Kleiner Perkins raises $3.5 billion to bet big on AI startups across healthcare and autonomy

Kleiner Perkins Raises $3.5 Billion to Invest in the AI Boom

Kleiner Perkins has taken stakes in companies including Stripe, Databricks Inc., and Waymo, and its partners believe the AI boom has "infinite capacity for the technology to create value". Ask Mark Gurman Anything About Apple Ask Mark Gurman Anything About Apple Ask Mark Gurman Anything About Apple From its latest devices, to an AI comeback and the future after Tim Cook, join the live conversation on Thursday, March 26 at 11 a.m. EDT. From its latest devices, to an AI comeback and the future after Tim Cook, join the live conversation on Thursday, March 26 at 11 a.m. EDT. From its latest devices, to an AI comeback and the future after Tim Cook, join the live conversation on Thursday, March 26 at 11 a.m. EDT. Click to listen Click to listen Click to listen Click to listen Kleiner Perkins, the half-century-old venture capital institution, is raising $3.5 billion to make bets on artificial intelligence startups reshaping industries including software, health care, transportation and autonomy. The firm -- best known for its early industry-defining investments in companies like Google and Amazon.com Inc. -- will dedicate $1 billion of the new cash to its 22nd early-stage fund, targeted at finding promising AI upstarts. The other $2.5 billion will be focused on investing in growth-stage companies, larger startups that include increasingly cash-hungry artificial intelligence players. The latest fundraising brings the firm's assets under management to just over $21 billion, cementing its place as one of the country's richest venture capital firms. "This is the most exciting time in my VC career to be investing," said partner Mamoon Hamid, citing widespread tech industry changes sparked by AI. "Both the quality and quantity of founders and the ideas and opportunities are at an all-time high." Get the Tech Newsletter bundle. Get the Tech Newsletter bundle. Get the Tech Newsletter bundle. Bloomberg's subscriber-only tech newsletters, and full access to all the articles they feature. Bloomberg's subscriber-only tech newsletters, and full access to all the articles they feature. Bloomberg's subscriber-only tech newsletters, and full access to all the articles they feature. Plus Signed UpPlus Sign UpPlus Sign Up By continuing, I agree to the Privacy Policy and Terms of Service. Kleiner Perkins' new funding lands at a moment when venture capital is coalescing around a small number of dominant themes and companies, as a few startups pull ahead in the race for funding and talent. The firm has taken stakes in some of the industry's most sought-after names, including payments behemoth Stripe, $134 billion startup Databricks Inc., and self-driving pioneer Waymo -- as well as Anthropic PBC and SpaceX, two AI giants widely expected to go public as soon as this year. Kleiner Perkins also saw significant windfalls after its portfolio company Figma Inc. went public last year and Windsurf was acquired. PitchBook estimates 2026 could be a record year for venture-backed exits, with companies including Anthropic, OpenAI and SpaceX potentially generating more than $100 billion in proceeds when they list publicly. Those market debuts could generate more cash than all US VC-backed initial public offerings this century. The AI boom has also generated widespread fear of a bubble, though Kleiner Perkins pushes back on those concerns. "We humans are not great at understanding exponentials," partner Ilya Fushman said. "But it's pretty clear from our companies' performance that we see infinite capacity for the technology to create value." Other venture firms piling into AI feel similarly about the potential, driving up competition for the best deals. In recent weeks alone, Thrive Capital raised more than $10 billion, General Catalyst has been in talks to raise a similarly large amount, and Coatue Management is gearing up to launch a large new fund to bet on AI and other tech startups. Part of Kleiner Perkins' advantage in the current market, it said, is its relatively small size and capacity to make selective bets. Even as the firm's assets under management grow, it has only seven people on its investment team, all of whom stay intensely engaged with portfolio companies. "KP's smaller partnership group, all of them help you. It's a real team," said Winston Weinberg, chief executive officer of Harvey AI, a legal AI unicorn backed by the firm. "A lot of them are ex-operators, and that background is really helpful." For Kleiner Perkins, one of Silicon Valley's most famous firms, the AI cycle represents both an opportunity and a test. Decades after its bets on early internet pioneers, the firm has recently undergone significant changes: working with a smaller team of partners and refocusing its strategy on early startups, a gradual strategy shift that followed periods of underperformance after it bet big on cleantech in the 2000s. The firm is now aggressively chasing early AI startups. "They consistently see past obvious trends to really understand a unique opportunity," said Markie Wagner, CEO of Forge, one of its newer portfolio companies. "They back founders before it gets popular." At the same time, the firm has also recently invested in larger companies, including Anthropic and Waymo, showing a willingness to engage in competitive deals even at later stages. Today, some of the Kleiner Perkins' earlier bets on valuable companies like Rippling, Synthesia and Together AI are beginning to mature. That could represent significant winnings for the firm, provided Silicon Valley's AI companies keep booming.

