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🕶️ From Counterterrorism to Campaigns

🕶️ From Counterterrorism to Campaigns

Startups Wanted Change; Now They Want Control

Paula Echeverria
May 31, 2025

Sponsored by

From AI policy pivots to billion-dollar raises, this week’s news shows just how tightly innovation, politics, and power are now intertwined. Palantir is reportedly back in Trump’s orbit, Elon Musk has exited his government role over a tax clash, and Sam Altman is rethinking his stance on AI regulation. Meanwhile, Builder.ai’s collapse is raising serious questions about “AI washing” and investor hype.

We’re also tracking big moves in venture funding, global talent policy, and why some startups are rethinking Delaware.

Here's what you need to know.

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Ten bullets of updates

📉 Carta chaos escalates. CEO accused of sexism after exec disavows internal email that implied women quit due to family duties.
🧠 Trump visa plans spark brain drain fears. New admin may tighten rules for foreign students, threatening the U.S. startup pipeline built on global talent.
🏆 VivaTech reveals top 30 startups .This year’s Innovation of the Year contenders include AI copilots, carbon-capturing drones, and even brain-computer tech.
💬 5 words to find love? New dating app Lovejack ditches swipes for simplicity, matching users based on five self-chosen words. Minimalist matchmaking is in.
📹 Still not on YouTube? A new guide lays out 6 reasons every business should start a channel, from SEO gains to building trust at scale. Miss it, miss out.
🧪 Musk, meds & MAGA. NYT reports Elon Musk used ketamine and LSD during Trump-era White House talks. The billionaire dismissed concerns as a smear campaign.
🤖 Can AI be your co-founder? A new piece asks if AI can fully automate entrepreneurship. Spoiler: it’s getting closer, but vision still isn’t programmable.
📖 Storytelling = Startup superpower. These 10 strategies help founders craft narratives that stick, sell, and scale. Because great products don’t pitch themselves.
🧬 Bioprinted organs in 10 years? Scientists say lab-grown human organs could be ready within a decade, with 3D bioprinting pushing medical sci-fi into startup reality.
📍 LatAm startups ditch Delaware? Some giants like Mercado Libre are moving away from Delaware, but experts say most founders should think twice before following suit.

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🕵️‍♂️ Palantir Helped Trump Target Voters — And Might Do It Again

Palantir, the once-secretive startup backed by Peter Thiel and the CIA, is reportedly in talks to work with Donald Trump again, this time to help power voter profiling and outreach. Known for its military-grade surveillance software, Palantir has long operated in the shadows of national security. Now, those same tools may be used to identify, track, and influence American voters.

According to The New York Times, Palantir executives have discussed offering their software to Trump's political operation, signaling a new phase in the company's shift from counterterrorism to domestic campaigning. The idea of targeting citizens with the same infrastructure built to hunt terrorists is already raising civil liberties alarms.

For the startup world, it’s a vivid example of mission drift at scale. When your product is built to map human behavior, the market doesn’t stop at defense; it stretches into politics, policing, and persuasion.

Palantir didn’t pivot. The world did.

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How Billionaires Quietly Replaced Governments

When a billionaire controls internet access and walks away from the government over a tax bill, we’re not in startup land anymore — we’re deep in the power game.

Elon Musk just announced his exit from a U.S. government advisory role after breaking with Trump on tax policy, but his influence still runs wide: from Starlink’s role in war zones to reshaping public discourse on X. In this video, we dig into how tech’s top founders have become global power players and what that means for democracy, innovation, and everything in between.

🕶️ Subscribe for more videos 🕶️

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Top investors are buying this “unlisted” stock

When the team that co-founded Zillow and grew it into a $16B real estate leader starts a new company, investors notice. That’s why top firms like SoftBank invested in Pacaso.

Disrupting the real estate industry once again, Pacaso’s streamlined platform offers co-ownership of premier properties – revamping a $1.3T market.

