Betaworks’ third fund closes at $66M to invest in early-stage AI startups

New York City-based Betaworks has closed its $66 cardinal Fund III, which volition absorption connected investing successful early-stage AI companies. 

Betaworks has been investing successful AI since astatine slightest 2016 and, done its concern programme Camp, has backed companies specified arsenic Huggingface and Granola. Jordan Crook, a spouse astatine the steadfast (and erstwhile TechCrunch employee), said the caller money volition absorption connected agents, autochthonal AI interfaces, and application-layer AI. 

“Around these themes, we volition proceed to bash consecutive effect investing and the Betaworks Camps,” Crook said. 

Fund III volition question to put successful astatine slightest 25 pre-seed to effect investments, arsenic good arsenic marque astatine slightest 50 investments into startups arsenic portion of the Betaworks Camps program. “Thus far, we’ve done astir 37 deals,” Crook said, adding that the mean cheque size was astir $500,000. 

Crook called the existent fundraising situation “frothy” for startups, and “spiky” for funds, but she noted that Fund III saw galore of the firm’s erstwhile constricted partners returning to invest. 

“The fundraising situation successful task was challenging successful 2024, and we weren’t exempt, fixed that we were upsizing our fund,” she said.

Betaworks antecedently raised a $46 cardinal Fund II successful 2020, and a $48 cardinal Fund I successful 2016. It launched successful 2008 arsenic a task studio, and has since go a staple successful the New York City tech ecosystem, launching its Betaworks Camps programme successful 2016. The firm’s different notable investments see Tumblr and Kickstarter.