🚀 Inversion Secures $44 Million to Pioneer On-Demand Delivery from Space

🚀 Inversion Secures $44 Million to Pioneer On-Demand Delivery from Space

🔦 Spotlight

Happy Friday, LA!

This week, Southern California's thriving space tech scene celebrated another milestone as Inversion, an El Segundo-based startup, announced a $44 million Series A funding round. The investment, co-led by Spark Capital and Adjacent, with participation from Kindred Ventures, Lockheed Martin Ventures and Y Combinator, underscores the growing appetite for innovative solutions in aerospace, logistics, and beyond. To date, they’ve raised $54 million, including a $10 million seed round in 2021. In September, they also secured a $71 million STRATFI agreement with the Space Force’s SpaceWERX to develop reentry vehicles for military applications, funded through a mix of government and private investment.

Image Source: Inversion

Inversion is pioneering a new frontier: reusable vehicles capable of rapidly returning payloads from orbit to Earth. Their "Earth Return Capsules" are designed to deliver within as little as an hour, enabling everything from rapid-turnaround experiments in microgravity to the delivery of critical medical supplies across the globe.

Building on this vision, a key focus for Inversion, as noted by SpaceNews, is the development of Arc, a reentry vehicle designed to provide "precision delivery on-demand" from space to Earth. With its first flight planned for 2026, the company is using the Series A funding to move Arc through its full product cycle, including design and development. This funding will also support Inversion's growth from its current 25 employees to a team of around 70, as well as their move into a new facility. Co-founder and CEO Justin Fiaschetti emphasized that the funding is sufficient to bring Arc through its inaugural flight.

Adding to the excitement, Inversion recently achieved a critical regulatory milestone in October by receiving a re-entry license from the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). This license is a pivotal step in their journey, allowing the company to safely and legally return payloads from orbit to Earth. It positions Inversion among a select group of companies capable of operating in this emerging sector and demonstrates their readiness to bring the concept of space-based logistics into reality.

This isn’t just a win for Inversion—it’s a win for the Los Angeles aerospace ecosystem, which continues to attract top-tier talent and funding. With giants like SpaceX and Relativity Space already calling the region home, Inversion is further cementing LA’s status as the nation’s space tech hub.

As Southern California continues to lead the way in space innovation, Inversion is one to watch. Their vision for merging cutting-edge aerospace technology with real-world logistics solutions may not just change how we view space—it might transform how we interact with it.

Stay tuned for more updates from LA’s tech and startup scene. For now, keep your eyes on the skies—Inversion is bringing them closer to Earth.


