Portfolio news:

Antares has closed a $96M Series B round to fast-track hardware development, fuel fabrication, and the launch of its first reactor demonstration in 2026, with a full-power prototype slated for 2027. The company has grown rapidly over two years, expanding to 60 people, a 145,000 sq-ft facility, and partnerships with NASA, DoW, and others.

Concrete4Change has closed a £500k pre-seed round, shortly after completing the Royal Academy of Engineering’s Regional Talent Engines programme. The programme provided early support that helped accelerate the company’s technology, build UK traction, and advance its mission to decarbonise the global concrete industry.

Portal to Bitcoin has secured $25M in funding led by JTSA Global, with backing from Coinbase Ventures, OKX Ventures, and Arrington Capital. The capital will support the launch of a trustless OTC desk for cross-chain Bitcoin trades, leveraging atomic swaps via Taproot and HTLCs. The platform prioritizes native Bitcoin settlement without wrapped assets or custodians, targeting institutional-scale, non-custodial trading.

K2 Space has raised $250M in a round led by Redpoint, with participation from T. Rowe Price, Hedosophia, Altimeter, and others, bringing its valuation to $3B. The funding will accelerate development of high-power, constellation-scale satellites to meet growing orbital data and power demands. K2’s first spacecraft, GRAVITAS, is set to fly in the coming months, showcasing a 20kW Hall-effect thruster and dual 10kW solar arrays.

Backed by Bertelsmann, Tribe Capital, Temasek, and Zomato’s Eternal, the company powers over $3B in GMV and serves 1.5 lakh+ merchants. Proceeds will support platform growth, debt repayment, and inorganic expansion.

Strategic Development Fund (SDF), part of EDGE Group, has signed a partnership and investment agreement with U.S.-based Machina Labs to explore a joint venture focused on advanced metal structures using AI-driven, software-defined factories. Initial investment is part of a broader commitment of up to AED125M. The collaboration aims to localize next-gen manufacturing for aerospace, defense, and mobility, supporting the UAE’s industrial innovation and sovereignty roadmap.

Percent has partnered with Alvos to complete its first set of transactions backing short-term consumer lending for underbanked populations in Mexico. The $1.46M raised will support Alvos' plan to 20x its monthly active loan portfolio by late 2026.

Kencko’s Instant Superfood Smoothies are now available in over 600 stores within the Kroger family of brands. The rollout marks a major milestone in expanding U.S. retail distribution and accelerating the company’s mission to make fruits and vegetables more accessible to everyday consumers.

DigiShares has introduced LAUNCH, a production-ready tokenization platform priced at just €3,000—making it the most affordable professional-grade solution in the industry. LAUNCH includes KYC/AML onboarding, smart contract workflows, token minting (Ethereum, Polygon, BSC), built-in trading, dividend distribution, and cap table management. Designed for issuers seeking a compliant and cost-effective entry point into real-world asset tokenization, LAUNCH has already attracted 10 new clients in recent months.

Klarna has rolled out Tap to Pay across 14 European countries, turning its app into a contactless wallet for in-store purchases. The feature is powered by NFC and Klarna’s debit-first card, which now serves over 4M users.

Summit County, Ohio has joined Biobot’s national network of 150+ wastewater monitoring sites to track substance use trends using opioid abatement funding.

Sugarfina has acquired upscale LA-based coffee roaster Caffe Luxxe, marking its third strategic roll-up following BOXFOX and Candy Club. The deal expands Sugarfina’s portfolio of premium, experiential brands into specialty coffee, adding 7 café locations, a growing eCom + subscription business, and wholesale distribution.

This rollout brings immersive therapeutics to 150,000+ residents and integrates AI-powered XR into physical, occupational, and speech therapy workflows. Select’s clinicians will now leverage real-time mobility, engagement, and cognitive data to personalize care and improve outcomes.

Blockdaemon is teaming up with VerifiedX to bring institutional-grade infrastructure to consumer DeFi products. The partnership enables apps like VFX SwitchBlade and Butterfly to offer rewards, lending, payments, and fiat on/off ramps—all powered by Blockdaemon’s secure, compliant infrastructure.

Booster has signed an agreement with Front End Limited Company to bring its smart mobile fueling technology to Saudi Arabia. The partnership will combine Booster’s proprietary fuel delivery platform with Front End’s local expertise to scale technology-enabled fueling services in major cities across the Kingdom.

Shardeum integrated Humanode's biometric verification to ensure only real users could claim rewards from its recent EVM Testnet quest, which attracted over 11,600 participants and 105,000+ transactions.

Kraken is teaming up with Deutsche Börse Group to deliver seamless institutional access to both traditional and crypto markets. Starting with an FX integration via 360T, the partnership will expand into regulated crypto, tokenized assets, and new solutions powered by Kraken Embed and xStocks—marking a new standard for institutional connectivity.

NEAR has introduced two new products—NEAR AI Cloud and Private Chat—designed to make verifiable privacy the default for AI. Built on confidential computing (Intel TDX, NVIDIA), NEAR AI Cloud ensures every inference is cryptographically attested, while Private Chat offers secure, sealed conversations. Already live with Brave, OpenMind, and Phala, NEAR AI is stress-tested, OpenAI-compatible, and ready for enterprise.

Additionally, NEAR Protocol achieved 1 million transactions per second in a public benchmark using sharded infrastructure and consumer-grade hardware.

This investment will accelerate commercialization of our AP-SALD platform, enabling high-barrier paper packaging that performs like plastic, while remaining fully recyclable and compostable.

Thailand’s second-largest bank (KBank) is now using Avalanche to power real-time cross-border payments to Singapore via StraitsX, joining Alipay+ in leveraging Avalanche for regulated travel payments at scale.

Rescale has teamed up with the University of Michigan College of Engineering to launch the Rescale Secure Compute Environment (RSCE), a cloud-hosted platform enabling high performance computing with support for sensitive data like CUI. The collaboration brings scalable digital engineering capabilities to U-M researchers while maintaining strict data security and compliance.

The company has secured EMI authorisation from the FCA. This milestone unlocks new possibilities for broader services and features.

Stripe has acquired the Valora team to strengthen its blockchain capabilities, especially around mobile wallets and stablecoin infrastructure.

Serve hit its 2025 goal on time, scaling its fleet twentyfold in a year and expanding across seven major U.S. metros, cementing its lead in zero-emission last-mile delivery with Level 4 autonomy and 99.8% completion rates.

ekko and Worldpay are teaming up to let millions of shoppers see the carbon footprint of their purchases and support climate projects directly at checkout—making everyday payments a tool for environmental impact.

York Space Systems, NASA, and Johns Hopkins APL successfully demonstrated the PExT payload aboard the BARD mission, achieving over 100 wideband comms relays across commercial and government networks—including in MEO. With all demo goals surpassed, extended operations will now push the system’s agility further through surface tracking and cross-constellation data transfers.