Tip-offs
•
Oct 10, 2025
Each week, we surface high-potential startups & promising founders.
This week's highlights →
💰 FinTech Fever
Fintech and crypto startups surging in web traffic.
Hylo | 52x growth in 3 months
Decentralized stablecoin system designed to maintain price stability through blockchain-based mechanisms. Raised $1.5M Seed round in Aug 2025 from Robot Ventures.
Standard | 32x growth in 3 months
Gamified decentralized finance (DeFi) protocol enabling users to manage and trade synthetic assets. Raised a Pre-Seed round in Nov 2024.
Seoul, Korea
Plume | 26x growth in 3 months
Platform providing blockchain infrastructure and compliance technology for institutional clients. Raised a Venture round in Aug 2025 from Hyperithm.
San Francisco, US
Curve Financial | 20x growth in 3 months
Decentralized exchange (DEX) optimized for stablecoin trading and low-slippage swaps. Raised a Seed round in Jan 2022.
Zurich, Switzerland
Factoro | 11x growth in 3 months
B2B SaaS platform offering invoice factoring services to improve liquidity for small and medium businesses. Raised a $120K Pre-Seed round in Jan 2019.
Monterrey, Mexico
🧑💼 Hiring Frenzy
Startups seeing a surge in job openings.
Wispr Flow | 900% growth in 3 months
AI voice-to-text app that turns natural speech into clean, formatted text across any app. Raised a $30M Series A in Jun 2025 from Menlo Ventures.
San Francisco, US
Manifold Bio | 300% growth in 3 months
Biotech company using DNA barcoding to engineer proteins and speed up drug discovery. Raised a $40M Series A in Jun 2022 from Triatomic Capital.
Boston, US
Ideogram | 200% growth in 3 months
AI-powered design platform that generates text-accurate images and creative visuals from natural-language prompts. Raised an $80M Series A in Feb 2024 from Andreessen Horowitz.
Toronto, Canada
Unitary | 150% growth in 3 months
Platform for trust and safety, combining AI and human expertise to automate content moderation. Raised a $15M Series A in Oct 2023 from Creandum.
Cambridge, UK
Chainlink | 111% growth in 3 months
Decentralized oracle network connecting smart contracts with real-world data, APIs, and traditional bank payments. Raised a $110K Series A in Oct 2022.
Grand Cayman, Cayman Islands
🧠 DeepMind DNA
Ex-Google DeepMind PhDs who started up in the last 18 months.
Shumeet Baluja
PhD (Computer Science). CMU alum.
165+ U.S. patents. 30+ years in deep learning. Ex-Google (AI & vision research), Chief Scientist at Lycos, & CTO of JAMDAT (IPO in 2004, acquired by EA). Now founder & CEO of POETIQ, building safe self-improving AGI.
San Diego County, US
Toby Shevlane
PhD (Governance of AI). Oxford alum.
Ex-Google DeepMind (AGI strategy & safety). Research background at GovAI and the University of Oxford’s Future of Humanity Institute. Now cofounder & CEO of Mantic, building AI forecasting systems to improve model evaluation.
London, UK
David Budden
PhD (Engineering). University of Melbourne alum.
Ex-DeepMind Director of Engineering (Gemini). Former researcher at MIT & Harvard. Now founder & CEO of PingYou, building human-AI alignment tools.
London, UK
Jonathan Hunt
PhD (Computational Neuroscience). University of Queensland alum.
Ex-DeepMind Senior Research Scientist & Twitter Staff Research Scientist (recommendation systems). Now cofounder & CTO of Elefant AI, building adaptive reasoning systems.
London, UK
Pouya Samangouei
PhD (Electrical & Computer Engineering). University of Maryland alum.
Ex-Google DeepMind Research Scientist. Earlier research on GANs, adversarial defense, and model interpretability. Now founder of a stealth AI startup.
San Francisco, US
