Slow Week Produces Small Venture Rounds

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This is a weekly feature that runs down the week’s top 10 announced funding rounds in the U.S. Check out last week’s biggest funding rounds here.

Regular readers know this is usually a top 10 list of the biggest rounds of the week. However, this week is a little different — mainly because of the election.

Very few companies announced funding rounds this week, and the ones that did were on the smaller side — obviously aside from Physical Intelligence’s massive one. Many startups clearly didn’t want their funding news overshadowed by a presidential election. So instead of running a list of 10, we’re going with a top five.

1. Physical Intelligence, $400M, robotics:  Physical Intelligence, a startup developing brains for a wide array of robots, raised a $400 million round at a $2 billion valuation led by Jeff Bezos, Lux Capital and Thrive Capital, per The New York Times. The San Francisco-based company had raised a $70 million seed round at a valuation of about $400 million back in March. Physical Intelligence is just the latest startup looking to use AI to improve how robots operate and create foundational software that could be used on a variety of robot models instead of having to create separate operating software for each individual model. Investors already have placed big bets in the intersection of robotics and its AI-enhanced foundational software — especially Bezos. In February, Sunnyvale, California-based Figure, which is developing AI-enhanced robots that it hopes will be able to perform dangerous jobs and alleviate labor shortages, raised a huge $675 million round at a pre-money valuation of roughly $2 billion. That round included investments from Nvidia, Bezos’ Explore Investments and others. In July, Pittsburgh-based Skild AI — also developing brain models that can be used in a variety of robots and for different tasks — raised a $300 million Series A led by Coatue, Lightspeed Venture Partners, SoftBank Group and Bezos, through his Bezos Expeditions. The funding valued the company at $1.5 billion. Overall, this has been a good year for robotics startups receiving funding.

2. Precision Neuroscience, $93M, neuroscience: New York-based Precision Neuroscience, a developer specializing in brain-computer interfaces, raised a $93 million Series C, per reports from medical news outlets citing financial filings. Investors were not named. Founded in 2021, the company has raised $146 million, per Crunchbase.

3. AmplifyBio, $50M, biotech: Ohio-based drug development company AmplifyBio received a $50 million investment — with ability to scale to $65 million — from Vitrian for its new manufacturing enablement center in New Albany, Ohio. Founded in 2021, the company has raised nearly $330 million, per Crunchbase.

4. Inquis Medical, $40M, medical: Menlo Park, California-based Inquis Medical, a medical technology company specializing in thrombectomy systems, locked up a $40 million Series B led by Marshall Wace. Founded in 2020, this is the first round with a disclosed amount, per Crunchbase.

5. PrognomiQ, $34M, healthcare: San Mateo, California-based PrognomiQ, a healthcare company developing detection tests for cancer and other complex diseases, announced a $34 million Series D led by Seer. Founded in 2020, PrognomiQ says it has raised more than $135 million.

Big global deals

There were two big $100 million rounds outside the U.S. this week.

• China-based Deeproute, which develops autonomous driving technology, raised a $100 million Series C.
• U.K.-based CrytocoinMiner, a cryptocurrency cloud-mining platform, raised a $100 million venture round.

Methodology

We tracked the largest announced rounds in the Crunchbase database that were raised by U.S.-based companies for the seven-day period of Nov. 2 to Nov. 8. Although most announced rounds are represented in the database, there could be a small time lag as some rounds are reported late in the week.

Illustration: Dom Guzman