AI startups announced about $2.42 billion in primary funding across 19 rounds of $20 million or more between October 12 and October 18, 2026. Modal Labs’ $750 million Series D was the largest round, at about 31% of the total.
The largest AI acquisition was much smaller. Rocket Software bought Israeli startup Geniez AI in a deal Calcalist estimated at up to $100 million. Neither company disclosed the price.
North American companies raised $1.28 billion, or 53% of the total. Four Chinese startups raised about $943 million (39%), two European startups raised $157 million, and Israel’s Pluto Security raised $42 million.
One deal needs a plain explanation. Indian firm F2A closed the first part of a ₹3,000 crore AI and deeptech fund. A fund close is money a venture firm collects from its own backers to invest later, so it is not counted in the startup total. No employee share sale or other secondary deal qualified this week.
AI funding this week: growth and early-stage rounds
The table lists every confirmed AI round of $20 million or more announced in the window, largest first. Yuan amounts are converted at about 6.69 per dollar, the rate implied by Infinigence AI’s widely reported $344 million figure.
| Company | What it does | Round | Amount | Valuation | Lead and notable investors | HQ | Region |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Modal Labs | Serverless cloud for AI inference, training and agent sandboxes | Series D | US$750M | US$15.75B | Accel (lead); Kleiner Perkins | New York, US | North America |
| Infinigence AI | Software that runs AI models across mixed Chinese and foreign chips | Series C | RMB 2.3B (about US$344M) | Not disclosed | Lead not disclosed; backers include Tencent, Baidu, Lenovo, Qiming, Shunwei | Shanghai, China | Asia-Pacific |
| BlueCore Compute | RISC-V server chips with built-in AI compute | Series B (several tranches combined) | Nearly RMB 2B (about US$299M) | Not disclosed | Cowin Venture among investors; local state funds and industry investors | Shenzhen, China | Asia-Pacific |
| Astribot | Cable-driven, two-arm AI robots | Not disclosed | RMB 1B (about US$150M) | RMB 15B (about US$2.24B) | Toposcend Capital (lead); Hongtai Fund, Shanheng Capital, Xianmu | Shenzhen, China | Asia-Pacific |
| Mosi Intelligence | Real-time multimodal AI models, spun out of Fudan University | Pre-A | More than RMB 1B (about US$150M) | Not disclosed | Huakong Fund (lead); Guokai Kechuang, Shanghai Science and Technology Innovation Fund | Shanghai, China | Asia-Pacific |
| Salience Labs | Photonic switching chips that connect GPUs in AI data centers | Series B | US$125M | Not disclosed | Bullhound Capital (lead); AMD Ventures, Intel Capital, SBI Group, Hudson River Trading, British Business Bank | Oxford, UK | Europe/UK |
| Labelbox | Reinforcement learning environments for AI labs and managed agents for enterprises | Series E (equity plus credit facility) | More than US$100M (split not disclosed) | Not disclosed | Infinitum Partners (lead); Wipro Ventures, Andreessen Horowitz, B Capital | San Francisco, US | North America |
| Suki | AI clinical documentation and agents for health systems | Series E | US$90M (equity and debt mix not disclosed) | Not disclosed | Healthier Capital (lead); Crosslink Capital, Hercules Capital | Redwood City, US | North America |
| Mueon | Semiconductor-based 3D computing modules for AI workloads | Series A | US$65M | Not disclosed | Maverick Silicon (lead); backers include Intel Capital, IQT | Hillsboro, US | North America |
| Albert Invent | AI platform for chemistry research and development | Series B | US$55M | Not disclosed | TCV (lead) | Oakland, US | North America |
| Reach Security | AI that checks and fixes the settings of security tools a company already owns | Series B | More than US$50M | Not disclosed | Top Tier Capital Partners (lead); Ballistic Ventures, In-Q-Tel, M12 | San Francisco, US | North America |
| Harmonic Security | Monitors and controls how employees use AI tools | Series B | US$50M | Not disclosed | Crosspoint Capital Partners (lead) | San Francisco, US and London, UK | North America |