Kleiner Perkins Raises $3.5B For AI-Focused Funds

Storied venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins announced Tuesday that it has raised $3.5 billion across new funds with a primary focus on artificial intelligence. The fundraise includes $1 billion for KP22, a fund to back early-stage companies, and $2.5 billion targeted for growth-stage investments. It's a considerable increase in capital commitments compared to the last time the Silicon Valley-based firm raised a flagship fund, back in 2024. In that raise, Kleiner pulled in just over $2 billion for funds to back early- and later-stage startups. This time around, Kleiner believes market fundamentals look particularly attractive for scaling up. "The AI super-cycle is one of the most important company-building moments in our lifetimes, and we are still in the early innings," its fundraising announcement states. Kleiner also notes that AI is enabling today's startups to iterate and grow faster than in past cycles. Founded in 1972, Kleiner has long been known as a cross-industry investor, active in virtually every popular sector for venture dealmaking. For its latest fund, the firm also identified a broad array of focus areas, including professional services, healthcare, autonomy, security, financial services and the physical economy. Recent investments Most recently, Kleiner, like most venture heavyweights, has been focused on AI startups. Beyond that, however, its portfolio companies are a highly varied lot. To illustrate, we used Crunchbase data to put together a list of the latest reported rounds in which it served as a lead or co-lead investor. It spans healthcare, accounting and cybersecurity, among other areas. Large lead investments While it's active in seed- and early-stage dealmaking, Kleiner also leads quite a few larger rounds. Over the past year, it's been lead investor in at least five valued at $150 million or more, which we list below. Of these, the largest was a $600 million Series F for Applied Intuition, a developer of autonomous vehicle technology. The next-largest include a $356 million Series D for Chainguard, focused on secure open-source software for AI systems, and a $300 million Series E for Harvey, the AI legal tech unicorn. Exits too Kleiner has also seen a few sizable recent exits for portfolio companies that it backed as lead investor. This includes last year's largest software IPO -- Figma -- which counted Kleiner as Series B lead investor. The firm was also an early lead investor in business credit card provider Brex, which Capital One agreed to acquire this year for $5.15 billion. Of course, Kleiner also has much more famous portfolio investments in its more distant past, including Google, Uber and Airbnb, to name a few. You don't last 50 years in the venture business without at least some of those too.

Venture Capital Firm Kleiner Perkins To Raise $3.5 Billion For AI Startups - Figma (NYSE:FIG)

Venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins is reportedly raising $3.5 billion for artificial intelligence startups in the software, healthcare, transportation and autonomy sectors. The firm will invest $1 billion in its 22 early-stage funds and will focus on finding AI startups in, while the remaining $2.5 billion will be invested in growth-stage companies and larger startups, Bloomberg reported . Kleiner Perkins is an American venture capital firm headquartered in Menlo Park and has more than $21 billion in assets under management. The firm's portfolio includes major companies such as Google, Amazon, Figma, Glean, Harvey, Rippling, TogetherAI, OpenEvidence, Waymo, and Anthropic. Other venture capital and private equity firms have been investing in artificial intelligence startups recently. Josh Kushner's venture capital firm Thrive Capital has raised more than $10 billion for a new fund, Thrive X, which will target investments in AI applications, infrastructure, robotics, and life sciences. "After years of stalled exits, compressed multiples, and mounting LP pressure, the US venture market is starving for liquidity. More than $4 trillion in aggregate value sits locked in unicorns -- and these three companies sit at the center of it," the report continued. The exit value generated from those three companies would be higher than all of the exit values generated by U.S. venture capital-backed IPOs since 2000. Photo: Shutterstock Market News and Data brought to you by Benzinga APIs To add Benzinga News as your preferred source on Google, click here.