Innovation

Samaya AI Launches Agent Control Plane And Adds NVentures And Databricks Ventures Backing

By Amit Chowdhry ● Feb 11, 2026

Samaya AI announced it has introduced a new architecture, the Agent Control Plane (ACP), positioning it as a control and governance layer for building and operating finance-focused AI agents that reason in real time within a specialized investment context. The Mountain View-based company also disclosed new investment from NVentures, NVIDIA’s venture capital arm, and Databricks Ventures, which it plans to use to extend development of ACP and expand customizable agents for financial workflows.

Gyala Therapeutics Wins €3.7 Million Spanish Government Grant And Initiates Phase I/IIa Clinical Trial

By Amit Chowdhry ● Feb 11, 2026

Gyala Therapeutics has initiated a Phase I/IIa clinical trial of its investigational CAR-T cell therapy, GYA01, after receiving authorization from Spain’s Agency of Medicines and Medical Devices (AEMPS). The clinical-stage biotechnology company is advancing GYA01 as a potential option for patients with relapsed or refractory acute myeloid leukemia (AML) or T-cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia (T-ALL), two aggressive blood cancers with poor outcomes and limited treatment options after relapse.

Birch Hill Raises $2.5 Million Pre-Seed For Onchain Lending And Tokenized Asset Markets

By Amit Chowdhry ● Feb 11, 2026

Birch Hill Holdings, an institutional digital asset infrastructure firm focused on onchain lending and tokenized asset markets, said it raised $2.5 million in pre-seed funding to build compliant, institution-ready access to blockchain-based credit and income strategies. The round was co-led by ParaFi Capital and Castle Island Ventures, with participation from Nascent, FalconX Ventures, Coin Operated Group, The Operating Group, JST Digital, Flowdesk, and a group of industry executives.

Inertia Enterprises: $450 Million Series A Raised For Commercializing Laser-Based Fusion Pilot Plant

By Amit Chowdhry ● Feb 11, 2026

Inertia Enterprises announced it has raised a $450 million in Series A financing to advance a commercial fusion energy program based on inertial confinement fusion physics demonstrated at the National Ignition Facility at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. The company, founded in 2024 and based in Livermore, California, said the round was led by Bessemer Venture Partners with participation from GV, Modern Capital, Threshold Ventures, and other investors.

Leah Partners With PwC UK To Power Agentic Operating Models

By Amit Chowdhry ● Feb 11, 2026

Leah, an agentic AI company behind Leah Agentic OS, has entered a partnership with PwC UK aimed at helping organizations design, deploy, and scale coordinated AI agents as they build modern operating models within Global Business Services. The companies said the collaboration combines PwC UK’s industry and functional expertise with Leah’s agentic operating system to support the design and stand-up of new operating models across shared services environments.

Clearwater Analytics Integrates With TreasurySpring For Fixed-Term Cash Management

By Amit Chowdhry ● Feb 11, 2026

Clearwater Analytics and TreasurySpring have announced a platform integration designed to help institutional clients invest surplus cash in fixed-term products with predictable maturities while keeping activity and reporting inside Clearwater’s investment management and accounting environment. The integration connects Clearwater’s platform directly to TreasurySpring’s marketplace of more than 1,000 cash investment products, expanding the options available to shared clients seeking defined-maturity matching and improved returns on excess cash.

Newo: $25 Million Series A Raised To Scale AI Voice Infrastructure for SMB Call Handling

By Amit Chowdhry ● Feb 11, 2026

Newo.ai announced it raised a $25 million Series A round led by Ratmir Timashev, the co-founder of Veeam Software and co-founder of OH.io, as the company looks to scale its AI voice and messaging infrastructure for small and medium-sized businesses. The San Francisco-based startup said the financing brings its total capital raised to about $32 million, following earlier angel, seed, and SAFE rounds, with Aloniq, Constructor, Acrobator, and s16vc also participating.

Smart Bricks: $5 Million Pre-Seed Funding Raised For Real Estate Investing Platform

By Amit Chowdhry ● Feb 11, 2026

Smart Bricks, a frontier AI lab building agentic AI infrastructure for real-estate investing, announced it has raised a $5 million pre-seed round led by Andreessen Horowitz’s a16z speedrun, with participation from funds and angels across the U.S., Europe, and the Middle East.

GitGuardian: $50 Million Series C Raised For Secrets And Non-Human Identity Security Platform

By Amit Chowdhry ● Feb 11, 2026

GitGuardian announced it has raised a $50 million in Series C financing to expand its secrets security and Non Human Identity (NHI) governance capabilities, positioning the round as a response to the rapid growth of service accounts, applications, and autonomous AI agents that require credentials, permissions, and oversight. The company says enterprises are facing an “exponential growth in non human identities,” with the emergence of autonomous agents widening what it describes as an AI agent security gap.

