Morning VC Brief丨2026.01.09

Week02 Highlights丨Cyera, LMArena, Protege, Swap Commerce, Lyte, Semafor, ATG, Babylon Labs

Author

eric gu
January 09, 2026

Morning VC Brief is an expert daily curation of tech and venture news. Feel free to forward; the sign-up is here

Table of Contents

01. Venture News

1/ AI-powered Data Security Platform Cyera Raised $400M Series F at $9B

  • Product: AI-native data security platform providing unified visibility and control of enterprise data, protecting sensitive information across cloud and on-premise environments with AI Guardian technology

  • Highlight: Secured 20% of Fortune 500 clients; 3.4x revenue growth

  • Investors: Blackstone (Lead), Accel, Coatue, Cyberstarts, Georgian

  • Source

2/ AI Model Evaluation Platform LMArena Raised $150M Series A at $1.7B

  • Product: Crowdsourced AI model performance leaderboard platform offering AI Evaluations service for enterprises, model labs, and developers to test models through its community

  • Highlight: 5M+ monthly users across 150 countries; 60M conversations/month; launched commercial service in September, achieved $30M ARR in under 4 months

  • Investor: Felicis (Lead), Andreessen Horowitz, Kleiner Perkins, Lightspeed Venture Partners

  • Source

3/ AI Data Platform Protege Raised $30M Series A

  • Product: AI data platform providing streamlined access to trusted, real-world proprietary data across healthcare, media, audio, and motion capture; curates and optimizes datasets for AI training and evaluation

  • Highlight: Provides revenue share payouts to data partners; aggregates private data including health records, medical imaging, and media content

  • Investor: Andreessen Horowitz (Lead), Footwork, CRV, Bloomberg Beta

  • Source

4/ E-Commerce Platform Swap Commerce Raised $100M Series C

  • Product: AI-powered e-commerce platform helping brands build web storefronts and manage cross-border transactions, inventory, and returns; popular with luxury clothing brands targeting global markets

  • Highlights: Focuses on global commerce solutions; competes directly with Shopify

  • Investor: DST Global, Iconiq

  • Source

5/ Physical AI Perception Platform Lyte Emerged From Stealth With $107M Funding

  • Product: End-to-end integrated perception platform for robotics and Physical AI; LyteVision integrates 4D sensing, RGB imaging, and motion awareness into single platform for autonomous mobile robots, robotic arms, quadrupeds, robotaxis, and humanoids

  • Highlight: Founded by Apple Face ID and Microsoft Kinect team; Won CES 2026 Best of Innovation Award in Robotics

  • Investor: Avigdor Willenz's group, Fidelity, Atreides Management, Exor Ventures

  • Source

6/ Digital News Startup Semafor Raised $30M at $330M

  • Product: Digital news media platform offering email newsletters, podcasts, and live events targeting C-suite executives and global leadership

  • Highlight: First profitable year in 2025 with $40M revenue, $2M EBITDA; 1M+ email subscribers heavily concentrated among C-suite

  • Investor: KKR co-founder Henry Kravis, Carlyle Group's David Rubenstein

  • Source

7/ Autonomous AI Financial Advisor Platform ATG Emerged From Stealth With $15M Pre-Seed

  • Product: Autonomous AI-driven investment strategist evaluating market data, portfolio construction, tax considerations, and behavioral finance

  • Highlight: Founded by Paperspace co-founders(sold to DigitalOcean for $111M in 2023)

  • Investor: Garry Tan, Collaborative Group, Fusion Fund, Box Group

  • Source

8/ Bitcoin DeFi Infrastructure Babylon Labs Raised $15M

  • Product: Trustless Bitcoin Vaults (BTCVaults) enabling native Bitcoin to serve as collateral without wrapping, custodians, or intermediaries

  • Highlight: Addresses $1.4 trillion idle Bitcoin market; partners with Aave Labs for Bitcoin-backed lending

  • Investor: a16z crypto

  • Source