The pace of large-scale startup fundraising slowed a bit this week, with no giant late-stage rounds for GenAI unicorns. However, we did see a good bit of funding activity in the fintech area, led by business payments platform Airwallex, along with some healthcare- and AI-related dealmaking. 1. Airwallex, $300M, fintech: Business payments platform Airwallex closed on $300 million at a $6.2 billion valuation. The financing includes $150 million in Series F funding and another $150 million for secondary share purchases for the San Francisco-headquartered company, which was founded in 2015 in Melbourne, Australia. 2. Awardco, $165M, HR tech: Awardco, a platform for employee rewards and recognition, raised $165 million in a Series B round backed by Sixth Street and Spectrum Equity. The financing set a valuation of over $1 billion for the Salt Lake City-based company, which was founded in 2012. 3. LMArena, $100M, AI: San Francisco-based LMArena, which describes itself as an open community...
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