Syndication and co-investment for institutional venture capital.

happyhotel, a German startup building revenue management software for independent hotels and hotel groups, has closed a €6.5 million Series A round led by Reimann Investors, with existing investors including Start-up BW Innovation Fund, seed + speed Ventures, and family office Wecken & Cie also participating. The capital will be used to accelerate expansion across Europe and invest in the further development of the company's commercial AI agent. Founded in 2019 and led by CEO Rafael Weißmüller, happyhotel's platform combines automated price optimisation with a team of internal revenue managers who handle strategic questions the AI cannot yet address. The AI agent analyses market and demand data in real time, then makes pricing and distribution decisions on behalf of hotel operators — a model Weißmüller has described not as a tool for revenue managers but as a replacement for the role itself. The system currently optimises distribution across more than 50,000 hotel rooms in 12 countries, which the company says increases average hotel revenue by around 15%. The raise comes as the hospitality sector contends with rising costs, volatile demand, labour shortages, and growing dependence on online booking platforms. happyhotel's pitch is that full automation of hotel room sales would free operators to focus entirely on the guest experience rather than distribution mechanics. The AI agent is expected to take on progressively more complex tasks over time as the product matures.

The London Borough of Lambeth Pension Fund has committed to Schroders Capital's UK Innovation LTAF, contributing to more than £68 million allocated to the strategy by local government pension schemes since its first close last year. The commitments push the fund past £100 million in deployed capital across 19 investments — a significant acceleration for one of the UK's first long-term asset fund structures targeting venture capital. Schroders Capital launched the UK Innovation LTAF to enable defined contribution pension schemes and other institutional investors to access early-stage UK companies, combining direct investments with primary and secondary commitments to venture managers. The vehicle raised £500 million at its first close, backed by investors including the British Business Bank and Future Growth Capital — a joint venture between Schroders and Standard Life. The portfolio spans technology and life sciences, with exposure to areas including artificial intelligence, fintech, and biopharmaceuticals. The fund's momentum is being watched closely as a test case for the UK government's ambition to route more pension capital into domestic high-growth companies. Chancellor Rachel Reeves said improving access to capital is central to the government's economic plan and would help bridge the gap between the UK's investment pools and the high-potential firms it wants to see drive the next phase of growth. Harry Raikes, head of UK venture investments at Schroders Capital, said a year on from the fund's first close, the strategy has been successfully put to work, with strong alignment between the value creation curve in venture and the long-term return objectives of pension capital.

🇪🇸 Madrid-based fintech startup Embat has raised €30 million in a Series B funding round led by Creandum, with participation from existing investors including Samaipata, 4Founders Capital, and VentureFriends. The funding will support the company’s European expansion strategy as demand rises for AI-powered treasury and cash management solutions among mid-sized and enterprise businesses. Founded in 2021 by Carlos Serrano and Ángel Peña, Embat develops cloud-based treasury management software that helps finance teams automate cash flow visibility, bank reconciliation, payments, forecasting, and financial operations through real-time banking integrations and artificial intelligence. The startup has rapidly emerged as one of Southern Europe’s fastest-growing enterprise fintech companies. The company currently serves more than 300 corporate clients across industries including retail, logistics, healthcare, hospitality, and manufacturing. Its platform integrates with over 15,000 banking institutions and ERP systems, allowing finance departments to centralize treasury operations and improve liquidity management across multiple markets and currencies. Embat said the new capital will be used to strengthen product development, expand AI capabilities, scale sales and customer success teams, and accelerate international growth across key European markets including Germany, France, Italy, and the UK. The company also plans to continue investing heavily in automation and predictive financial intelligence tools for CFOs and finance teams. The funding comes amid increasing investor interest in enterprise fintech infrastructure startups focused on automating back-office financial operations. As businesses face rising complexity in global cash management, treasury technology platforms leveraging AI and real-time banking connectivity are becoming an increasingly important segment within B2B fintech.

