Exclusive-Alphabet's CapitalG, Nvidia in talks to fund Vast Data at up to $30 billion valuation, sources say
NEW YORK/SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) -Alphabet's growth-stage venture arm CapitalG and Nvidia are in talks to invest in artificial intelligence infrastructure provider Vast Data in a new funding round that could value the startup as high as $30 billion, two sources said.
The startup is raising several billion dollars from tech giants, private equity and venture capital investors, which could make it one of the most valuable AI startups, the two sources with knowledge of the matter said, as companies building the backbone for the AI boom come into sharper focus.
CapitalG and existing backer Nvidia are in discussions to participate in the round, which could close in the next few weeks, according to the sources, who requested anonymity to speak on private matters.
New York-headquartered Vast Data develops storage technology specifically designed for large AI data centers, enabling efficient data movement between graphics processors (GPUs) made by the likes of Nvidia.
Its clients include companies such as Elon Musk's xAI and CoreWeave, and its value in the AI supply chain makes it an attractive acquisition target, bankers and analysts said.
Nvidia declined to comment, while Vast Data and CapitalG did not respond to requests for comment.
TechCrunch earlier reported Vast Data's fundraising efforts, but the valuation of up to $30 billion and the expected involvement of CapitalG and Nvidia have not been reported previously.
Vast Data CEO Renen Halak has said the company is free cash flow positive. The company earned $200 million in annual recurring revenue (ARR) by January 2025, with a strong backlog of orders and projections to grow ARR to $600 million next year, according to a separate source familiar with its financials.
The company has raised roughly $380 million to date, and its last funding round in 2023 valued it at $9.1 billion.
Vast Data has said it would consider an initial public offering at the right time.
While no listing is imminent, according to another source familiar with the matter, investors and bankers view the data infrastructure firm as a likely IPO candidate.
Vast Data last year hired Amy Shapero, its first chief financial officer, who was previously in the same role at publicly listed e-commerce giant Shopify, in a move that could signal preparations for an IPO.
Mergers and acquisitions activity has also been heating up in the sector, and Nvidia has been acquiring companies that add complementary software and hardware products beyond its flagship GPUs.
In 2020, it bought networking chip and cable maker Mellanox, which has helped Nvidia build integrated systems featuring its latest Blackwell chips. It has also acquired software companies such as Run:ai, which helps engineers optimize data center AI hardware.
Vast Data's storage architecture is based on a system of flash storage devices and other off-the-shelf hardware, combined with its specialized software for data access and movement. The company says adopting its technology can reduce the cost of building and running large AI models.
Several companies, such as Weka and DDN, are pursuing similar efforts, but analysts and industry executives say Vast Data's technology is more mature than that of its rivals.
Shares of Nvidia slumped 2.3% and Alphabet stock sunk 1.4% during regular trading on Friday.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Yahoo
23 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Trump officials scramble to justify firing of economic statistician – as critics say ‘scary' move is a sign of ‘authoritiarianism'
Members of Donald Trump's team scrambled to provide coherent explanations for the sudden firing of a top official at the Bureau of Labor Statistics on Sunday as Friday's firing resonated throughout Washington and left the White House open to criticism of Trump's 'authoritarian' leanings. The US president directed the firing of Erika McEntarfer on Friday after a jobs report showed private companies adding just 73,000 positions in July, a drop from projections and a further sign that the Trump economy is stalling in the face of growing uncertainty around the president's tariff agenda. McEntarfer's firing was immediately denounced by her Trump-appointed predecessor and numerous others in Washington. Republicans on the Hill struggled to defend it, while members of Donald Trump's team insisted in interviews that the president and