☕ Mira Murati’s startup loses co-founders to OpenAI & China has blocked imports of Nvidia’s H200 AI chips.
Gemini introduces 'Personal Intelligence' & OpenAI signed a $10+ billion multi-year compute deal with Cerebras.
Breaking News
OpenAI has signed a $10+ billion multi-year compute deal with Cerebras, securing 750 megawatts of capacity from 2026 to 2028 to power faster, low-latency inference for ChatGPT and other products. The agreement signals OpenAI’s push to diversify beyond Nvidia GPUs for certain workloads, while strengthening Cerebras’ position ahead of a potential IPO as an alternative AI compute platform.
China has blocked imports of Nvidia’s H200 AI chips, despite U.S. approval just one day earlier, leaving an estimated $54 billion in orders stuck at customs, according to reports. Chinese firms including Alibaba and ByteDance have ordered roughly 2 million H200 GPUs after years of pent-up demand, highlighting how geopolitical friction is now directly disrupting AI infrastructure supply chains—even when regulatory green lights exist on paper.
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STARTUPS RAISING MILLIONS
💰 Startup Funding Updates
PRE-SEED
Meet Caria, a NYC-based AI-native recruitment software company, raised $1M in Pre-Seed funding. The round was led by ANF Investment.
SEED
VoiceRun, a Cambridge, MA-based provider of an enterprise platform for Voice AI, raised $5.5M in Seed funding. The round was led by Flybridge Capital Partners, with participation from RRE Ventures and Link Ventures.
Ammobia, a San Francisco, California-based developer of low-cost ammonia production technology, raised $7.5 million in seed funding. Backers included Shell Ventures, Air Liquide (ALIAD), MOL Switch, and Chevron Technology Ventures.
Titl, a Miami, FL-based proptech company supporting property title verification using AI and blockchain, raised $2.5M in Seed funding round. The round was led by Cofounders Capital and FIT Ventures.
Axol Biosciences, an Edinburgh, Scotland, UK-based provider of induced pluripotent stem cell (iPSC) technologies for drug discovery and disease research, raised $2.8M in funding. The round was led by BroadOak Capital Partners, with participation from Roslin Foundation.
Vivere Oncotherapies, a Berkeley, CA-based company developing cancer therapies that activate the immune system, raised over $10M in funding. Backers included YK Bioventures, Pillar, Berkeley Frontier Fund, Freeflow Ventures and The National Cancer Institute.
Musical AI, an Ottawa, Ontario, Canada-based provider of an attribution and rights management platform for generative AI across the music sector, raised $4.5M in funding. The round was led by Heavybit with participation from BDC and Build Ventures.
GROWTH
Vista AI, a Palo Alto, CA-based company which specializes in automated MRI scanning software for hospitals and imaging centers, raised $29.5M in Series B funding. The round was led by Cedars-Sinai Health System, Intermountain Health, University of Utah Hospital System, Temple University/Fox Chase Cancer Center, and Tampa General Hospital, with participation from Khosla Ventures, Bold Brain Capital, and other existing investors.
Caldera Therapeutics, Inc., a Cambridge, MA-based clinical stage biotechnology company, launched with $112.5M total capital raised. The amount consisted of a $75M Series A round from Atlas Venture, LAV and venBio, and most recently a $37.5M Series A-1 round led by Omega Funds, with participation from new investors Wellington Management and Janus Henderson Investors.
Skild AI, a Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania-based developer of a scalable foundation model for robotics, raised close to $1.4 billion in funding at a valuation of over $14 billion. The round was led by SoftBank Group, with participation from NVIDIA’s NVentures, Macquarie Capital, Jeff Bezos (via Bezos Expeditions), Disruptive, 1789 Capital, and strategic investors including Samsung, LG, Schneider Electric, CommonSpirit, and Salesforce Ventures.
Alpaca, a San Mateo, CA-based company which specializes in brokerage infrastructure APIs, raised $150M in Series D funding, at $1.15 Billion valuation. The round was led by Drive Capital with participation from Citadel Securities, Opera Tech Ventures, MUFG Innovation Partners, Flat Capital, DRW Venture Capital, Kraken, Altered Capital, X&KSK, Bank Muscat, Endeavor Catalyst, Portage, Horizons Ventures, Social Leverage, Unbound, Diagram, Derayah Financial, and Revolut’s CTO, Vlad Yatsenko.
depthfirst, a San Francisco, CA-based company developing security solutions for businesses, raised $40M in Series A funding. The round was led by Accel with participation from Alt Capital, BoxGroup, Liquid 2 Ventures, Mantis VC, SV Angel, and angel investors including Jeff Dean, Kirsten Green, Colin Evans, Logan Kilpatrick, and Julian Schrittwieser.
Monnai, a Los Angeles, CA-based identity and risk data infrastructure company, raised $12M in funding. The round was led by Motive Partners, with participation from Commerce Ventures and 500 Global.
Aikido Security, a Brussels, Belgium- and London, UK-based provider of developer-first security products, raised $60m in Series B funding. The round was led by DST Global with participation from PSG Equity.
SkyFi, an Austin, TX-based provider of an AI-first Earth intelligence platform, raised $12.7M in Series A funding. The round was co-led by Buoyant Ventures and IronGate Capital Advisors, with new participation from DNV Ventures, TFX Ventures, Beyond Earth Tech, Nova Threshold, and Chris Morisoli, and existing investors RSquared VC and J2 Ventures.