🇮🇳 Bengaluru-based food-tech startup DIL Foods has raised ₹72 crore (approximately $8.6 million) in a Series B funding round led by Belgian investment fund Think Investments, with participation from existing investors including Venture Catalysts and existing strategic backers. The latest funding will support the company’s aggressive expansion plans as it scales its asset-light cloud kitchen and virtual restaurant model across India. Founded in 2022 by former Rebel Foods executive Sahil Sambhi, DIL Foods partners with small and mid-sized restaurants to help them launch and operate digital-first food brands using its proprietary supply chain, branding, and operational infrastructure. The startup operates multiple food brands across categories including biryani, North Indian cuisine, snacks, and regional foods through a distributed kitchen network model. The company plans to use the fresh capital to expand into additional Indian cities, strengthen backend technology infrastructure, improve supply chain efficiency, and scale partner restaurant onboarding. DIL Foods is also investing heavily in brand development and operational automation as competition intensifies in India’s rapidly growing online food delivery ecosystem. Unlike traditional cloud kitchen operators that invest heavily in physical infrastructure, DIL Foods follows a partnership-driven expansion strategy where existing restaurants leverage idle kitchen capacity to run the company’s digital brands. This allows faster market penetration with significantly lower capital expenditure while improving restaurant utilization and profitability. The funding comes at a time when investors are increasingly backing asset-light food-tech models focused on operational efficiency and scalable unit economics. India’s online food delivery and quick-service restaurant ecosystem continues witnessing strong growth driven by urban consumption, digital ordering habits, and rising demand for convenience-led dining experiences.

🇬🇧 London-based AI drug discovery startup Isomorphic Labs has secured $2.1 billion in fresh funding as the Google DeepMind spinout accelerates development of its AI-powered drug design engine and expands globally. The funding round was led by Thrive Capital, with participation from Alphabet, further strengthening investor confidence in one of the world’s most advanced AI-driven biotech companies. Founded by DeepMind CEO and Nobel Prize-winning AI researcher Demis Hassabis, Isomorphic Labs was spun out of Google DeepMind in 2021 to commercialize breakthrough AI systems for biology and pharmaceutical research. The company builds on AlphaFold, DeepMind’s landmark AI model capable of predicting protein structures with unprecedented accuracy, which has become one of the most influential technologies in modern computational biology. The new funding will be used to scale the company’s AI drug design infrastructure, expand scientific and engineering teams, and accelerate partnerships with major pharmaceutical companies globally. Isomorphic Labs has already established collaborations with Eli Lilly, Novartis, and other major biotech and pharma players as it pushes toward using generative AI to dramatically reduce the time and cost required for discovering new medicines. The company recently introduced its proprietary Drug Design Engine, a next-generation AI platform designed to improve molecular prediction, protein-ligand interaction analysis, and therapeutic discovery workflows beyond AlphaFold 3 capabilities. According to the company, the platform significantly improves biological modeling accuracy while reducing computational complexity and development timelines. The funding highlights growing global investor interest in AI-native biotechnology startups as pharmaceutical companies increasingly adopt machine learning systems for drug discovery, molecular simulation, protein engineering, and precision medicine. The deal also reinforces Alphabet’s broader strategy of commercializing advanced AI research through standalone businesses across healthcare, robotics, and infrastructure.

🇺🇸 San Francisco-based voice AI startup Vapi has raised $50 million in a Series B funding round led by Peak XV Partners, with participation from M12 (Microsoft’s Venture Fund), Kleiner Perkins, Bessemer Venture Partners, and existing investors. The latest raise brings the company’s total funding to $72 million and reportedly values the startup at around $500 million post-money. Founded by Jordan Dearsley and Nikhil Gupta, Vapi develops API-native infrastructure that enables enterprises and developers to build, deploy, and manage AI voice agents at scale. The company has rapidly emerged as one of the fastest-growing players in the enterprise voice AI sector, with its platform now powering more than 1 billion calls globally and supporting over 1 million developers. Vapi’s enterprise customers include Amazon Ring, Intuit, New York Life, Kavak, Instawork, and Cherry. Amazon Ring reportedly routes 100% of its inbound customer support calls through Vapi after evaluating more than 40 voice AI vendors, highlighting the startup’s growing traction among large-scale enterprise clients. The company said it has achieved 10x growth in enterprise ARR as businesses increasingly adopt AI-powered voice systems across customer support, collections, appointment scheduling, sales workflows, and IVR automation. Vapi’s infrastructure is designed for low-latency performance, customizable workflows, and production-scale deployment, allowing companies to integrate AI voice systems without managing complex telephony infrastructure internally. The fresh capital will be used to expand engineering capabilities, strengthen infrastructure reliability, improve governance and monitoring systems for enterprise AI agents, and scale go-to-market operations globally. Vapi also plans to focus heavily on predictability, uptime guarantees, and compliance tooling as enterprises deploy AI voice systems into increasingly sensitive workflows. The funding round reflects surging investor interest in enterprise AI infrastructure startups building foundational tooling for autonomous customer interaction systems. Voice AI has rapidly become one of the most competitive segments within generative AI, with startups racing to replace traditional call-center infrastructure using conversational AI agents capable of handling large-scale enterprise interactions.