Venture Geopolitics Issue 50
02 June 2026
On the one hand, one of the most strategically important assets for Europe’s future will be funded by foreign capital. On the other, France suddenly finds itself hosting an enormous amount of AI capacity, sitting on French soil, consuming French power, employing French workers and operating under French law.
The sovereignty debate largely reflects a fear; there are powerful actors whom we are no longer sure are always our friends.
Our response has been to seek independence: to build domestic champions, reduce reliance on foreign capital and own more of the stack. But perhaps ownership is not the only thing that matters?
Rory Stewart provocatively suggested on his podcast this week that coordinating with China on AI governance may, in some respects, be easier than coordinating with Silicon Valley. His guest, British Anthropic co-founder Jack Clark capitulated: countries tend to have the ‘enlightened view’ that they will still be around for a long time; industry tends to have the view that it may well not be, and must out-compete to remain relevant. Matt Clifford extended this argument: governments have many levers at their disposal. Once there is hardware on the ground, irrespective of who funded it, that hardware becomes part of a distributed body subject to political and regulatory influence.
Money can move. CEOs can move. Massive educated workforces and enormous concentrations of strategic infrastructure have significant inertia. Two stories this week illustrate this perfectly.
Infrastructure. This week Jensen Huang described Taiwan as the “epicentre” of the AI revolution as Nvidia deepened its commitment to the island with a plan to spend $150B annually. Taiwan’s power does not come from ephemeral finance that ignores borders. It comes from industrial capability.
People. Airwallex’s geopolitically motivated relocation this week is the exception that proves the rule. Over the last year, under intense pressure from US clients and lawmakers, they’ve managed to move 5% of their staff out of China to two of the most attractive cities on the planet, and it’s made global headlines.
All this gets to the real sovereignty question. Do we need capability in critical sectors? Yes. Can we take outside investment to build it? Probably. Should we make our cities attractive places to live and build businesses so it is difficult to exfiltrate talent and easy to import it? Definitely.
Build the data centres, the schools and the parks. The capital can come from outside; the capability should be here.
IPOs / Publics
Seven large IPOs plan to list this week, raising ~$4.8B combined - led by INNIO Holding (gas engines, $1.9B at $19.1B) & Quantinuum (quantum computing, $1B at $12.2B), as IPO market momentum continues with Renaissance IPO Index up 22.5% YTD vs S&P 500’s 11.0% (here)
Anthropic confidentially filed S-1 paperwork with the SEC for a potential IPO, joining the AI public markets queue as regulatory review begins with no share count or pricing set (here)
Quantinuum seeks to raise $1.05B in US IPO at $45-50 per share, valuing the Honeywell-backed quantum computing firm at $12.7B despite posting a $136.6M quarterly loss on $5.2M revenue - timing the listing as Trump administration pledges $2B in quantum sector funding including $100M for Quantinuum (here)
Newcleo, a European nuclear startup developing advanced modular reactors & mixed oxide fuel, will go public via SPAC merger at $2.4B pre-money valuation, raising up to $429M to accelerate reactor deployment across Europe & the US as tech giants race to secure AI power infrastructure (here)
European defence-tech firms Quantum Systems & Destinus are discussing IPO advisory roles with banks for potential 2027 listings, with Quantum Systems targeting at least €10B valuation - up from earlier private talks around €7B during its €600M fundraising discussions with Blackstone & Airbus (here)
FalconX confidentially filed with SEC for IPO with Cantor as lead banker, targeting year-end listing despite crypto IPO market cooling after early 2025 enthusiasm from Circle & Bullish debuts faded (here)
US public company count halved from 8,000 in 1996 to 3,900 in 2025, as IPO activity dropped from 400+ annually in the 1990s to 115 per decade recently (here)
Alphabet announced plans for an $80B equity raise to expand AI infrastructure & compute capabilities, highlighting the massive capital requirements for maintaining competitiveness in the AI arms race (here)
Nvidia launched Cosmos 3, its open-source physical AI foundation model using breakthrough mixture-of-transformers architecture that combines vision reasoning, world generation & action prediction for robotics, autonomous vehicles & AI agents (here)