the nation needed what he called 'reliable' numbers. Trump accused McEntarfer of cooking the numbers on Kamala Harris's behalf during the 2024 election, and now working to make him look bad, a notion even the president's own advisers wouldn't echo directly. Kevin Hassett, director of the White House economic council, led the efforts to defend the president's decision-making on Sunday. He was joined by Jamieson Greer, the US trade representative. Hassett directly contradicted the president during his interview on Fox News Sunday with Shannon Bream; he argued that it was the formula by which the BLS determined job market gains — not malicious activity by McEntarfer — which needed to be addressed. Pointing to a letter from McEntarfer's predecessors, Bream asked Hassett: 'They're saying it's not good to cast aspersions on what's being done because it's a formula. It's used the same way every single time. So are you saying maybe the formulas, the calculations need to change?' 'That's right. They really need to get back to ground zero and find out why these numbers are so unreliable,' said Hassett.' "The data can't be propaganda. The data has to be something you can trust, because decision-makers throughout the economy trust that these are the data that they can build a factory because they believe, or cut interest rates because they believe. And if the data aren't that good, then it's a real problem for the US,' Hassett continued. He and others pointed to the agency revising totals for May and June as evidence that the BLS required changes: 'We expect more big revisions for the jobs data in September, for example ... we want to know why, we want people to explain it to us.' Greer, during a pre-taped interview with CBS's Face the Nation, backed up Hassett's claims that sharp revisions dating back to 2024 were evidence of the numbers produced by the agency being unreliable. "You want to be able to have somewhat reliable numbers,' he said. 'There are always revisions, but sometimes you see these revisions go in really extreme ways.' But there's still nothing linking McEntarfer to the kind of nefarious activity which Trump alleged she was up to in a Truth Social post. 'I have directed my Team to fire this Biden Political Appointee, IMMEDIATELY. She will be replaced with someone much more competent and qualified. Important numbers like this must be fair and accurate, they can't be manipulated for political purposes,' Trump wrote on Friday. He added: 'In my opinion, today's Jobs Numbers were RIGGED in order to make the Republicans, and ME, look bad — Just like when they had three great days around the 2024 Presidential Election, and then, those numbers were 'taken away' on November 15, 2024, right after the Election.' No one on the president's team has attempted to present any evidence backing up Trump's claims. A number of McEntarfer's predecessors and other top officialst at the BLS fired back in a statement from a group called the 'Friends of the BLS': 'The President seeks to blame someone for unwelcome economic news.' The president's critics said that the firing and unsupported explanation meant that future figures released by the agency would be thrown into question and was an example of Trump desiring ability to dictate the creation of phony statistics. 'This is the stuff of democracies giving way to authoritarianism,' warned Larry Summers, former director of the White House economic council under Biden (and Hassett's predecessor), on ABC's This Week. 'This is really scary stuff, and it can hardly be surprising that when the rule of law is in a bit question that there's a big uncertainty premium in the markets.' He went on to argue that Trump's battering of Fed Chair Jerome Powell followed in a similar vein, and was behind much of the uncertainty curbing U.S. investments on Wall Street. Friday marked the resumption of Trump's reciprocal tariffs; enforcement of rates as high as 50% on some U.S. trading partners will resume this week. Economists largely agree that those tariffs are driving up consumer prices and stifling U.S. investment rather than encouraging the return of manufacturing plants to America as companies continue to evaluate new costs stemming from Trump's import duties. The job numbers put out by the BLS on a monthly basis are some of the most important statistics gathered by the U.S. government in terms of their ability to move financial markets around the world. Experts say the sharp revisions are a result of more accurate data collection efforts.
