Does the one person unicorn exist? Or is it the startup version of a \u2018cryptid,\u2019 a mythical creature that is oft-discussed but may or may not actually exist?<\/p>\n
I wondered that when chatting recently with Ben Broca, CEO and founder of Polsia, whose company offers an AI \u201cco-founder\u201d that claims to build and run an entire company autonomously. (You may recognize Broca\u2019s name, as he was a very early employee at Travis Kalanick\u2019s CloudKitchens.)<\/p>\n
\u201cYou give [Polsia] an idea, and it will go ahead and build a product,\u201d said Broca. \u201cIt will fix bugs. It will handle support. It will run marketing campaigns, including ads. It will do all of this autonomously. Every night, it wakes up, does work, and reports back via email to the user with what it has done, what it plans to do the next day, and how the general state of the business is.\u201d<\/p>\n
Broca is practicing what he preaches: He posted last week on LinkedIn<\/a> that Polsia (whose investors include True Ventures) had hit a revenue run rate of $4.5 million\u2014with him as the sole employee.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cPolsia is preaching solopreneurship,\u201d said Broca. \u201cI\u2019m preaching letting go of the \u201899%\u2019 that are not technical, not in Silicon Valley, not in New York, don\u2019t have access to code. I want to give them a chance to survive in this new economy that\u2019s going to be completely disrupted by AI.\u201d<\/p>\n I\u2019m famously skeptical of any and all revenue-related startup claims in the AI era. I told this to Broca, who says he believes Polsia\u2019s revenue has some stability based on the level of user engagement he\u2019s seeing. He also, despite being a \u201csolopreneur,\u201d does work with people. His central idea is one of an outsourced \u201cvirtual team.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cThat\u2019s my crazy solution to the solopreneur problem,\u201d said Broca. \u201cI can leverage people, but in a different way. They don\u2019t have to be full\u2011time employees\u2026 I can still have a GC with a law firm. I can have an infrastructure team with an infrastructure\u2011for\u2011agents company\u2026 and they\u2019re incentivized for me to be as big as possible.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n But direct employees? For now, nope.<\/p>\n \u201cInitially I was \u2018for now I\u2019m alone,\u2019\u201d said Broca. \u201cAnd then, since online the response has been so overwhelmingly positive and people [are] amazed how much you can do, it\u2019s becoming almost like an odd performance where I\u2019m like, \u2018Well, okay, how far can I go?\u2019\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n See you tomorrow,<\/p>\n Allie Garfinkle Submit a deal for the Term Sheet newsletter here<\/a>.<\/p>\n Joey Abrams curated the deals section of today\u2019s newsletter. Subscribe here<\/a>.<\/p>\n VENTURE CAPITAL<\/p>\n – Halter<\/a>, an Auckland, New Zealand-based agriculture tech company, raised $220 million in Series E funding. Founders Fund led the round and was joined by Blackbird, DCVC, Bond, Bessemer, NewView, Ubiquity, Promus, and Icehouse Ventures.<\/p>\n – Granola<\/a>, a London, U.K.-based AI-powered notepad platform designed for taking meeting notes, raised $125 million in Series C funding. Index Ventures led the round and was joined by Kleiner Perkins and existing investors Lightspeed, Spark, and NFDG.<\/p>\n – Mirage<\/a>, a New York City-based AI-powered video generation platform, raised $75 million in funding from General Catalyst.\u00a0<\/p>\n – Rocketlane<\/a>, a Wilmington, Del.-based professional services automation platform, raised $60 million in Series C funding. Insight Partners led the round.<\/p>\n – Doss<\/a>, a San Francisco-based developer of operations software for inventory-based businesses, raised $55 million in Series B funding. Madrona and Premji Invest led the round and were joined by Intuit Ventures and existing investors.<\/p>\n – Terrestrial Bio<\/a>, a Woburn, Mass.-based developer of a skin patch and applicator for administering therapies, raised $50 million in Series C funding. RA Capital led the round and was joined by Engine Ventures, GHIC, and Siteground.<\/p>\n – Glimpse<\/a>, a New York City-based developer of AI agents for retail consumer brands, raised $35 million in Series A funding. Andreessen Horowitz led the round and was joined by existing investors 8VC and Y Combinator.<\/p>\n – Origin<\/a>, a London, U.K.-based AI-powered employee benefits platform, raised $30 million in Series A+ funding. Notion Capital led the round.<\/p>\n – Renasens<\/a>, a Stockholm, Sweden-based textile recycling company, raised \u20ac10 million ($11.6 million) in seed funding. Extantia led the round and was joined by Course Corrected VC and existing investors.<\/p>\n – Trayd<\/a>, a New York City-based construction payroll and workforce solution platform, raised $10 million in Series A funding. White Star Capital led the round and was joined by Suffolk Technologies, Y Combinator, and RXR.<\/p>\n – Krane<\/a>, a San Francisco-based AI-powered construction supply chain management platform, raised $9 million in seed funding. Link Ventures and Glasswing Ventures led the round.<\/p>\n – Eunice<\/a>, a London, U.K.-based AI platform for due diligence, raised $8 million across seed and pre-seed rounds from Moonfire, Speedinvest, and Openspace.<\/p>\n – Conntour<\/a>, a Miami, Fla. and Tel Aviv, Israel-based AI video intelligence platform, raised $7 million in seed funding from General Catalyst, Y Combinator, SV Angel, and Liquid 2 Ventures.\u00a0<\/p>\n – Triangle Health<\/a>, a Los Angeles, Calif.-based AI platform designed to help users research treatment options, raised $4 million in pre-seed funding. SNR.vc led the round and was joined by Hannah Grey VC, Antler Criticality Fund, and angel investors.<\/p>\n PRIVATE EQUITY<\/p>\n – Chimney Rock Equity Partners acquired United Electronics Company<\/a>, a Charleston, S.C.-based electronics design and manufacturing company. Financial terms were not disclosed.<\/p>\n – TowerBrook Capital Partners acquired a majority stake in ID UNLIMITED<\/a>, a Lyon, France-based sports textiles company. Financial terms were not disclosed.<\/p>\n EXITS<\/p>\n – Clearlake Capital Group agreed to acquire Qualus Corporation<\/a>, a Lake Mary, Fla.-based power services firm, from New Mountain Capital. Financial terms were not disclosed.<\/p>\n – GIC agreed to acquire a minority stake in Envu<\/a>, a Cary, N.C.-based environmental solutions company, from Cinven. Financial terms were not disclosed.<\/p>\n FUNDS + FUNDS OF FUNDS<\/p>\n – Lead Edge Capital<\/a>, a New York City-based growth equity firm, raised $3.5 billion for its seventh fund focused on software, internet, and tech-enabled companies.<\/p>\n
X: @agarfinks<\/a>
Email: alexandra.garfinkle@fortune.com<\/a><\/p>\n