October 2026 Startup Funding Report and the Companies Behind the Biggest Rounds

October 2026 brought a steady run of large startup funding rounds across AI infrastructure, cybersecurity, financial technology, robotics, defense manufacturing and materials. This guide collects the companies that announced rounds during the month, with the details that matter when you want to understand them: what the company builds, how much it raised, at what stage and valuation, who invested, and where it is based.

All figures come from company announcements and press reports published between October 1 and October 30, 2026. Where a company has not disclosed a number, this guide says so instead of estimating it. Where a figure is reported by the press but not confirmed by the company, that is stated too.

Funding at a Glance

AI and Infrastructure Startups

This group builds the chips, cloud platforms, models and testing tools that other AI products run on.

FuriosaAI

FuriosaAI, based in Seoul and founded in 2017, completed a $620 million Series D at a $2.9 billion post money valuation, announced on October 28. About $280 million came from South Korea's National Growth Fund and roughly $110 million from international investors, including Infinitum, Jericho Capital, QUDA Capital, Cisco Investments, NeoFort Holding and Worldline Capital. Returning investors include Naver, DSC Investment, Korea Development Bank, Nextrans and Kakao Investment.

The company designs processors built for AI inference, which is the stage where a trained model generates responses. Its second generation chip, RNGD, is sold as a 180 watt accelerator card and in servers holding several cards. FuriosaAI says RNGD entered mass production in January 2026, that it expects to produce about 20,000 cards during 2026, and that it has secured manufacturing and memory capacity to more than double that output in 2027. Named deployments involve Samsung SDS and LG Group, and a third generation accelerator is in development with partners that include Broadcom.

Modal Labs

Modal Labs raised a $750 million Series D at a $15.75 billion valuation, announced on October 14, with Accel among the investors. The company provides cloud infrastructure for running AI inference and other compute heavy applications.

Cohere

Cohere, based in Toronto, announced the first close of a Series E that targets up to C$7 billion, about US$4.49 billion. Germany's Schwarz Group is leading the round. Other participants include Bell Ventures, Bullhound Capital, Inovia Capital, Nvidia, Prosperity7 Ventures and the Government of Canada. Prime Minister Mark Carney said the government would invest up to C$1.6 billion. Press reports say the round is expected to value the company at about C$36 billion. Cohere has not disclosed how much money it closed in this first stage, so C$7 billion is the target and not the confirmed total.

Founded in 2019 by Aidan Gomez, Ivan Zhang and Nick Frosst, Cohere builds large language models and software for businesses and institutions that want to deploy AI under their own security and legal requirements. The company says its annual recurring revenue grew 165 percent year over year in the third quarter of 2026 and that it serves about 300 customers. It has also said it plans to invest at least C$1.7 billion in Canadian computing infrastructure by 2030 and is planning a combination with the German company Aleph Alpha.

Dulo

Dulo, based in San Francisco, raised a $130 million seed round. Investors include Eric Schmidt, John Doerr, DST Global, Construct Capital and Lowercarbon Capital. The company was founded in 2026 by Sebastian Thrun and Adrian Aoun and is building foundation models for engineering and hardware design. The round was first reported by the press, citing a person familiar with the deal. Dulo has not publicly released product specifications, customer names, revenue or independent performance results.

Wabi

Wabi, based in San Francisco, raised $55 million at a $1.25 billion valuation in a round led by IVP. Other investors include Andreessen Horowitz, Forerunner and the Amazon Alexa Fund, along with individuals such as Tobi Lütke, Marc Benioff, Marissa Mayer and Dick Costolo. The company did not name a funding stage for the round.

Eugenia Kuyda, who previously created the AI companion app Replika, founded Wabi. It began as a way to create applications through natural language instructions and now offers a personal AI assistant for individuals and groups, with shared apps for activities such as planning events and organizing schedules. The company has not disclosed verified revenue or user numbers.

Plato

Plato, based in San Francisco, raised a $16 million Series A led by Nava Ventures, with Gradient Ventures, Transpose Platform and Mustafa Suleyman, CEO of Microsoft AI, investing personally. Total funding is now $19 million. Robert Farlow and Pranav Putta founded the company in 2025.

Plato builds simulated workplaces where AI agents can be trained and evaluated before they work in real systems. The simulations recreate workflows in customer support, finance, accounting, human resources and healthcare administration. They can be reset and reused so developers can compare results, and the company scores whether an agent followed requirements, such as staying within an authorized budget, and not only whether it reached the goal.

