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◆QUANTLOGIX STARTUP DAILY
WEDNESDAY · 09/30/2026 SILICON VALLEY
Displayed Rounds
12
Past 7 days
Disclosed Capital
$8.6B
Past 7 days
Tracked Startups
2,590
QL private book
Mega-Round Board
8
$100M+ recent
Markdown Watch
100
names flagged

◆ World Labs Acquisition (announced) ($8.2B) leads the startup tape

Twelve disclosed deals totaling $8.6B. Strip out AMD's announced $8.2B acquisition of Fei-Fei Li's World Labs and the week's genuine funding tape is roughly $400M across 11 deals — thin. Largest venture round on tape: BigHat Biosciences' $75M Series C (DFJ Growth, Premji Invest co-lead). Astro Digital's $180M SPAC merger with Proem Asset Management is an announcement, not a close. Notable pre-seed/seed: Ando $20M (Index/Emergence/Accel, split by stage), Feather $8M (Gradient), Sanyark Space $2M. Mega-round board unchanged in shape: OpenAI $122B, Waymo $16B, Scale AI $14B. Most-active lead count is meaningless this week — every listed lead has one deal; AMD's $8.2B is an acquisition price, not a round size.

◆ Daily Startup News

Company-level news from the last 24h: Ahmedabad spacetech startup SatLeo is launching a thermal-imaging payload on a SpaceX rocket. BC-based Bridge launched an app to digitize financial reconciliation. Vietnam's Dat Bike partnered with Toshiba on electric motorcycle components. Aspirity Partners made its Nordic debut with a €100M+ investment in IoT carrier Onomondo. IIT Bombay alumni launched Kokasa to build defense and aerospace systems. A Pittsburgh biotech and a Boston-area company formed a new joint startup. None of these are funding events; treat as operational signals only.

◆ Valuations & Secondary Transactions

Reported post-money marks: OpenEvidence to $15.0B, +25% vs. its $12.0B mark from January 2026. Rightway at $1.75B is +59.1% — but against a $1.1B mark from March 2021, roughly 6% annualized over five-plus years, hardly a repricing. New small-cap marks: Sanyark Space at $7.5M reported post-money (tape shows an $8M figure — likely pre/post basis difference; verify before quoting either). Outside the ledger: General Intuition raised $220M at $6.2B; Efficient Computer at $650M; Skyroot Aerospace is targeting a $3B valuation in a $300M round — a target, not an agreed price. Anthropic pre-IPO perpetuals reached $643M in volume through Sept. 21.

Company / Round DateReported Post-MoneyPrior Post-Money / DateMark ChangeEvidence
Sanyark Space
2026-09-26
$8MUnavailableNot comparableTracked roster; source link unavailable
Arivihan
2026-09-25
$60MUnavailableNot comparableTracked roster; source link unavailable
Outmarket
2026-09-25
$335MUnavailableNot comparableTracked roster; source link unavailable
OpenEvidence
2026-09-24
$15B$12B
2026-01-21
+25.0%Tracked roster; source link unavailable
Rightway
2026-09-24
$1.8B$1.1B
2021-03-30
+59.1%Tracked roster; source link unavailable

Historical round marks are not replaced with today's company valuation. Mark changes compare disclosed post-money levels, not investor returns; dilution and financing terms may differ. Secondary indications, fund marks and enterprise values in linked reporting are separate evidence, not interchangeable round valuations.

◆ Capital by Sector

AIAI · $8.2B disclosed in window$8.2BSpace / DefenseSpace / Defense · $180M disclosed in window$180MDrug DiscoveryDrug Discovery · $75M disclosed in window$75MInsurtechInsurtech · $35M disclosed in window$35MBusiness/Productivity SoftwareBusiness/Productivity Software · $20M disclosed in window$20MHealthcareHealthcare · $20M disclosed in window$20M

Disclosed round capital in the window. Undisclosed amounts count as zero.

◆ The Funding Tape — Past 7 days

Twelve disclosed deals totaling $8.6B. Strip out AMD's announced $8.2B acquisition of Fei-Fei Li's World Labs and the week's genuine funding tape is roughly $400M across 11 deals — thin. Largest venture round on tape: BigHat Biosciences' $75M Series C (DFJ Growth, Premji Invest co-lead). Astro Digital's $180M SPAC merger with Proem Asset Management is an announcement, not a close. Notable pre-seed/seed: Ando $20M (Index/Emergence/Accel, split by stage), Feather $8M (Gradient), Sanyark Space $2M. Mega-round board unchanged in shape: OpenAI $122B, Waymo $16B, Scale AI $14B. Most-active lead count is meaningless this week — every listed lead has one deal; AMD's $8.2B is an acquisition price, not a round size.