🤝 Venture Deals

LA Companies

  • Seen Health, a company enhancing healthcare for seniors, has raised a $22M Series A funding round led by 8VC to support the opening of its first center in California and drive the development of the company’s technology. - learn more
LA Venture Funds
  • Theory Forge Ventures participated in a $30M Seed funding round for San Francisco-based Wordware, a startup developing a full-stack operating system for AI development that enables users to create sophisticated AI agents using natural language; the funds will be used to expand their platform and accelerate growth. - learn more
  • Clocktower Ventures participated in the most recent funding round for OpenYield, a New York-based company revolutionizing bond trading with its automated, equity-like marketplace, bringing the company's total funding to $7M to date. - learn more
  • Bonfire Ventures led a $4.25M Seed funding round for KeySavvy, a Seattle-based platform that simplifies and secures private-party car transactions; the funds will be used to expand their operations and engineering team, support new partnerships, enhance platform automation, and launch a fast-financing product for buyers. - learn more
  • Aliment Capital led a $42M Series C funding round for OneRail, an Orlando-based company specializing in last-mile delivery logistics software; the funds will be used to enhance their platform's capabilities and expand market reach. - learn more
  • UP.Partners led a $7M second-extension Series A funding round for Teleo, a Palo Alto-based company specializing in autonomous construction equipment; the funds will be used to expand their product offerings and accelerate market adoption. - learn more
  • Alexandria Venture Investments participated in a $30M Seed funding round for Valora Therapeutics, a San Diego-based biotechnology company developing novel immunotherapies using their proprietary AbLec platform; the funds will be used to advance their research and development efforts, optimize the platform, and progress AbLec therapeutics toward clinical trials. - learn more
  • Progression Fund participated in a $1.5M Pre-Seed funding round for GetMyHome, a Redondo Beach-based real estate service provider that offers a full rebate of seller-paid agent commission fees, charging clients a flat fee for the services they need, and employs agents who receive flat-fee compensation to help clients secure their dream homes without the incentive to push for overbidding. - learn more
  • Hyperlink Ventures participated in a $33M Series B funding round for Selector, a Santa Clara-based company specializing in AI-driven solutions that provide comprehensive visibility and intelligence for complex networks, infrastructure, and applications; the funds will be used to accelerate the development of their AIOps, Large Language Model (LLM), and Digital Twin technologies, as well as to expand their global presence. - learn more
  • Bonfire Ventures and Impulsum Venture Colab participated in a $5.25M Seed funding round for CalmWave, a Seattle-based health-tech startup specializing in reducing non-actionable ICU alarms to alleviate clinician fatigue; the funds will be used to boost market growth and expand partnerships with GPO channels like Premier, Inc. and Partners Coop. - learn more
  • Wavemaker 360 participated in a $14.5M Seed funding round for Citizen Health, a San Mateo, CA-based company with an AI-powered consumer health platform designed to support individuals managing rare and complex conditions; the funds will be used to enhance their platform and advance research in rare disease drug development. - learn more
  • B Capital led a $25M Series A funding round for Synapticure, a Chicago-based virtual care company specializing in neurodegenerative diseases; the funds will be used to expand partnerships, invest in technology, accelerate clinical research, and scale their medical group to enhance care for patients and caregivers nationwide. - learn more
  • Amboy Street Ventures and Emmeline Ventures participated in a $16M Series A funding round for Alloy, a New York-based menopause care startup that offers personalized treatments, including hormone therapy and symptom management, through telemedicine consultations and home delivery of medications. - learn more
  • Morpheus Ventures participated in a $28M Series A funding round for Goodstack, a SaaS and fintech platform that helps businesses integrate charitable giving, and the funds will be used to expand services for corporates, build technology for nonprofits, and hire across the team in 2025. - learn more
  • Trousdale Ventures participated in a Series B funding round for Anello Photonics, a Santa Clara, CA-based company specializing in silicon photonic optical gyroscopes (SiPhOG™); the funds will be used to improve navigation and positioning in GPS-denied environments for industrial and defense uses. - learn more
  • Cultivate Next participated in a $30M Series B funding round for Plantible Foods, a San Diego-based biotechnology company that creates sustainable, plant-based protein ingredients, starting with Rubi Protein™ from the aquatic plant Lemna, will use its investment to expand manufacturing at its first commercial plant, "The Ranchito," a 100-acre facility in West Texas. - learn more
  • Bonfire Ventures led a $4M Seed funding round for Mithrl, a San Francisco-based company providing an AI-powered platform to accelerate scientific research; the funds will be used to expand their go-to-market team and further develop the platform. - learn more
  • Upfront Ventures led a $15M Seed funding round for BrightAI, a San Francisco-based company specializing in AI-powered sensor technology for real-time monitoring across various industries; the funds will be used to enhance their technology and meet growing customer demand. - learn more

      LA Exits

      • Brainjolt, a Pasadena-based digital media company that creates and curates engaging content across various platforms and reaches millions of users monthly, has been acquired by Centerfield. - learn more

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              Montgomery Summit Is Back at the Fairmont Miramar

              🔦 Spotlight

              Hey Los Angeles,

              If you’re looking to stack your March with the right rooms and the right people, The Montgomery Summit, presented by March Capital, is coming back to Santa Monica (March 10–11, 2026) at the Fairmont Miramar. It’s been running since 2004, founded by March Capital co-founder Jamie Montgomery, and it consistently draws a tight mix of founders, investors, and execs who show up to have real conversations, not just do the conference lap.

