Two brains, twice the potential 🧠
Sep 18, 2025
Kaley Ubellacker
Happy Wednesday!
Happy Wednesday! If you’re new here, welcome to Necessary Nuggets, your one-stop pre-seed shop. We deliver updates from Necessary Ventures and helpful tidbits on our little corner of the world. Every edition is also on our blog.
What's happening at Necessary Ventures:
Portfolio company Wayve ranked in the top 10 in Fortune Magazine’s Future 50 List.
Good Reads 📖
For the rushed reader …
Three former Google X scientists are actually giving people a second brain through an AI-powered app that gains context by listening to everything everyone says.
Serial founders continue to hold an edge over first-time entrepreneurs in fundraising, with PitchBook data showing they outperform newcomers across deal size, valuations, and investment stages.
Robinhood is aiming to open startup investing to everyday investors with its proposed publicly traded fund Robinhood Ventures Fund I.
For the less rushed reader …
Mind over matter
Have you ever felt two-brained about something? Well, three former Google X scientists are actually giving people a second brain through an AI-powered app that gains context by listening to everything everyone says. Their startup, TwinMind, just raised $5.7 million in seed funding and released an Android version of their app, along with a new AI speech model that understands over 140 languages. Co-founders Daniel George and his former Google X colleagues Sunny Tang and Mahi Karim, heavily leaned on their Google X experience, where they ran multiple startup-like projects, to rapidly build their app. TwinMind runs in the background of users’ phones, capturing all ambient speech to build a personal knowledge graph, and unlike meeting-note apps like Otter or Fireflies, it runs natively on-device, continuously recording audio, transcribing it in real time, and generating notes, tasks, or translations. Talk might be cheap, but memory is priceless.
Are you serial?
VCs are skipping amateur hour. Serial founders continue to hold an edge over first-time entrepreneurs in fundraising, with PitchBook data showing they outperform newcomers across deal size, valuations, and investment stages. Investors’ flight to safety, driven by liquidity concerns and rising AI startup costs, has made VCs more likely to back founders with proven track records. While first-timers bring fresh perspectives and a willingness to experiment, the current market favors experience, as large funds seek teams they can confidently underwrite for both capital efficiency and rapid growth. This dynamic may narrow the founder pool and limit startup diversity, and some investors warn that sticking solely with repeat entrepreneurs could reduce long-term returns. When it comes to checks, the early bird doesn’t always get the worm.
Equitable equity
Robinhood is giving rookies a chance at riches. Robinhood is aiming to open startup investing to everyday investors with its proposed publicly traded fund, Robinhood Ventures Fund I. The fund would hold shares in private startups across sectors like AI, fintech, aerospace, robotics, and enterprise software. While the SEC filing is public, key details, like the number of shares, management fees, and specific startups, haven’t been disclosed yet. The fund’s pitch targets retail investors who typically lack access to early-stage startup equity, contrasting with accredited investors and existing funds. This move follows Robinhood’s controversial tokenized stock experiments in Europe, but the new fund takes a more traditional mutual fund-style approach. Thanksgiving isn’t here yet, but everyone’s getting a piece of the pie.
Market Stirrings 🚩
Here's what the week looked like in pre-seed:
$47.6M
106
Data aggregated from proprietary research and Crunchbase; valuation estimate based on 10-20% ownership stake.
TOP DOWN, VALUATIONS UP
Convertible note rounds are seeing higher valuation caps as round sizes increase. Carta’s data shows that rounds between $2.5M and $4.9M typically carry valuation caps above $20M, while smaller rounds under $500K are more commonly capped between $5M and $9.9M.
Fire Up the Pre-Seeds🔥
Highlights from this week’s pre-seed raises:
fintech
Accordance - Striking accord in finance.
Accordance raised $3 million from General Catalyst and Afore Capital. Accordance is building an AI-powered platform that transforms tax and accounting rules into instant, expert guidance for finance teams.
proptech
Nox Metals - Sheet happens.
Nox Metals raised $500k from Y Combinator. On a mission to strengthen America’s industrial base, Nox Metals is building software-driven metal processing factories that deliver custom-cut, certified metals.
AI
Altan - Talk about squad goals.
Altan raised $2.5 million co-led by JME Ventures and VentureFriends. Altan is building an AI-native platform that assembles autonomous teams of AI agents to design, build, deploy, and run full-stack software.
JOBORTUNITIES
| Hardware Test Engineer | - Copper:
Rethinking the induction stove and making kitchen electrification more accessible than ever. Picture a fossil-free future, without sacrificing aesthetics.| Full Stack Software Engineer | - OneImaging:
Envisioning the future of transportation beyond cars and into the realm of personal electric vehicles. Its first product, P1, is the ultimate tool for city navigation.
Outro🚪
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Thanks for reading, and see you next week!
