☕ Cursor raises $2.3 Billion funding, OpenAI unveils GPT-5.1 & Mira Murati’s AI startup is raising at a $50B valuation.
Valve announces three new products & Microsoft unveils an AI “super factory”.
The oldest cat ever recorded lived to 38 years and 3 days old.
That’s almost four decades of naps, attitude, and judging humans.
📬 What’s in store:
Today’s Picks: Startup legal docs for founders, Lovable’s AI playbook for PMF, Deel founder’s work principles, essay on originality, proof we’re not in an AI bubble, ChatGPT retention data.
Coding Assistant, Cursor raises $2.3B as its valuation soars to $29.3B.
Microsoft unveils an AI “super factory”.
Valve announces three new products.
OpenAI unveils GPT-5.1: smarter, faster, and more human.
Russia’s first humanoid robot falls during its debut.
Google will let users call stores, browse products, and check out using AI.
Amazon and Microsoft back new limits on Nvidia’s China chip exports.
Thinking Machines targets a $50B valuation in new funding talks.
OpenAI pushes back against order to hand over 20M ChatGPT logs.
Apple cuts App Store fees to 15% for mini apps.
VC & Startup Jobs: VC & investors backed startup hiring for remote roles.
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STARTUPS RAISING MILLIONS
💰 Startup funding updates
Exowatt, a Miami, FL-based renewable energy company, raised additional $50M in funding. The round, an extension to Exowatt’s April 2025 $70M Series A round, was led by MVP Ventures and 8090 Industries, with participation from The Florida Opportunity Fund, DeepWork Capital, Dragon Global, Massive VC, New Atlas Capital, BAM, Overmatch, Protagonist, StepStone, Atomic, and Bay Bridge Ventures.
Clairity, a Boston, MA-based AI-driven precision health company, raised $43M in Series B funding. The round was led by ACE Global Equity and Santé Ventures, with continued participation from the Breast Cancer Research Foundation (BCRF) and new investors.
Songscription, an Oceanside, NY-based music learning platform provider, raised $5M in funding. The round was led by Reach Capital, with participation from Emerge Capital, 10x Founders, and Dent Capital.
Carbon, a Redwood City, CA-based additive manufacturing company, raised $60M in new funding. The round was led by Sequoia Capital, Silver Lake, adidas, Baillie Gifford, Madrone, and Northgate.
Big Rentals, a Los Angeles, CA and Nashville, TN-based equipment rental platform provider, raised $2.8m in seed funding. The round was led by SNAK Venture Partners with participation from Ironspring Ventures, EquipmentShare, Forum Ventures, Jason Calacanis’s LAUNCH Fund, and NuFund Venture Group. Sonia Nagar, Co-Founder of SNAK Venture Partners, will join the Big Rentals board.
Vida, an Austin, TX-based provider of an AI phone agent operating system for enterprises, raised $4M in Series A funding. The round was led by Trammell Venture Partners (TVP) with participation from Timechain and others.
Fabric8Labs, a San Diego, CA-based electrochemical additive manufacturing company, raised $50M in funding. The round was led by NEA and Intel Capital, with participation from existing investors Lam Capital, TDK Ventures, SE Ventures, and new investors Marunouchi Innovation Partners, SK hynix, Ericsson Ventures, Masco Ventures, and Toppan Global Venture Partners.
sunday, an Atlanta, GA-based payment platform built for restaurant hospitality, raised $21M in Series B funding. Backers included DST Global Partners.
Anzen, a San Francisco, CA-based provider of a commercial insurance distrubution platform, raised $16m in Series A funding. The round, which brought total capital raised to $26m, was led by Madrona, with participation from Sandbox Industries, SNR, Andreessen Horowitz, and other investors.
Maybern, a NYC-base provider of an operating system for private funds, raised $50M in Series B funding. The round was led by Battery Ventures, with participation from Primary Venture Partners, Human Capital, MetaProp, Grafton Street Partners, Camber Creek, and Friends & Family Capital.
Bindwell, a San Francisco, CA-based agriculture-tech company using AI to accelerate pesticide discovery, raised $6M in Seed funding. The round was led by General Catalyst and A Capital, with participation from SV Angel and Y Combinator founder Paul Graham.
Code Metal, a Boston, MA-based company providing automated code translation and optimization solutions, raised $36.5M in Series A funding. The round was led by Accel, with participation from new investors including RTX Ventures, Bosch Ventures, Smith Point Capital, Overmatch VC, and AE Ventures.
