Pulse 2.0

Apollo: AUM Tops $1.05 Trillion As Record $60 Billion Quarterly Inflows Are Entirely Organic

SpaceX: AI Adjusted EBITDA Reaches $1.15 Billion As Starlink Subscribers Double To 12 Million

Yukon Partners Provides Mezzanine Financing For Second Nature Brands’ Acquisition Of Tillamook Country Smoker

X-Caliber Rural Capital Provides $25 Million USDA Loan For Plantible Foods’ Texas Expansion

Eldridge Provides $278 Million Loan To Refinance Blackstone And Portman’s Ten Twenty Spring

Lumilens Emerges From Stealth With Over $900 Million Raised At $5.51 Billion Valuation

By Amit Chowdhry ● Yesterday at 11:25 PM

Lumilens has emerged from stealth with more than $900 million in total funding as it develops optical connectivity systems for large-scale AI data centers. The company announced more than $700 million in new financing co-led by Atreides Management, Bain Capital Ventures, Meritech, Seligman Ventures and Spark Capital. The round values Lumilens at $5.51 billion.

Sequoia Financial Acquires All Star Financial With $796 Million In AUM And $566 Million In Retirement Assets

By Amit Chowdhry ● Yesterday at 11:24 PM

Sequoia Financial Group has acquired All Star Financial, an independent wealth management firm based in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area. All Star Financial had approximately $796 million in assets under management and an additional $566 million in retirement plan assets under advisement as of June 30, 2026. Financial terms were not disclosed.

SambaNova Appoints Mohsen Moazami As Vice Chair Of Global Strategy And Partnerships

By Amit Chowdhry ● Yesterday at 11:23 PM

SambaNova has appointed Mohsen Moazami as Vice Chair of Global Strategy and Partnerships following the AI infrastructure company’s Series F financing at an $11 billion valuation.

Talcott Financial And Goldman Sachs Launch West Grove Re With About $1 Billion In Capital

By Amit Chowdhry ● Yesterday at 11:22 PM

Talcott Financial Group has established West Grove Re, a Bermuda-based reinsurance sidecar formed in partnership with Goldman Sachs.

Gryphon Investors Raises More Than $770 Million For Gryphon VI Co-Investment Fund

By Amit Chowdhry ● Yesterday at 11:22 PM

Gryphon Investors has completed the final closing of Gryphon VI Top-Up Co-Investment Partners with more than $770 million in total commitments. The oversubscribed fund exceeded its original $650 million target.

JJ Watt Invests In Base Power Through $1 Billion Series D And Becomes A Customer

By Amit Chowdhry ● Yesterday at 11:20 PM

Former professional football player JJ Watt has invested in Base Power as part of the Texas energy company’s $1 billion Series D financing. Watt has also become a Base customer and said switching his Houston home to the company’s service reduced his power bill by more than 20%.

Sammons Financial Names Rob TeKolste CEO And Chairman As Esfand Dinshaw Retires

By Amit Chowdhry ● Yesterday at 11:19 PM

Sammons Financial Group has named President Rob TeKolste as its next Chief Executive Officer and Chairman of the Board. TeKolste will assume both roles on January 1, 2027. Current Chairman and CEO Esfand Dinshaw will retire at the end of 2026 following a 27-year career with Sammons, including 16 years as CEO.

Solar Landscape Secures Up To $150 Million From Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners For 250 MW Solar Portfolio

By Amit Chowdhry ● Yesterday at 11:18 PM

Solar Landscape has secured a development financing facility of up to $150 million from Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners through its Green Credit Fund II.

Charles River Associates Expands Credit Facility To $400 Million

By Amit Chowdhry ● Yesterday at 11:13 PM

Charles River Associates has increased and extended its credit facility through a six-bank lending syndicate. The five-year facility provides up to $400 million of financing, consisting of a $75 million term loan and a $325 million revolving credit facility.

ReCode Therapeutics Secures Cystic Fibrosis Foundation Funding And Names Heather Clark CEO

By Amit Chowdhry ● Yesterday at 11:12 PM

ReCode Therapeutics has secured new funding from the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation and entered a research collaboration with an undisclosed gene editing company to develop potential genetic medicines for cystic fibrosis.

