Giant thanks to everyone who came out tonight for the StrictlyVC evening in San Francisco! It was such a warm, raucous night; thanks to our wonderful speakers, including Replit CEO Amjad Masad, veteran VC Lior Susan of Eclipse, former TV anchor Campbell Brown of Forum AI, Uber CTO Praveen Neppalli Naga, and Nicolas Sauvage of TDK Ventures, whose team co-hosted the event. We’ll have coverage and photos for you soon.:) - CL

Anthropic is seeking investor commitments within 48 hours for a roughly $50 billion round that could value the company at more than $900 billion and close within two weeks. TechCrunch has more here.

A judge blocked Elon Musk from arguing that A.I. poses an existential threat to humanity in his $150 billion lawsuit against OpenAI, removing a core argument his legal team has leaned on as the case proceeds in federal court. The New York Times has more here.

By Anna Heim

Nvidia has laid a new brick in its AI empire. NVentures, its corporate VC fund, has backed Legora, reportedly its first legal AI investment.

Leveraging AI to help lawyers streamline their work, the Swedish-born legal tech startup is competing with U.S. player Harvey.

Alongside Atlassian and other new financial investors, NVentures joined Legora’s cap table as part of a $50 million Series D extension that comes a month after the startup’s $550 million Series D. 

In the interval, this Y Combinator alum crossed $100 million in annual recurring revenue (ARR) — a milestone that contributed to its new $5.6 billion post-money valuation. 

This brings Legora’s valuation just a tad closer to Harvey’s, which reached $11 billion last month when Sequoia tripled down on its investment. Andreessen Horowitz, Coatue, Conviction Partners, Elad Gil, Matt Miller’s Evantic, and Kleiner Perkins also participated in that round.

Legora, too, is backed by high-profile VCs, but it puts even more emphasis on the big names it secured as clients, such as Bird & Bird, Cleary Gottlieb, and Linklaters. According to the company, the platform it launched only 18 months ago is now used by more than 1,000 law firms and in-house legal teams across 50 markets.

Harvey has game in that area, too. It claims 100,000 lawyers across 1,300 organizations as customers, ranging from global law firms like Hengeler Mueller and Latham & Watkins to corporate legal teams at companies like T-Mobile and Bridgewater.

CMBlu Energy, a 12-year-old company based in Alzenau, Germany, that develops non-lithium battery systems that store and deliver electricity for multi-hour use in data centers and industrial applications, raised a $58.6 million Series C round at a $1+ billion valuation. The deal was led by Samsung Ventures, with Strabag also joining in. More here.

JuliaHub, an 11-year-old company based in Cambridge, MA, that designs and simulates industrial systems by combining physics-based models with AI to automate engineering, testing, and control code generation, raised a $65 million Series B round led by Dorilton Capital and including General Catalyst and AE Industrial Partners. More here.

Netomi, an 11-year-old company based in San Mateo, CA, that builds AI systems that handle customer support by resolving requests and predicting issues before users contact a company, raised a $110 million round led by Accenture Ventures, with Adobe Ventures, WndrCo, SLW, Naver Ventures, Metis Strategy, and Fin Capital also chipping in. VentureBeat has more here.

Standard Intelligence, a recently founded San Francisco startup that develops AI models designed to learn and explore like humans, raised a $75 million round from Sequoia and Spark Capital at a $500 million post-money valuation. More here.

Vivacta Bio, a one-year-old Shanghai startup that develops therapies that genetically modify immune cells inside the body to treat cancer, avoiding lab-based cell extraction and reinfusion, raised a $50 million Series A round co-led by Loyal Valley Capital and Decheng Capital, with OrbiMed and Hankang Capital also opting in. More here.

Belo, a five-year-old Buenos Aires startup whose digital wallet allows users hold multiple currencies and crypto assets, send money internationally, and make payments locally, raised a $14 million Series A round led by Tether, with Titan Fund, The Venture City, Mindset Ventures, and G2 also participating. Tech Funding News has more here.

Casa, a two-year-old San Francisco startup that offers a subscription service that schedules and manages home maintenance and repairs, including booking workers and anticipating future projects, raised a $20 million Series A round led by Forerunner Ventures. The company has raised a total of $27 million. Inc. has more here.

Definity, a three-year-old Chicago startup that monitors and manages data pipelines as they run, analyzing system behavior and automatically identifying and resolving issues in real-time, raised a $12 million Series A round led by GreatPoint Ventures, with Dynatrace as well as previous investors StageOne Ventures and Hyde Park Venture Partners also taking part. The company has raised a total of $16.5 million. More here.

Featherless, a three-year-old San Francisco startup that runs a serverless platform that lets developers deploy and run open-source AI models without managing infrastructure, raised a $20 million Series A round co-led by AMD Ventures and Airbus Ventures, with BMW i Ventures, Kickstart Ventures, Panache Ventures, and Wavemaker Ventures also pitching in. Tech.eu has more here.

Lighthouse Pharmaceuticals, a four-year-old startup based in Novato, CA, that develops small-molecule drugs targeting infections linked to Alzheimer’s disease and other neurodegenerative conditions, raised a $12 million Series A round. Double Point Ventures was the deal lead. More here.

Photon, a four-year-old New York startup that connects doctors, pharmacies, and patients to route prescriptions and show pricing, availability, and fulfillment options before a prescription is filled, raised a $16 million Series A round led by Healthier Capital, with Notation, Flare Capital, and Evidenced also engaging. The company has raised a total of $25 million. More here.

