Issue #45 • October 21, 2025
Hi Seedradar Squad! This week showcased the intense acceleration of AI into high-value, highly-regulated professional sectors. The top story saw OpenEvidence secure a monumental funding round, nearly doubling its valuation and cementing AI's role in diagnostics and research. Simultaneously, Anthropic made a huge leap for developers. This dual acceleration in professional AI and enterprise software is mirrored by a massive late-stage funding round for Upgrade, positioning the fintech giant for a significant public market debut.
📈 Important News of the Week!
• Upgrade raised $165 million in its latest funding round. The round was led by investment firm Neuberger. The capital injection is intended to scale its operations and product offerings as it prepares for a potential IPO within the next 12 to 18 months. - Read More
• Anthropic launched a web interface for its AI coding agent, Claude Code, making the powerful developer tool accessible beyond the command line for the first time. Available to Pro and Max subscribers, the web app allows users to connect to GitHub repositories and assign multiple coding tasks to run in parallel in secure, cloud-based sandbox environments. - Read More
• OpenEvidence, an AI-powered medical search engine for clinicians, closed a $200 million Series C round led by Google Ventures, nearly doubling its valuation to $6 billion in just three months. - Read More
💰 Hot Funding Rounds You Missed!
• Campfire ($65M) -n AI-powered accounting and enterprise resource planning (ERP) platform designed to automate and streamline complex financial workflows for modern businesses, serving as an alternative to legacy systems. - Read More • CoMind ($60M) -A neurotechnology company developing a non-invasive optical device to continuously monitor critical brain health indicators like blood flow and pressure at a patient's bedside. - Read More • Stand insurance ($35M) -An insurance company that protects catastrophe-exposed properties by using physics and AI to model risk and tying coverage to mitigation upgrades that make homes more resilient. - Read More
🌱 The Next Big Thing: Our Startup Pick!
🎯 This Week's Emerging Star: Blank Bio 1
Blank Bio, a Y-Combinator-backed startup, is accelerating the development of next-generation RNA medicines with its AI-powered computational toolkit. The company provides researchers with specialized foundation models purpose-built for RNA therapeutics, starting with mRNA design. This allows pharmaceutical and biotech partners to design more effective, stable, and safer drug candidates computationally before ever entering the lab.
By solving the critical computational bottleneck that has slowed RNA drug discovery, Blank Bio's "done-for-you" platform de-risks the entire development pipeline. The company's toolkit helps scientists decode complex biological data, identify novel drug targets, and discover new biomarkers, drastically reducing the time and cost of traditional wet-lab experimentation. This allows research teams to focus on clinical strategy and innovation, making Blank Bio a foundational company worth watching very closely.
🔥 Igniting the Future: Seedradar Ventures Syndicate!
At Seedradar Ventures, we back relentless founders at the earliest stage, investing in teams solving big problems with solutions that deliver a 10–20x greater impact.
Our syndicate offers investors access to a curated pipeline of early-stage startups, sourced through our network.
🚀 Startup Radar: Movers, Shakers & Future Makers
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🛠️ Trending AI Tools to Supercharge Your Workflow!
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💼 Join the Revolution: Hot Startup Jobs!
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💼 Resource of the Week: The Podcast You Need Right Now!
🎙️ Andrej Karpathy: “We're Summoning Ghosts, Not Building Animals”
A must-watch, in-depth interview with AI expert Andrej Karpathy. He provides a sober, realistic assessment of the current state of LLMs, arguing that AGI is still a decade away and that current models have significant "core cognitive gaps". This interview offers a crucial, grounded perspective for founders navigating the hype cycle.
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Disclosure: Seedradar Ventures and/or its general partner may hold investments in some of the companies mentioned in this newsletter. This content is provided for informational purposes only and should not be considered investment advice.
1 The general partner of Seedradar Ventures is an investor in Blank Bio.