Francisco Partners To Acquire Majority Stake In Command Alkon From Thoma Bravo

By Amit Chowdhry ● Yesterday at 11:09 PM

Francisco Partners has agreed to acquire a majority stake in Command Alkon from Thoma Bravo, supporting the construction technology company’s continued expansion and development of AI-powered capabilities.

Wealth Enhancement Acquires $592 Million Firm Miramar Capital

By Amit Chowdhry ● Yesterday at 11:08 PM

Wealth Enhancement has acquired the investment advisory business of Miramar Capital, an independent registered investment advisor based in Northbrook, Illinois. Miramar Capital is led by founders and senior portfolio managers Bob Kalman and Max Wasserman and manages more than $592 million in client assets. The acquisition increases Wealth Enhancement’s total client advisory, trust and brokerage assets to more than $159.4 billion.

Sandisk: Datacenter Revenue More Than Doubles Sequentially To $2.98 Billion As Consumer Sales Fall 32%

By Amit Chowdhry ● Yesterday at 10:51 PM

Sandisk reported sharply diverging performance across its end markets during the fiscal fourth quarter of 2026 as datacenter revenue more than doubled sequentially while consumer sales declined.

The Trade Desk: Partnerships Expand Across Netflix, Databricks And Adobe As Revenue Grows 3%

By Amit Chowdhry ● Yesterday at 10:51 PM

The Trade Desk continued expanding its advertising, data, commerce, connected-TV, and artificial-intelligence partnerships during the second quarter of 2026, even as revenue growth slowed to 3% and profitability declined.

Hadrian Raises $1.37 Billion Series D At $7.87 Billion Valuation To Expand Automated Defense Manufacturing

By Amit Chowdhry ● Yesterday at 4:06 PM

Hadrian has raised $1.37 billion in Series D equity financing to build additional highly automated factories and expand production of critical U.S. defense, aerospace and industrial systems. The financing values the advanced manufacturing company at $7.87 billion. The round was co-led by WCM Investment Management, Washington Harbour Partners, Valor Equity Partners, 137 Ventures and Baillie Gifford.

Mirendil Selects Google Cloud AI Hypercomputer For TPU And NVIDIA GPU Training Infrastructure

By Amit Chowdhry ● Yesterday at 4:02 PM

Mirendil is expanding its use of Google Cloud’s AI Hypercomputer to support the pre-training and post-training of advanced artificial intelligence models. The frontier AI research company will use a combination of Google Tensor Processing Units and NVIDIA accelerated computing infrastructure running on Google Cloud.

OpenAI Improves GPT-5.6 Sol And Gives Free Users Unlimited GPT-5.6 Luna Text Chats

By Amit Chowdhry ● Yesterday at 3:59 PM

OpenAI has introduced updates to ChatGPT that improve GPT-5.6 Sol for Plus and Pro subscribers while giving Free users expanded access to GPT-5.6 Luna, including unlimited text conversations.

Ford Announces Fathom, A New Midsize Electric Truck Starting At $28,350 With Preorders Opening In Early 2027

By Amit Chowdhry ● Yesterday at 3:55 PM

Ford has named its upcoming midsize electric truck the Ford Fathom, introducing the first vehicle built on the company’s Universal EV Platform. The standard-range version of the Fathom will carry a starting manufacturer’s suggested retail price of $28,350. Ford plans to begin accepting preorders in early 2027.

Naïve Raises $28.5 Million Series A To Build Infrastructure For Autonomous Companies

By Amit Chowdhry ● Yesterday at 3:36 PM

Naïve has raised $28.5 million in Series A funding to develop infrastructure that enables AI agents to operate businesses through a unified application programming interface. The round was led by Nexus Venture Partners, with participation from Y Combinator, Zetta Venture Partners and Liquid 2 Ventures.