By handing keys to 2,000+ happy homeowners, Pacaso has already made $110m+ in gross profits.

Now, after 41% gross profit growth last year, they recently reserved the Nasdaq ticker PCSO. But the real opportunity is now, at the unlisted stage.

Until May 29, you can join Pacaso as an investor for just $2.80/share.

Invest before the window closes.

_{This is a paid advertisement for Pacaso’s Regulation A offering. Please read the offering circular at}_{invest.pacaso.com}_{. Reserving a ticker symbol is not a guarantee that the company will go public. Listing on the NASDAQ is subject to approvals. Under Regulation A+, a company has the ability to change its share price by up to 20%, without requalifying the offering with the SEC.}

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These companies just raised money

💰 Grammarly grabs $1B. The AI writing giant just scored $1B in non-dilutive funding from General Catalyst, sidestepping dilution while doubling down on enterprise growth.
💼 Zeal Capital closes $82M Fund II. The VC firm backing inclusive fintech and future-of-work startups just locked in its second fund to scale impact-focused investing.
🏗️ Buildots raises $45M. The Israeli startup uses AI and hardhat-mounted cameras to track construction progress, aiming to keep big builds on time and on budget.
⚡ Tesla alums raise $38M. Heron Power, founded by ex-Tesla engineers, lands a Series A to modernize aging grid tech with faster, smarter switchgear.
🛂 Gale wants to fix visas with AI. The startup just raised $10.5M to automate immigration paperwork, starting with H-1B applications. Bureaucracy, meet your match.
🔌 Volteras goes big on EVs. Backed by $4.6M in seed funding, the startup wants to connect more electric vehicles than anyone else with its universal charging platform.
🧫 Alba Health raises $2.5M. The startup is betting on gut health as the next frontier, offering at-home microbiome testing to personalize nutrition and wellness.

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🧨 Builder.ai Imploded — Here’s Why It Matters

Photo by Bradyn Trollip on Unsplash

Builder.ai, a self-proclaimed AI-powered dev platform, raised nearly $450M from top firms before collapsing in spectacular fashion. As it turns out, their AI assistant “Natasha” wasn’t doing much of the heavy lifting: real humans were. And when the Financial Times revealed inflated revenue numbers and shady audits, the illusion fell apart fast.

This is clearly a warning sign. In a post-ChatGPT world, investors are chasing anything with “AI” on the label, and some startups are happy to sell that dream, even if the tech isn’t real. Just this year, the CEO of Nate was charged for using humans to fake AI shopping, and Amazon quietly shut down parts of its “Just Walk Out” stores that were supposedly fully automated.

Builder.ai’s downfall exposes a deeper problem: startups aren’t just building products. They’re building narratives. And sometimes, those narratives are more fiction than function.

We’ll be launching a video about this case soon. Stay tuned! 🍿

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Slidebean Revenue Data

Mistakes were made as we grew Slidebean, but those mistakes shaped the lessons that helped us thrive. The journey wasn’t just about surviving—it was about learning and evolving.

To give you an honest glimpse into what growth really looks like, we’re sharing our actual financial numbers from the formative years of Slidebean. Download them now and see the ups, downs, and everything in between that built the company we are today.

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🤖 Sam Altman’s “Oh Sh*t” Moment on AI Regulation

Sam Altman spent most of 2023 calling for strong AI regulation, even asking the U.S. Senate to act fast. But this week, Wired reported a quiet shift. Altman is now walking that back, partly because of one unexpected twist: Trump’s return to power.

Turns out, calling for regulation is easier when you like who’s in charge. As one source put it, OpenAI has become “acutely aware that a future administration might use regulation against them, not just to help society.” So Altman’s lobbying machine has pivoted: less “please regulate us,” more “actually, maybe let us cook.”

For startups building in AI, this is a huge mood shift. It signals that even the most idealistic players are hedging their bets, not just on tech, but on politics.

And it shows how quickly “responsible innovation” can turn into “strategic survival.”