AI and Energy Startups Secure Massive VC Funding
Venture capital investment continues to pour into AI and energy startups, with several firms announcing major funding rounds. Recent highlights include AI company Anthropic raising a Series G at a $380 billion valuation, humanoid robotics firm Apptronik securing $520 million, and fusion energy startup Inertia raising a $450 million Series A. AI-focused startups reportedly captured 52.7% of all global venture capital in 2025.
- Anthropic's $30 billion Series G was led by GIC and Coatue and follows earlier strategic investments from corporate backers including Google and Amazon. The company, founded by former OpenAI employees in 2021, now has a run-rate revenue exceeding $14 billion. - Fusion startup Inertia was founded in 2024 to commercialize the laser-based fusion technology pioneered at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL), which first achieved a net energy gain in 2022. Its Series A was led by Bessemer Venture Partners with participation from GV (formerly Google Ventures). - Apptronik's funding is an extension of its Series A, bringing the total round to over $935 million. The company has established commercial partnerships with Mercedes-Benz and GXO Logistics and a strategic partnership with Google DeepMind to advance its humanoid robots. - The broader humanoid robotics sector experienced a funding surge in 2025, with startups raising $6.1 billion, a more than 300% increase in deal value compared to the previous year. - While AI startups captured a record $192.7 billion in 2025, this has created a "funding drought" for startups outside the AI sector, where the number of funded ventures has fallen to its lowest point in years. - Overall venture capital for energy technology startups actually declined for the third consecutive year in 2025 to $27 billion, partly due to intense competition for capital from AI companies. However, the massive power requirements of AI data centers are in turn driving investment into specific energy sub-sectors like fusion and grid modernization. - Inertia's leadership team includes co-founders Dr. Annie Kritcher, who was the lead physicist for LLNL's 2022 fusion ignition experiment, and Jeff Lawson, the former founder and CEO of Twilio. - To place the energy investment in context, Inertia's $450 million Series A is a significant outlier compared to the median pre-money valuation for an AI startup's Series A round in 2025, which stood at $84 million.