Nvidia launched its RTX Spark Superchip for PCs, challenging Apple, Intel & Qualcomm in consumer computing for the first time - the chip combines Blackwell GPU with Grace CPU to run AI agents locally, with Dell, Asus & HP building premium devices later this year (here)
Nvidia plans to spend $150B annually in Taiwan, terming it the ‘epicentre’ of the AI revolution as it builds a new headquarters employing 4,000 people by 2030 - deepening ties with TSMC & other key chip manufacturing partners while Taiwan becomes increasingly central to global AI supply chains (here)
Nvidia’s Jensen Huang joins Tsinghua University’s advisory board alongside Apple’s Tim Cook & other tech leaders, maintaining China ties despite US export controls that have largely shut Nvidia out of the Chinese market (here)
Samsung Electronics agreed to share 10.5% of operating profits with 78,000 semiconductor workers, delivering average $400,000 bonuses amid AI-driven memory chip demand - though workers in other divisions receive far smaller payouts, highlighting Korea’s two-tier labour structure (here)
Big Dogs
Groq raising up to $650M from existing investors following its $17B licensing deal with Nvidia in December, as the AI chip startup pivots from hardware to AI inferencing services (here)
Anthropic released Claude Opus 4.8 with improved performance & cheaper fast mode whilst raising $65B at $965B, surpassing OpenAI’s $850B valuation as AI leaders compete on both capability & cost efficiency (here)
Venture Capital
Ethan Choi, formerly of Khosla Ventures, is raising a $500M fund after being terminated for ‘misrepresentation’ according to the firm (here)
TMV launched a $200M fund backed by Prologis & the American Bureau of Shipping to invest in US maritime & logistics startups, targeting automation, AI & clean-fuel technologies as Washington pushes maritime industrial revival amid China competition (here)
Transition Ventures closed $150M Fund II to back hardware-software companies at the intersection of AI & physical world, targeting energy, computing, space & climate sectors across Europe & US (here)
Byfounders closed a new 1.4B SEK ($130M) fund, building on the success of Lovable, reflecting continued investor appetite for Nordic enterprise software despite only one major Swedish VC fund close this year (here)
London reclaimed the top European tech hub position from Paris, driven by $17.7B in funding last year & 138 unicorns including Wayve, Granola & ElevenLabs, ranking 4th globally behind Bay Area, New York & Boston according to Dealroom’s ecosystem index (here)
Balderton-led campaign backed by Revolut, Mistral, Wayve & 100+ European founders challenges narrative that startups must move to Silicon Valley, launching six-figure advertising blitz across London, Paris, Stockholm, Berlin & Munich coinciding with major tech conferences (here)
Regulation
EU drafts tech sovereignty strategy to reduce reliance on US technology, proposing Cloud & AI Development Act to triple data centre capacity within 5-7 years whilst favouring European alternatives like SAP, Mistral & OVHcloud over dominant US providers (Amazon, Microsoft, Google control 70%+ of EU cloud market) (here)
Florida Attorney General James Uthmeier sued OpenAI & Sam Altman over child safety risks, demanding better safeguards & parental controls after ChatGPT allegedly advised the FSU shooter (here)
Google engineer Michele Spagnuolo charged with fraud for using confidential search data to make $1.2M on Polymarket bets - the second major Polymarket insider trading case in a month after a US soldier netted $400K using classified Venezuela intel (here)
Malaysia began enforcing rules requiring social media platforms with 8M+ users to block under-16s from creating accounts, with penalties up to $2.5M for non-compliance. The move follows similar restrictions in Australia, Brazil & Indonesia as governments globally grapple with platform regulation amid child safety concerns (here)
Venture Geopolitics
Gold overtook US Treasuries as the world’s top central bank reserve asset, reaching 27% of global reserves vs 22% for Treasuries, driven by geopolitical tensions & central bank diversification away from dollar holdings since 2022 sanctions on Russia (here)
US considering expanding nuclear weapons deployments to more European NATO states including Poland & Baltic nations as Trump reduces conventional forces, aiming to maintain deterrence against Russia whilst pushing allies to shoulder more defence burden (here)
SoftBank pledged up to €75B to build Europe’s largest AI data centre network in France, starting with €45B for 3.1GW capacity by 2031 in Hauts-de-France, leveraging nuclear power & fast-track approvals after Macron-Son dinner talks in April (here)