DateCompanyRoundAmountReported Post-MoneyLeadSector
2026-09-28 Astro Digital SPAC merger + PIPE (announced) $180M — Proem Asset Management Space / Defense
2026-09-28 Modulate Venture $25M — Future Ventures AI
2026-09-28 World Labs Acquisition (announced) $8.2B — AMD AI
2026-09-26 Sanyark Space Pre-Seed $2M $8M Avaana Capital; AUM Ventures Space
2026-09-25 Arivihan Series A $10M $60M Accel; Prosus Education
2026-09-25 Outmarket Series B $35M $335M SignalFire Insurtech
2026-09-24 Ando Pre-seed + Seed (combined) $20M — Index Ventures; Emergence Capital (seed); Accel (pre-seed) Business/Productivity Software
2026-09-24 Basalt Health Series A $20M — NEA Healthcare
2026-09-24 BigHat Biosciences Series C $75M — DFJ Growth; Premji Invest (co-leads) Drug Discovery
2026-09-24 ByteAsk Pre-seed $1M — Y Combinator; Entrepreneur First Software Development Applications
2026-09-24 Dextr AI Seed $7M — Elevation Capital AI
2026-09-24 Feather Pre-Seed $8M — Gradient Ventures Robotics

◆ Stage Mix — Deals & Capital by Stage

Where the window's activity sits on the funding ladder: deal count (solid) against disclosed capital (faded) per stage, with the companies behind each cluster. Stages come from the reported round labels; undisclosed amounts count as zero capital.

Seed: 5Series A: 2Series B: 1Series C–D: 1Other: 3
Seed · 5 deals · $37MSeries A · 2 deals · $30MSeries B · 1 deal · $35MSeries C–D · 1 deal · $75MOther · 3 deals · $8.4B
SeedSeed: 5 deals5 dealsSeed: $37M$37MSeries ASeries A: 2 deals2 dealsSeries A: $30M$30MSeries BSeries B: 1 deal1 dealSeries B: $35M$35MSeries C–DSeries C–D: 1 deal1 dealSeries C–D: $75M$75MOtherOther: 3 deals3 dealsOther: $8.4B$8.4B
Seed
5 deals · $37M disclosed · 0% of window capital
Series A
2 deals · $30M disclosed · 0% of window capital
Series B
1 deal · $35M disclosed · 0% of window capital
Series C–D
1 deal · $75M disclosed · 1% of window capital
Other
3 deals · $8.4B disclosed · 98% of window capital

◆ VC Activity & Lead Investors

Deal volume halved week-over-week (40 to 19 tracked rounds) while dollars rose 43.4% — but the dollar gain is one acquisition, not broad funding. AI took $8.23B of $9.07B tracked capital, 91% of it the World Labs transaction; AI venture rounds alone (Modulate, Dextr AI) were modest. Fund formation stays active: Protego Ventures closed a $125M Fund I for early-growth defense; Peak XV raised its Surge seed cap to $5M across 18 new startups; KB Financial seeded a Korean impact fund-of-funds; South Australia's only VC firm raised a first fund. Coverage is thin on check sizes — lead totals shown are full round sizes, not individual checks.

Lead InvestorDisplayed DealsAssociated Round Sizes
AMD1$8.2B
Proem Asset Management1$180M
DFJ Growth; Premji Invest (co-leads)1$75M
SignalFire1$35M
Future Ventures1$25M
Index Ventures; Emergence Capital (seed); Accel (pre-seed)1$20M
NEA1$20M
Accel; Prosus1$10M

Total sizes of associated rounds, not the lead investor's check sizes. Investor types are not inferred from their names.

◆ Private Equity & Growth Buyouts

Fund closes and buy-side moves dominate: Stride Consumer Partners closed its oversubscribed $550M Fund II (last 24h). The architect of IRIS Software's $4B recapitalisation launched an AI-first investment group with two acquisitions. Livingbridge-backed Elevare Software Group debuted with dual UK housing-tech acquisitions. Sun Capital CV acquired Anderson Global; a housing/healthcare AI platform raised $350M per Alternatives Watch. UK automotive software provider Pinewood's first-half profit rose on the Seez contribution — evidence bolt-on deals are feeding through P&Ls. Deal terms and targets aren't detailed in available evidence; treat specifics accordingly.