| Pluto Security | Security for AI agents and apps that employees build with AI | Seed and Series A | US$42M (US$8.5M seed plus about US$34M Series A) | Not disclosed | Jump Capital (Series A lead); TLV Partners (seed lead); Skinos, Ansa Capital | Israel | Middle East/Israel |
| Duvo | AI agents that automate work across existing enterprise systems | Series A | US$32M | Not disclosed | Balderton Capital (lead); Index Ventures, Northzone, Credo Ventures | Czech Republic | Europe/UK |
| RapidCanvas | Custom enterprise AI agent apps, built and run with field engineers | Series B | US$29M | Not disclosed | Vertex Ventures Southeast Asia and India (lead); Hitachi Ventures | Austin, US | North America |
| Sunbound | AI revenue operations for senior living and skilled nursing operators | Series A | US$24M | Not disclosed | TTV Capital (lead); Bling Capital, Fika Ventures, Live Oak Bank, Ziegler Link-Age | Washington, DC and Cleveland, US | North America |
| Brellium | AI audits of clinical notes and billing codes | Not labeled | US$23M | Not disclosed | Left Lane Capital, First Round Capital (leads); Digital Health Venture Partners | New York, US | North America |
| Opsin | Governance and security for enterprise AI agents | Not labeled | US$21M | Not disclosed | SYN Ventures, Race Capital (co-leads) | San Jose, US | North America |
| Causa Prima | AI agents for invoice approvals, disputes and payments between businesses | Seed | US$20M | Not disclosed | Base10 Partners (lead); QED Investors, FJ Labs, Creandum, Kfund | San Francisco, US | North America |
AI infrastructure and chips took most of the money
Five infrastructure companies raised about $1.58 billion, or 65% of the week’s total. Modal says its annualized revenue has more than tripled since its May round to over $1 billion. Its valuation also more than tripled over the same period.
Infinigence AI has now raised RMB 4.3 billion in total. Its software spreads AI training and inference across 16 chip types. BlueCore Compute’s figure combines several B-series tranches, so not all of it is new money from this week.
Salience Labs demonstrated a 64-port all-optical switch at ECOC 2026 and is building 128-port and 256-port versions. AMD Ventures and Intel Capital, whose parent companies compete in AI chips, both joined the round. Mueon has raised $80.5 million in total.
AI models, robotics and research tools
Astribot closed its fourth round since March. In June, its valuation was reported above RMB 10 billion, and this round set it at RMB 15 billion. Shenzhen Investment Holdings’ Toposcend Capital led.
Mosi Intelligence came out of Fudan University’s OpenMOSS team in late 2024. It will spend the money on real-time models that listen and watch continuously.
Labelbox says it became profitable in 2026 and grew more than fivefold year over year. It works with more than 400 customers. Albert Invent’s round brings its total funding to $105 million.
AI security startups closed four rounds
Reach Security, Harmonic Security, Pluto Security and Opsin raised $163 million combined. Harmonic and Pluto watch how employees use AI tools, while Opsin focuses on autonomous agents.
Harmonic’s total funding reached $76 million, two years after its $17.5 million Series A. Pluto says it passed $2 million in annual recurring revenue since it began selling in April. Reach says its customer base doubled over the past 12 months.
Healthcare and enterprise AI applications
Suki has raised more than $250 million across its rounds. The company plans to build agents that handle referrals, orders and follow-ups after a patient visit. Brellium has now raised $39.7 million in total.
Duvo’s total funding reached $48 million. Its founder, Tomáš Čupr, also runs online grocer Rohlik. RapidCanvas has raised $52.5 million in total and runs most of its engineering in India.
Sunbound announced its Series A alongside its purchase of Richter Healthcare Consultants, a billing firm. Causa Prima raised its seed round three months after a $10 million pre-seed.