Harbinger, a Garden Grove, CA-based American-made medium-duty electric and hybrid vehicle manufacturer, raised $160M in Series C funding. The round was led by FedEx, Capricorn’s Technology Impact Fund, and THOR Industries, with participation from Ridgeline, Tiger Global, Leitmotif, Maniv Mobility, Schematic Ventures, Overture Climate, Ironspring Ventures, ArcTern Ventures, Litquidity Ventures, and The Coca-Cola System Sustainability Fund, managed by Greycroft.
Cronvall, a Helsinki, Finland-based industrial procurement technology company, raised €3.9M in funding. The round was led by Greencode Ventures, Stephen Industries, and Innovestor.
Forgis, a Zurich, Switzerland-based startup building edge software for the automotive and advanced manufacturing sectors, raised $4.5M in Pre-Seed funding. The round was led by redalpine, with participation from Massimo Banzi, co-founder of Arduino, and other investors from deep tech and manufacturing.
Gate Bioscience, a Brisbane, California-based biotechnology company developing a new class of small molecule medicines aiming to eliminate disease-causing proteins at their source, closed a $65m Series B financing. The round was led by new investor Forbion and was joined by additional new investor Eli Lilly and Company (“Lilly”), as well as existing investors Versant Ventures, Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) Bio + Health, GV and ARCH Venture Partners.
Beacon Biosignals, a Boston, MA-based neurotechnology company powering AI-driven diagnostics and precision medicines for the brain, raised $86m in Series B funding. Backers included Innoviva, Google Ventures (GV), Nexus NeuroTech Ventures, S32, Catalio Capital Management, Takeda, General Catalyst, Logos Capital, Casdin Capital, and Indicator Ventures.
Scorbit, an Ann Arbor, MI-based connected gaming platform bringing classic and modern arcade experiences online, closed a $5m seed funding round. The round was led by Detroit Venture Partners, with participation from Grand Ventures, Weiser Family Office, Michigan Rise / Red Cedar, Invest Detroit Ventures, Eberg Capital, Ann Arbor SPARK Capital, Mudita Venture Fund II LLC, Precursor Ventures, Side Door Ventures, Wakestream, and Gambit Ventures.
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NEW VCs IN THE MARKET
🏦 Venture Capital updates
Glasswing Ventures, a Boston, MA-based vc firm focused on AI-native and Frontier Technology startups, closed its Fund III, at over $200m. Existing and new limited partners participated in the raise. Fund III will continue to invest in enterprise applications, cybersecurity innovations, and AI-native productivity and automation, including ERP, procurement, and workflow systems.
KEY STORIES IN TECH
📜 Latest in tech
Coding Assistant, Cursor raises $2.3B as its valuation soars to $29.3B
AI coding tool Cursor closed a massive $2.3B round just five months after its last raise, more than tripling its previous $9.9B valuation and drawing new backing from Coatue, Nvidia, and Google.
The company plans to use the capital to advance Composer, its in-house AI model launched in October, aiming to reduce reliance on external models from OpenAI, Google, and Anthropic.
With OpenAI and Anthropic sharpening their own coding assistants, 2026 is shaping up to be a highly competitive year for AI developer tools — and Cursor is gearing up for that fight.
Microsoft unveils an AI “super factory”
Microsoft is launching an AI “super factory” in Atlanta, a two-story complex designed for model training that will house hundreds of thousands of densely packed Nvidia GPUs for its partners.
The one-million-square-foot facility uses a liquid-cooling system and is part of the Fairwater network, connected by 120,000 miles of new fiber-optic cables to reduce latency between data centers.
Alongside the company’s own operations, the site’s enormous computing power will be available to prominent AI firms, including OpenAI, Mistral AI, and Elon Musk’s xAI for their projects.
Valve announces three new products
Valve revealed the Steam Machine, a 6-inch cube console for the living room that runs a Linux-based OS and doubles as a computer with a KDE Plasma desktop environment.
The company also announced the Steam Frame, a standalone virtual reality headset that functions as its own PC and is reportedly able to stream any game from a user’s Steam library.
A new Steam Controller was unveiled with magnetic thumbsticks, trackpads, a gyroscope, and grip buttons; it is designed for the Steam Machine but also works with PCs and laptops.
OpenAI unveils GPT-5.1: smarter, faster, and more human
OpenAI unveiled GPT-5.1, introducing a “Thinking” model for complex topics and an “Instant” model that is warmer, more conversational, and better at following very precise user instructions.
