#ai-startups

#ai-startups

Driving the news: A number of towering figures in the field have grown dissatisfied with their Big Tech jobs and opted to start up their own ventures. Meta AI chief scientist Yann LeCun - who has clashed with Meta leadership over research direction - is the latest star heading for the exits. Meta says it plans to partner with LeCun's new startup, which will focus on models with real-world reasoning.

While the 996 parlance and laser focus on AI may be new, hustle culture has always been embedded in Silicon Valley to some degree. Some business leaders, perhaps most famously Elon Musk, have long demanded those hours from their employees: "There are way easier places to work, but nobody ever changed the world on 40 hours a week," he once said of the "hardcore" work ethic promoted at his companies.

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From the start, Nicholas and his team focused on solving real problems rather than chasing hype or inflated valuations. He is a firm believer that conviction should come from customers, not VCs, and that once Forethought delivered tangible value to real users, the hype and valuations naturally followed. His "7-Failure Rule" urges founders to embrace iteration over perfection and to expect a few misses before finding what truly clicks.

When I went to college in 2017, I already knew I wanted to work in startups and make a difference in the world. After my freshman year at the University of Michigan, I switched majors from business to computer science, which I felt would be more useful for running an early-stage company. But in late 2018, at age 19, I dropped out of college for a full-time job.

If you believed AI startups and the world's greatest AI-forward tech companies are just hiring engineers, data scientists, and developers, you're clearly missing out. Behind tech powerhouses and AI house names like OpenAI, Anthropic, and other smaller AI startups from Silicon Valley to Europe, there are three skills that repeatedly show up on these companies' career pages and are evidently in strong demand.

After spending roughly three yearsas a consultant at Deloitte, I was feeling hollow. Due to the nature of consulting, I never got to see the value of my work because I would move on to the next project before my suggestions were implemented. I decided to pivot into tech. In 2021, in my mid-30s, I moved from India, where I' m from, to Seattle for a master's degree in business analytics at the University of Washington.

As a journalist who covers AI, I hear from countless people who seem utterly convinced that ChatGPT, Claude, or some other chatbot has achieved "sentience." Or "consciousness." Or-my personal favorite-"a mind of its own." The Turing test was aced a while back, yes, but unlike rote intelligence, these things are not so easily pinned down. Large language models will claim to think for themselves, even describe inner torments or profess undying loves, but such statements don't imply interiority.

Roy Lee, CEO of AI tech startup Cluely, which makes software for job interviews and work calls, told The New York Times that he leased eight apartments for employees in a recently-built luxury complex situated just a one-minute walk away from the office. The rents in the 16-story building range from $3,000 to $12,000 a month. "Going to the office should feel like you're walking to your living room, so we really, really want people close," Lee told The Times on Thursday.

Wabi will enable users to create their own mini-apps without any coding. "It's a platform to discover, remix, and share, create mini apps for daily life," Kuyda said. "We'll tell a little bit more when we launch publicly. Right now, it's a very close private beta." Wabi is a 10-person team, Kuyda said, and plans to launch its product "soon." The idea for Wabi, a "personal software platform," led Kuyda to step away from Replika, she said.

It's likely safe to say-creative accounting's been around for as long as accounting itself. In 1494, for example, mathematician and 'father of modern accounting' Luca Pacioli wrote of Venetian merchants willfully rendering their ledgers illegible. In the Gilded Age, inflating assets and understating liabilities was standard practice across a booming system. And who can forget the "channel stuffing" of the 2000s?

In less than three years, Midjourney's ARR went from zero to $200 million. In 20 months, ElevenLabs, a voice AI startup, saw its ARR soar from zero to near $100 million. In three months, vibe coding darling Lovable went from zero to $17 million in ARR, this summer hitting $100 million in ARR. In its first six months, Decagon hit "seven figures" in ARR, the company reported.

From model infrastructure to niche applications, AI is producing a new breed of founders and a new set of investor expectations. In this candid conversation on the , at TechCrunch Disrupt 2025 - taking place on October 27-29 in San Francisco - top VCs will share what's catching their eye (and what's not), how they're thinking about defensibility in a world of AI monopolies, and what founders need to show to get that next term sheet.

You are seconds away from signing up for the hottest list in NYC Tech! Sign up today Octane - $24.5M Funding Round Octane, an end-to-end financing platform for powersports equipment purchases, has raised $24.5M in funding according to a recent SEC filing. The filing indicates that there were five investors in this round. Founded by Jason Guss in 2014, Octane has now raised a total of $245.7M in reported equity funding.

Cohere, the Toronto-based startup building large language models for business customers, has long had a lot in common with its hometown hockey team, the Maple Leafs. They are a solid franchise and a big deal in Canada, but they've not made a Stanley Cup Final since 1967. Similarly, Cohere has built a string of solid, if not spectacular, LLMs and has established itself as the AI national champion of Canada.

It's knowing that the city itself wants you to to build something great, is willing to actually put the money where the mouth is, right? And help you do that.

Nominal plugs into a company's existing enterprise resource planning (ERP) system and helps CFOs and controllers automate tasks to reduce manual work and errors.

"It's such a critical part of the internet," Sinha, a partner at Point72 Ventures, said regarding the creator economy's enduring significance. He noted that initial hype might have subsided but remains confident in its importance.

VAST Data is in discussions for financing that could elevate its valuation to $30 billion, positioning it among the top valuable AI startups.

Cursor is capitalizing on the disparity in the AI startup landscape by acquiring talent from startups like Koala to enhance its enterprise offerings and compete with major players.

Digital health startups raised $6.4 billion in venture capital funding during the first half of 2025, slightly more than the preceding two years' totals.

Belgium's startup ecosystem is thriving with strong public-private partnerships and innovative deep tech, highlighted by AI-first startups positioning it on Europe's innovation map.

Lovable, one of Europe's fastest-growing AI startups, is raising over $150 million at a nearly $2 billion valuation, following a previous $15 million round.