Trump’s Board of Peace has received zero dollars in its official World Bank fund despite $17B in pledges for Gaza reconstruction, with donations instead flowing to an opaque JPMorgan account - highlighting institutional dysfunction in a flagship diplomatic initiative where no US reconstruction funds have been deployed 4mo after launch (here)
SpaceX raised Starlink pricing from $5,000 to $25,000 per terminal for Pentagon drone operations during Iran war, nearly doubling LUCAS drone costs to $60,000 per unit - the Pentagon agreed despite unease, highlighting military dependence on Musk’s satellite network amid concerns over pricing leverage (here)
China is overhauling its surveillance network with advanced AI-powered cameras that can analyse behaviour in real-time & retrieve footage using text prompts, marking Beijing’s push towards predictive policing as local authorities upgrade decade-old infrastructure with systems from Hikvision & Huawei (here)
Airwallex is relocating 100+ staff from China to Singapore & San Francisco as it pursues US expansion, responding to Washington’s data transfer restrictions targeting China - a move accelerated after Silicon Valley investor Keith Rabois accused the $8B payments company of being a ‘Chinese backdoor’ (here)
EU drafts sweeping emergency powers to control semiconductor supplies during shortages, including forcing chipmakers to override existing contracts & enabling bloc-wide purchasing to reduce dependence on Taiwan & Asia for critical chips (here)
New research suggests remote work, not AI, may primarily explain weak junior hiring in white-collar roles - analysis of hundreds of millions of job postings found the correlation between AI exposure & reduced entry-level hiring disappears when accounting for remote work rates, as junior employees require more supervision & mentorship that’s harder to provide virtually (here)
Norway’s foreign minister says Trump’s ‘crazy world’ & US-China tensions are forcing Oslo to reassess EU membership after rejecting accession twice over fishing concerns, as trade policy & defence integration become more critical (here)
Germany’s domestic intelligence agency (BfV) selected French AI firm ChapsVision over Palantir for data analysis software, part of a broader push to reduce European dependence on American tech in sensitive security infrastructure (here)
Progressive Democrats led by Bernie Sanders, AOC, Ro Khanna, Elizabeth Warren & Maine candidate Graham Platner are crystallising hardline anti-AI positions, pushing data centre moratoriums, AI company taxation & restrictions on AI-linked political money as a counterpoint to party centrists (here)
Strategic Sectors
AI
Robinhood launched AI agent integration allowing customers to automate stock trading & credit card purchases through third-party AI tools like Claude, with agents restricted to dedicated accounts & virtual cards whilst maintaining user notifications & kill switches (here)
Netflix launched INKubator, an internal AI-native animation studio producing short-form animated content with plans to expand to longer formats, positioning against YouTube’s kids programming dominance despite industry backlash over AI in animation (here)
ByteDance is developing Groq-style AI inference chips with Chinese memory startup InnoStar, which is raising $400M at $1.5B pre-money from investors including ByteDance & Jack Ma’s Yunfeng Capital, as China’s tech giants build homegrown AI hardware to circumvent US export restrictions (here)
Kirkland & Ellis allocated $500M to build proprietary AI platform using knowledge from 250 lawyers, avoiding reliance on tools available to competitors - a signal that professional services firms see custom AI as competitive moat worth massive investment (here)
DuckDuckGo launched Chrome & Firefox extensions for its no-AI search as traffic surged 30% week-over-week following Google’s AI-first search overhaul, with visits to its AI-free page hitting 3x baseline on 28 May - reflecting sustained user rejection of forced AI integration (here)
Notable deals:
Cognition (AI coding startup) raised over $1B at $25B pre-money, led by Lux Capital, General Catalyst & 8VC, jumping from $10.2B valuation just 8 mo ago as enterprise clients like NASA & Mercedes-Benz drive $492M revenue run-rate with 50% monthly growth (here)
Fireworks AI (AI inference) in talks to raise funding at $15B, up from $4B in October, with Index Ventures set to co-lead - highlighting fierce competition in AI inference alongside rivals Baseten ($5B) & Fal ($4.5B) (here)
OpenRouter raised $113M Series B led by Google’s CapitalG at $1.3B, more than doubling its valuation from $547M a year ago. The AI gateway serves 8M users across 400+ models, processing 100T tokens monthly - up 5x in 6 mo - signalling enterprise demand for multi-model AI infrastructure rather than single-vendor lock-in (here)
