🕶️ $91B raised, but everyone’s still broke

Seven bullets of updates

1. 🚀 OpenAI is in talks to acquire AI coding assistant Windsurf for $3B, despite Cursor's $200M ARR advantage.

2. 📉 X's U.K. revenues plummeted over 60% post-Musk takeover, with ad concerns cited as the main culprit.

3. 🚫 Nvidia’s H20 chip exports now require a U.S. license, impacting $5 billion in annual sales.

4. ⚖️ FTC vs Meta: The trial could force Meta to divest Instagram and WhatsApp, affecting 80% of its U.S. market share.

5. 🤖 Simular's AI agent beats OpenAI’s Operator by 2.5% on OSWorld by switching between multiple models.

6. 📊 Steve Hasker, CEO of Thomson Reuters, is betting big on AI to transform workflows—90% of revenue is now beyond news.

7. 🚕 BluSmart halts service amid probe; India’s EV cab startup hit $98M ARR in 2024 before founders stepped down.

✦

91 billion shades of delusion

Startups pulled in a whopping $91.5 billion in venture capital in Q1 2025 — an 18.5% bump from the previous quarter and the second-highest tally in a decade. But don’t let the headline number fool you: nearly half of that came from one company (hi, OpenAI), and another 27% was soaked up by a handful of unicorns like Anthropic and Isomorphic Labs. According to PitchBook’s Kyle Stanford, the dealmaking may look hot, but investor sentiment is ice-cold. Why? Hopes for a booming 2025 IPO season have fizzled thanks to market volatility, recession fears, and President Trump’s tariff drama. With Klarna and Hinge already tapping the IPO brakes, liquidity isn’t just drying up — it’s evaporating.

For many startups, this funding surge masks a brewing storm. With dreams of big exits dashed, founders may have to swallow down rounds or sell at steep discounts. A lot of them are surviving on razor-thin margins after years of inflated valuations and cost-cutting, but if the economy tips into recession, even that thread might snap. The “ZIRP survivors” of 2022 who limped through with hope for 2025 may now be heading toward fire sales or shutdowns. As Stanford bluntly puts it: the liquidity everyone was banking on isn’t coming — and the startup reckoning might just be getting started. Read more.

✦

Your bank balance is a lie (and here's how they do it)

✦

✦

These companies just raised money

1. 📦 Hammerspace raises $100M at a $500M valuation to enhance AI data strategies, backed by Altimeter.

2. 🎬 Capsule lands $12M to level up its AI video editor with real-time collaboration and smart brand suggestions.

3. 📈 Deck scores $12M to AI-automate data access—up 120% in connections with just 30 employees.

4. 🗣️ Former YC startup Telli raises $3.6M pre-seed for AI voice agents, boasting 50% monthly revenue growth.

5. 🧵 Graze raises $1M to simplify Bluesky feed-building, now powering 4,500 feeds for 3,000 users with ad options.

✦

OpenAI’s A-SWE: now hiring to replace you

OpenAI is developing A-SWE, an AI agent that can build apps, run tests, fix bugs, and even write documentation — basically doing all the things software engineers hate to do. CFO Sarah Friar says it goes beyond code suggestions, acting like a fully autonomous dev. It’s the third in OpenAI’s growing lineup of specialized agents, following Operator and Deep Research.

This push comes as tech leaders like Google, Meta, and Amazon predict AI will soon handle most coding tasks. While past attempts like Cognition’s Devin struggled, OpenAI’s $300B valuation and recent $40B raise suggest serious momentum. As Sam Altman put it: maybe we just need fewer engineers — and better prompts.

✦

Startup Events and Deadlines

1. Crash Course in Startup Fundraising | April 23 | Online

2. Crash Course in Financial Modeling | April 24 | Online

3. Startup Grind Conference 2025 | April 19-30 | USA

4. Entrepreneurs Roundtable Accelerator | Deadline: April 28 | USA

5. Startup Battlefield 200 | Deadline: June 9 | Global

6. Entrepreneur First London - Summer | Deadline: July 1 | UK

✦