Andreessen Horowitz hosted Cool Month

This is a monthly series in which we profile the most active investors in American companies, take a look at some of their most interesting investments, and post interesting facts about who spent how much.

July was a hot month across much of the country, but apparently not at many venture capital firms.

Only one firm — Andreessen Horowitz — reached double-digit funding rounds for U.S. startups this month.

Major firms like Khosla Ventures and New Enterprise Associates have only done a handful of deals, with none of them achieving significant profits.

Let’s take a look at who recorded the biggest growth in a weak month

Andreessen Horowitz, 11 transactions

The Menlo Park, California-based giant once again led in the number of deals involving U.S. startups — though one could argue that it was in the news more often last month because of politics.

Andreessen has been in great form lately, announcing 30 deals in the past three months.

In July, the company led or co-led three massive funding rounds — the largest being a $200 million round for space startup Astranis, which it co-led with Bam Elevate.

Andreessen also led a $175 million Series B round for autonomous surface ship maker Saronic, which is valued at $1 billion, and a $130 million Series B round for Hebbia, an AI startup that helps enterprises analyze all types of data to answer more complex, multi-step questions.

General Catalyst, 9 offers

Massachusetts-based General Catalyst closed nine deals last month. While that number isn’t huge, it’s actually 3x larger than the one the VC firm closed in July 2023.

That amount actually included leading or co-leading four megadeals — worth $100 million or more — in the U.S., including a $200 million funding round for Troy, Michigan-based healthcare company HarmonyCares, with McKesson Ventures and a large, anonymous national payer. The firm also co-led or co-led large rounds for Aven and Kandji.

Perhaps the most interesting round General Catalyst participated in was a large $300 million Series A round for Skild AI. The Pittsburgh-based startup — valued at $1.5 billion — builds robot brains, and those brain models can be used in different robots and for different tasks.

Sequoia Capital, 9 transactions

Sequoia Capital maintained a stable position throughout the year, recording an average of seven transactions per month involving American startups.

Sequoia led regulatory compliance startup Vanta in a $150 million funding round that valued the company at $2.45 billion. The company also participated in Skild AI’s previously mentioned round and San Francisco-based AI legal tech startup Harvey’s $100 million Series C at a valuation of $1.5 billion.

Lightspeed Venture Partners, 8 transactions

Lightspeed Venture Partners is similar to Sequoia in terms of consistency, having participated in seven deals involving U.S. startups in the past six months.

Last month, that included co-leading Skilda’s funding round with Coatue, SoftBank Group and Jeff Bezos as part of his Bezos Expeditions.

The Silicon Valley giant also co-led a $150 million Series C round for clinical-stage precision oncology startup Scorpion Therapeutics, and a $140 million Series C round for Kirkland, Washington-based software supply chain security startup Chainguard, making it a unicorn at a $1.12 billion valuation.

It is also worth paying attention to:

• Next on the list were Index Ventures and Alumni Ventures, which concluded seven transactions each.
• In July, Lightspeed Venture Partners led the way in terms of the most directly or co-led deals, with five.
• Lightspeed Venture Partners also topped the list for the most rounds led or co-led by the largest amounts of money, having led or co-led four rounds totaling nearly $662 million.
• Y Combinator once again emerged as the top investment incubator and accelerator, recording 18 deals in July.

Methodology

Here’s a list of investors who have participated in the most rounds involving U.S.-based startups. It doesn’t include incubators or accelerators because their investment numbers can fluctuate.

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Illustration: House of Guzman