Cybersecurity
GCHQ director Anne Keast-Butler warns Russia is escalating activity against UK infrastructure, democratic processes & supply chains, highlighting cyber threats to critical systems that underpin both public services & commercial operations (here)
Cybersecurity hiring surges as AI generates new vulnerabilities, with job postings up 11% year-on-year & executive packages reaching $7-8M as companies scramble to address AI-generated code bugs & emerging threats from models like Anthropic’s Mythos (here)
Defence
US Central Command confirmed adversaries used commercial location data to target & surveil American servicemembers on battlefields, highlighting how ad industry data brokers create national security vulnerabilities by selling phone location information on open markets (here)
Pentagon has positioned troops & warships in Caribbean for potential Cuba invasion, including USS Nimitz carrier strike group & guided missile destroyers, as Trump considers military action after economic pressure failed to topple Communist government (here)
EU defence chief Andrius Kubilius urges member states to open weapons stockpiles for Ukraine & shift from ‘haute couture’ sophisticated missiles to simpler, scalable production - noting Ukraine produces 700 cruise missiles annually vs EU’s sub-300 output against Russia’s 1,200 (here)
Canada selected Saab’s GlobalEye early warning aircraft over Boeing’s E-7 Wedgetail for Arctic patrol duties, marking PM Mark Carney’s strategic pivot away from US defence suppliers amid trade tensions & Nato realignment with Nordic allies (here)
Dell shares surged 30% following a $9.7B Pentagon AI software contract win & strong Q1 results showing 88% revenue growth to $43.8B, with AI servers accounting for $16.1B - propelling CEO Michael Dell’s net worth up $34B overnight to $245B (here)
Notable deal:
German defence unicorn Stark is reportedly seeking €300M at €2.5B, more than doubling its valuation from earlier this year when it crossed €1B. The autonomous strike drone maker joins Helsing (raising $1.2B at $18B) & Quantum Systems (raised €340M at €3B) in Europe’s booming defence tech sector, as investors pour capital into autonomous warfare systems amid surging military demand post-Ukraine (here)
Space
Blue Origin’s New Glenn rocket exploded during testing, grounding NASA’s alternative lunar lander & leaving SpaceX as the sole near-term option for 2028 moon missions - perfectly timed as SpaceX prepares its $75B IPO at $1.75T+ valuation on 12 June (here)
SpaceX secured $6.45B in new Space Force contracts ($4.16B for ‘Golden Dome’ missile defence satellites, $2.29B for LEO communications) ahead of its anticipated record-breaking IPO, highlighting government revenue dependence that comprised one-fifth of 2025 revenue (here)
Energy
Trump administration selected five companies including Oklo & Newcleo to convert 50+ tonnes of Cold War-era weapons-grade plutonium into nuclear reactor fuel, marking the first time US has made such material available to private firms. Critics warn of proliferation risks & high costs based on past failed programmes, while companies argue it addresses nuclear fuel shortages & provides better waste disposal than burial (here)
Microsoft, Google, Amazon & Meta joined Elemental Impact’s new initiative to pilot climate technologies in data centres, investing $500K-$5M in up to 10 startups through 2027 focused on cooling, energy storage & low-carbon materials as AI infrastructure expansion drives emissions concerns (here)
Per The Economist, China’s solar industry faces severe challenges despite producing 80% of global panels & renewables overtaking coal globally - even America’s war with Iran roiling energy markets won’t rescue Chinese manufacturers from current turmoil (here)
Notable deal:
Base Power, the home battery startup founded by Michael Dell’s son Zach Dell, is raising around $1B at $12B valuation with Ribbit Capital in talks to lead, tripling its $4B valuation from October’s Series C round that raised $1B (here)
Critical Materials
Chinese buyers are aggressively purchasing US tungsten scrap, paying up to 5x normal prices and driving 350% price increases since May 2025, prompting calls for export restrictions on this defence-critical metal where China controls over half of global supply (here)
Crypto
Nine anonymous crypto wallets control majority voting power in Polymarket disputes affecting billions in bets, with 2,000 contracts adjudicated via UMA token holders in the past year - raising concerns about concentrated power & biased outcomes despite Polymarket’s promises to fix the resolution mechanism (here)