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Welcome to another edition of 🔍 Startup Researcher - North America and Israel, your essential digest delivering the latest news and premium insights on startups and venture capital across the region 🌎️

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📰 Important News

• Donald Trump announced the creation of a U.S. crypto reserve including bitcoin, ether, XRP, solana, and cardano, leading to a surge in crypto prices.

• Canoo CEO Anthony Aquila offered $4 million to buy nearly all of the company's assets after its Chapter 7 bankruptcy filing.

• Google co-founder Larry Page is reportedly launching a new AI startup named Dynatomics, focusing on using AI for product manufacturing.

• Starship suffered its second consecutive test flight failure, losing engines and breaking apart over the Bahamas and the Dominican Republic.

• OpenAI is planning to charge up to $20,000 per month for AI agents, including options for knowledge workers, software developers, and PhD-level research.

💸 Top Funding Rounds

• Anthropic raised $3.5 billion in Series E funding at a $61.5 billion valuation to advance next-gen AI, expand compute capacity, and accelerate international growth.

• Epirus closed a $250 million Series D round to expand its market presence and enhance its drone-swarming countermeasures.

• Shield AI secured $240 million in funding, bringing its valuation to $5.3 billion, to enhance its autonomous drones and software.

• Peregrine Technologies raised $190 million in Series C funding led by Sequoia Capital at a $2.5 billion valuation to expand its data intelligence platform.

• Callio Therapeutics secured $187 million in Series A funding to develop multi-payload antibody-drug conjugates (ADCs) for oncology.

💰️ Notable Exits

• CoreWeave filed for a $35 billion IPO on Nasdaq, aiming to list under the symbol "CRWV," after strong 2024 revenue growth.

• CoreWeave has also acquired AI developer platform Weights & Biases for $1.7 billion to enhance its cloud services and infrastructure.

• Armis acquired Otorio for $120 million to enhance its cybersecurity offerings for industrial environments.

• Dynatrace acquired AI startup Metis to enhance cloud-native database observability with Metis' AI solutions, in a deal valued in the tens of millions.

• Kevin Rose, Digg's original founder, and Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian have acquired Digg with plans to revive the platform.

🏦 About Investors

• Israeli VC firm Team8 Capital, led by Sarit Firon, secured $1 billion following major tech exits including Dig, Talon, and Planck.

• Foundation Capital raised a $600 million fund, focused on seed-stage investments in emerging markets like AI, fintech, and crypto.

• SoftBank CEO Masayoshi Son is planning to borrow $16 billion for AI investments, with an additional $8 billion potentially by 2026.

• General Catalyst, managing $32 billion in assets, is facing leadership exits as Deep Nishar, Kyle Doherty, and Adam Valkin depart.

• Canadian private investment firm Sarona Asset Management is raising its third global emerging markets fund-of-funds.

🚀 Startup of the Week

Introducing our Startup of the Week 🏆

Anthropic

Anthropic, an AI startup founded in 2021 by former OpenAI employees Dario and Daniela Amodei, raised $3.5 billion in a Series E funding round, bringing its valuation to $61.5 billion. The funding, led by Lightspeed Venture Partners and other major investors, will be used to accelerate the development of next-gen AI models, expand computing capacity, and support international growth, particularly through advancements in its Claude models. Anthropic's AI solutions, already adopted by major companies like Zoom, Pfizer, and Amazon, are revolutionizing industries with applications such as automating clinical study reports and enhancing productivity tools.

💼 Investor of the Week

Introducing our Investor of the Week 🏆

Team8 Capital

Israeli VC firm Team8 Capital, led by Sarit Firon, has secured $1 billion fueled by major tech exits such as the sale of cybersecurity firms Dig and Talon to Palo Alto Networks for a combined $1 billion and the acquisition of Planck by Applied Systems for $300 million. Founded in 2014 by Nadav Zafrir, a former Israeli military intelligence commander, Team8 has become a leader in cybersecurity investments, with Firon playing a key role in the firm’s success. Team8’s performance has outpaced industry standards, with most of its portfolio companies achieving significant returns, cementing its position as a top player in the venture capital landscape.

🤑 Opportunity Radar

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