The GPT-5.1 Thinking model adjusts its speed, answering simple questions about twice as fast while taking more time to provide a more thorough analysis for difficult technical topics.
New personalization features let users select one of eight communication styles, including Friendly or Cynical, and fine-tune how concise replies are or how often emojis should appear.
Russia’s first humanoid robot falls during its debut
Russia’s first AI-powered humanoid robot, named AIdol, malfunctioned and toppled forward during its debut at a Moscow tech forum, landing flat on its face while walking across the stage.
The company’s CEO explained the incident was caused by a calibration error in the robot’s balance and motion control algorithms, which engineers will now fine-tune before its next demonstration.
AIdol features a silicone face with 19 servomotors to show emotions and is constructed with 77 percent domestically produced components as a result of Western sanctions on advanced imports.
Google will let users call stores, browse products, and check out using AI
Google’s conversational shopping in AI Mode lets you describe desired items, with the system pulling suggestions and comparisons from billions of product listings that also show sponsored results.
The “Let Google Call” feature is an agentic AI that can phone local stores on your behalf to ask about item stock and current promotions, then sends you the information.
A new agentic checkout will monitor an item’s price for you, confirm you still want to buy it when the cost drops, and then complete the purchase using Google Pay.
Amazon and Microsoft back new limits on Nvidia’s China chip exports
Amazon and Microsoft are supporting the GAIN AI Act, legislation that would force AI chipmakers like Nvidia to prioritize U.S. orders over foreign customers — a move also backed by Anthropic.
The Act, folded into the National Defense Authorization Act, reflects rising U.S. concerns that China could use advanced AI chips to strengthen its military capabilities.
Nvidia argues the law would hurt global competition by restricting the availability of high-end processors abroad, while Meta, Google, and President Trump have not taken a position.
Thinking Machines targets a $50B valuation in new funding talks
Former OpenAI exec Mira Murati’s startup Thinking Machines is in early discussions to raise a new round that could value the company between $50B and $60B, up from $12B just months ago.
The company has raised about $2B to date and recently launched Tinker, a tool for fine-tuning language models, as it positions itself among the fastest-rising AI startups.
Deal terms are still being negotiated, and the talks follow the departure of co-founder Andrew Tulloch, who recently left to join Meta.
OpenAI pushes back against order to hand over 20M ChatGPT logs
OpenAI is asking a federal judge to reverse an order requiring it to turn over 20 million anonymized ChatGPT conversations in its copyright fight with The New York Times, arguing the move would expose users’ private chat histories.
The Times says the logs are needed to prove ChatGPT reproduced its copyrighted articles and to counter claims that it “hacked” the model to manufacture evidence.
OpenAI insists the request is a privacy violation affecting millions of unrelated users, while the Times argues the sample would be anonymized and protected under a legal order.
LAST COFFEE SIP
☕ Other news
Apple cuts App Store fees to 15% for mini apps
Apple is launching a Mini Apps Partner Program that halves commissions to 15% on in-app purchases for “self-contained” web-based mini apps hosted inside larger native iOS and iPadOS apps.
To qualify, host apps must be on the App Store, use Apple’s in-app purchase system, adopt APIs like Advanced Commerce and Declared Age Rating, and share refund-related purchase data with Apple.
The move helps mini app platforms like WeChat, LINE, and emerging AI mini app ecosystems grow on Apple’s rails, while ensuring Apple still captures a cut as app engagement shifts into these embedded experiences.
DAILY PICKS
🗞️ What else is brewing
Startup Legal Document Pack – Essential Legal Docs for Founders. (Link)
Lovable founders’ AI playbook to help new founders reach PMF faster. (Link)
Alex Bouaziz (Deel founder) just shared his principles for work. This guy knows his stuff. (Link)
Great essay on the importance of being original in business. (Link)
According to these four charts, we’re not in an AI bubble. (Link)
ChatGPT product retention. (Link)
How did you hear about us: The most useful data — that you’re not gathering. (Link)
Benchmarking humans & AI in contract drafting. (Link)
Dot com bubble vs AI bubble. (Link)
Perplexity prompt guide to get more work done. (Link)
How to keep winning. (Link)
State of crypto in 2025 by a16z. (Link)
What investors ask and how to answer: A practical Q&A prep kit for founders. (Link)
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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Investment Analyst - Cornell University | USA - Apply Here
Associate - Venture Capital - Artha Venture Fund | India - Apply Here
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Analyst / Associate - Core Innovation Capital | USA - Apply Here
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AI Tech Lead - Core Innovation Capital | USA - Apply Here
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