Cybersecurity and Developer Tools

These startups sell security and software tooling to engineering and security teams.

Upwind

Upwind, based in San Francisco, closed a $400 million Series C at a $3.8 billion valuation, announced on October 28. Bessemer Venture Partners led the round, with Canapi Ventures and returning investors Cyberstarts, Greylock Partners, Craft Ventures, Salesforce Ventures and TCV. The valuation compares with $1.5 billion at its Series B earlier in 2026, and disclosed funding to date is more than $800 million.

Founded in 2022 by Amiram Shachar and fellow entrepreneurs, Upwind makes cloud security software that analyzes applications and infrastructure while they are running, which helps teams separate urgent threats from lower priority alerts. The company says its revenue quadrupled during 2026 but has not disclosed the actual revenue figure. It lists customers in financial services, technology and manufacturing.

Armadin

Armadin raised a $255.5 million Series B at a valuation above $2.5 billion, announced on October 1, with Andreessen Horowitz and Accel among the backers. The company builds AI driven offensive cybersecurity tools, which test systems by simulating attacks to find weaknesses.

Daytona

Daytona raised a $60 million Series B at a $1 billion valuation. FirstMark Capital, Samsung NEXT Ventures and Okta Ventures took part. The company provides a secure platform for managing development environments for engineering teams.

Supabase

Supabase raised a $150 million growth round, announced on October 2, with GIC as an investor. The company announced a deal to acquire Turso at the same time. Supabase offers a backend platform for developers building applications. The company has not disclosed a valuation for this round in the announcements reviewed for this guide.

Enterprise Software, Fintech and Connectivity

These companies sell software and services that handle finance, operations, training and communications for businesses.

Kalshi

Kalshi, based in New York, raised a $1 billion Series G at a $40 billion post money valuation, announced on October 29. Sequoia Capital and Wellington Management co led the round. Other investors include Baillie Gifford, Andreessen Horowitz, Coatue, CapitalG, Morgan Stanley Investment Management, Hudson River Trading, Balyasny Asset Management, Stripes, Layer Global and Sequoia Global Equities. The previous $1 billion round, about five months earlier, was at a $22 billion valuation.

Tarek Mansour and Luana Lopes Lara founded Kalshi, which operates a federally regulated exchange for event contracts, where traders take positions on outcomes in areas such as economics, politics, sports and weather. It is expanding into perpetual futures tied to cryptocurrency and other financial markets. The company says annualized trading volume has passed $1 trillion, which measures transaction activity and not revenue. State authorities have challenged its sports contracts, alleging they amount to unauthorized gambling. Kalshi disputes that and operates under federal derivatives regulation.

Serval

Serval, based in San Francisco, raised a $150 million Series C at a $3 billion valuation, announced on October 29. Sequoia Capital led, with Elad Gil, Evantic, First Round Capital, General Catalyst, Redpoint, Conviction and Headline participating. Total funding is $277 million, and this was the company's third round in about twelve months.

Serval makes AI software for enterprise service management. It started with IT work such as access requests, support, software provisioning and device management, and is expanding into HR, finance and legal processes. Its Catalyst platform lets employees describe a process in plain language and generates the automation. The company says Lucid Motors moved from ServiceNow to Serval in about 45 days. It has not disclosed absolute revenue.

Casap

Casap, based in New York, raised a $56 million Series B led by Base10 Partners, announced on October 28. Experian and Synchrony took part as strategic investors, alongside existing investors Emergence Capital and Lightspeed Venture Partners. Cumulative funding is $90 million, following a $25 million Series A about a year earlier.

The company builds AI agents for banks that handle fraud investigations and payment disputes, and it is expanding into customer complaints and collections. It says its software keeps a record of every action taken and lets human employees step in when judgment is needed. Casap reports that revenue grew tenfold after its previous financing but has not disclosed the absolute figure.

Collective

Collective, based in San Francisco, announced a $100 million financing package on October 29. It combines a $40 million Series B equity round, led by General Catalyst, QED Investors and Gradient Ventures with Intuit Ventures, FT Partners and SemperVirens participating, and a separate $60 million growth facility from General Catalyst's Customer Value Fund. The facility is meant to fund customer acquisition and is not equity.

Hooman Radfar, Bugra Akcay and Uğur Kaner founded Collective, which provides business formation, bookkeeping, payroll, taxes, invoicing and financial services to people who run businesses on their own. The company reports annual recurring revenue growth of about 120 percent and says its customers have saved an estimated $350 million in cumulative taxes.