              This year’s program is shaping up to be a big one: 1,200+ attendees, 180+ speakers, and CEOs from 120+ carefully selected private tech companies. In other words, if you want early looks at breakout companies and the context you can’t get from a headline scroll, this is one of LA’s most high-signal two-day events.

              What I like about Montgomery is the vibe. It’s less “conference chaos” and more “high-signal collisions,” with structured ways to connect, including 1:1 meeting scheduling through the Summit app for eligible attendees. The agenda doesn’t stop when the panels do, there’s a Getty Villa reception and a closing reception, so the Summit keeps moving well past the main stage hours.

              It’s invitation-only, but you can request an invitation here.

              Keep scrolling for the latest LA venture rounds, fund news and acquisitions.


              🤝 Venture Deals

                  LA Companies

                  • Vast secured $500M in new financing, made up of $300M in Series A equity and $200M in debt, to accelerate production of its Haven commercial space stations and expand its facilities and team. The round was led by Balerion Space Ventures with participation from IQT, Qatar Investment Authority, Mitsui & Co., MUFG, Nikon, Stellar Ventures, Space Capital, Earthrise Ventures, and founder/first investor Jed McCaleb, as Vast pushes toward Haven-1 and its longer-term successor vision. - learn more
                  • PartsPulse has raised $3M from UP.Partners and used the momentum to officially launch its unified AI platform at CONEXPO in Las Vegas. The startup says its “command center” combines inventory planning, pricing optimization, and sales intelligence into one system for OEMs, dealers, and fleet managers, and it was built with UP.Labs and co-developed with Wabash to help parts businesses spot revenue opportunities and stock the right parts at the right time. - learn more
                  • Procode AI launched out of stealth with $4M in venture funding and acquired The Auctus Group, a major revenue cycle management (RCM) firm that bills for 300+ plastic surgery and dermatology providers. The company says the combination will bring AI into private-practice surgical billing, using its “Coding Copilot” to translate operative reports into billing codes faster and reduce denials, while Auctus continues operating under CEO John Gwin. - learn more
                  • Smack has raised $32M across Seed and Series A to scale what it calls the first “frontier AI lab” built specifically for national security, after landing contracts with multiple branches of the U.S. military in 2025. The Series A was led by Geodesic Capital and Costanoa Ventures, with participation from Point72 Ventures, Felicis, First In, Scribble Ventures, Bloomberg Beta, Washington Harbour Partners, Palumni VC, Fulcrum Venture Group, Anomaly Fund, and Fortitude Ventures. - learn more

                                  LA Venture Funds

                                  • BOLD Capital Partners participated in KeyCare’s $27.4M financing round, backing the Epic-native virtual care company as it scales an AI-enabled model designed to extend health systems’ capacity with 24/7 virtual urgent, preventive, chronic, and virtual-first primary care. The round was led by HealthX Ventures and also included 8VC, LRVHealth, and Ikigai Venture Partners, plus strategic investors such as WellSpan Health, Allina Health, University of Chicago Ventures, Edge Ventures, and Exact Sciences, bringing KeyCare’s total funding to $55M+. - learn more
                                  • Fifth Wall led RenoFi’s $22M Series B, backing the Philadelphia startup’s push to make renovation financing simpler through an AI-enabled platform that underwrites loans based on a home’s after-renovation value. The round also included meaningful participation from Progressive Insurance and additional support from investors such as HighSage Ventures, Alumni Ventures, Flintlock Capital, and Gaingels, plus continued backing from Canaan, First Round Capital, Curql, TruStage Ventures, and several credit union partners. - learn more
                                  • B Capital co-led Bounce’s $5M internal round alongside existing backers Accel and Qualcomm Ventures, extending fresh capital without bringing in new investors. Bounce founder Vivekananda Hallekere told The Economic Times the round underscores continued support from its current investors as the electric mobility startup pushes forward in the EV space. - learn more

