Craft Ventures

They're doing everything based on their own models.

Upwind is a San Francisco startup that uses AI to secure cloud infrastructure, and the company has raised a $400 million Series C round at a $3.8 billion valuation, led by Bessemer Venture Partners, with participation from existing packers, including Greylock Partners and Kraft Ventures.

The round comes nine months after Upwind closed its previous $250 million financing at a $1.5 billion valuation.

The fresh funding, which has been in the works for months, nearly fell apart after Datadog attempted to buy the company, according to a person familiar with Upwind.

He became a COO, so Chief Operating Officer at PayPal.

He's a film producer, Genie.com, Yammer, Zenefits, Kraft Ventures, Calendly.

So he is entirely not a scientist.

He is instead an investor, venture capitalist through and through.

And sticking with AI funding, cybersecurity startup Upwind Security has raised $400 million at a $3.8 billion valuation.

Bessemer Venture led the investment with participation from Greylock and Kraft Ventures.

Upwind detects threats in companies, cloud infrastructure, including mitigating risks from AI.

And GE Vernova has agreed to buy Trench Group for $9 billion.

$3 billion valuation.

Led by Spark Capital, with heavy hitters like Meritech Capital, Kraft Ventures, and Citadel Securities affiliates jumping in, the financial momentum behind this pivot is undeniably massive.

It is massive because the underlying methodology is incredibly sound.

I mean, ASI is not building chatbots.

And we think there's a third category, which is really the the orchestration of the most critical infrastructure, the most complex systems, no matter if that's powering the energy grid, air traffic systems, transportation, logistics, military operations, and that's really where we specialize as a company.

Mark led the round, but Kraft Ventures, Andreessen Horowitz, affiliates of Citadel Securities all participated.

Are you in this place in the company's growth where you just need the capital or you need more sort of operational help from those investors that are on the cap table?

Yeah, we're scaling an enduring company here.

Right.

And then maybe the, the biggest example is, uh, David Sacks obviously had his own venture firm before Craft Ventures.

He's back in the private sector now.

Uh, and we reported, uh, about a month ago, I think, that they're targeting a new billion-dollar fund.