Hubbl Technologies: $6 Million Series A Raised For Salesforce Ecosystem Intelligence Platform

By Amit Chowdhry ● Feb 11, 2026

Hubbl Technologies, a company positioning itself as an intelligence layer for the agentic era, said it has raised $6 million in a Series A round led by Salesforce Ventures, with participation from Industry Ventures. The company said the financing will accelerate development of its Intelligence Platform and expand its ability to deliver contextual intelligence to enterprises as they adopt AI-driven business operations.

ManageMy: $45 Million Closed For Expanding Agentic AI Workflows And Underwriting Automation

By Amit Chowdhry ● Feb 11, 2026

ManageMy, an intelligent orchestration platform for insurers, said it has raised $45 million, including $20 million secured in a recent Series B round co-led by Ventura Capital and OCVC, with backing from BNF and a consortium of strategic leaders in traditional insurance and insurtech.

Brandlight: $30 Million Series A Raised For Enterprise AI Visibility Platform

By Amit Chowdhry ● Feb 11, 2026

Brandlight announced it has raised $30 million in Series A funding to accelerate development and scaling of its enterprise platform focused on helping brands manage AI search visibility and navigate what it described as a convergence of AI search, advertising and commerce. The round was led by Pelion Venture Partners with participation from existing investors Cardumen Capital and G20 Ventures.

Infragistics: Interview With Founder & CEO Dean Guida About The Software Tools Company

By Amit Chowdhry ● Feb 11, 2026

Infragistics develops software tools—enterprise UI component libraries, design/prototyping products, its Reveal embedded analytics platform that helps teams build modern web and desktop applications, and Slingshot, where AI-powered insights meet seamless work management. Pulse 2.0 interviewed Infragistics founder and CEO Dean Guida to gain a deeper understanding of the company.

Nasdaq Launches New Private Capital Index Benchmarks

By Amit Chowdhry ● Feb 11, 2026

Nasdaq has launched the Nasdaq Private Capital Indexes, a new suite of rules-based benchmarks designed to provide more consistent, objective measurement in private markets, where performance data and benchmarking have often been fragmented and less standardized. The company positioned the launch as the next step in expanding Nasdaq Private Capital Solutions, a broader platform that combines benchmarking, institutional-grade datasets, and analytics into workflow-ready tools for institutional investors and consultants.

Take2: $14 Million Series A Closed For Healthcare Recruiting AI Agent Platform

By Amit Chowdhry ● Feb 11, 2026

Take2, an AI agents platform built for healthcare recruiting, announced it has raised a $14 million Series A round led by Human Capital, with participation from Bertelsmann Healthcare Investments, Reach Capital, SemperVirens VC and Honeystone Ventures. Take2 is positioning its platform as a response to what it describes as a healthcare hiring breaking point, citing high turnover, significant vacancy costs, and recruiting workflows that remain heavily manual. The company said its autonomous AI agents are designed to automate core recruiting work rather than simply assist recruiters.

Perseus Materials Raises Strategic Investment From Lockheed Martin For Composite Manufacturing

By Amit Chowdhry ● Feb 11, 2026

Perseus Materials, a venture-backed startup developing a large-scale additive manufacturing system for composite parts, announced it has closed a strategic investment from Lockheed Martin. The company, founded in 2022 by Stanford researchers, said the backing will support hiring, fulfillment of initial customer orders, and an expansion of its physical footprint.

Nucleus Security: $20 Million Series C Closed For Exposure Management Platform

By Amit Chowdhry ● Feb 11, 2026

Nucleus Security, a unified vulnerability and exposure management platform, announced it has raised a $20 million Series C funding round led by Delta-v Capital to meet what it described as surging enterprise demand for exposure management.

Tenna Systems: $13.5 Million Seed Funding Closed For Spectrum Intelligence Platform

By Amit Chowdhry ● Feb 11, 2026

Tenna Systems, a defense technology company focused on software-driven spectrum intelligence, said it has raised an oversubscribed $13.5 million seed funding round to accelerate expansion in the U.S. defense market, where it said it has already partnered with government agencies and prime contractors to deliver hardware-free spectrum intelligence for wireless-dependent systems at global scale.