                                                  LA Exits

                                                  • Silent House Group has been acquired by concert staging and live-experiences giant TAIT, formalizing a long-running partnership between the two companies. The deal pairs Silent House’s LA-born creative and production chops, behind major tours and live experiences including Taylor Swift’s The Eras Tour and Kendrick Lamar’s Grand National Tour, with TAIT’s engineering, staging, and global delivery capabilities to build touring, experiential, and broadcast productions at any scale. - learn more

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                                                                            Revel’s Afterburner Round: $150M for Hard Tech Infrastructure

                                                                            🔦 Spotlight

                                                                            Hello Los Angeles,

                                                                            This week’s biggest hard tech funding headline belongs to Revel, which just raised a $150M Series B to modernize the software layer behind hardware test and control. The round was led by Index Ventures, with major participation from Redpoint Ventures and returning investors Thrive Capital, Felicis, and Abstract Ventures, plus angel participation including Figma CEO Dylan Field.

                                                                            Image Source: Revel

                                                                            Revel’s pitch is simple: rockets, advanced energy, robotics, and defense systems have evolved fast, but the tooling that tests and commands them is still stuck in the past. The company says its platform can cut test stand setup time from 14 days to about 8 hours, and that teams go from testing every other day to multiple tests per day. One customer, Impulse Space, reportedly runs 80+ instances of RevelTest, and Revel claims every pilot it has run has converted into a paying customer.

                                                                            What makes this more than “just another big round” is where Revel is aiming next: expanding from test stands into industrial control across critical infrastructure, including nuclear facilities, power stations, refineries, water treatment, data centers, and biomedical manufacturing. Their platform includes live telemetry and safe command execution, and even a purpose built language, RevelCode, designed for deterministic, debuggable control in high consequence environments. In other words, if LA is becoming a capital of hard tech, Revel is trying to become the control room software those companies standardize on.Keep scrolling for the latest LA venture rounds, fund news and acquisitions.

                                                                            🤝 Venture Deals

                                                                                LA Companies

                                                                                • Third Way Health raised an oversubscribed $15M Series A led by Health Velocity Capital to scale its AI-enabled hybrid human and automation front-office operations for medical practices. The company says it will use the funding to accelerate customer growth, expand operations, and deepen its AI and automation roadmap, building on its claim of supporting practices serving 5M+ patients annually. - learn more
                                                                                • Inhouse raised $5M in seed funding to grow its AI legal platform that helps small and midsize businesses generate contracts, get answers to complex legal questions, and bring in attorneys when needed. The round included backing from Run Ventures, Royal Street Ventures, Switch, and LegalZoom cofounder and former CEO Brian Liu, and the company says it will use the new capital to expand its AI agent capabilities and increase automation across contract lifecycle management, compliance, and proactive risk management. - learn more
                                                                                • Subject raised a $28M growth investment led by Vistara Growth, with participation from new backers NextEquity Partners, Green Street Impact Partners, and Outcomes Collective, plus existing investors including Kleiner Perkins and others. The company says it will use the funding to accelerate development of its AI-powered K–12 curriculum and online learning platform, expand accredited course offerings, and scale adoption with more districts and educators worldwide. - learn more
                                                                                • Mogul raised $5M in a round led by the Yamaha Music Innovations Fund, with participation from Urban Innovation Fund, Mindset Ventures, Fairway Capital Partners, and renewed support from Amplify LA and Wonder Ventures. The royalty management platform says it will use the funding to expand services for artists and their teams, building on traction like processing over $1.5B in royalties and launching its new Catalog Valuation Center to help creators understand the value of their catalogs. - learn more
                                                                                • Handl Health raised a $14.2M Series A led by Arthur Ventures, with follow-on investment from Syndra Capital Partners, an additional strategic investor, and increased participation from existing backers Mucker Capital, Riverfront Ventures, Digital Health Venture Partners, and Boutique Venture Partners. The company says it will use the new capital to expand its platform and deliver deeper analytics that help employers and benefits decision-makers design lower-cost health plans with more predictable pricing and better care outcomes. - learn more
                                                                                • Skorppio launched a self-serve, on-premise high-performance computer rental platform that lets AI teams, VFX studios, researchers, and schools rent enterprise-grade systems without buying hardware or locking into the cloud. The company says its fleet includes everything from performance laptops to DGX-class AI systems and GPU servers, supported through a PNY Pro partnership that makes NVIDIA Blackwell GPUs available, plus curated “KIT” bundles designed for specific workflows. - learn more

