OpenAI secured more billions, but there’s still capital left for other startups

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This week once again brought us AI funding news, as well as some warnings: Some categories and stages are showing signs of overheating. Luckily, we also spotted some cool startups — literally.

Most interesting startup stories from the week

It may seem hard to believe, but OpenAI is still a startup, hence its recurring top spot here. There were other interesting stories this week, though.

BillionAI: OpenAI raised $6.6 billion at a $157 billion post-money valuation, in addition to securing a $4 billion revolving line of credit and launching a new interface. The company reportedly asked investors not to back rivals such as Anthropic and xAI, but OpenAI didn’t confirm. Meanwhile, Anthropic hired OpenAI co-founder Durk Kingma in a remote role.

Attack of the clones: Y Combinator faced criticism for backing AI code editor PearAI, whose CEO apologized for cloning another YC-backed, open source project without proper attribution and with a “flubbed” license.

Livestreamed shopping: Livestream shopping app Whatnot said its annual gross merchandise volume (GMV) surpassed $2 billion this year, a sign that there’s still hope for the live commerce business in the U.S.

Most interesting fundraises this week

Some companies prefer to raise funding under the radar; others even operate underwater.

Deep end: AI coding startup Poolside raised a $500 million Series B round of funding led by Bain Capital Ventures, with participation from eBay and Nvidia. This allowed Poolside to bring 10,000 Nvidia GPUs online to train future models, CEO Jason Warner said.

Cool water: Barcelona-based immersion cooling startup Submer raised $55.5 million to get more customers for its solution, which is already used by hyperscalers, telecom companies, and other large corporations.

11x meets a16z: 11x.ai, a startup that develops AI sales bots, secured a Series B round of funding of approximately $50 million led by Andreessen Horowitz, TechCrunch learned.

Stealthy funding: Cloud backup startup Eon came out of stealth and revealed it already reached a $750 million post-money valuation after raising three rounds of funding, including a $77 million Series B.

More stealthy funding: Series, a generative AI game-development platform, quietly raised a $28 million Series A round of funding from Netflix, Dell, a16z, and others.

Most interesting VC and fund news this week

Trim season: Veteran venture firm CRV returned $275 million from its $500 million late-stage Select fund to investors, citing overvaluation of mature startups. This follows a similar move by India’s Peak XV, which reduced its fund size and fees amid signs of overheating.

Launching: Former Y Combinator managing director and Twitter executive Ali Rowghani is launching Maxq, a new venture firm targeting $250 million for its debut fund.

NY bullish: Index Ventures is looking to hire another New York-based investor with plans to add three or four new people to its local team within the next year, partner Shardul Shah told TechCrunch.

Last but not least

Talking to TechCrunch global managing editor Matt Rosoff ahead of this year’s Startup Battlefield 200 at TechCrunch Disrupt, New York tech investor and serial entrepreneur Kevin Ryan shared some thoughts on when and whether founders should sell their company. His conviction: More of them should.