Qu Appoints Restaurant Technology Pioneer Paul Rubin As Chief Product And Technology Officer

By Amit Chowdhry ● Yesterday at 3:34 PM

Qu has appointed Paul Rubin as Chief Product and Technology Officer to lead the company’s product and engineering roadmap as artificial intelligence, cloud computing and edge technologies reshape restaurant operations.

PwC And Zyter Collaborate To Help Healthcare Organizations Reduce Total Cost Of Care With AI

By Amit Chowdhry ● Yesterday at 3:27 PM

PwC and Zyter have formed a collaboration to help healthcare payers and providers improve health outcomes, reduce avoidable medical expenses and modernize the delivery of clinical and administrative services.

Pipedrive Acquires Outfunnel To Integrate Sales And Marketing Data Sync Into Its CRM

By Amit Chowdhry ● Yesterday at 3:10 PM

Pipedrive has acquired Outfunnel, an Estonian sales and marketing automation startup whose application is the highest-rated offering on the Pipedrive Marketplace. Financial terms of the transaction were not disclosed.

Nuwellis Appoints Dale Brady As Principal R&D Engineer To Advance Medical Device Development

By Amit Chowdhry ● Yesterday at 3:06 PM

Nuwellis has appointed Dale Brady as Principal R&D Engineer, strengthening the medical technology company’s research and development organization as it advances existing and new product programs.

Framewerx Acquires AD Micro Technology To Expand AI-Powered Managed IT Services

By Amit Chowdhry ● Yesterday at 2:59 PM

Framewerx has acquired AD Micro Technology, expanding its managed IT services capabilities, geographic reach and client support operations. The transaction combines Framewerx’s IT consulting, managed services and AI-powered support capabilities with AD Micro Technology’s experience in networking, cybersecurity, backup, cloud infrastructure and printer management. Financial terms of the acquisition were not disclosed.

LPL Onboards $300 Million Firm Paxel Financial Consulting

By Amit Chowdhry ● Yesterday at 2:49 PM

LPL Financial has added the financial advisors of Paxel Financial Consulting to its broker-dealer and registered investment advisor platforms. The team, led by founder Chin Po, CPA, reported serving approximately $300 million in advisory, brokerage and retirement plan assets as of the end of 2025.

New York Life Appoints Zhen Zhao As Chief AI Officer To Lead AI Strategy And Agentic AI Development

By Amit Chowdhry ● Yesterday at 2:45 PM

New York Life has appointed Zhen Zhao as Chief AI Officer to lead the company’s artificial intelligence strategy, platforms and execution. Zhao will oversee the development and delivery of advanced AI and data science solutions across the insurer, including agentic AI and machine learning capabilities.

Rackspace Appoints Pranav Nambiar To Lead And Scale Sovereign AI Infrastructure

By Amit Chowdhry ● Yesterday at 2:13 PM

Rackspace Technology has appointed Pranav Nambiar as Senior Vice President and General Manager of AI Infrastructure. Nambiar will lead the infrastructure, operating model, strategic partnerships and go-to-market strategy supporting Rackspace’s AI infrastructure offerings.

Zayo Teams With NVIDIA To Build 8,000 Miles Of Fiber For AI Infrastructure

By Amit Chowdhry ● Yesterday at 2:11 PM

Zayo is working with NVIDIA to expand the high-capacity network infrastructure needed to connect AI factories, GPU clusters, neoclouds and enterprise artificial intelligence deployments across North America.

Unframe Appoints Three Senior Executives After Reaching $100 Million In Contract Value And 400% Net Revenue Retention

By Amit Chowdhry ● Yesterday at 2:08 PM

Unframe has expanded its executive team with three senior appointments as the enterprise AI company prepares for its next phase of growth. The company appointed Jonathan Pogact as Vice President of Marketing, Lior Hakimi as Vice President of Finance and Chris Slovak as Global Field Chief Technology Officer.

Broad Sky Partners Completes Sale Of Smith + Howard To TPG Following Nearly 4x Revenue Growth

By Amit Chowdhry ● Yesterday at 2:05 PM

Broad Sky Partners has completed the sale of Smith + Howard to TPG, concluding a three-and-a-half-year partnership that expanded the accounting and advisory firm into a national professional services platform.