#venture-capital

#venture-capital

When Daniel Ek and Martin Lorentzon founded Spotify in April 2006, they were two Stockholm entrepreneurs with a prototype so skeletal that Per Roman, the cofounder of investors Bullhound Capital, who would later back the company, says his first look at it was "world-changing," despite there barely being a product to look at.

“Yes, you should. You can go there for a bit and then come back, but you should at least go.” Graham's message landed at a moment when Stockholm's startup ecosystem is attracting increasing attention from investors and founders. According to global data intelligence platform Dealroom, the Swedish capital was home to more than 1,800 startups as of 2025, with a combined enterprise value of $236 billion.

Benchmark is famously selective in the companies it chooses, and backs hardware companies so rarely that Vishria was kicking himself for giving time to Cerebras. "Why did I take this meeting?" he kept muttering. At one point, he even messaged his assistant, who manages his calendar, and bugged her: "Why did you let me take this meeting?" Vishria recalls.

The school's endowment invested $20 million in OpenAI during a very early fundraising round, well before Microsoft's $1 billion investment in 2019 and before most people had heard of the AI lab. That stake is now expected to be worth roughly $2 billion, representing a staggering 9,900% return on a single investment.

Andreessen Horowitz, which over its 14-year history has never raised capital from the major California pension funds, is changing its tune this year. The firm, also known as a16z, has raised $400 million from CalPERS for a new fund called California Innovation Opportunities, Fortune found in public records. The firm is also currently pursuing investments from CalSTRS, according to lobbying records.

Lonsdale suggested starting small: He and some of his friends would pay for a one-mile, approximately $6 million to $7 million underground tunnel system, built by Elon Musk's the Boring Company, that would connect his friends' land around town. He said that the initial mile-long tunnel could spark interest from leadership for a citywide tunnel system that the Boring Company could ultimately build in partnership with the city, and a pitch deck he sent after the call refers to "a growing group of successful citizens" willing to donate or sell land at below-market prices for stations near the airport, Tesla's Austin gigafactory, the Q2 Stadium, Lonsdale's house, and his venture capital firm, 8VC.

"I've never seen a situation like this change so quickly," says Wettlaufer, partner at the short-selling shop Bleecker Street Research, which opened its short position into SVB in January. Wettlaufer wasn't talking about the events of the last two and a half days-when a bank run ushered the California financial regulator into its offices to close it down not long after SVB said it was raising more than $2 billion in capital through a share sale. No-Wettlaufer was referring to the last two years.

Kalshi announced on Thursday a $1 billion Series F round, valuing the company at $22 billion. That's double the $11 billion valuation Kalshi nabbed just five months ago after raising a $1 billion Series E. This latest round was led by Coatue, with participation from Sequoia, Andreessen Horowitz, and Paradigm.

Moonshot AI, the Beijing-based developer of the Kimi chatbot, is closing a $2bn funding round at a post-money valuation above $20bn, Bloomberg reported on Wednesday. Meituan's Dragon Ball investment arm is leading the round, with China Mobile, CITIC Private Equity Funds, and other institutions participating. Meituan Dragon Ball alone is contributing more than $200m.

Bristol's headcount at innovative companies surged by 65% between 2019 and 2024, while Edinburgh's workforce grew by 43%, outpacing Oxford and Cambridge significantly.