                                                                                              LA Venture Funds

                                                                                              • B Capital participated in Gushwork’s $9M seed round, backing the startup’s bet that “AI search” will become a major new channel for B2B lead generation. The round was co-led by Susquehanna International Group and Lightspeed, and Gushwork says it’s helping businesses show up in answers from tools like ChatGPT, Gemini, and Perplexity using automated marketing agents that generate search optimized content and backlinks. - learn more
                                                                                              • UP.Partners participated in BeyondMath’s $18.5M seed round, backing the company as it scales its “generative physics” approach to faster engineering-grade simulation. The raise included a $10M seed extension led by Cambridge Innovation Capital, with additional participation from Insight Partners and InMotion Ventures. - learn more
                                                                                              • MANTIS Venture Capital participated in SolveAI’s $50M funding round, backing the company as it launches a platform that lets employees build enterprise applications using natural language instead of code. The raise included a $45M Series A led by GV plus a previously undisclosed $5M pre-seed led by Accel, with additional participation from Northzone, NeverLift, and angels including Mike LoSapio, Pushmeet Kohli, and Olivier Godement. - learn more
                                                                                              • Fabric VC participated in Kash’s $2M pre-seed round, backing the startup as it embeds prediction markets directly into social media starting with X. Kash says users can turn posts into live, tradable markets through its @kash_bot, letting people express conviction on real-world outcomes inside the feed rather than in separate apps. The round also included investors such as Big Brain Holdings, Spartan Group, Coinbase Ventures, Kosmos Ventures, Halo Capital, MoonRock Capital, and Polaris Fund. - learn more
                                                                                              • M13 led LuminosAI’s latest funding round as the company launched Lighthouse, a new feature it says can automatically test generative and agentic AI systems for concrete legal liability. LuminosAI says the new capital will help it accelerate growth and expand its team to support a growing customer base, with participation from investors including Bloomberg Beta, Hawktail, AME Cloud Ventures, Crosscourt, Octave, Great Oaks, Fundrise, and others. - learn more

                                                                                                            LA Exits

                                                                                                            • Niagen Bioscience has sold its ChromaDex Reference Standards business to LGC in an all-cash transaction that closed on Feb. 24, 2026, as the company sharpens its focus on its core longevity strategy. Niagen says the divestiture helps it fully exit non-core operations and concentrate resources on NAD+ science, intellectual property, and commercial growth around its Niagen solutions, while LGC adds the standards portfolio to deepen its reference materials offering for pharma and lab customers. - learn more
                                                                                                            • Mutiny has been acquired by LA-based investment firm Shamrock Capital, which says the deal will help Mutiny accelerate growth and strengthen its position as a leading gaming-focused creative agency. Founded in 2021 and previously incubated within Trailer Park Group, Mutiny works with publishers and brands on research-driven, player-first creative, social, and community campaigns. Shamrock says Mutiny will continue scaling as a standalone business, with support that could include strategic acquisitions. - learn more
                                                                                                            • Vestigo Aerospace has been acquired by Applied Aerospace & Defense, bringing Vestigo’s Spinnaker deorbit drag-sail product line into Applied’s portfolio. Applied says Spinnaker helps satellite and launch-vehicle operators meet tightening orbital debris rules by providing a lightweight, cost-effective way to deorbit objects in low Earth orbit, and Vestigo founder and CEO Dr. David Spencer will join Applied as VP of Deployable Systems. - learn more

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                                                                                                                                    Snap’s New Growth Engine Isn’t Ads

                                                                                                                                    🔦 Spotlight

                                                                                                                                    Hey LA,

                                                                                                                                    This week’s most interesting story isn’t a flashy new feature, it’s a quieter flex: Snapchat is getting people to pay for Snapchat, on purpose.

