Private Markets: Crusoe raises $1.375B at valuation above $10B

Crusoe, which dubs itself “the AI factory company,” announced the closing of its $1.375B Series E round, bringing the company’s expected valuation to over $10B.

This week’s private company news:

• Prediction market Kalshi is receiving funding offers from venture capital investors that would value the startup at more than $10B, according to people familiar with the matter, Bloomberg’s Kate Clark and Lydia Beyoud report. The interest comes just weeks after Kalshi announced a $300M funding round at a $5B valuation. Investors have been eager to back the fast-growing startup, and have discussed funding the company at valuations ranging from $10B to $12B or higher, according to the people.
• Genspark is in talks to raise over $200M at a valuation of over $1B in a new funding round, sources told Forbes‘ Anna Tong. The fundraising comes months after the AI agent startup closed a $100M series A round valuing the company at $530M, the report noted.

Some of the biggest capital raises by private companies this week include: 

• Crusoe – The AI factory company announced the initial closing of its anticipated $1.375B Series E round, bringing the company’s expected valuation to over $10B. The oversubscribed round was co-led by technology investors Valor Equity Partners and Mubadala Capital, with participation from 137 Ventures, 1789 Capital, Activate Capital, Altimeter Capital, Atreides Management, BAM Elevate, DPR Construction, Ora Global, Fidelity Management & Research Company, Founders Fund, Franklin Templeton, Galvanize, Long Journey Ventures, Lowercarbon Capital, M37 Management, MCJ, NVIDIA (NVDA), Radical Ventures, Ribbit Capital, Salesforce Ventures, Saquon Barkley, Spark Capital, StepStone Group, Supermicro, T. Rowe Price, Tiger Global Management, Upper90, Winklevoss Capital, and Zigg Capital.
• Stoke Space – The space technology company has raised $510M in Series D funding, supporting the first launch of Stoke’s reusable Nova rocket. The round was led by Thomas Tull’s USIT, or US Innovative Technology Fund. Publicly traded companies in the space include Rocket Lab (RKLB), Astra Space (ASTR), and Lockheed Martin (LMT).
• Avride Secures – The developer of autonomous driving technologies announced it secured strategic investments and commercial commitments from Uber (UBER) and Nebius Group (NBIS). The transaction totals up to $375M.
• Peregrine Energy Solutions – The developer and operator of utility-scale battery storage raised an additional $130M in new capital from a consortium of investors, such as the Ministry of Environment of South Korea, IMM Investment, Woori Private Equity Asset Management and funds managed by AB CarVal. Publicly traded companies in the space include Fluence Energy (FLNC), ESS Tech (GWH), and AES Corp. (AES).
• Tensec – The fintech startup focused on providing cross-border financial services said it secured a strategic $60M credit facility with Upper90 Capital Management. Publicly traded companies in the space include PayPal (PYPL) and FIS (FIS).

Unicorns to watch this week:

• n8n – The company, which describes itself as an AI workflow orchestration / automation platform, has recently raised $180M in a Series C round, valuing the company at $2.5B. Publicly traded companies in the space include UiPath (PATH), ServiceNow (NOW), and Pegasystems (PEGA).
• OpenEvidence – The AI startup focused on medical assistant tools for doctors has an estimated valuation of $6B after raising $200M in Series C financing. Publicly traded companies in the space include Doximity (DOCS), Cerner (ORCL), and IBM (IBM).
• Lovable – The startup offering an AI-powered “vibe-coding” platform that enables users with little or no technical background to build apps and websites via natural language raised back in July $200M in a Series A round that valued it at $1.8B. Publicly traded companies in the space include Appian (APPN), Pegasystems (PEGA), and ServiceNow (NOW).
• Statsig – With a valuation of about $1.08B, the product experimentation platform achieved unicorn status via a $100M Series C in May. Publicly traded companies in the space Amplitude (AMPL).
• Chaos Industries – The defense tech / national security startup building advanced detection, radar, monitoring and communications systems is valued at about $2B after securing $275M in Series C funding this year. Publicly traded companies in the space include L3Harris Technologies (LHX) and Northrop Grumman (NOC).

IPOs to watch: 

• Evommune (EVMN) – The clinical-stage biotechnology company developing innovative therapies that target key drivers of chronic inflammatory diseases has filed for an initial public offering and applied to list its common stock on the New York Stock Exchange.
• Central Bancompany (CBC) – The company announced its filing of a registration statement on Form S-1 with the Securities and Exchange Commission relating to a proposed initial public offering of shares of its Class A common stock. In connection with the proposed initial public offering, the Board of Directors of Central Bancompany approved a 50-for-1 stock split in the form of a stock dividend, whereby each shareholder of record as of the October 20 record date will receive 49 shares of Class A common stock for each share owned as of the record date.
• Ethos (LIFE) – The life insurance technology company announced that it filed a registration statement on Form S-1 with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission relating to a proposed initial public offering of its Class A common stock. The number of shares to be offered and the price range for the proposed offering have not yet been determined.
• Lendbuzz (LBZZ) – The company is offering an undetermined number of shares of its common stock and the selling stockholders identified in this prospectus are offering additional shares of common stock, according to an initial public offering prospectus filed with the SEC.
• Sea Forrest International (SFTI) – The company has filed for an initial public offering of 3.75M Class A shares and anticipates that the initial public offering price of the Class A shares will be between $4.00 and $4.50 per share.

“Private Markets” is The Fly’s recurring series of stories on the latest moves in the private sector, largest unicorn companies and initial public offerings to watch. Fly subscribers, add $PRIVATE to your portfolio for alerts on breaking news in the startup and venture capital space.