Yahoo
23 minutes ago
- Yahoo
Apple CEO drops bombshell about its future
Apple CEO drops bombshell about its future originally appeared on TheStreet. Apple is notoriously close-to-the-vest when it comes to making announcements, preferring to keep loyal fans and die-hard investors in the dark until the timing is right. The company's "one more thing" mentality, reflected by founder Steve Jobs's surprising product reveals at Apple keynote conferences, appears shared by current CEO Tim Cook. In contrast to other big tech leaders, including Elon Musk, Cook often lets Apple's products do the talking. As a result, investors often look closely at Cook's comments during conference calls, looking for clues to what he may have planned for the company next. During Apple's second-quarter earnings conference call, Cook may have dropped his guard a little when he offered an interesting response about Apple's massive cash stockpile and artificial intelligence ambitions. CEO Tim Cook says Apple is open for business Apple reported a solid June quarter that outpaced analysts' expectations. Revenue was a whopping $94 billion, up 10% year over year, and almost $5 billion better than Wall Street expected. Net income was over $23 billion, resulting in earnings per share, or EPS, of $1.57, up 12% from one year ago, and 14 cents ahead of company's massive profit lifted its cash hoard to about $36 billion from roughly $30 billion last year, giving it plenty of financial firepower to invest in its products and software. And that's precisely what investors want to see happen. While competitors like Google have gone all in on artificial intelligence, developing the AI chatbot Gemini, Apple's AI strategy has been criticized as too little, too late. The company's arguably slow development of AI solutions relative to peers has left many investors wondering if Tim Cook's number-crunching mindset sets Apple on a course of missing out on the most significant opportunity since the dawn of the Internet. However, during Apple's earnings conference call, Cook acknowledged that he'd consider accelerating Apple's AI efforts by using its massive cash war chest. When Citi analyst Atif Malik asked about the prospects of 'big M&A," Cook responded bluntly. 'We've acquired around seven companies this year,' said Cook on the call. 'We're very open to M&A that accelerates our road map… We are not stuck on a certain size company.' Cook said he didn't have anything to announce currently, but his willingness to consider a big deal could mean that reports of interest in Perplexity, a major AI player, may have merit. Buying Perplexity could make sense for Apple Cook aims to accelerate Apple's development timeline, ostensibly via internal research and development and smaller bolt-on deals. However, if he really wanted to, he could do a deal to acquire Perplexity that could, as he put it, 'help us accelerate a road map.'Perplexity provides an AI chatbot similar to Google and OpenAI's ChatGPT, but there are key differences. It has its own in-house model, Sonar, that's built on Meta Platforms' Llama open source code. It's also leaned on rival chatbots, including DeepSeek's R1. Subscribers to its Pro tier can also toggle between other large language models, including OpenAI, Gemini, Anthropic's Claude, and Elon Musk's Grok. Acquiring Perplexity would instantly give Apple an established model for monetizing AI. Perplexity operates on a freemium model, with a no-cost introductory subscription and paid service. Perplexity prioritizes real-time insight with direct responses — a design that arguably matches Apple's deep focus on user experience. In short, Perplexity's desire for a better chatbot user experience aligns nicely with Apple's approach, historically. Perplexity would cost Apple a pretty penny Cook says Apple has acquired seven companies this year, about one 'every several weeks.' Those deals, however, are small and haven't cost the company much of its war chest. Buying Perplexity would be a different story. Perplexity, which launched in 2022 around the same time as ChatGPT, has over 22 million monthly active users. Its annualized revenue could hit $150 million this summer, according to About Chromebooks data, up from an ARR of $63 million exiting last year. The company's rapid user growth translated into Perplexity answering 780 million queries in May, according to which was up from 230 million in August 2024. Also in May, its website recorded 153 million visits, about triple the number from March. Perplexity isn't publicly traded, is currently reportedly valued at $18 billion, and its AI search market share is about 6%.Apple CEO drops bombshell about its future first appeared on TheStreet on Aug 3, 2025 This story was originally reported by TheStreet on Aug 3, 2025, where it first appeared.
Yahoo
23 minutes ago
- Yahoo
The ABC News host took the administration to task for the president's firing of his stats boss.
ABC News host George Stephanopoulos says President Donald Trump's administration resembles the authoritarian regimes in Venezuela and Turkey after the president fired the head of the Bureau of Labor Statistics. On Friday, the president fired BLS Commissioner Erika McEntarfer after the agency released its July jobs report showing that the economy added a mere 73,000 jobs last month—far fewer than the 109,000 jobs the White House forecasted. Trump claimed BLS had 'RIGGED' the numbers 'to make the Republicans, and ME, look bad.' 'Suppressing statisticians is a time-honored tool for leaders trying to solidify their power and stifle dissent,' Stephanopoulos said on Sunday's edition of This Week. 'It's happened throughout history. Most recently in Venezuela and Turkey, where presidents punished officials and economists who do not tow the party line.'