ProRata.ai Appoints Michele Tobin As Chief Revenue Officer And Peter Sloterdyk As Chief Marketing Officer

By Amit Chowdhry ● Feb 10, 2026

ProRata.ai, a technology company developing AI solutions focused on respecting content creators, has appointed Michele Tobin as chief revenue officer and Peter Sloterdyk as chief marketing officer. Both executives report to founder and CEO Bill Gross and will also hold the same roles at Gist, a ProRata company that provides brand-visibility products to help brands and businesses stand out as generative AI reshapes discovery and marketing.

Varaha: About $45 Million Raised For Carbon Removal Platform

By Amit Chowdhry ● Feb 10, 2026

Varaha, an India-founded carbon removal project developer, announced a Series B financing round of approximately $45 million and said it has closed the first $20 million tranche led by WestBridge Capital.

Phenom Acquires Be Applied To Scale Skills First Hiring With Cognitive Assessments

By Amit Chowdhry ● Feb 10, 2026

Phenom, an applied AI company focused on helping employers hire, develop, and retain talent, has acquired Be Applied, an AI-driven cognitive assessment platform that validates candidate and employee capabilities at enterprise scale. The deal is designed to help large organizations move toward skills-first hiring, with faster, more consistent validation across both high-volume and specialized roles.

JumpCloud Launches Venture Arm And Backs Identity-Fraud Startup Tofu

By Amit Chowdhry ● Feb 10, 2026

JumpCloud has launched JumpCloud Ventures, a new venture arm that supports early-stage companies building identity, security, AI, and IT productivity solutions. The company framed the program as a long-term effort to help advance foundational technologies that enable modern enterprises to scale securely.

Circit: $22 Million Raised For Audit Verification Platform

By Amit Chowdhry ● Feb 10, 2026

Circit, an audit confirmation and financial data verification platform, has raised $22 million in growth equity funding to scale its global verification network and support continued growth, including expansion in the U.S.

Lobster Data Expands Into North America Via Bosch Reseller Partnership

By Amit Chowdhry ● Feb 10, 2026

Lobster Data is expanding into North America to help logistics, manufacturing, and retail companies address fragmented supply chain systems, slow onboarding, and limited network visibility, following its work with more than 2,000 customers across Europe.

G42: Up To $1 Billion Commitment Backs Vietnam Sovereign AI And Cloud Infrastructure Buildout

By Amit Chowdhry ● Feb 10, 2026

G42, an Abu Dhabi-based technology holding group focused on artificial intelligence, has signed a framework cooperation agreement with a Vietnamese consortium comprising FPT Corporation and Viet Thai Group to develop sovereign AI capabilities and cloud infrastructure across Vietnam.

Tharros: Federal Cybersecurity Provider Lands Blue Delta Venture Investment

By Amit Chowdhry ● Feb 10, 2026

Tharros, a provider of mission-critical cybersecurity and vulnerability research services for the U.S. federal government, has secured a venture capital investment from Blue Delta Capital Partners as it pushes to scale its technical capabilities and broaden its federal cyber offerings.

Natilus: $28 Million Series A Closed To Commercialize Hyper-Efficient Freight And Passenger Planes

By Amit Chowdhry ● Feb 10, 2026

Natilus, a U.S.-based aerospace manufacturer developing blended wing body aircraft for cargo and passenger markets, has raised $28 million in Series A financing to advance commercialization of its aircraft family, including the KONA regional freighter and the HORIZON EVO passenger program.

Algorized: $13 Million Series A Raised For Physical AI Perception And Predictive Safety Platform

By Amit Chowdhry ● Feb 10, 2026

Algorized, a company building an intelligence layer for Physical AI, has closed a $13 million Series A financing to scale its Predictive Safety Engine, which it positions as an edge native “nervous system” for industrial automation. The round was led by Run Ventures, with participation from the Amazon Industrial Innovation Fund and Acrobator Ventures, alongside continued backing from existing investors.

Roo Capital Adds Two Investment Principals To Senior Leadership Team

By Amit Chowdhry ● Feb 10, 2026

Roo Capital, an early-stage venture capital firm, has expanded its senior leadership team with the appointments of Varun Sridhar and Yuriy Dovzhansky as Principals, as the firm looks to deepen its work with founders across Vertical SaaS, AI, healthcare tech, and cybersecurity.

Somethings: $19.2 Million Series A Raised For Digital Youth Mental Health Platform

By Amit Chowdhry ● Feb 10, 2026

Somethings, a digital mental health platform focused on teens and young adults, has raised $19.2 million in Series A funding to expand access to peer support for youth ages 13 to 26. The round was led by Catalio Capital, with participation from existing investors General Catalyst and Tusk Ventures.