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A Hong Kong PE Firm's $1.5bn Bet on AI and Chips Defies Market Jitters

Hermitage Capital is deploying a cross-border fund into frontier tech at a moment when most investors are pulling back from volatile sectors.

By Priya Nair·Oct 10, 2026·6 min read
Startups

A $320 Million Bet That Silicon Valley Has Tunnel Vision

Endeavor Catalyst closes its fifth fund to back high-growth founders in markets the Bay Area barely watches, with half of all profits flowin…

Arjun S. Mehta ·   · 5m
Startups

Samsung Memory Profits Surge Nine-Fold as AI Chip Demand Reshapes Bonus Payouts

The Seoul giant's third-quarter operating profit climbed to $80 billion, with memory workers set to receive 10.5% of unit profits as AI infr…

Mei-Lin Tan ·   · 5m
Startups

Why a DeepMind Veteran Is Building an AI Agent That Hires Humans

Shivani Poddar's Wajo enters a crowded personal-assistant market with virtual cards, human task delegation, and a pitch centred on privacy. …

Priya Nair ·   · 7m
Startups

Tokyo Electron Eyes ¥1 Trillion Operating Profit as Testing Complexity Lifts Pricing Power

Japan's chip toolmaker is tracking toward a 60 per cent profit jump, driven by sustained foundry investment and the rising value of advanced…

Kenji Watanabe ·   · 5m
Startups

Chinese Tech Groups Turn to Follow-On Deals to Fund AI Ambitions

Follow-on equity raises in Hong Kong hit USD 37.9 billion in H1 2026, surpassing IPOs for the first time in five years as AI infrastructure …

Wei Zhang ·   · 5m
Startups

Lambda Eyes $14.5 Billion Valuation as Anthropic Deal Drives GPU Cloud Ambitions

The San Francisco startup is raising up to $4 billion before a 2027 public debut, but 70 per cent of its order backlog rests on a single cli…

Linh T. Pham ·   · 5m
Startups

Anthropic Hands Early-Stage Companies a Year of Team Access and API Credits

The move expands the Claude for Startups programme with free premium seats and marketplace access, part of a broader push to embed AI into e…

Arjun S. Mehta ·   · 5m
Startups

Ghost Ships a Desktop Computer Designed to Run AI Agents Locally for $3,499

A 19-year-old founder and Andreessen Horowitz are betting that consumers will pay for dedicated hardware to keep their personal AI data encr…

Arjun S. Mehta ·   · 4m
Startups

Etched Draws Bids Up to $50B Just Months After $21B Round

The AI chip startup's aggressive hardware push and early customer wins are fuelling another valuation leap, giving it ammunition for a costl…

Wei Zhang ·   · 6m
Startups

Five Startups Emerge from Pear VC's Latest Cohort

A chip designer promising to bypass traditional memory, a spatial AI model for 3D environments, and a privacy-first personal assistant stood…

Arjun S. Mehta ·   · 6m
StartupsExclusive

Asia's Largest AI Exits Went Through Exchanges. America's Went Through Acquirers

Asian exchanges set the price for AI hardware in the third quarter of 2026 while American acquirers bought the software. The two routes did …

Valerie Nguyen ·   · 10m
Startups

DeepWay Pivots to Licensing Model for European Electric Truck Push

The Baidu-backed startup plans to transfer assisted-driving technology to local partners rather than compete head-on with established Europe…

Priya Nair ·   · 5m
Startups

Why One Veteran OpenAI Safety Lead Walked Away

David Robinson spent three and a half years writing safety reports for major launches. His departure highlights a deeper question: can "move…

Mei-Lin Tan ·   · 6m
Startups

A Software Play for Satellites: Why This Founder Left SpaceX to Build AI Infrastructure in Orbit

Satlyt is betting that spacecraft operators will need a common platform for AI workloads before orbital data centres become reality…

Linh T. Pham ·   · 6m
Startups

Photon Bets Messaging Beats App Stores With $4.5M Seed

A San Francisco startup helping developers build agents that run on iMessage and WhatsApp has closed seed funding after 40,000 sign-ups and …

Kenji Watanabe ·   · 5m
Startups

Three Safety Researchers Exit OpenAI Over Alleged Information Mishandling

The departures follow internal investigation into sharing of sensitive data with external AI safety group, marking latest friction between t…

Hana Park ·   · 5m
Startups

Consumer AI Hits a Revenue Ceiling Despite Better Models

Subscription growth remains stubbornly linear while operating costs soar, pushing frontier labs toward enterprise contracts and forcing new …

Arjun S. Mehta ·   · 6m
Startups

OpenAI Holds Off Public Listing as Safety Framework Lags Behind Model Velocity

The $852 billion AI developer says it will remain private until governance mechanisms can keep pace with capability expansion, a stance that…

Marcus Halloran ·   · 7m
Startups

ElevenLabs Reaches $22 Billion in Employee Tender as Voice AI Valuations Surge

The New York and London voice synthesis company doubled its paper value in eight months through a $300 million secondary sale designed to ke…

Priya Nair ·   · 6m
Startups

Seed Checks Swell as Peak XV Backs Fewer Bets at Higher Ticket Sizes

The venture firm's latest Surge cohort reflects a structural shift in early-stage funding: larger capital commitments, more capital-hungry d…

Sofia M. Reyes ·   · 8m
Startups

Samsung Bets $1 Billion on AI Data Centre Play Through Helix Deal

Six affiliates of the South Korean conglomerate invest in KKR-backed infrastructure venture as the group looks beyond its core chip business…

Hana Park ·   · 5m
Startups

AMD Bets $8.2 Billion on World Models with World Labs Acquisition

The chipmaker's largest AI play yet brings Fei-Fei Li's spatial intelligence startup in-house as competition with Nvidia intensifies across …

Mei-Lin Tan ·   · 4m
Startups

OpenAI Seeks $30 Billion Pre-IPO Round at $1.4 Trillion Valuation

The ChatGPT maker pursues a record-breaking bridge round as revenue accelerates to $40 billion run-rate, while CEO Sam Altman delays public …

Linh T. Pham ·   · 5m
Startups

EliseAI Hits $4 Billion Valuation as Investors Double Down on Vertical AI

The housing and healthcare automation platform closed a $350 million round, signalling sustained appetite for AI tools that tackle specific …

Priya Nair ·   · 5m