The 11 standout startups from YC’s Demo Day, according to VCs
TechCrunch spoke to investors to find the hottest startups in the Spring 2026 YC batch. Some of them commanded valuations of over $175 million, VCs said.
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AI | Fundraising | Startups
AI inference startup Baseten reportedly raising $1.5B months after its last mega-round
Startup Baseten is reportedly close to finalizing a $1.5 billion round at a $13 billion as the “inference gold rush” marches on.
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AI | Enterprise | Startups
Source: Elastic agrees to buy CRV-backed Deductive AI for up to $85M
Deductive AI, a startup that uses AI to catch and resolve bugs in software, was founded just three years ago.
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Every fusion startup that has raised over $100M
Fusion startups have raised $7.1 billion to date, with the majority of it going to a handful of companies.
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He made your free video player run smoothly. Now he’s doing that for robots.
French serial entrepreneur and open source legend Jean-Baptiste Kempf has been building Kyber, an infrastructure layer to control remote devices in real time.
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Founders Fund’s outlier bet on humanely killed fish
Shinkei makes a refrigerator-sized robot called Poseidon to kill fish quickly and humanely.
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Ethan Thornton is trying to do everything all at once
Mach’s approach differs sharply from some of its peers.
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AI | Fundraising | Startups | Venture
The founder conference built for growth: TechCrunch Founder Summit pass rates increase June 26
Save up to $190 on your pass to TechCrunch Founder Summit 2026 by June 26, 11:59 p.m. PT. Designed for founders first on November 4 in Boston. Register today.
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WhatsApp gets new chief as Meta taps India’s CRED founder Kunal Shah and invests $900M in startup
WhatsApp gets a new boss, as Will Cathcart moves to a new role at Meta, while Shah steps down as CEO of Indian fintech giant CRED to replace Cathcart.
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AI chipmaker Groq confirms $650M raise, re-staffs after Nvidia’s $20B not-acqui-hire deal
What does an AI company do after one of those not-acqui-hire deals? Groq raised money, is leaning into its neocloud business, and is hiring new execs.
