Stripe CEO Says AI Startups Are Growing Faster Than SaaS – AI isn’t just another software 🌊🧠 Raises

For those that are new around here, this is an extension of my weekly newsletter where I highlight new and innovative AI products that are worth exploring.

Hey hey!

Happy Wednesday!

Here’s your news in newsletter!

Riding off the high of yesterday’s catchup recap, Today’s News issue covers the news from the past week, so it’ll be short and sweet.

In this Issue:

• Your Weekly Industry News Recap

• Investors; We need to talk

• The Raise Recap

• The AI Debate: What’s Next?

The Headliner: AI startups are growing even faster than SaaS ever did 🤯📢📰

Stripe’s CEO says AI startups are growing even faster than SaaS ever did—and dismissing them as just “wrappers” is a huge mistake. 🚀📈 Unlike traditional software, AI companies are scaling at breakneck speed, thanks to massive demand and evolving infrastructure. The key takeaway? AI isn’t just another tech trend—it’s a full-blown revolution, and businesses that don’t adapt will be left behind. ⚡🤖 Read more: Link

Your Weekly Industry News Recap

• Mira Murati Launches New AI Startup – OpenAI’s former CTO is making moves—her new venture, Thinking Machine Labs, is already making waves. 🌊🚀 Read more: Link

• Stripe CEO Says AI Startups Are Growing Faster Than SaaS – AI isn’t just another software wave—it’s a hyper-growth revolution. 📈🔥 Read more: Link

• Gender Pay Gap Gets an AI Solution – EvenBetter AI just launched a tool to track and reduce gender-based pay disparities. 🏢 Read more: Link

• Healthcare AI Users Want More From Their Tools – A new survey reveals that AI in healthcare still isn’t living up to its full potential. 🏥📉 Read more: Link

• Accounting Hasn’t Fully Embraced AI Yet – The financial industry is slow to adopt AI, but Quanta just raised $4.7M to change that. 📊💡 Read more: Link

• Decentralized AI is the Future of the Internet? – The push for a decentralized AI web is growing—can it work, or is it just hype? 🌐🤖 Read more: Link

• Meet the Founder Behind 24 AI Startups – A Norwegian entrepreneur just launched 24 AI startups at once—is this genius or chaos? 🤯🚀 Read more: Link

• Microsoft Deploys Thousands of AI Agents – AI is running inside and outside Microsoft, changing how enterprises operate. 🏢🤖 Read more: Link

• Amazon’s GenAI Alexa Just Got Smarter – Alexa can now carry out deeper conversations, make smarter suggestions, and even detect emotions. 🏡🗣️ Read more: Link

Investors; We Need To Talk…

Over the past year of reporting on AI, We’ve watched astronomic valuations get slapped on startups building foundational infrastructure—chipsets, core models, and research labs. But here’s the thing: we’re in a sandbox era, where everyone’s experimenting, and the real winners won’t be the ones selling the newest iteration of the shovel. They’ll be the ones digging up value that people actually use. We’re in an exploratory phase that I like to call the sandbox era! What does this mean for investors? It means your chips might want to be balanced across a few positions. Which ones? Read the whole article on the state of funding for the AI space.

The Raise Recap 📈💰 

• Blackbird Vaults AI Secures $5M – This Aussie startup is shaking up cybersecurity with AI-driven data protection. Their $5M seed round will fuel enterprise security innovation. 🔐💡 Read more: Link

• India’s AI Fund Targets $150M – India is going big on AI, launching a massive $150M fund to back homegrown AI startups. 🇮🇳💰 Read more: Link

• Amazon Releases GenAI Alexa – Alexa just got a major AI upgrade, with generative AI making it more conversational than ever. 🗣️🤖 Read more: Link

• Chinese AI Startup Zhipu Raises $140M – China’s AI boom continues! Zhipu lands $140M to expand its LLM-powered offerings. 🇨🇳🤖 Read more: Link

• Snowflake Expands AI Investment to $200M – The data cloud giant is pouring $200M into AI-driven enterprise tools, doubling down on AI's future. ☁️📊 Read more: Link

• Microsoft Invests in AI Cloud Backup with Veeam – Microsoft is doubling down on AI-driven cloud storage with a fresh investment in Veeam. ☁️🔍 Read more: Link

• Taktile Secures Funding to Make AI in Finance Safer – AI-powered decision-making in finance needs guardrails—Taktile just raised millions to help. ⚖️📈 Read more: Link.

• SoftBank’s Masayoshi Son Bets Big on AI – The billionaire CEO is borrowing heavily to invest in AI—can this strategy pay off? 🏦💰 Read more: Link

• AI-Powered Finance Workforce is Here – Unique AI raises $30M to develop AI-powered banking and finance automation. 💳🤖 Read more: Link

🔥 The AI Debate: What’s Next?👀

Bold predictions, ethical concerns, and industry shakeups

Due to popular demand, I’m cooking up a recap of the complexities surrounding AI so to get everyone up to pace on what’s been moving. This will probably take a little longer than I’d like to write, but bear with me. It’s coming!

• Do AI Model Releases Even Matter Anymore? – With new models launching every other week, should we even care about who’s next? 🤔💭 Read more: Link

• Is Agentic AI the Future of Security? – Borneo AI just launched always-on AI security agents—can we trust them? 🔐🤖 Read more: Link

Stay well, and see you next week!

-✌🏽 Sam