Sava

Sava, based in New York, came out of stealth with a $10 million seed round led by Gradient Ventures. Y Combinator, SV Angel, Instacart co founder Max Mullen, Orange Collective and SurgePoint Capital also invested. Nimit Maru and Rush Sadiwala founded the company, which builds software to simplify creating, funding and administering trusts. Alongside the funding it launched Sava Trust Company, a Nevada chartered corporate fiduciary.

Bites

Bites, based in Tel Aviv and New York, raised a $40 million Series A led by PeakSpan Capital, with existing investors Vertex Ventures, Horizon Capital, Rittenhouse Ventures and Lyra Ventures. Total funding is $55 million, and the company plans to use the money for U.S. expansion and product development.

Eran Heffetz, Tal Nagler Almog and Hagai Horovitz founded Bites in 2020. It delivers short videos and interactive lessons to frontline workers through WhatsApp, SMS, Microsoft Teams, Slack or web links, and uses AI to turn company documents into training content. The company reports engagement above 90 percent within three weeks and net revenue retention of about 161 percent. Customers include Unilever, Shake Shack, Wynn Resorts, The Venetian and Compass Group.

Broccoli AI

Broccoli AI, based in San Francisco, raised a $30 million Series B led by Khosla Ventures, with Y Combinator and Operator Partners. The announcement also disclosed an earlier $22 million Series A completed about nine months before. Press reports put the valuation at about $300 million, which the company has not confirmed.

AJ Jain and Aditya Ketkar founded the company, which builds AI agents for plumbing, electrical, HVAC, roofing and other home service businesses. The agents answer calls, schedule appointments and follow up on estimates, and connect to existing contractor management systems. Broccoli says more than 1,500 businesses use it, including Ace Hardware Home Services, Mr. Electric and Any Hour Group, and that revenue has tripled since its Series A.

Braid

Braid, based in The Hague in the Netherlands and formerly known as Next Communications, raised a $38 million Series A led by Octopus Ventures with KPN Ventures. It is the company's first external funding since it was founded in 2023.

Braid provides software that lets businesses offer branded mobile connectivity, including eSIM service, inside their own products through a single API, without building telecom infrastructure. The company says it connects to more than 600 carriers in more than 200 countries, serves about 90 enterprise customers, and is profitable and generating positive cash flow.

Hardware, Defense, Science and Materials

These startups make physical products or run physical operations, so their funding goes into factories, equipment and production capacity.

Foundry Robotics

Foundry Robotics, based in Emeryville, California, raised a $100 million Series A led by Marlinspike Partners, announced on October 28. Khosla Ventures, Red Glass Ventures, SE Ventures, Wing VC, Axiom Ventures, Hanabi and Zero Shot Fund also took part. The company announced the round together with a move into a 130,000 square foot facility in Emeryville.

Adarsh Kulkarni and Emmanuel Lamacchia founded Foundry, which operates its own factories designed around AI powered robotic assembly. Customers buy manufacturing capacity from Foundry instead of buying robots. Target products include drones, underwater vehicles, satellite components, industrial equipment and computing infrastructure.

Eka Robotics

Eka Robotics raised a $150 million Series A led by Andreessen Horowitz and F Prime, which set its valuation at $1.45 billion. The company builds force sensing robot hands for tasks that require careful manipulation of objects.

Firehawk Defense

Firehawk Defense, based in Dallas, raised more than $150 million in a Series D at a valuation above $1.4 billion, announced on October 29. Advent International and Rochefort Asset Management co led the round.

The company makes propulsion systems and materials for rockets and artillery, including solid rocket motor propellant and components for Hydra 70 rockets, and it is developing propulsion components for 155mm artillery. It uses thermoplastic materials and says it can produce usable energetic material in hours instead of weeks. Firehawk is expanding in Oklahoma and Mississippi. Its Crawford, Mississippi facility is already integrating Hydra 70 rockets, and its Great Plains Arsenal in Lawton, Oklahoma is expected to begin commissioning in early 2027, with planned initial capacity of about 740,000 pounds of thermoplastic propellant per year and room to grow beyond three million pounds. Those are planned figures, not current output. The company also reports a six for six Hydra 70 live fire test following a U.S. Army award.

Group14 Technologies

Group14 Technologies, based in Woodinville, Washington, raised €150 million, about $169 million, in an extension of its Series D, announced on October 29. The investor is new and was not named. The extension brings the Series D to more than $665 million.