◆ Investment Funds & Capital Formation

A $200M closed-end fund from Dan Ives targeting private AI companies launched — and its NYSE-listed vehicle, Ives Ultra AI Opportunities, IPO'd at $10/share per Unite.AI. Note a closed-end AI vehicle's listed price can trade off its NAV; watch the discount. Other closes (all last 24h): Protego Ventures $125M Fund I for early-growth defense; Rising Point $325M debut, past target, after shifting from an independent-sponsor model; Princeton Equity more than doubled its flagship to a $1.3B close in two months. Fund size ≠ deployed capital; none of these closes are startup investments yet.

◆ M&A & Exits

AMD's $8.2B agreement to acquire World Labs (announced, not closed) is the week's defining transaction and the largest AI acquisition in the tracked book. Below it, a micro-M&A pattern: Bolt.new acquired AI-agent startup Dokai (its first deal); Clio bought a courts-focused company to deepen legal verticalization. Commentary attributes the small-deal spree to LLM commoditization — acquirers buying teams and distribution, not models. Also note: the architect of IRIS Software's $4B recapitalisation launched an AI-first investment group with two tech acquisitions, and Elevare debuted with dual UK housing-tech deals. World Labs remains subject to closing conditions until stated otherwise.

◆ Off-Book Wire

Funding headlines from outside the tracked book — sourced links, not QL data.

◆ Mega-Round Board

The largest recent private rounds ($100M+) across the tracked book — 2247 ranked. Full board: quantlogix.ai/mega-rounds.

OpenAIOpenAI · $122B · Late-stage primary122000WaymoWaymo · $16B · 2026 mega-round16000Scale AIScale AI · $14B · Series F + Meta investment14300PrometheusPrometheus · $12B · Funding12000SwitchSwitch · $11B · Buyout/LBO11000Blue OriginBlue Origin · $10B · Private (Bezos-funded)10000

◆ Private Markets Weekday Digest · 09/30/2026

Display-only private-markets tape from the tracked roster — formations, priced fundraises, valuation marks, and U.S. VC lead activity. No inferred amounts; empty sections stay empty.

Window: 2026-09-30 · sources: private-companies.json, investors.json

New company formations

No rows in the report window.

Fund raises

No rows in the report window.

Valuation marks

No rows in the report window.

Top U.S. VC activity

No rows in the report window.

No in-tree private-market events matched the report window; amounts and valuations were not inferred.

◆ Private Market Desk — Evening Edition · 09/29/2026

The Silicon Valley Private Market Daily — the 8pm PT desk close: qualified raises, roster re-rates and sector velocity from the QL private-market pipeline.

💰 Notable Raises

  • Seattle biotech InduPro — $77M Series B. A newly closed institutional round adds a fresh company and pricing signal to the private-market dataset.
  • Reverion — $175M Series B (+ Kembara, Allianz, KfW Capital, Aurum Impact, Carbon Equity). Reversible fuel-cell power plants Funding supports mass production of reversible fuel-cell power plants for the energy transition.
  • Marble — $7M. Automation for fraud and AML Expanding the use of automation for anti-money laundering and fraud detection workflows.

🔍 Reported, not yet verified

  • EliseAI — reported $350M Series F; details did not clear cross-source verification — held for manual review, excluded from the dataset.
  • Atomic — reported $12.5M; details did not clear cross-source verification — held for manual review, excluded from the dataset.

📊 Valuation re-rates (roster marks that moved)

