School Bus Startup Zum Eyes IPO as Market Broadens

Midjourney, the AI lab known for image and video generation, has acquired Co-Star, an astrology app. The acquisition marks Midjourney's expansion beyond its core generative AI offerings into consumer applications. The deal signals the company's strategy to diversify its product portfolio beyond creative tools.

AegisAI, a startup founded by former Google security executives, raised $36 million in Series A funding led by Battery Ventures, bringing its total funding to $49 million. The company focuses on defending against AI-driven spear phishing attacks. The funding reflects growing enterprise concern about sophisticated phishing threats powered by generative AI.

Etched, a startup founded by three Harvard dropouts, has raised funding at a $10.3 billion valuation by developing chips and memory components designed to accelerate AI model inference without requiring GPUs. The company claims its hardware can speed up inference across any AI model. The funding round attracted backing from major investors, signaling confidence in the alternative chip approach to AI acceleration.

Sierra, the AI customer support startup led by Bret Taylor, is acquiring Takeoff, a three-person startup founded by Aakash Thumaty that builds agents capable of handling extended tasks. Takeoff was generating nearly $10 million in annualized revenue one year after its founding and had raised $15 million from Matrix and venture capitalist Lachy Groom. The acquisition allows Sierra to expand beyond customer support into broader agent applications, leveraging Thumaty's expertise in building long-running autonomous systems.