A grab bag of funded startups caught our attention this past month, from a previously bootstrapped custom metal manufacturer that got its first outside funding from big-name Silicon Valley backers, to a startup that aims to provide geothermal energy from underwater volcanoes to small island nations. Let's take a look. Reno, Nevada-based SendCutSend said last month that it has raised $110 million in funding led by brothers and Stripe founders John and Patrick Collison, along with Sequoia Capital and Paradigm, at a reported $1 billion valuation. The company operates an on-demand manufacturing platform specializing in custom-cut metal and fabrication. The round is its first venture investment, and apparently came only after Sequoia's Andrew Reed flew to Reno to woo SendCutSend CEO Jim Belosic into accepting Silicon Valley backing. Previously, Belosic had bootstrapped the company, founded in 2018, with personal savings, bank loans and credit cards, he told The Wall Street Journal. He held little interest in taking cash from startup investors until SendCutSend started to be flooded earlier this year with orders from AI-driven industries including robotics and data centers, and Belosic said he realized the business needed outside investment to grow....

Before boarding Air Force One, White House staffers and reporters had to surrender various items collected during the trip, including staff burner phones, credential badges, and lapel pins issued by China. Those traveling on Air Force One threw those objects in a bin at the bottom of the plane's stairs, according to a journalist in the White House press pool. Photos from the trip show several people in the U.S. government delegation, including Trump, White House communications director Steven Cheung, Apple chief executive Tim Cook, Nvidia's Jensen Huang, and Secret Service agents, all sporting pins on their coat lapels. Goodin did not explain why officials and reporters had to throw away those items, though presumably for security reasons. While the summit appeared cordial, China remains a key adversary of the United States, given its advanced intelligence and espionage capabilities. The U.S. and its allies have long accused China of spying and carrying out cyberattacks. It's not far-fetched to believe some of the gifted items could be bugged, as governments have done before. It's also reasonable to assume the burner phones were likely targeted during the trip. Burner phones are designed to be new and dedicated devices that can be used where attacks can be assumed and later thrown out....

Good morning & happy Tuesday! Today we're diving into AI giants OpenAI & Anthropic, which just outsourced their sales teams to private equity (breaking down their PE playbook, why it matters & what to expect next + bonus deep dives into OpenAI that wants to build the last App Store while also developing a personal AI CFO, & Anthropic's AWS strategy), and a 3-year-old firm nobody's heard of that just bought the world's largest corporate travel company (why Long Lake Management is acquiring Amex GBT, and what it means for Ramp, Brex and Navan + bonus deep dives into American Express and why it skipped the Agent Protocol wars & Anthropic, which just told founders exactly what AI products to build in 2026). Let's jump straight into the fascinating stuff '' On the same day, OpenAI and Anthropic each finalized & signed joint ventures with the biggest names in private equity - TPG, Blackstone BX 0.00%', Goldman Sachs GS 0.00%', and Bain Capital - to physically embed their engineers inside thousands of portfolio companies....

The Great Travel Meltdown of 2026 started taking shape at the end of February. At first, the U.S. war against Iran forced the cancellation or rerouting of many flights to the Middle East; then the blockage of the Strait of Hormuz drove up the price of jet fuel and threatened to cause crises for the major airlines. Though the two-week cease-fire announced last night may reopen the strait, prices are unlikely to rebound immediately. Separately, large numbers of TSA workers started staying home after a protracted budget fight in Congress left them working without pay for weeks on end. Airport-security lines snaked into terminal basements or out their front doors. President Trump deployed ICE agents at the nation's major airports, and although TSA workers are now receiving back pay, the funding situation isn't yet resolved. Getting somewhere by plane has always been an onerous proposition. If you search the phrase travel chaos on Google News, you will find that headlines about 'travel chaos' reoccur in batches about every six months, going back to the beginning of time. But as a result of recent, tragic world events, the state of consumer aviation seems to be deteriorating at a rapid pace. Now Americans with travel plans would like to know exactly how worried they should be, and exactly how worried everyone else already is....