  • Rightway — $1.1B (2021-Q1) → $1.8B (+59%) on Series E led by Francisco Partners.
  • OpenEvidence — $12B (2026-Q1) → $15B (+25%) on Unlabeled (reported).
  • Brahma AI — $1.4B (2025-Q1) → $2B (+40%) on Preferred equity round (unlabeled) led by Multiples Alternate Asset Management.
  • Impulse Space — $4.3B (2026-Q2) → $5.6B (+31%) on Series D extension.
  • Factory — $1.5B (2026-Q2) → $5B (+233%) on Growth round (series undisclosed).
  • Profound — $1B (2026-Q1) → $1.8B (+80%) on Series D led by Sequoia Capital / Kleiner Perkins (co-led).
  • Temporal — $5B (2026-Q1) → $12.6B (+151%) on Series E led by Lightspeed.
  • The Boring Company — $5.7B (2022-Q2) → $23B (+305%) on Series D led by United Arab Emirates and affiliated investment entities.
  • Harvey — $11B (2026-Q1) → $15.5B (+41%) on Later Stage VC led by Diffusion / Lightspeed Venture Partners (co-led).
  • Cognition — $26B (2026-Q2) → $48B (+85%) on Later Stage VC led by Andreessen Horowitz / Accel / Founders Fund / General Catalyst / Avenir (co-led).
  • Upwind — $1.5B (2026-Q1) → $3.8B (+153%) on Series C led by Bessemer Venture Partners, TCV.
  • AfterQuery — $300M (2026-Q2) → $3.2B (+967%) on Growth round (reported).
  • Fluidstack — $7.5B (2026-Q1) → $18B (+140%) on Growth round (series undisclosed) led by Jane Street.
  • Instinct — $500M (2026-Q3) → $2.5B (+400%) on Series B led by Index Ventures / Benchmark (co-led).
  • Firmus Technologies — $5.5B (2026-Q1) → $10.5B (+91%) on Growth Equity led by Nvidia & Coatue.
  • Hadrian — $1.6B (2025-Q3) → $7.9B (+392%) on Series D led by JPMorgan Strategic Investment Group.
  • HappyRobot — $500M (2025-Q3) → $1.2B (+140%) on Series C led by Prysm Capital.
  • Owner — $1B (2025-Q2) → $2.3B (+130%) on Series D led by Growth Equity at Goldman Sachs Alternatives.
  • K2 Space — $3B (2025-Q4) → $6.8B (+127%) on Series D led by Kleiner Perkins / ICONIQ Capital.
  • Anthropic — $965B (2026-Q2) → $1000B (+4%) on Strategic Investment led by AMD.
  • Wonder — $7B (2025-Q2) → $9.7B (+38%) on Series D.
  • Baseten — $5B (2026-Q1) → $13B (+160%) on Series F led by Altimeter Capital, Conviction, Spark Capital.
  • Prometheus — $38B (2026-Q2) → $41B (+8%) on Funding led by Jeff Bezos.
  • Ramp — $32B (2025-Q3) → $44B (+38%) on Series F led by ICONIQ / GIC / Ontario Teachers' Pension Plan.

⚡ Mega-round momentum (sector velocity, closed rounds)

  • ↑ AI — $19.3B across 26 rounds / 26 companies (accelerating, 26 vs. 7 prior rounds). Top: Anthropic $5B (Strategic Investment).
  • ↑ Energy — $3.4B across 5 rounds / 5 companies (accelerating, 5 vs. 2 prior rounds). Top: Valar Atomics $1B (Series B).
  • ↑ Defense — $3.4B across 5 rounds / 5 companies (accelerating, 5 vs. 1 prior round). Top: Helsing $1.8B (Late Stage).
  • → Transportation — $3B across 1 round / 1 company (steady, 1 vs. 1 prior round). Top: The Boring Company $3B (Series D).
  • ✦ Space / Defense — $1.9B across 4 rounds / 4 companies (new, new vs. a quiet prior window). Top: Stoke Space $1B (Series E).
  • ✦ Defense / Industrials — $1.4B across 1 round / 1 company (new, new vs. a quiet prior window). Top: Hadrian $1.4B (Series D).

🚀 New / Stealth Companies

  • No fresh stealth intake surfaced this window.

🏦 Private-Market Fund Watch

  • No new fund registrations, launches, or portfolio changes cleared primary-source verification in this window.

📊 Robinhood Ventures Performance

  • RVI — $27.52 close (2026-09-29) · day -2.86% · since first available close (2026-03-06) +31.05% · NAV/premium-discount not published in today's qualified inputs.
  • RVII — $22.1 close (2026-09-29) · day +0.78% · since first available close (2026-08-13) -3.70% · NAV/premium-discount not published in today's qualified inputs.

🏛️ Institutional Ownership (13F)

  • RVI: no holders currently indexed in the curated top-manager 13F universe. The quarter-over-quarter read is BEARISH: 0 new, 0 increased, 0 decreased, and 1 exited (2026-03-31 → 2026-06-30). Coverage is filing-based and can lag quarter-end by up to 45 days.
  • RVII: no holders currently indexed in the curated top-manager 13F universe. Coverage is filing-based and can lag quarter-end by up to 45 days.

🧭 Macro read

The private market displays significant concentration in AI-centric infrastructure and defense technology, evidenced by large raises (EliseAI, Reverion) and new specialized vehicles like Protego Ventures. Uncertainty persists regarding IPO timelines, notably for OpenAI and Oura, as the market balances massive valuation expectations against a slower exit environment.

🗂️ Dataset updated: added 1 company to the QuantLogix private-companies list — Reverion — 2,590 → 2,591. Append-only.

