September 5, 2024

Everybody gets a billion

Hi there,

Here is this week’s Hot or Not.

Hot: $1B+ AI rounds

On Wednesday, OpenAI co-founder Ilya Sutskever’s AI startup Safe SuperIntelligence (SSI) announced it had raised $1B. Ilya left OpenAI in May 2024.

The deal is the 9th $1B+ AI equity round this year following: 

1. xAI — $6B Series B (May 2024)
2. Anthropic — $2.75B Series D (March 2024) 
3. G42 — $1.5B corporate minority (April 2024)
4. Anduril — $1.5B Series F (August 2024)
5. CoreWeave — $1.1B Series C (May 2024)
6. Wayve — $1.05B Series C (May 2024)
7. Moonshot AI — $1B Series B (February 2024)
8. Scale — $1B Series B (May 2024)

SSI has 10 employees and was founded 3 months ago, with plans to develop safety-focused AI systems. 

Investors in the round included Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) and Sequoia Capital. 

They appear to be hedging their bets — both have invested in a number of leading model developers, including open-source xAI and Mistral AI.

Big tech investors are similarly hedging their bets by investing in all of the top genAI players (or most of them).

Not: Miami

A16z has left Miami.

In 2022, the firm opened an office in the city but exited it in May due to lack of use (and post-crypto meltdown). 

Venture funding to startups in Miami has also collapsed since 2021’s peak. 

For comparison, startups based in Silicon Valley raised $17.9B in Q2’24 — 100x as much as Miami. 

I’m a Miami Dolphins fan and really was hoping Miami would become a thing. It’s not looking like it will be.

Hot: Promising startups in industrials

We recently used CBI data to identify 52 future tech hotshots – i.e., startups poised for big, successful exits.

Interestingly, industrial startups represent a sizable portion of the list.

Zooming in on these promising industrial startups reveals key signals about the direction of their industry.

For example, many of these companies are locked in on climate tech innovation, covering everything from carbon removal to grid management to green hydrogen.

And others have focused on marrying AI and robotics to transform manufacturing and agriculture.

What key trends are emerging in other industries? Unlock the full map and find out in the free Future Tech Hotshots Report.

Lukewarm: "Flying car" tech

Electric vertical take-off and landing (eVTOL) aircraft can take off and land vertically without the need for a runway.

Their small size and limited range make them promising candidates for handling a broad range of short journeys.

While market potential has led to multiple years with total equity funding exceeding $1B, funding has fallen off a cliff since peaking in 2022.

But funding doesn’t give the full picture.

Several companies — like Joby Aviation, Archer Aviation, and Lilium — are nearing eVTOL commercialization, with plans to launch air taxi services as soon as 2025.

Learn more about the opportunities and challenges associated with eVTOL development in this brief.

The +1

Listen up. I am disgusted.

I love you.

Anand

@asanwal 

P.S. After you read our big tech in energy report, join our experts for a discussion on emerging energy trends to watch. Register for the live briefing here.

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