Weekly Tech Pulse
AI Security Deals Heat Up as F5 Drops $180M While Seattle Startup Raises $10M for Emotional AI & Basketball League Hits $340M Valuation While Investors Lose $89M on Missing Ships
US & International Startup & Tech News
F5 Paying $180M to Acquire CalypsoAI to Boost AI Enterprise Security Offerings
Seattle-based security giant F5 will acquire CalypsoAI for $180 million in cash to strengthen its AI enterprise security offerings. CalypsoAI, founded in 2018 with offices in Ireland and New York, provides real-time threat defense and data security products for companies deploying AI workloads. The acquisition follows F5's recent purchases of cybersecurity startup Fletch and observability company MantisNet, as the company continues expanding its security portfolio amid growing AI adoption.
Source: Geekwire
Ex-Apple PhDs Raise $10M, Choose Seattle to Build an AI Foundation Model That Understands Emotion
Former Apple engineers Edward Zhang and Fangchang Ma raised $10 million led by Accel for their startup Nuance Labs, which is developing an AI system capable of understanding and expressing emotion in real-time. The founders chose to build in Seattle rather than San Francisco, citing the city's untapped talent pool and less hype-driven culture. Nuance aims to create emotionally intelligent conversational AI using specialized auto-regressive transformers to model human behavior frame by frame, targeting applications like AI avatars and emotion analysis during video calls.
Source: Geekwire
Yieldstreet Tells Investors in $89 Million Worth of Marine Loans to Expect Losses
Private market platform Yieldstreet reached a $5 million settlement with borrowers who defaulted on $89 million in marine loans backed by 13 ships. However, since recovery costs exceeded the settlement amount, investors are unlikely to see any repayment and the deals are being closed with losses. The marine loan saga, which involved fraud allegations and missing ships, contributed to Yieldstreet's partnership collapse with BlackRock in 2020.
Source: CNBC
Unrivaled Hits $340M Valuation, Adds Two Clubs After Series B Round
The women's 3-on-3 basketball league Unrivaled closed an oversubscribed Series B round at a $340 million valuation, led by Bessemer Venture Partners. Co-founded by WNBA stars Breanna Stewart and Napheesa Collier, the league is expanding from four to six teams by adding Breeze Basketball Club and Hive Basketball Club. The inaugural season delivered record-breaking viewership with 221,000 average viewers and produced the 10 most-watched women's basketball games in TNT Sports history.
Source: Forbes
Cognition Valued at $10.2 Billion Two Months After Windsurf Purchase
AI startup Cognition closed a $400 million funding round at a $10.2 billion valuation, led by Peter Thiel's Founders Fund. The company, which develops the AI software engineer Devin, acquired Windsurf in July after Google poached Windsurf's founders with a $2.4 billion deal. Since the acquisition, Cognition's annual recurring revenue has more than doubled, and the combined enterprise ARR has grown over 30%.
Source: CNBC
LATAM Startup & Tech News
Healthtech Osigu Receives US$10M to Accelerate Healthcare Payment Transformation in Latin America
Miami-based Osigu secured a $10 million strategic investment from Eos Ventures to transform healthcare payments across Latin America. Founded by Guatemalan entrepreneur Fernando Botrán, Osigu operates as a cloud-based platform that manages transactions between insurers, healthcare providers, and patients. The company uses AI and automation to reduce administrative costs, speed up reimbursements, and bring transparency to a system that has long been plagued by inefficiencies and weeks-long waiting periods for patients.
Source: Latim Fintech
UME Raises USD $21.8M in Series B Funding
São Paulo-based fintech UME raised $21.8 million in Series B funding led by Valor Capital Group and Bewater, with participation from PayPal Ventures and other investors. Led by CEO Berthier Ribeiro, UME helps businesses build and scale their own credit operations through AI-native credit decisioning and PIX integration. The company plans to use the funds to expand its payment network and strengthen its technology infrastructure, having previously raised $15 million in Series A and secured a $20 million debt facility.
Source: FinsMes
Opportunities with Us
Browse all available opportunities here!
Special thanks to our sponsor:
Axented helps businesses design, build, and scale their products and teams worldwide.
With over 10 years of experience and a diverse portfolio of more than 300 projects delivered in over 15 countries, Axented has established itself as a trusted partner in the tech industry.
Renowned for its expertise and commitment to excellence, Axented provides innovative solutions to help businesses thrive in a digital world.