                                                                                                                                    Snap just proved “free app” isn’t the only business model

                                                                                                                                    Snap says its direct revenue business is now running at a $1B annualized pace, with 25M+ subscribers paying across a growing menu of products like Snapchat+, Lens+, Snapchat Premium, and Memories Storage Plans. That matters because it’s not just a nice add-on to ads, it’s a different kind of relationship with users. Ads monetize attention. Subscriptions monetize intent.

                                                                                                                                    And intent is sticky. If someone pulls out a card for you, they don’t churn the way an algorithm does.

                                                                                                                                    Creator Subscriptions are the real tell

                                                                                                                                    Snap is also launching Creator Subscriptions, starting with an alpha on February 23 for select U.S. creators, then expanding to Snap Stars in Canada, the U.K., and France in the following weeks. The offer is straightforward: subscriber-only Stories and Snaps, priority replies, and an ad-free experience inside that creator’s Stories.

                                                                                                                                    The strategic move is even simpler. Snap wants “paying for closeness” to happen inside Stories and Chat, not on some external membership page. If they get that right, creators stop treating Snapchat as just a top-of-funnel channel and start treating it like a place to actually monetize their audience. Snap, meanwhile, gets a revenue stream that doesn’t care what CPMs are doing this quarter.

                                                                                                                                    Meanwhile, IRL: lululemon’s Studio Yet.

                                                                                                                                    Lululemon’s Studio Yet. pop-up is running Feb. 18 through March 8 at 8175 Melrose Ave. It’s a ticketed, limited-capacity lineup of workouts and community programming, with proceeds (less fees) supporting BlacklistLA.

                                                                                                                                    Keep scrolling for the latest LA venture rounds, fund news and acquisitions.

                                                                                                                                    🤝 Venture Deals

                                                                                                                                        LA Companies

                                                                                                                                        • Radiant announced a strategic investment from Lockheed Martin via Lockheed Martin Ventures, further oversubscribing the company’s current financing round. Radiant is developing its 1 MW Kaleidos portable nuclear microreactor and says it’s targeting a first reactor startup this summer at Idaho National Laboratory, with initial customer deployments planned for 2028. - learn more
                                                                                                                                        • Mesh Optical Technologies announced it has raised over $50M, led by Thrive Capital, to scale production of its Alpha C1 optical transceiver, which converts electrical signals to light at 1.6 Tbps for AI data centers. The startup says its edge is manufacturing: it builds the optical engine using fast, repeatable flip-chip die bonding to make high-volume, U.S.-based production of optical links possible, backed by a team with experience from SpaceX and Intel.- learn more

