Confirmed developments

The late-February picture remains dominated by AI-scale capital and investor repositioning, alongside steady activity in climate and infrastructure-adjacent areas. TechCrunch’s historical tally underscores how normalized nine-figure AI rounds have become: in 2024, it counted 49 U.S. AI startups raising rounds of $100 million or more, including seven rounds at $1 billion or larger. TechCrunch also reported that the AI industry “didn’t slow down” in 2025, while fewer companies raised rounds larger than $1 billion than in 2024, suggesting that very largest checks may have become somewhat less frequent even as overall AI fundraising stayed active.

In venture fund formation and strategy, VentureBurn reported that San Francisco-based Paradigm is raising $1.5 billion to invest in artificial intelligence, robotics, and other emerging technologies. The same report said Paradigm expects to continue backing crypto projects while investing beyond crypto, and that it worked with OpenAI to launch “EVMbench,” described as a tool to evaluate whether machine-learning models can spot flaws in smart contracts. The details indicate ongoing experimentation at the intersection of AI and blockchain tooling, paired with a broader mandate that reaches beyond Paradigm’s historical association with crypto.