IO River, a Boston, MA-based provider of an Edge-level innovation platform for the CDN market, raised $20m in Series A funding. The round was led by Venture Guides and New Era Capital Partners, with participation of S Capital and private investors including Ofir Ehrlich and Pavel Gurvich.
Novee, a Tel Aviv, Israel-based AI offensive security startup, emerged from stealth with $51.5m in total funding. Backers included YL Ventures, Canaan Partners and Oren Zeev (Zeev Ventures).
osapiens, a Mannheim, Germany-based provider of enterprise software for sustainable growth, raised US$100M in Series C funding. Decarbonization Partners, a joint venture between BlackRock and Temasek, led the round joining existing investors Goldman Sachs Alternatives, which led the US$120M Series B in 2024, and Armira Growth, which led the US$27M Series A investment in 2023.
Tive, a Boston, MA-based company which specializes in supply chain and logistics visibility technology, raised $20M in funding. The round was led by Lightsmith Group, with participation from Sageview Capital, World Innovation Lab, AVP, and Supply Chain Ventures.
Flip, a NYC-based provider of an AI solution that automates customer service calls for enterprise brands, raised $20M in Series A funding. The round was led by Next Coast Ventures and Ridge Ventures with participation from Data Point Capital, ScOp Venture Capital, Bullpen Capital, Forum Ventures and a group of angel investors.
HPS/PayMedix, a Milwaukee, WI-based healthcare financing and payments solutions provider, raised $33M in equity and debt financing. HLM Investment Partners led a $16M growth equity investment with participation from Escalate Capital Partners and RVM Enterprises, and existing investor SV Health Investors.
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NEW VCs IN THE MARKET
🏦 Venture Capital Updates
Superorganism, a U.S.-based VC firm focused on biodiversity startups, has raised a $25.9M debut fund backed by Cisco Foundation, AMB Holdings, Builders Vision, and a16z’s Jeff Jordan. The fund targets pre-seed and seed-stage companies tackling extinction, nature-friendly climate tech, and conservation tools, writing $250K–$500K checks.
KEY STORIES IN TECH
📜 Latest In Tech
Mira Murati’s startup Thinking Machines Lab loses co-founders to OpenAI
Mira Murati announced that Thinking Machines Lab has parted ways with co-founder and CTO Barret Zoph, with Soumith Chintala stepping in as the new CTO.
Shortly after, OpenAI confirmed that Zoph, co-founder Luke Metz, and former staffer Sam Schoenholz are all returning to OpenAI.
The exits are notable because Thinking Machines Lab is less than a year old and had raised a $2 billion seed round at a $12 billion valuation, making the loss of multiple co-founders a meaningful early setback.
App downloads declined again in 2025, but consumer spending surged to nearly $156B
Global app downloads fell for the fifth straight year to 106.9B in 2025, down 2.7% YoY, while consumer spending jumped 21.6% to $155.8B, driven largely by subscriptions and in-app purchases, according to Appfigures.
Non-game apps are now the bigger revenue engine: spending hit $82.6B, up 33.9% YoY, overtaking games, which brought in $72.2B and accounted for about 46% of total app spending.
In the U.S., app spending rose 18.1% to $55.5B even as downloads dropped 4.2%, reinforcing that fewer installs but higher monetization per user is now the core trend in the app economy.
Apple to customize Gemini AI without Google branding
Apple will customize its version of Google’s Gemini AI model independently and may remove Google branding from the experience, according to a new report from The Information about the partnership.
The Gemini-powered Siri will run on Apple devices and Private Cloud Compute, meaning Google won’t have access to user data, and Apple expects it to answer questions directly instead of listing links.
Apple also wants the new Siri to handle unclear requests by searching through messages to identify contacts, like figuring out which contact is your mother even if not labeled that way.
China blocks Nvidia H200 imports despite US approval
China’s customs officials blocked Nvidia H200 chip shipments on January 14, just one day after the US Commerce Department approved exports, leaving over $54 billion in orders stuck at checkpoints.
Chinese tech giants including Alibaba and ByteDance have ordered 2 million H200 chips, nearly three times Nvidia’s current inventory, after three years of US export restrictions created massive pent-up demand.
The H200 outperforms Huawei’s Ascend 910C by 32% in processing and 50% in memory bandwidth, forcing Chinese AI labs to choose between unreliable US supply chains or slower domestic chips.
Meta considers doubling Ray-Ban smart glasses production
Meta and its manufacturing partner EssilorLuxottica are considering doubling production of Ray-Ban smart glasses to 20 million pairs by the end of 2026, responding to strong demand for the devices.
High demand in the US has forced Meta to delay the international launch of its Meta Ray-Ban Display smartglasses to fulfill existing orders, while the company also plans to cut 10% of Reality Labs staff.
Warby Parker stock rose 10% after the news, likely because the company is partnering with Google on incoming smartglasses, showing strong market interest in the overall smartglasses category this year.
LAST COFFEE SIP
☕ Other News
Gemini introduces 'Personal Intelligence'
Google is rolling out a Gemini beta feature called Personal Intelligence that lets the AI reason across Gmail, Photos, Search, and YouTube history to deliver more context-aware, proactive responses.
Instead of just fetching data, Gemini can connect signals across apps, like linking emails, watched videos, and photos, to make tailored suggestions such as trip plans, purchases, or reminders.
The feature is opt-in and off by default, includes guardrails for sensitive data, does not train directly on personal content, and is launching first for Google AI Pro and AI Ultra users in the U.S.
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