🔗 Sources

  • [SF Business Times](https://www.bizjournals.com/seattle/news/2026/08/13/indupro-series-b-fundraise-prakash-raman-cancer.html)
  • [TechCrunch](https://techcrunch.com/2026/09/29/a16z-backed-eliseai-raises-350m-doubles-valuation-to-4b/)
  • [TechStartups](https://techstartups.com/2026/09/29/startup-funding-news-today-september-29-2026-atomic-anote-helix-marble-reverion-more/)
  • [RVI market performance](https://polygon.io/)
  • [SEC Form 13F methodology](https://www.sec.gov/divisions/investment/13ffaq.htm)

◆ Markdown Watch

100 tracked names flagged for markdown risk — 125 scored nightly, 2465 left unscored (no comp bridge). Down rounds are recorded in the open ledger — receipts only work in public. Live boards: markdown-watch · down-round-ledger.

Click a column to sort · third click restores rank order
#CompanySectorRisk ScoreBandVs CompsLast MarkLast Round
1 Linktree SaaS 86 High +515% $1.3B 54 mo ago
2 Replit Data / Infra 86 High +178% $9.0B 41 mo ago
3 Xendit Financial Services 80 High +1898% $2.7B 53 mo ago
4 Forter Fintech 80 High +979% $3.0B 65 mo ago
5 Greenlight Fintech 80 High +623% $2.3B 66 mo ago
6 Betterment Fintech 80 High +441% $1.1B 42 mo ago
7 Cross River Bank fintech 80 High +220% $3.0B 54 mo ago
8 Pump SaaS 76 High +1647% $1.5B 28 mo ago

Nightly score: comp-bridge premium (45%) · round staleness (30%) · IPO-readiness drag (15%) · funding deceleration (10%). Companies without a computable public-comp bridge stay unscored — never guessed.

63 markdowns detected all-time · 12 flagged beforehand · 51 missed · hit rate 19%

CompanyDetectedEventMarkCalled?
Databricks 2026-09-28 Mark cut −29.5% $190B → $134B ✓ Flagged #92 · Moderate
Apex 2026-09-28 Mark cut −56.5% $2.3B → $1.0B ✗ Missed
Firework 2026-09-28 Mark cut −95.7% $18B → $750M ✗ Missed
Anchorage Digital 2026-09-21 Mark cut −28.6% $4.2B → $3.0B ✗ Missed
Etched 2026-09-21 Mark cut −51.5% $10B → $5.0B ✗ Missed
Found 2026-09-21 Mark cut −70.0% $2.0B → $600M ✗ Missed
Public 2026-09-21 Mark cut −99.4% $190B → $1.2B ✗ Missed
Upgrade 2026-09-14 Mark cut −30.8% $7.3B → $5.0B ✓ Flagged #64 · Moderate

Down-round & valuation headlines scraped at publication from Google News, Hacker News, CNBC, Yahoo Finance and the wider tech press.

◆ IPO Runway — Latest Deep Dives

◆ Founder & Investor Take

AMD–World Labs resets the AI exit bar

An $8.2B strategic acquisition of an embodied-AI lab — announced, not closed — plus founder-anxiety reporting around Fei-Fei Li's tenure move suggests consolidation risk is now top-of-funnel for AI infrastructure and physical-AI teams. Practical read: map strategic buyers (chips, cloud, defense) alongside financial sponsors, and assume LLM-commoditization logic is pushing acquirers toward teams and distribution rather than models.

Tokenized secondaries are liquid until they aren't

Anthropic pre-IPO perpetuals reached $643M in volume through Sept. 21, with coverage explicitly flagging a liquidity test ahead. Founders should resist using token-market marks as round-pricing anchors — these instruments trade on sentiment and structural flows, not diligence, and the liquidity test will reveal whether there are real buyers underneath. If your employees or angels are being pitched tokenized exposure to late-stage AI names, treat those prices as indicative at best.

Pivots get financed — but priced accordingly

Groq raised $350M at a $3.5B valuation while pivoting from AI chipmaker to neocloud provider. The lesson isn't that pivots are rewarded; it's that AI-infrastructure capital will fund strategic repositioning at a discount to prior narrative peaks, and execution risk gets embedded in the price. Efficient Computer's $97M Series B at $650M shows hardware bets still clear.

◆ Outlook

October opens with concentration risk on full display: one $8.2B announced acquisition is doing nearly all the work in weekly capital figures while underlying deal count halves. Watch whether AMD–World Labs closes, whether Anthropic's tokenized liquidity test holds, and whether the markdown ledger's cuts spread to more AI names.

QuantLogix briefings are educational market commentary generated from live data, not investment advice. Private-market figures come from public reporting and the QuantLogix private-company dataset; amounts and valuations are as-reported, not audited. Markets carry risk of loss.