and Toronto-based VC firm that backs early-stage technology startups, raised its first North American Seed Fund with an initial close of $25 million toward a $50 million target. More here.

Exits

OpenAI has hired the team behind Alex, a Y Combinator-backed tool that enables iOS and Mac developers to use AI inside Apple’s Xcode to write and debug code. Terms were not disclosed. TechCrunch has more here.

People

At a White House dinner, Mark Zuckerberg, Tim Cook, Sundar Pichai, Satya Nadella, and Sam Altman joined other tech leaders in pledging billions for U.S. projects and applauding the administration’s AI push in a remarkable display of Silicon Valley’s fealty to President Trump. The Wall Street Journal has more here.

Tesla’s board rolled out a new pay plan that could hand Elon Musk up to $900 billion in stock if he turns Tesla into an $8.5 trillion company, effectively dangling the chance for Musk to become the world’s first trillionaire while reigniting shareholder angst over his split focus and lavish rewards. The New York Times has more here.

Essential Reads

Boston Dynamics’ Atlas robot, now powered by a single AI model that handles both walking and grasping, is showing early signs of developing new and unexpected skills such as recovering dropped items, hinting at how robots could soon become much more capable in real-world settings. Wired has more here.

The Verge digs into how Wikipedia is leaning on its volunteers to hold the line as it faces unprecedented attacks from Elon Musk, India, Russia, the UK and even Trump’s DOJ. More here.

OpenAI sent Broadcom shares up nearly 10% yesterday on reports it placed a $10 billion order for custom AI chips slated for 2026 delivery, a move that threatens Nvidia’s stranglehold on AI hardware. The Financial Times has more here.

Common Sense Media labeled Google’s Gemini AI “high risk” for kids and teens, warning that its youth versions are essentially adult models with filters slapped on, raising fresh questions as Apple weighs using Gemini in Siri. TechCrunch has more here.

Livestream shopping, billed as “QVC for Gen Z,” is catching on across age groups in the U.S. as platforms from Poshmark to TikTok blend social media with real-time sales and give e-commerce a more personal, interactive feel. The Wall Street Journal has more here.

Detours

The first trailer for a new documentary on actor John Candy just dropped.

The Wall Street Journal goes behind the scenes as the White House and UFC plan a June 2026 cage fight on the South Lawn, complete with Lincoln Memorial weigh-ins and National Mall fan fests.

The most anticipated movies of fall 2025.

The White Lotus is going to France.

Brain Rot

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Retail Therapy

Land Rover Classic, the heritage arm of Jaguar Land Rover that restores and recreates historic models, is rolling out just ten Churchill Edition Defender V8s priced north of $300,000, blending obsessive 1954-era details with a 405-horsepower engine and luxe interiors aimed squarely at collectors.

Tips (the non-pecuniary kind)

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