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Scoop: Databricks is in advanced talks to buy Postgres startup Neon for about $1 billion, sources tell me Upstarts Media. The deal could go higher with employee retention. Paid subscribers just got the story and context in their inboxes. Join them 👇 upstartsmedia.com/p/scoop-databr…

SCOOP: Legal AI startup Legora (formerly Leya) is in talks to raise $85 million in funding at a $675 million valuation. General Catalyst and Iconiq are leading the deal. With Iain Martin forbes.com/sites/rashishr…

New: Meta is recruiting former national security officials to bolster its military ambitions, months after allowing its Llama AI model to be used for military use. forbes.com/sites/davidjea…

NEW: Shield AI is one of defense tech’s most hyped startups, largely thanks to its V-BAT drone. But last year, a grisly injury involving a U.S. service member threw the $5 billion company off course. forbes.com/sites/davidjea…

My latest: I talked to Abel Avellan, whose company AST SpaceMobile aims to use satellites to let you use your cell phone wherever you are--and to connect the over 2 billion people across the world who don't have regular internet access. forbes.com/sites/alexknap…

New: I chatted with Niantic CEO John Hanke and other company brass about the bombshell decision to sell off Pokemon Go and the rest of the games business and pivot to enterprise AI.  “It was like two bodies running a three-legged race,” one investor said. forbes.com/sites/richardn…

A metaverse startup that claims to have raised $3 billion, one of the year's largest rounds, is back after a rebrand with a pitch to buyout investors at a $18 billion valuation forbes.com/sites/phoebeli…

The Midas List returns for a 24th year. With only a handful of IPOs, and acquisitions, the big driver of changes to our ranking of the world's best VCs have been mega raises from startups like OpenAI & SpaceX Check out the full @forbes list for 2025 forbes.com/lists/midas/

We also profile Hemant Taneja who has built General Catalyst into one of the world’s largest venture funds but now plans to reshape it as a “strategic conglomerate”. Richard Nieva and @_iainmartin unpack what that means from buyouts, rollups and hospital MA. forbes.com/sites/iainmart…

For this year’s Midas List, we profiled Hemant Taneja and General Catalyst, which has been stretching the scope of its VC firm so far that it’s buying a hospital and cofounding AI companies. With Iain Martin forbes.com/sites/iainmart…

For our Midas Seed list, I profiled Satya Patel of Homebrew. Chris Britt, CEO of IPO-bound Chime, says he walks the “fine line” of knowing when to push and let founders “do our thing.” forbes.com/sites/richardn…

New: As Scale and Meta finalize their deal, OpenAI, one of Scale’s most prominent customers, has already been working for months to wind down its business with Scale and is vetting new partners, sources told Forbes. forbes.com/sites/richardn…

Scoop: Dalton Caldwell and Paul Buchheit, two long-tenured Y combinator partners, are leaving the firm to start their own Series A fund. forbes.com/sites/richardn…

New- Last night Meta announced its mega $14B investment in Scale AI. But there's more to the deal: Meta could spend the majority of its annual AI budget on Scale over the next five years — a provision worth hundreds of millions in revenue for Scale. forbes.com/sites/davidjea…

Exclusive: Browserbase is releasing Director, a new tool for non-developers to set up automations to retrieve data across the web and use it with AI agents. The startup has also raised $40M in a Series B funding round led by Notable Capital, increasing its valuation to $300M.

In a world where AI search engines hoard eyeballs, traditional SEO is no longer going to cut it. A crop of startups have emerged that aim to help businesses get cited in answers generated by ChatGPT, Gemini and Perplexity. forbes.com/sites/rashishr…

New: After Scale’s deal with Meta, Uber is making a push by expanding the services of the data labeling unit it launched late last year. “We do see an opportunity to build this into a meaningful business line for Uber,” the unit’s GM told Forbes. forbes.com/sites/richardn…

OpenEvidence, an AI search tool that's already used by 40% of doctors in the U.S., has raised $210 million led by GV and Kleiner Perkins at a $3.5 billion. That investment makes CEO Daniel Nadler a billionaire by Forbes estimates. With Amy Feldman. forbes.com/sites/amyfeldm…

I wrote about layoffs due to AI & automation. Fiverr’s CEO, who sent a memo to employees about AI coming for jobs, told me he wrote it after hearing chatter around the office. "I felt like this needed validation from me — that they aren’t imagining stuff." forbes.com/sites/richardn…

Scoop: Cognition is in talks to raise north of $300M at a valuation of $10B, more than doubling its value from March. The startup had just announced its acquisition of Windsurf after its founders joined Google. With Rashi Shrivastava and Iain Martin forbes.com/sites/richardn…