Pmtbox, a four-year-old startup based in Orem, UT, that combines payments processing, fraud controls, and transaction data into a single system so merchants can manage transactions and monitor risk in one place, raised a $15 million seed round led by Tandem Ventures, with Element Ventures and Cynosure Investment Partners also joining in. Tech Funding News has more here.

Rocsys, a seven-year-old Dutch startup that builds robotic systems that automatically connect and disconnect electric vehicle chargers for autonomous fleets, raised a $13 million Series A round led by Capricorn Partners, with Scania Invest and Forward also digging in. The company has raised a total of $56.2 million. EU-Startups has more here.

Blomma, a one-year-old San Francisco startup that tracks goals, analyzes work data, and generates career guidance and documents such as performance reviews and communications, raised a $5 million seed round led by Felicis Ventures. Pulse 2.0 has more here.

Chance Studios, a six-month-old Los Angeles startup that provides a social and trading platform for trading card game collectors, raised a $3.2 million round co-led by Makers Fund and Hashed, with Arbitrum Gaming Ventures, Gam3Girl Ventures, and Digital Elm also taking part. More here.

Dreambase, a two-year-old Austin startup that connects to a company’s database and automatically generates dashboards, analyzes data, and answers questions using AI agents, raised a $3.7 million seed round led by Felicis Ventures, with Active Capital, FirstMile Ventures, Darkmode Ventures, Angel Collective, Earl Grey Capital, and Mercury Fund also contributing. More here.

Mosaic SoC, a two-year-old Zurich startup that designs chips that process camera and sensor data on-device to track position, map surroundings, and recognize objects in real-time, raised a $3.8 million pre-seed round led by Founderful, with Kick Foundation also investing. Tech Funding News has more here.

Online Oceans, a three-year-old UK startup that builds autonomous surface vessels and fleet control systems for maritime surveillance and defense missions, raised a $5.4 million round. Seraphim Space was the deal lead. UKTN has more here.

Shapes, a four-year-old San Francisco startup that provides a group chat app where users interact with AI agents and other people in shared conversations, raised an $8 million seed round led by Lightspeed, with AI Capital Partners and AI Grant also participating. More here.

137 Ventures, a 15-year-old San Francisco VC firm that backs defense, AI, and industrial startups, has raised more than $700 million across two growth-stage funds. The firm’s most notable investment is SpaceX, which it first backed in 2010. TechCrunch has more here.

Ridgeline Capital Management, a six-year-old Memphis venture firm that invests in AI, advanced computing, hardware, and automation, raised $180+ million for its second fund, with FedEx and Cisco Investments among its limited partners. The Wall Street Journal has more here.

Skio, a five-year-old subscription payments startup and Y Combinator alum, has been acquired by competitor Recharge for $105 million in cash after raising just $8 million, according to its founder. TechCrunch has more here.

OpenAI’s lawyers used emails and testimony to argue Elon Musk withheld promised funding and tried to recruit away staff during a 2017 power struggle, pressing him under cross-examination in his ongoing lawsuit against the company. Wired has more here.

Speaking of Elon Musk, he admitted under oath that xAI partly trained its Grok model on OpenAI systems using distillation, calling it standard practice among AI companies. TechCrunch has more here.

Two California ballot initiatives backed by $57 million of Sergey Brin’s money are on track to qualify for the November ballot. The Wall Street Journal has more here.

Meta told employees it may pursue additional layoffs beyond a planned 10% cut, as executives say the company will keep trimming costs while ramping spending on AI infrastructure. Business Insider has more here.

Alphabet, Amazon, Microsoft, and Meta plan to spend a combined $725 billion on AI infrastructure this year, up 77% from $410 billion in 2025. The Financial Times has more here.

Anthropic is facing White House resistance to expanding access to Mythos, its powerful AI model for finding and exploiting software flaws, as officials point to security risks, compute capacity, and the company’s strained relationship with the Trump administration. The Wall Street Journal has more here.

More than 50% of large “long-shot” bets on military action on Polymarket paid off, versus 25% for political markets and 14% overall, raising concerns that insiders with access to sensitive information may be exploiting the platform. Ars Technica has more here.

Google and Meta are using AI to automate ad creation, targeting, and buying, cutting campaign costs by as much as 65% and driving AI-related ad sales from $1 billion in 2022 to $35 billion last year and a projected $56 billion this year. The New York Times has more here.

A six-year-old private school in Cupertino founded by Silicon Valley executives for gifted children has unraveled into lawsuits, internal power struggles, layoffs, and a breakaway group of families, as a “move fast and break things” mindset collides with running a school. The Wall Street Journal has more here.

Palantir has started selling a $239 French-style chore coat as it pushes beyond typical tech merch, pitching the line as part of its effort to “re-industrialize America.”

Inside the Enhanced Games, where steroid use is not just tolerated; it’s encouraged.

Chanel is sparking debate with “shoe-less” heels that strap onto bare feet, with no soles in sight.

The latest on the search for the next James Bond.

The Kentucky Derby takes place this Sunday, and one of the hottest tickets in town is the Mansion, which offers about 300 guests access to a 10,000-square-foot VIP space that includes a private betting area, a concierge service, and high-end dining. Tickets start at $60,000 for the weekend.

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