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This is a weekly feature that runs down the week’s top 10 announced funding rounds in the U.S. Check out last week’s biggest funding rounds here.

This March certainly did not go out like a lamb, with seven rounds hitting $100 million or more in the final week. While there were no huge rounds like last week, money was again spread around from AI to biotech to marketing and more. Let’s see if April can continue the trend of a growing amount of large raises.

1. , $175M, semiconductors: Optical interconnectivity startup Celestial AI raised a massive $175 million Series C led by ’s . With the explosion of generative AI, both compute power availability and memory capacity are becoming more and more crunched — and marriage between compute and memory causes both to increase simultaneously. However, Celestial’s photonic fabric platform helps separate compute and memory, making processing extensive AI faster and more energy-efficient computing. It was just last June when Santa Clara, California-based Celestial raised its $100 million Series B funding led by , and ’s fund. Founded in 2020, the company has raised nearly $339 million, . It’s been a busy couple of weeks in the semiconductor industry as investors have flocked to the sector knowing its importance in the rocketing AI industry. Earlier in March, shares of — a developer of data center connectivity technology with use cases in generative AI — soared after its initial public offering on the . Shares have since then remained well above their IPO price.

2. , $150M, biotech: Oncology startup Avenzo Therapeutics locked up the biggest biotech raise of the week, closing a $150 million Series A-1 financing led by ,, and . The San Diego-based firm has now raised $347 million since the company’s founding in August 2022, per the company. The startup plans to use the new proceeds to advance its emerging oncology pipeline, which includes a treatment for metastatic breast cancer and other advanced solid tumors.

3. (tied) , $115M, marketing: It seems like every week there is a big funding round involving the intersection of AI and some new sector. This week it’s marketing, as New York-based The Brandtech Group, an AI marketing company, has secured a $115 million Series C funding. No lead investor was named, but it was the money came from new investors — and — and existing investors and . The company uses machine-generated content and AI to push marketing initiatives. Founded in 2015, the company has raised $725 million, .

3. (tied) , $115M, data integration: Every company wants to know about the data it has, and observability cloud solution Observe locked up a big round this week to help with that effort. The startup, which helps companies manage data by breaking down silos and making it useful, raised a $115 million Series B at a valuation of $400 million to $500 million this week. The round was led by . also invested with others. Founded in 2017, the San Mateo, California-based company has raised $277 million, .

5. (tied) , $100M, cybersecurity: Things have not been great fundingwise in cybersecurity the past year or so as investors have pulled back and IT budgets have been cut. However, some startups are still raising. Case in point, New York-based Coro, a cybersecurity platform purpose-built for small and medium-sized enterprises, announced a $100 million Series D led by . Founded in 2014, Coro has raised $255 million, .

5. (tied) , $100M, accounting: Artificial intelligence is disrupting most industries, and financial services certainly is no exemption. To that point, New York-based FundGuard, an AI-powered investment accounting platform for asset managers, raised a fresh $100 million round led by and new investors including and funds managed by . The company did not disclose a valuation, but it has been the round was raised at a valuation of up to $400 million. Founded in 2018, FundGuard has raised more than $150 million, per the company. FundGuard is leveraging AI capabilities to help streamline investment accounting operations and workflows. The startup, which has offices in New York, Boston, London, Toronto and Tel Aviv, plans to use the new cash for ongoing investment in product innovation as well as customer acquisition.

5. (tied) , $100M, energy: Arlington, Virginia-based Lightshift Energy, formerly known as Delorean Power, locked up $100 million from . Lightshift is a utility-scale energy storage development company and plans to use the cash infusion for its projects across public power, investor-owned utilities and large corporate consumers in the U.S. Founded in 2019, the company has raised more than $121 million, .

8. (tied) , $60M, semiconductor: Santa Clara, California-based Eliyan, a chiplet interconnect developer, raised a $60 million round co-led by and . Founded in 2021, this is the company’s first announced round, .

8. (tied) , $60M, artificial intelligence: Los Angeles-based HeyGen, an AI video platform, raised a $60 million funding round led by at a $500 million post-money valuation. Founded in 2020, the company has raised $69 million, .

10. , $58M, health care: New York-based Pelago, a substance use management platform, announced a $58 million round led by . Founded in 2017, Pelago has raised $151 million, per the company.

Big global deals

Despite the number of big rounds domestically, the biggest came from across the Pacific.

• China-based , a provider of energy-saving and intelligent-control services, raised more than $692 million.

Methodology

We tracked the largest announced rounds in the Crunchbase database that were raised by U.S.-based companies for the seven-day period of March 23 to 29. Although most announced rounds are represented in the database, there could be a small time lag as some rounds are reported late in the week.

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