Private market news feed.

Anduril is pursuing a hunter-killer drone strategy designed to counter low-cost Iranian-style threats at a price point that doesn't require expensive interceptors. The approach reflects the company's focus on asymmetric cost-effective defense solutions.

Source: Fox Business

Anduril's president disclosed that the company is a 'heavy' participant in Middle East conflict operations, with its systems actively being used to counter Iran's Shahed drones.

Source: Yahoo

Databricks launched Lakewatch, an AI-powered SIEM platform using Anthropic's Claude for threat detection. The company acquired Antimatter and SiftD (Splunk veterans) to build it. Adobe and National Australia Bank are early customers. The move expands Databricks' TAM into the $30B+ cybersecurity market ahead of a potential IPO, with the company at $5.4B+ ARR and 65% YoY growth.

Source: CNBC

Kalshi raised more than $1 billion at a $22 billion valuation, led by Coatue Management. That's a 2x in three months (was $11 billion in December).

Source: Bloomberg

Amazon Web Services is deploying Cerebras CS-3 systems in AWS data centers, pairing them with Amazon's Trainium chips for a new disaggregated inference service on Bedrock. The pitch: an order of magnitude faster AI inference by splitting prefill and decode across two specialized chips. AWS is the first cloud provider for Cerebras's architecture.

Source: AmazonNews

ByteDance puts Seedance 2.0 on hold: The global launch of ByteDance's latest video-generation model has been paused due to a string of copyright disputes with major Hollywood studios and streaming platforms.

Source: TheInformation

Fal, the fast-growing cloud service for AI-generated images, video, and audio, is in talks to raise $300–350 million — nearly doubling its valuation to ~$8 billion from a financing three months ago.

Source: The Information

OpenAI expects to increase its headcount to around 8,000 employees by year end, up from about 4,500 employees

Source: The Information

ByteDance has agreed to sell its gaming subsidiary Moonton, developer of Mobile Legends: Bang Bang, to Saudi Arabia's Savvy Games Group for approximately $6 billion in a major gaming acquisition.

Source: Bloomberg.com

VAST Data announced an expanded partnership with NVIDIA and introduced new AI Foundation Stacks at its Vast Forward 2026 event. The company's CMO Marianne Budnik also addressed the gap between AI hype and real-world deployment at the conference.

Source: qz.com

Anduril Industries is set to roll out its first uncrewed Fury fighter jet from its Rickenbacker, Ohio facility this summer, using hand-assembly techniques rather than complex robotics or machinery. The production launch marks a significant milestone for the company's autonomous aircraft program.

Source: bloomberg-tech

A major dispute has emerged between Anthropic and the Trump administration over the Pentagon's use of Claude, with the DoD stating it could replace Anthropic's AI within six months, court filings revealing the two sides were nearly aligned just before Trump declared the relationship over, and the fallout reportedly fracturing Trump's broader pact with Silicon Valley.

Source: Federal News Network