Good day. Venture investors have staked SonoThera $125 million in new capital, hoping the startup’s technology will revolutionize the treatment of Duchenne muscular dystrophy and other diseases.

SonoThera is developing a gene therapy for Duchenne, a rare genetic disease that causes progressive muscle loss. SonoThera’s treatment uses a new delivery technology designed to make gene therapy safer and applicable to a wider range of diseases.

Gene therapy delivered through a vector known as adeno-associated virus has been transformative for many patients. But AAV also is limited in the amount of genetic material it can deliver and in some cases has led to serious toxicities and deaths.

“We need better ways to deliver the transgene to different cells,” said Luca Issi, a senior biotech analyst with investment bank RBC Capital Markets, “and if you can do it in a safer fashion, that would be progress for the field.”

Venture capitalists are funding efforts to find more direct, safer paths to delivering gene therapy and other genetic medicines, including nonviral strategies like SonoThera’s.

One of them, Avidity Biosciences, uses antibodies to direct oligonucleotide therapies to muscle to treat genetic neuromuscular diseases. Avidity, which went public in 2020, was acquired by drugmaker Novartis in February for $12 billion.

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And now on to the news...

In the artificial-intelligence world, pretty much everyone wants to lay hands on chips and other computing hardware made by the market leader, Nvidia. Everyone except Darrick Horton, that is. Horton is the 28-year-old co-founder and chief executive of TensorWave. The Las Vegas-based cloud-computing startup refuses to use Nvidia’s graphics processing units—or GPUs, its signature chips—or its other products, out of concern that Nvidia controls too much of the AI infrastructure market. Horton says that situation is bad for competition. Instead, TensorWave exclusively uses hardware and software made by Advanced Micro Devices, Nvidia’s smaller rival in the GPU space. The startup has closed its Series B funding round, led by AMD and the hedge fund Magnetar Capital, raising $350 million at a post-money valuation of $1.55 billion.

Will artificial intelligence improve workers’ lives, or hand them the equivalent of a pink slip? It's one of the most pressing questions facing the U.S. economy today. For answers, The Wall Street Journal turned to 16 economists about what they think AI will mean for the economy, workers and workplaces. There’s little doubt AI will boost productivity, economists surveyed said, and smaller and newer companies should benefit from its growth. But economists diverged when it came to the question that worries many Americans the most: in the coming years, will AI eliminate more jobs than it adds?

Kalshi is planning to require that participants in some prediction markets disclose the identity of their employers, after an advisory committee recommended tighter security measures to combat potential insider trading and market manipulation. Users seeking to make bets in some markets linked to material nonpublic information will be required to submit an online form disclosing where they work, Kalshi said. The changes are set to be rolled out in the coming weeks.

Funds

European pre-seed investor Pitchdrive closed its fourth fund at €60 million (about $69 million), which is €10 million above the original target.

People

Venture and growth equity investor Norwest appointed Ken Yagen as product, AI and technology operating executive and principal, and Bryan Wise as chief information officer and principal. Yagen most recently served as chief product officer at CData. Wise was previously CIO at 6sense.

Iceye, a Finnish satellite operator, scored more than €450 million (about $520 million) in a primary Series F funding round led by General Atlantic at a valuation of over €10 billion. Including a secondary placement, the total value of the round exceeded €1 billion.

Standard Bots, a Glen Cove, N.Y.-headquartered industrial robot maker, landed $200 million in Series C funding at a $1 billion valuation. Investors included RoboStrategy and General Catalyst.

Morpho Association, a Paris-headquartered startup building an open blockchain-based credit network, picked up $175 million in funding from investors including Paradigm and a16z crypto.

PointFive, a startup helping companies detect and remediate cloud and AI waste, secured a $60 million growth investment. Accel led the funding, which included participation from Salesforce Ventures, Index Ventures and others. The company has offices in New York and Israel.

Sandstone, a Brooklyn, N.Y.-based relationship management platform for legal departments, raised $30 million in Series A funding led by Lightspeed Venture Partners.

Aryon Security, an Israel-based preventive cloud security platform, snagged $29 million in Series A funding. Brightmind Partners led the investment, which saw participation from Datadog Ventures, Skinos Ventures, Blumberg Capital and Viola Ventures.

Jedify, a New York-based startup building autonomous context graphs for AI systems, nabbed $24 million in Series A funding. Led by Norwest, the round included contributions from Snowflake Ventures, S Capital VC, Cerca Partners and Oceans Ventures. Assaf Harel, partner at Norwest, will join the company’s board.

Exponent Energy, an Indian rapid-charging electric vehicle technology platform, picked up a $21.1 million investment co-led by 360 ONE and TDK Ventures. Hitachi Ventures also invested.

Vinyl Equity, a Chicago-based startup building infrastructure for capital markets and corporate transactions, collected $20 million in Series A funding. Jump Capital led the round, which included additional support from MUFG Innovation Partners, Index Ventures, Spark Capital and Infinity Ventures. 

NewOrbit, a U.K.-headquartered startup building satellites for very low earth orbit, closed an $18.5 million Series A round led by Voyager Ventures.

Golden Analytics, a Bellevue, Wash.-based data analytics platform, added $14 million in seed extension funding led by Insight Partners.

Rivvun AI, a Seattle-headquartered startup developing an autonomous AI execution layer for enterprise spend and revenue recovery, raised nearly $7.6 million in seed funding led by Sitara Capital and 3one4 Capital.

• U.S. Expands List of Chinese Tech Companies It Says Assist Beijing’s Military

• Anthropic Releases New ‘Mythos-Class’ Model to General Public With Guardrails
   
• White House Reins In AI-Testing Unit as National-Security Concerns Grow
   
• SpaceX Employees Get a Crash Course in How the Rich Handle Money
   
• San Francisco Rejects a Tax Hike on Companies With Well-Paid Executives
   
• Siri AI’s Secret Weapon: It’s Always Right There

• Silicon Valley found AI and started looking for God (The San Francisco Standard)
   
• Anthropic, OpenAI stoke brisk pace of VC fundraising (The Information)

This newsletter was compiled by Matthew Strozier and Zachary Cole.

Share your tips, comments and questions: vcnews@wsj.com

The team: Matthew Strozier, Yuliya Chernova, Brian Gormley and Sarah Klearman.

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