Enterprise Weekly #523: Cognition Rescues Windsurfers, Claude Hits Wall Street, and More
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Late last Friday news dropped that OpenAI’s deal to buy Windsurf was off. Not only did the deal fall apart, but Google hired its founders and key R&D employees to join the DeepMind team. This understandably set off a firestorm of questions on the destiny of Windsurf and the employees who were not on the same boat to join Google and criticism of the founders and investors for leaving what’s left of Windsurf high and dry.
But then on Monday, in another twist of fate, Cognition acquired the remainder of Windsurf. While the deal makes sense (and seems quite brilliant) for Cognition’s AI engineer and Windsurf’s IDE working together as technology complements (in addition to the huge ARR boost it gives their business), it’s also a saving grace for making the Windsurf employees whole and opens up even further questions on the startup employee social contract – wherein employees take risks in joining fledgling startups for the meaningful work and upside, and the expectation is that founders will take care of the people betting their careers on them in the event of an extremely large exit.
This all underscores how we are operating in a much different time and the race to win in AI is bucking any previously accepted norms around hiring and acquiring, and also firing. As Coldplay put it, “Nobody said it was easy. No one ever said it would be this hard. Oh, take me back to the start.”
Alongside the talent wars this week was Anthropic’s first shot at an industry-specific solution with the launch of Claude for Financial Services, which is designed to help finance professionals analyze markets, conduct research, and make investment decisions. It’s a big step, but as Jon Lehr on our team learned from talking to finserv leaders in the space: “useful but not groundbreaking (yet)”.
📚 Read more news:
NYTimes: How Nvidia’s Jensen Huang Persuaded Trump to Sell A.I. Chips to China
Newcomer: Windsurf’s Double Deal Marks a New Frontier for M&A
Bloomberg: Scale AI to Cut 14% of Staff Following Meta Investment
Harvard Business Review: How AI Is Redefining Managerial Roles
🧵 Read more threads:
Company: Paratus
Role: Founding Engineer
Technology: Work management platform for defense
Funding: Stealth 👀
🌟 Company of the Week 🌟
Helios raises $4M led by Unusual Ventures
Future of Work - Seed - New York, NY
Co-Founders: Joe Scheidler, Joseph Farsakh
Opper raises $3M led by Luminar Ventures
Infrastructure / Dev Tools • Pre-Seed • Stockholm, Sweden
Covenant raises $4M led by Flybridge Capital Partners
Future of Work • Seed • New York, NY
ProductNow raises $6M led by Sierra Ventures
Collaboration / Productivity • Seed • Palo Alto, CA
Callidus Legal AI raises $10M led by Cervin Ventures
Future of Work • Venture • San Francisco, CA
Collate raises $10M led by Venrock
Data / AI / Machine Learning • Series A • Saratoga, CA
IntuigenceAI raises $10M led by Innovation Endeavors
Future of Work • Seed • Berkeley, CA
Cogent Security raises $11M led by Greylock Partners
Risk / Security • Seed • Alexandria, VA
Empirical Security raises $12M led by Costanoa Ventures
Risk / Security • Seed • Chicago, IL
ParadeDB raises $12M led by Craft Ventures
Infrastructure / Dev Tools • Series A • New York, NY
Rwazi raises $12M led by Bonfire Ventures
Sales / Marketing • Series A • Los Angeles, CA
SuperAnnotate raises $13M led by Dell Technologies Capital
Data / AI / Machine Learning • Series B • San Francisco, CA
Zip Security raises $13.5M led by Ballistic Ventures
Risk / Security • Series A • New York, NY
Heka Global raises $14M led by Windare Ventures
Risk / Security • Series A • New York, NY
Ordio raises $14M led by 3VC
HR Tech • Series A • Cologne, Germany
Murphy raises $15M led by Northzone
Future of Work • Pre-Seed & Seed • Barcelona, Spain
Tavrn raises $15M led by Left Lane Capital
Future of Work • Series A • San Francisco, CA
Heron raises $16M led by Insight Partners
Collaboration / Productivity • Series A • New York, NY
Foundation EGI raises $23M led by Translink Capital
Collaboration / Productivity • Series A • Los Altos, CA
iCounter raises $30M led by SYN Ventures
Risk / Security • Series A • Dallas, TX
NetBox Labs raises $35M led by NGP Capital
Infrastructure / Dev Tools • Series B • New York, NY
Unify raises $40M led by Battery Ventures
Sales / Marketing • Series B • San Francisco, CA
Spacelift raises $51M led by Five Elms Capital
Infrastructure / Dev Tools • Series C • Redwood City, CA
Exein raises $81.2M led by Balderton
Risk / Security • Series C • Rome, Italy
Island raises $250M led by Coatue Management
Risk / Security • Series E • Dallas, TX
Thinking Machines Lab raises $2B led by Andreessen Horowitz
Data / AI / Machine Learning • Seed • San Francisco, CA
Cognition acquires Windsurf for an Undisclosed Amount
Infrastructure / Dev Tools • Acquisition • New York, NY
Meta acquires Play AI for an Undisclosed Amount
Data / AI / Machine Learning • Acquisition • Palo Alto, CA