October Venture Funding Hit $59B as DeepSeek Led China’s Record Startup Deal

Global venture funding totaled $59 billion in October, a 45% increase from a year earlier, according to Crunchbase data cited in the article. The month was shaped by DeepSeek’s $15.9 billion round, described as the largest-ever venture deal for a Chinese company. U.S.-based companies raised $28 billion, while China-based companies raised $20.6 billion. Crunchbase noted that the last time more than $20 billion was invested in China in a single month was June 2018, when Ant Group raised $14 billion in Series C funding.

Seven companies raising billion-dollar rounds accounted for just over 40% of October’s global venture funding. Those large rounds went across frontier labs, manufacturing, energy, semiconductors, prediction markets and spend management software. DeepSeek’s round valued the company at $90 billion and placed it among the Top 10 most highly funded private companies, per the article. Other major rounds included Re:Build’s $2.1 billion raise, Axiom’s $2 billion round, Ramp’s $1.85 billion round, Tenstorrent’s $1.5 billion Series E, and $1 billion rounds for Kalshi and Flapping Airplanes.

AI-driven companies received 66% of global venture funding in October, with semiconductor companies gaining share during the month. Crunchbase also reported that eight additional companies raised rounds north of $500 million across frontier labs, robotics, legal, chips, agentic AI and healthcare. TypeSafe AI was highlighted for an $870 million Series A tied to adoption of its decision model Jev. The takeaway: October’s headline growth was broad in category labels, but the capital flow remained strongly tied to AI infrastructure and AI-enabled businesses.

The U.S. IPO market was described as slow ahead of Anthropic’s planned November IPO, which the article said could surpass SpaceX’s June listing that raised $85.7 billion. On the M&A side, at least nine venture-backed companies were acquired for more than $1 billion in October, including Uber’s $2.3 billion acquisition of ezCater. Crunchbase said 2026 had already set records for acquisitions, IPOs and funding rounds across major venture markets with two months remaining. Its methodology notes that the data is based on reported Crunchbase data as of Nov. 2, 2026, and that Cohere’s targeted $5 billion funding was not included in October totals because no initial or final close was reported.