Good day. Security industry veterans John Viega and Mark Curphey founded Crash Override in 2022 to help companies manage their software sprawl. Then came the artificial-intelligence boom and the rise of AI coding startups. If software was overwhelming companies before, now add vibe coding.

“With AI, we're definitely seeing big expectations from people that, like people all over the company that weren't even developers before, are going to be able to leverage it to deploy even more software,” said Viega, chief executive of Crash Override and former CEO of cybersecurity startup Capsule8, which was acquired by Sophos in 2021. “The amount of software being deployed that people can't keep track of is just on the verge of exploding.”

New York-based Crash Override is announcing its $28 million seed round co-led by GV and cybersecurity-focused SYN Ventures, with participation from Blackstone Innovations Investments and Bessemer Venture Partners.

Crash Override isn’t telling companies to stop using AI-generated code—whether created by amateurs vibing with AI tools or developers using coding assistants. Instead, it helps companies oversee it, along with other software, with a visibility platform.

AI-coding agent startups have seen significant growth. Globally, they have raised $1.2 billion in venture funding in 25 deals so far this year, according to research firm CB Insights, roughly double the $664 million raised in 38 deals during all of 2023. The data excludes large-language model developers that have launched their own coding AI agents.

Jay Leek, managing partner and founder of SYN Ventures, said the growth of AI coding companies has spawned a new crop of startups trying to figure out how to monitor and secure that code. “This is a thing,” he said. “I didn't think it was a thing, to be honest with you, like less than four months ago.”

Still, it’s very early days, Leek said, and others in the field lag Crash Override in their development.

Leek and Erik Nordlander, general partner at GV, have joined Crash Override’s board.

“AI is creating lots of code, but it's certainly far from bug-free or free of security vulnerabilities or, you know, free of dependencies on other code that might have issues,” Nordlander said.

The quality of AI-generated code could be undercut by the sheer quantity. “Let's say it's like 10 times fewer bugs,” Nordlander said. “Well, if there's 10 times more code, then you're right back where you started.”

And now on to the news...

Grayscale joins queue of crypto firms filing to go public. Grayscale Investments, the crypto asset manager that helped popularize bitcoin funds, said it plans to go public, The Wall Street Journal reports. The company made its plans known to regulators through a confidential filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. It said Monday it hasn’t yet determined the number of shares to be registered and the price range of its offering.

• Other digital-currency companies have unveiled their plans to go public this year. Crypto exchange Gemini filed confidentially to go public last month, and shares of stablecoin issuer Circle Internet Group have skyrocketed more than 500% since its blockbuster stock-market debut.
   
• Grayscale is a unit of Digital Currency Group and a key part of the crypto empire built by billionaire investor Barry Silbert.

Elon Musk said Tesla shareholders would vote on investing in xAI, the latest move by the billionaire entrepreneur to tap his own companies to help fund his artificial-intelligence startup. Musk’s comments follow a Wall Street Journal report on Saturday that said SpaceX, his rocket company, had committed $2 billion toward a recent fundraising round for xAI. The turn inward for investment comes as xAI requires billions of dollars to power servers as it plays catch up in the global AI race.

Nvidia said it has received assurances from the Trump administration that it can sell its H20 artificial-intelligence chip in China, days after Chief Executive Jensen Huang met President Trump, WSJ reports. The administration’s move marks a turnabout after the Commerce Department restricted sales of the chip in April, costing Nvidia billions of dollars. The news came during a visit by Huang to Beijing, where he was meeting senior officials. “I’m very happy,” he told reporters.

Funds

Propel Venture Partners closed its Fund V at $100 million to continue making early-stage investments in the financial services ecosystem. This latest fund brings Propel’s total commitments to over $436 million.

Quartus Capital Partners held the final closing of its Quartus AI Fund LP with over $50 million in commitments. The firm has deployed capital to nine startups across sectors including healthcare, education, security and logistics.

People

Venture growth firm March Capital appointed Melissa Montan as vice president of platform and marketing. She previously served as senior vice president at HSBC Innovation Banking.

Moonvalley, a Toronto-based startup building AI video models and tools trained exclusively on licensed content, added $84 million in new funding. Led by General Catalyst, the round included additional support from Comcast Ventures, Khosla Ventures and others.

Agora, a Jersey City, N.J.-based stablecoin platform, raised $50 million in Series A funding. Paradigm led the round, which included participation from Dragonfly.

Virtru, a Washington, D.C.-based data security provider, picked up a $50 million investment, bringing the company’s valuation to $500 million. Iconiq led the round, which included participation from Bessemer Venture Partners and others.

Moment, a New York-based startup that automates trading and portfolio-management workflows for fixed income teams, raised $36 million in Series B funding. Index Ventures led the investment, which included participation from Andreessen Horowitz and Lightspeed Venture Partners.

NetBox Labs, a New York-based network- and infrastructure-management startup, secured $35 million in Series B financing. NGP Capital led the round, which saw additional participation from Salesforce Ventures and Headline.

Amogy, a Brooklyn, N.Y.-based startup building technology that unlocks ammonia’s potential as a clean energy source, added $23 million in new funding co-led by Korea Development Bank and KDB Silicon Valley.

Motor Ai, a Berlin-based autonomous driving startup, was seeded with a $20 million investment led by Segenia Capital and eCAPITAL.

Murphy, a Barcelona-based startup using AI to automate debt collection, emerged from stealth with $15 million in pre-seed and seed funding led by Northzone.

Zip Security, a New York-based provider of software that automates cloud-based identity management, device management and endpoint threat detection, collected $13.5 million in Series A funding. Ballistic Ventures led the round, which included contributions from General Catalyst and others. Barmak Meftah, co-founder and general partner of Ballistic Ventures, joined Zip’s board.

Duranta, a Seattle-based software platform for landscapers and lawn care professionals, grabbed a $7 million seed round from investors including Base10 Partners and Pear.

Trupeer, a San Francisco-based startup that turns screen recordings into product videos, fetched a $3 million investment led by RTP Global.

• The race is on to build U.S. copper mines after Trump pledges higher tariffs

• PE-backed McGraw Hill, NIQ Global Intelligence unveil IPO terms

• Starbucks tells white-collar workers to come to the office more—or take a buyout
   
• Shoppers are slowly turning away from plastic packaging

• VC Alexa von Tobel launches new podcast ‘Inspired,’ looking to reset American ambition (Fortune)
   
• Europe’s VCs are on pace for lowest fundraising year in a decade (Bloomberg)

This newsletter was compiled by Marc Vartabedian, Matthew Strozier and Zachary Cole.

WSJ Pro Venture Capital is a premium service of The Wall Street Journal. We cover venture capital and the global startup ecosystem. Share your tips, comments and questions: vcnews@wsj.com

The Team: Matthew Strozier, Yuliya Chernova, Brian Gormley and Marc Vartabedian.

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