Friday Founders: Issue #5 | Highlights from 4 – 10 July 2025

Hi Founders,

It’s Friday, 11 July 2025, and the news ticker barely paused for fireworks. From Brussels’ new AI playbook to a $9 billion data-center grab, here are the ten stories you’ll want on your radar before the weekend.

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1. 🏛️ EU Publishes Final AI Code of Practice

TL; DR: Brussels released its long-awaited blueprint for general-purpose AI, detailing copyright filters, red-team logs, and independent risk audits—despite heavy lobbying to delay.

Why you should care: The voluntary “code” is the preview of mandatory rules arriving in 2026. Ship model-card provenance and watermarking now, while it’s still cheap.

Read more → Financial Times

2. 🏗️ CoreWeave To Buy Core Scientific in a $9 B All-Stock Deal

TL; DR: GPU cloud CoreWeave is snapping up Bitcoin-miner-turned–data-center-operator Core Scientific to lock in cheap power and real estate.

Why you should care: Compute landlords are verticalizing. If your AI infra bill is creeping up, start scouting long-term power contracts—or a consolidation target.

Read more → Reuters

3. 🎞️ Google Adds Image-to-Video to Veo 3

TL; DR: A fresh Gemini update lets creators feed a single image and get 4-second video clips, sharpened by “progressive rendering”

Why you should care: Short-form ads, UGC tools, and storyboards just got automated. Budget for prompt-engine optimization, not manual editing hours.

Read more → TechCrunch

4. 🚕 Tesla Robotaxi Pilot Expands in Austin

TL; DR: Elon Musk confirmed a wider geofence for the FSD-only ride-hail network, rolling out this weekend after new safety hires.

Why you should care: A larger service area means richer tele-ops data, and faster regulatory precedent for autonomous fleets. Urban-mobility startups: update your TAM slides.

Read more → Not a Tesla App

5. 💳 Fintech iCapital Valued at $7.5 B in New Raise

TL; DR: The alt-investment platform pulled fresh cash at a post-money north of $7 billion as private-markets demand soars.

Why you should care: LP appetite for unlisted assets is back. If you facilitate secondary liquidity or fund-ops automation, the sales cycle just got shorter.

Read more → Reuters

6. 🖥️ AWS Ships P6e-GB200 GPU Instances (600 Gbps)

TL; DR: EC2’s July-10 doc dump quietly revealed new P6e-GB200 AI-training boxes, pairing Nvidia’s GB200 with up to 600 Gbps networking.

Why you should care: Training times drop again; cost models change. Benchmark before you renew any multi-year GPU contract.

Read more → AWS Docs

7. 🤝 Genesis AI Raises $105 M Seed for Universal Robotics Model

TL; DR: Stealth robotics lab Genesis emerged with a nine-digit seed led by Eclipse and Khosla to build a foundation model for physical tasks.

Why you should care: The “ChatGPT-for-robots” race is on. If you sell simulation, SLAM, or edge compute, line up integrations now—these funds need partners fast.

Read more → TechCrunch

8. 🧮 Harmonic AI (Robinhood CEO’s Math Startup) Raises $100 M, Hits $900 M Valuation

TL; DR: Vlad Tenev’s side project scored a nine-figure A round to tackle symbolic reasoning and math for LLMs.

Why you should care: Investors see a moat where current models stumble—precise math. Fin-tech and quant-trading founders: A specialized co-processor for algebraic tasks may soon exist.

Read more → Bloomberg

9. 💸 Groq Targets $6 B Valuation in Fresh Raise

TL; DR: The AI-chip upstart is pitching investors on a $300–$500 M round tied to a Saudi compute deal.
Why you should care: Sovereign-fund capital is hunting bespoke silicon. Startups with domain-specific accelerators—or compilers—could ride the wave.

Read more → Freedom 96.9

10. 🌧️ Climate-Tech Rainmaker Bags $25 M Series A for Drone Cloud-Seeding

TL; DR: Despite conspiracy backlash, Rainmaker closed a round to expand AI-guided seeding drones after proving out Texas trials.

Why you should care: Weather modification is moving from sci-fi to funded infra. Ag-tech and insurance founders should watch regulatory frameworks taking shape.

Read more → Axios