ChatGPT Shops for You, Black Forest Labs Eyes $4B, & Cerebras Secures $1.1B
AI shopping agents, billion-dollar hardware, and a European AI lab raising big with Meta ties.
Traded: Venture Capital
September 30, 2025
Your dose of daily dealflow, essential VC & tech trends to know. The biggest moves in venture, all in one place. Celebrating startups, founders, and funders.
🧑🍳 Let’s get right into it…
🛍️ OpenAI launches a shopping agent, putting pressure on Amazon and Google’s e-commerce dominance.
🖼️ Black Forest Labs in talks to raise $200M–$300M at a $4B valuation, and partners with Meta.
💰 Cerebras Systems secures $1.1B to fuel the AI hardware race.
🚀 Rebellions raises $250M from Arm and Samsung Ventures for its AI chips.
🌐 Flying Tulip grabs a massive $200M Seed to build a full-stack onchain exchange.
🎵 Spotify CEO Daniel Ek steps down after nearly two decades leading the streaming giant.
🧑🚀 Top 3 Deals You Can’t Miss
1️⃣ Cerebras Systems – $1.1B growth round, scaling its frontier AI compute hardware ambitions.
2️⃣ Rebellions – $250M raise at $1.4B valuation, led by Arm & Samsung Ventures.
3️⃣ Black Forest Labs – in talks for $200M–$300M at a $4B valuation, building AI image models with Meta.
🧠 Dopamine Dealflow
🌳 Series B+ & Growth
Cerebras Systems (Sunnyvale, CA) – $1.1B growth; AI compute hardware scale-up.
Rebellions (Seoul, Korea) – $250M; led by Arm & Samsung Ventures; AI chips.
Viamericas (Coral Gables, FL) – $113.6M; remittance & money transfers.
Eve (San Francisco, CA) – $103M Series B; AI platform for plaintiff law firms.
Firehawk Aerospace (Dallas, TX) – $60M; hybrid rocket propulsion.
Vibe.co (New York, NY) – $50M Series B; CTV ad platform.
Alvys (Solana Beach, CA) – $40M Series B; AI-powered TMS for freight.
Leo Cancer Care (Middleton, WI) – $40M; upright radiotherapy devices.
Yup (Jakarta, Indonesia) – $32M Series C-1; digital banking.
Alex (San Francisco, CA) – $20M; AI agents for interviews.
🚀 Series A
Lexroom (Milan, Italy) – $19M Series A; gen-AI for legal workflows.
Zania (San Francisco, CA) – $18M Series A; agentic AI for security GRC.
Umony (London, UK) – $15M Series A; AI comms compliance for FS.
Qovery (Paris, France) – $13M Series A; automates DevOps.
Neura Health (New York, NY) – $11.4M Series A; virtual neurology clinic.
Reveni (Madrid, Spain) – €7.5M Series A; logistics dashboard.
🌱 Seed & Early Rounds
Flying Tulip (Global/Onchain) – $200M Seed; Brevan Howard Digital, Susquehanna Crypto, CoinFund; onchain exchange.
Gain (Tel Aviv, Israel) – $12M Seed; AI employees for hire.
True Labs (Hong Kong) – $10M Seed; AI-first decentralized exchange.
NoBACZ Healthcare (Cambridge, UK) – £4.8M; livestock wound care.
Hospitable (San Francisco, CA) – $1.5M; property management SaaS.
FLIZpay (Berlin, Germany) – $1M Pre-Seed; mobile payments.
Aspyr Living (Fort Lauderdale, FL) – $250K (of $3M Seed); natural lifestyle products.
Joiner (Vilnius, Lithuania) – €500K Angel; social friend-making app.
🤝 Strategic, M&A & Undisclosed
Fiserv (Milwaukee, WI) acquired StoneCastle Cash Management (NYC); insured deposit platform.
Natus Medical (Middleton, WI) bought minority of Holberg EEG (Bergen, Norway); AI EEG interpretation.
ActiveComply (Orlando, FL) – undisclosed investment from Level Equity; digital comms compliance.
Aarvik Therapeutics (Hayward, CA) – undisclosed Series Seed 2; ADC oncology.
Black Forest Labs (Germany) – in talks to raise $200M–$300M at $4B valuation; AI image partner to Meta.
Toyota launched Woven Capital Fund II; strategic CVC expansion.
💸 VC Funds Raised & Raising
Notion Capital (London, UK) – $130M Growth Fund; B2B SaaS/fintech.
Boost VC (San Mateo, CA) – $87M Fund 4; frontier tech.
Jolt Capital V – €260M anchor investment from EIF; European growth equity.
Woven Capital Fund II (Toyota) – undisclosed.
Founders: Want to be featured on @tradedvc? → traded.co/submit/vc
📚 Read of the Day
🛒 ChatGPT Kicks Off the Era of AI Shopping Agents
Chatbots are no longer just answering questions — they’re buying on your behalf.
OpenAI just launched a shopping system powered by ChatGPT that can automatically search, compare, and purchase items for users — a move set to fundamentally change e-commerce. Instead of browsing manually, users can hand over their intent and let the agent handle transactions. Analysts say this could rival Amazon and Google in online retail.
🧑🍳 The Product Pitch
The system goes beyond recommendations: it acts as a fully autonomous shopping agent, making purchase decisions and completing checkouts based on user prompts.
🚀 The Strategy
By embedding commerce into AI chat, OpenAI positions ChatGPT as not just a productivity tool but also a direct competitor in retail infrastructure — potentially reducing reliance on Amazon search or Google Shopping ads.
💡 Why It Matters
For founders: the agentic era is here. Shopping, bookings, and transactions are being re-routed from web interfaces to conversational AI. For investors: this could open new moats around payments, trust, and personalization, while shaking incumbents that rely on ad-driven discovery.
📰 News You Don’t Want To Miss
@tradedvc posts on 🔥
OVER AND OUT, BACK TO THE GRIND ⚙️
Want more content? We don’t blame you. You can find more TradedVC content on Instagram, LinkedIn, X, and at traded.co/vc✌️
More News
View All
