Last year, AI grabbed half of venture dollars globally. But the sector's blockbuster growth hasn't necessarily come at the expense of other startup industries. Rather, areas that benefit from AI-driven automation such as legal tech, or that combine AI software with physical tech, like robotics and defense tech, are seeing record-high funding levels as well, Crunchbase data shows. The legal industry may have a reputation for stodginess, but when it comes to automating and streamlining, the sector has been quick on the uptake with new technologies. Venture funding to legal tech startups last year totaled more than $4 billion, per Crunchbase data. That's a record, and nearly double the $2.2 billion the sector raised a year earlier. Defense tech, too, saw record funding last year, as companies such as Anduril Industries and Helsing raised massive rounds. Overall funding to the sector jumped to $8.5 billion in 2025, per Crunchbase data ' an all-time high and more than double the prior year's total....
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In areas from consumer products to apps to gaming, U.S. venture firms have raised fresh capital to invest in industries where funding levels remain drastically below peak. This, along with a modest uptick in first-quarter venture investment, indicates some sectors may have hit a cyclical low last year and should be heading higher. To get a sense where newly allocated capital is going, we aggregated U.S. fundraising data for all new startup investment vehicles announced this year. We then looked at some of the sectors where investors plan to focus. To a large degree, they will continue to fund hot themes of recent quarters, and AI in particular. However, we also saw a number of funds targeting areas that might be considered more out of favor. Let's take a closer look. Against that backdrop, it's interesting to see that Andreessen Horowitz has earmarked $1 billion out of the firm's latest $7.2 billion fundraise to go toward an apps-focused fund. One expects AI will factor heavily into this strategy, given the firm's stated enthusiasm for AI-driven companionship, wellness and creativity tools....
AI commanded the attention of VCs last year, but while investors debated whether to bet on image-generation AI or medtech AI, several extremely consequential startup sectors ended up being overshadowed. Perhaps the most interesting field in startups right now is space exploration, with uses ranging from making space travel more accessible, to asteroid mining for rare metals ' including those needed for clean energy tech. Space hasn't always been a VC sweetheart due to huge upfront costs and high risk. But today, sending products into space is cheaper than ever through private companies like SpaceX. This allows new ventures to test out their technologies at (relatively) minimal cost. Space exploration offers untold opportunities to improve life on earth. Startups like Odyssey Spaceworks are launching science labs in Earth's orbit, seeking to accelerate areas like cancer research. Others are helping connect our world with satellite internet or vehicles that break the sound barrier. Many of these secondary applications can also bring in faster profits than traditional space exploration. But the full applications of such knowledge are so far unknown ' which is what makes this sector so explosive....