                                                                                                                                                    LA Venture Funds

                                                                                                                                                    • Alexandria Venture Investments participated as an existing investor in Ten63 Therapeutics’ latest strategic financing, which also included participation from Morpheus Ventures and added new backers such as Chugai Venture Fund and the Gates Foundation, bringing total funding to more than $45M. Ten63 says it will use the capital to scale BEYOND, its AI-driven “Large Quantum Chemistry Model” platform for designing small-molecule drugs against historically “undruggable” targets, including programs in oncology and an HPV-focused effort supported by the Gates Foundation.- learn more
                                                                                                                                                    • B Capital participated in Code Metal’s $125M Series B, a round led by Salesforce Ventures that valued the company at $1.25B, alongside investors including Accel, J2 Ventures, Shield Capital, Smith Point Capital, and others.Code Metal says it will use the new capital to expand engineering, accelerate product development, grow government and commercial partnerships, and scale go-to-market for its “verifiable” AI code generation and translation platform used in mission-critical environments. - learn more
                                                                                                                                                    • Bonfire Ventures co-led Odynn’s $9.5M seed round alongside 8VC, with participation from Khosla Ventures and General Catalyst. Odynn says it’s building personalized AI infrastructure for travel companies, aiming to replace one-size-fits-all booking portals with dynamic experiences that tailor search, recommendations, and conversion flows to each traveler. - learn more
                                                                                                                                                    • MTech Capital led Qumis’s $4.3M oversubscribed seed round, which also brought in American Family Ventures as a new strategic investor and pushed total funding to $6.75M. The company says it’s building an attorney-trained AI platform for commercial insurance “coverage intelligence,” and will use the funding to expand go-to-market and deepen product capabilities as adoption grows among large brokers and carriers (including NFP). - learn more
                                                                                                                                                    • WndrCo participated in Mansa’s seed funding round, which the company says totaled $12M and was led by MaC Venture Capital. Mansa is now launching a vertical “micro-drama” format inside its app, debuting with the 27-episode original series The Heiress, The Baller & The Secret Society and positioning the feature as a mobile-first way to release serialized stories globally. - learn more
                                                                                                                                                    • Alpha Edison co-led Ownwell’s $50M Series B, with Wonder Ventures participating alongside investors including Mercato Partners, Intuit Ventures, Left Lane Capital, First Round Capital, Long Journey Ventures, and PROOF Fund. The round includes $30M in equity and $20M in debt financing from Western Alliance Bank, and Ownwell says it will use the capital to expand nationally and simplify the property-tax appeal process through a new “National Appeals Packet” product. - learn more
                                                                                                                                                    • Three Six Zero participated as an existing investor in Hook’s $10M Series A, which was led by Khosla Ventures with participation from Point72 Ventures, Imaginary Ventures, and Waverley Capital, bringing Hook’s total funding to $16M. Hook is an artist-first social platform that lets fans legally remix licensed songs using simple AI-powered tools and share them across social platforms, and it says the new capital will fund user growth plus product expansion like an Android app, richer creation formats, and deeper ecosystem integrations. - learn more
                                                                                                                                                    • Overture Ventures participated as an existing investor in Zero Homes’ $16.8M Series A, which was led by Prelude Ventures alongside SJF Ventures and the Exelon Foundation. Zero Homes says it’s using the funding to expand into new markets, broaden its home-upgrade offerings, and grow its contractor network, powered by a smartphone-based “digital twin” approach that produces upgrade designs and pricing remotely. - learn more
                                                                                                                                                    • Rebel Fund participated in Sphinx’s $7.1M seed round, which was led by Cherry Ventures alongside Y Combinator, Deel Ventures, and Singularity Capital. Sphinx is building browser-native compliance agents that work inside banks’ and fintechs’ existing tools to automate AML, KYC, and KYB work, with the new funding earmarked to scale that “agentic compliance workforce.” - learn more
                                                                                                                                                    • Matter Venture Partners led ChipAgents’ oversubscribed $50M Series A1, bringing total capital raised to $74M, with participation from existing investors Bessemer Venture Partners, Micron, MediaTek, and Ericsson. ChipAgents says it will use the new funding to scale its agentic AI platform for chip design and verification, expand engineering and research, and accelerate global deployment of multi-agent “chip teams,” alongside a new HQ buildout in Santa Clara. - learn more
                                                                                                                                                    • MemorialCare Innovation Fund participated in SpendRule’s $2M round, which was led by Abundant Venture Partners with additional backing from Zeal Capital Partners. SpendRule is emerging from stealth with an AI-driven platform that helps hospitals validate invoices against complex contract terms before payments go out, aiming to reduce overspending and “contract leakage” across purchased services. The company says early customers include health systems like MemorialCare, Kettering Health, and MUSC Health. - learn more

                                                                                                                                                                LA Exits

                                                                                                                                                                • Fred Segal is being acquired by Aritzia, which is buying the brand’s rights/IP (terms not disclosed) and planning a revival under its ownership. Melrose Avenue is central to the deal too, since Aritzia is also taking a lease on Fred Segal’s iconic ivy-covered site at 8100 Melrose as part of the comeback plan. - learn more
                                                                                                                                                                • The Expert is being acquired by Havenly in an all-equity deal (terms not disclosed), bringing The Expert’s high-end virtual designer consultations and trade-oriented marketplace into Havenly’s broader home and commerce ecosystem. Lee Anne Blake will join Havenly as chief commercial officer, and while The Expert will remain a standalone website, Havenly plans to plug in its tech to strengthen The Expert’s purchasing and procurement tools for designers. - learn more

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