AI funds and acquisitions this week
One AI-focused fund closed above $20 million. Two AI acquisitions carried price estimates above that level, and both estimates came from Calcalist.
| Company | What it does | Round | Amount | Valuation | Lead and notable investors | HQ | Region |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| F2A (Fundamentum Frontier Advisors) | Growth-stage AI and deeptech fund planning 12 to 15 investments | Fund first close | ₹3,000 crore (about US$340M) | Not applicable | Nandan Nilekani (anchor investor) | India | India |
| Geniez AI | AI agents that monitor and run mainframe systems | Acquisition | Up to US$100M (estimate) | Not disclosed | Acquirer: Rocket Software | Israel | Middle East/Israel |
| Loops | AI analytics that explains why business metrics change | Acquisition (pending close) | About US$30M (estimate) | Not disclosed | Acquirer: Salesforce | Israel | Middle East/Israel |
Geniez AI had six employees and raised a $6 million seed round in September 2025. Salesforce plans to fold Loops into Tableau, with the deal expected to close in early November.
Several AI deals had no price attached. Cohere, which appears in our ranking of the most-funded AI startups, signed a letter of intent to buy AISLE. Anthropic bought Opaque Systems, and Mistral bought UK company New Material.
AI funding outside the US: regional activity
Europe had two qualifying AI rounds worth $157 million: Salience Labs and Duvo. Tech.eu tracked more than 65 European tech deals worth over €1.8 billion, led by fintech and healthtech.
China had the second-largest share of the week. Infinigence AI, BlueCore Compute, Astribot and Mosi Intelligence raised about $943 million combined, and all four announced on October 12 or 13.
India had no qualifying AI round. Entrackr counted $302.85 million across 28 Indian startups from October 12 to 17. RapidCanvas raised $29 million, but it is headquartered in Austin.
Pluto Security was the only qualifying deal across Africa, the Middle East and Israel. Techloy counted $101.9 million in the region, and the second-largest deal was MAX’s $29 million for electric two-wheelers in Nigeria. No Gulf or African AI startup reached $20 million.
Latin America had no qualifying AI deal. Techloy counted $12.45 million across the region for the week, and the largest AI round was Dapta’s $6 million seed. No Japanese, South Korean, Southeast Asian or Australian AI round of $20 million or more surfaced in Techloy’s Asia roundup.
For the prior seven days, see last week’s digest led by TypeSafe AI and Manus, which tracked $2.39 billion across 14 rounds.
FAQ
How much did AI startups raise from October 12 to 18, 2026?
AI startups announced about $2.42 billion across 19 primary rounds of $20 million or more. North American companies took $1.28 billion, or 53%, and four Chinese startups raised about $943 million.
What was the largest AI funding round this week?
Modal Labs raised a $750 million Series D led by Accel, valuing the New York AI cloud company at $15.75 billion. That is more than triple its valuation from May.
What was the biggest AI acquisition this week?
Rocket Software bought Israeli startup Geniez AI, which builds AI agents for mainframe systems. Calcalist estimated the deal at up to $100 million. Neither company disclosed the price.
Did any Indian AI startup raise more than $20 million this week?
No India-based AI startup crossed $20 million. Entrackr counted $302.85 million across 28 Indian startups from October 12 to 17. RapidCanvas raised $29 million, but it is headquartered in Austin.
Which AI sector raised the most money this week?
AI infrastructure and chips raised about $1.58 billion across five rounds, or 65% of the total. Modal, Infinigence AI, BlueCore Compute, Salience Labs and Mueon made up the group.
Trends in this week’s AI funding
- Infrastructure took about 65% of the money, while security had the most deals of any application area. The four security rounds all sell tools that watch or limit how AI is used inside companies.
- A few investors showed up more than once. Intel Capital joined Salience’s round and is among Mueon’s backers, and In-Q-Tel backed Reach and is also on Mueon’s investor list.
- Valuations kept climbing at the top. Modal more than tripled its valuation in about five months, and Astribot went from above RMB 10 billion in June to RMB 15 billion.
