TL;DR

Abridge, Harvey raise $300M+ at $5B+ in vertical AI; Polymarket, Digital Asset secure major blockchain rounds.

Highlights

• Abridge (AI medical scribe) raised $300M Series E led by a16z at a $5.3B valuation, doubling in four months 1.
• Harvey (legal AI) closed $300M Series E at $5B, co-led by Kleiner Perkins and Coatue, with Sequoia, GV, DST, and OpenAI Startup Fund 2.
• Polymarket (on-chain prediction markets) is finalizing a $200M round led by Founders Fund, pushing valuation above $1B 3.
• Digital Asset Holdings secured $135M from DRW, Tradeweb, Goldman Sachs, Citadel, and others to expand the Canton blockchain for regulated finance 4.
• Former Coral Capital execs are raising $100M for a Nasdaq-listed vehicle to accumulate Binance’s BNB token 5.
• Beta Technologies’ Alia CX300 completed the first commercial all-electric passenger flight, signaling progress in sustainable aviation 6[DRIV].
• ChatGPT hit 29.5M App Store downloads in 28 days, nearly matching TikTok, Facebook, Instagram, and X combined; shift seen from search to AI chatbots 7.
• Anthropic won a federal court ruling that AI training on copyrighted books is “fair use,” but piracy claims will proceed to trial 8.
• San Francisco office vacancies fell for the first time since 2020, led by AI and tech tenant demand 10.
• Meta and Microsoft launched a $399 Xbox-branded Quest 3S VR headset, further integrating Xbox services into third-party hardware 11.
• Tesla began paid robotaxi rides in Austin using unsupervised FSD, attracting NHTSA scrutiny after safety incidents 12.
• Kaspersky identified “SparkKitty” malware in Apple and Google app stores targeting crypto wallet seed phrases via photo libraries 15.

Commentary

Venture deal activity remains concentrated in vertical AI, with Abridge and Harvey both raising $300M Series E rounds at valuations above $5B—each doubling their marks within four months 12. This momentum, driven by strong ARR and deep enterprise integration, signals that sector-specific AI platforms with real-world traction continue to command premium pricing and investor attention, even as broader late-stage activity stays selective.

Blockchain and digital asset infrastructure also saw renewed institutional backing. Polymarket’s unicorn round and Digital Asset’s $135M raise from a mix of Wall Street and crypto-native investors highlight sustained interest in regulated, real-world asset tokenization and on-chain prediction markets 34. The planned $100M BNB vehicle on Nasdaq mirrors earlier public-market crypto exposure strategies, but the SparkKitty malware incident underscores persistent security risks that could influence both adoption and regulatory scrutiny 515.

AI’s impact is visible beyond software: San Francisco’s first drop in office vacancies since 2020 is attributed to AI and tech tenants, hinting at a potential floor in urban commercial real estate and possibly reviving proptech deal flow 10. Meanwhile, Beta Technologies’ electric aircraft milestone and Tesla ’s robotaxi pilot (despite regulatory attention) show that capital is still moving into hardware-intensive, long-horizon bets with credible commercialization paths 612.

On the regulatory front, Anthropic’s partial court win on AI model training data offers some clarity for foundation model developers, though ongoing piracy claims and the NHS’s warning on uncertified AI scribing tools in the UK highlight the evolving compliance landscape 814. For VCs, diligence around regulatory risk and enterprise adoption remains critical, especially as AI and crypto infrastructure attract larger, later-stage rounds.