The company makes silicon carbon materials for lithium ion batteries. Its flagship product, SCC55, is designed to replace or supplement graphite in battery anodes, and it serves uses such as consumer electronics, electric vehicles and drones. The new funding will help build a facility called BAM 4 in Sagunto, Spain, with initial capacity of 10 gigawatt hours per year. Group14 already operates a plant in South Korea, is building capacity in Washington state, and expects its near term footprint to reach 40 gigawatt hours once all planned facilities are running. Its Woodinville facility has supplied more than 150 customers.

Opentrons

Opentrons, based in Long Island City, New York, raised a $40 million Series E led by Avego, with BroadOak Capital Partners. Existing investors include SoftBank Vision Fund and Khosla Ventures. Founded in 2014, the company makes programmable laboratory robots that automate tasks such as liquid transfers and sample preparation for biotechnology, pharmaceutical and academic labs. It says it has deployed more than 11,000 robots in more than 80 countries.

Rendezvous Robotics

Rendezvous Robotics, based in Golden, Colorado, raised a $20 million seed round co led by MaC Venture Capital and Toyota Ventures, announced on October 28. Other investors include the University of Michigan Endowment, Astera, Industrious Ventures, Aurelia Foundry, ATX Venture Partners and Mana Ventures. The company is developing modular spacecraft that join together autonomously after launch. It has planned a 2028 demonstration mission in which seven modules assemble, separate and reconnect in a new configuration. That mission has not yet happened.

American Advanced Materials

American Advanced Materials, based in Mountain View, California, raised a $12.5 million seed round led by Amity Ventures, with Human Capital, Anti Fund and Powerset. Alex Liegl and Diego Represas founded it in 2025. The company plans to make titanium sponge, a material used in aerospace and defense, at a first U.S. facility using the established Kroll process, and it is also developing production of zirconium oxychloride, used in nuclear energy and advanced manufacturing.

The company reports signed letters of intent from industry buyers worth more than $1 billion in potential purchases. Letters of intent are not binding purchase orders. The seed money will fund engineering, design and hiring, and the company expects to raise additional project financing to build the facility.

Key Numbers From October 2026

Different funding trackers count different things, so monthly totals vary by source. Three counts from published trackers show the range:

• One tracker recorded 326 startup rounds worth $37.4 billion for the month, and its ten largest rounds added up to $25 billion, which is 67 percent of the total. In its count, 67 rounds were Series A with a median size of $16.8 million, and 30 were Series B with a median of $50 million.

• One AI focused tracker listed 105 AI rounds worth $43.6 billion as of October 26, led by a $20 billion OpenAI round and a $15 billion DeepSeek round.

• Another AI tracker counted $25.7 billion across 59 AI rounds from October 1 to 21, but excluded OpenAI's $20 billion because it completed a round first recorded in March. That leaves about $5.68 billion of new money across 58 rounds, with a median round of $15.5 million.

The gap between a few very large rounds and a small typical round is visible in every count above.

How to Read a Funding Announcement

Funding headlines combine several different things. These distinctions help when comparing companies in this guide.

• Target versus closed. A company can announce a round it is raising before it has collected all the money. Cohere's C$7 billion is a target, and the amount from its first close has not been disclosed.

• Equity versus other financing. Collective's $100 million package is $40 million of equity plus a $60 million facility for customer acquisition. The two are not the same kind of money.

• Round stage. Seed, Series A, B, C and so on describe how far along a company is and what investors expect, but there is no fixed size for any stage. Compare the Series A rounds here, from $16 million to $150 million.

• Post money valuation. This is the company's value including the new money. Some announcements state it, and some press reports give a valuation the company has not confirmed.

• Company reported metrics. Growth rates such as Upwind's quadrupled revenue or Casap's tenfold growth come from the companies and are not tied to disclosed revenue figures.

• Volume versus revenue. Kalshi's $1 trillion in annualized trading volume counts the value of contracts traded, not the money the company earns.

• Letters of intent versus contracts. American Advanced Materials reports letters of intent worth more than $1 billion, which are not binding purchase orders.

• Planned versus operating capacity. Firehawk's Oklahoma facility and Group14's Spanish plant are planned or under construction, so their stated capacities describe future output.

• Announcement date versus close date. FuriosaAI's round was announced as completed on October 28, but part of the commitments had been reported earlier in the fundraising process.