Issue #12 | Wednesday, June 10, 2026
💸 Over $1.4B in disclosed startup funding went to 31 companies with one or more female founder this week. This does not include Anthropic’s $65B capital event.
The largest raise was 🥇 Figure — $250M to expand their blockchain-powered financial services platform.
From the VC angle, 8 new women-led funds were announced this week.
Ysios Capital's (Julia Salaverria) $116.2M fund is the largest fully launched women-led venture fund announced this week, dedicated to backing the next generation of biotech companies.
I’m reading the signs around Factorial Energy Founder Siyu Huang’s public trading announcement on their solid state battery tech.
💡 Key takeaways from Issue #12…
Pooling at the top. 45.6% of funding went to four companies developing infrastructure tech in AI, quantum, finance, energy.
Future is now. Startup positioning narratives are shifting way from “what could this become?” to “this is already becoming the system.”
The signals in this digest come from a variety of credible sources. If you have a tip, opp, data point, or story you would like to include, please send it to [email protected].
Thank you for being a valued subscriber of WINS LIST.
Amie
Amie Sheridan | Editor, WINS LIST
📶 Capital Signal
The biggest stories about women and capital this week
📈 Founder Raises
Tier 1 — Mega Rounds ($100M+)
Anthropic (Daniela Amodei) raised a $65B IPO filing + $900B pre-money valuation to scale enterprise AI foundation models and Claude products.
Figure (Alana Ackerson, Cynthia Chen, June O., Sara Priola) raised $250M to expand its blockchain-powered financial services platform.
Twinco Capital (Carmen Marin and Sandra Nolasco) secured a €150M (~$170M) to finance global supply chain operations and working capital infrastructure.
Quobly (Maud Vinet) raised a €115M Series A (~$133M) to build silicon spin qubit quantum chips for next-generation computing infrastructure.
Factorial Energy (Siyu Huang) raised a $100M to scale solid-state battery technology for electric vehicle energy storage.
Tier 2 — Growth Rounds ($25M–$99M)
Ona Therapeutics (Valerie Vanhooren) raised an $86.6M Series B to develop antibody-drug conjugates targeting treatment-resistant cancers.
Stepful (Tressia Hobeika) raised $55M to train and place healthcare workers into clinical roles.
Layup Parts (Elisa Suarez) raised a $42M Series A to manufacture advanced composite parts for industrial applications.
Gigaton (Buffy Price) raised a $26M Series A to reduce manufacturing cost and energy consumption using AI systems.
Gradient Labs (Danai Antoniou) raised a $13M Series A extension to build agentic customer operations software for financial services.
Ilant Health (Elina Onitskansky, Jessica Muse) raised a $15M Series A to scale obesity and cardiometabolic care platforms.
Tier 3 — Early Stage (<$25M)
Opal Security (Umaimah Khan) raised a $23M Series A to build AI-native identity and access governance infrastructure.
Board (Brynn Putnam) raised $20M to develop a hybrid physical-digital gaming platform.
Plot (Megan Duong) raised $10M Seed to build a social video marketing intelligence platform.
Cala (Elisenda Bou-Balust) raised €7M Pre-Seed to build a knowledge layer for AI agents.
Intellectible (Rosie Higgins) raised $3M Seed to build AI-powered revenue operations tools.
AethexAI (Mariama D. Diallo, Ayooluwa Odemuyiwa) raised $3M Pre-Seed to build voice AI models for customer support in emerging markets.
Kestrel Labs (Marian Pulford) raised $2.15M to build compliance infrastructure for the built environment.
New Dawn Bio (Kianti Figler) raised €2.1M Pre-Seed to develop cultured wood materials.
Poindexter Labs (Jocelyn D’Arcy) raised £2M Seed to build LLM training and benchmarking infrastructure.
Joyvié Health (Zoe Robson) raised $1.04M Pre-Seed to develop continence care solutions.
Atheni.ai (Mackenzie M. Howe, Louise Ballard) raised a £350K angel round to build AI adoption tools.
Galaxy Diagnostics (Amanda Elam) raised undisclosed funding to advance infectious disease diagnostics.
🏦 VC Signals
Reach Capital (Jennifer Carolan, Wayee Chu) is raising up to $275M Fund V focused on education and workforce innovation.
Ysios Capital (Julia Salaverria) launched a $116.2M fund to invest in biotech companies.
Version One Ventures (Angela Tran) raised $108M across two funds to invest in early-stage technology startups.
Merantix Capital (Nicole Büttner) launched a €103M (~$112M) AI fund to back early-stage AI-native companies.
Marvelous (Lian Michelson) partnered with the Joachim Herz Foundation to launch a $23.2M deeptech fund.
U&I Ventures (Kim Moore) raised $18M+ toward a $25M target for its debut enterprise infrastructure fund.
Commit Capital (Laura Yao) launched a $15M fund focused on B2B software, developer tools, and infrastructure.
Generationship (Michelle Yi and Rachel Chalmers) closed a $2.7M debut fund investing in pre-seed women-led AI and infrastructure startups.
💬 Investor Speak: Angela Tran | Version One VC
Adjacent to the close of her firm’s TWO new funds totaling over $100M…
“🎉 Today, we're excited to share that we've closed two new funds: Version One Fund V ($78M) and Opportunities Fund III ($30M). 🎉
We're thrilled and lucky to back the next generation of founders who are deeply mission-driven, with unusual insight and an almost obsessive desire to solve a problem they understand better than anyone else. They're building on non-obvious, wonderfully wild ideas with the potential to transform the world.
Today, these ideas look like AI, robotics and physical AI, deep tech, biology, and emerging global ecosystems including India and Africa. And our core belief is that the founders bold enough to pursue them will be the category creators of the next decade.”
👀 If I’m Reading the Signs: Siyu Huang | Factorial Energy
Narrative intelligence around venture funding communication
Adjacent to Factorial Energy’s transition to the public market, Founder and CEO, Siyu Huang provided her own commentary on LinkedIn.
“Today, Factorial Energy (Nasdaq: FAC) begins trading on Nasdaq.
Ten years ago, we started with a belief that solid-state batteries could change the world. Today we mark a milestone, but what stays with me most is the journey, and the people who made it.
From Cornell's incubator to the world's first automotive-sized solid-state battery cell operating at room temperature. From powering drones one cell at a time, to the world's first lithium metal solid-state battery vehicle, built and driven by Mercedes-Benz a record 1,205 km from Stuttgart to Malmö.
Deep technology demands patience, resilience, and partners willing to hold conviction through uncertainty. We were fortunate to find them - the not-for-profit strategic investor for the U.S. national security community and America's allies, alongside Mercedes-Benz, Stellantis, Hyundai Motor Company, and Kia Corporation.”
📶 Signal Strength
✅ Siyu shows a strong narrative arc that compresses technical progress into a clear investor-native storyline.
✅ She includes tier-one partnerships (Mercedes-Benz, Stellantis, Hyundai, Kia) for validation and credibility.
✅ She positions Factorial as “infrastructure-level energy technology” reframing the products as foundational energy systems.
📉 Signal Gaps
⭕ Siyu does not include any performance metrics in her post.
👀 What I’d Add
More proof in numbers, customer success data, and scalability metrics.
Bottom Line:
Siyu generally does an effective job of amplifying her external signal through high frequency posts and personal commentary. She is unique in that she includes audio and video commentary on LinkedIn where most founders do not. Her presence, particularly in this announcement-style post, would benefit from an infusion of performance-based metrics that showcase impact and momentum.
🎬 Signing Off
That’s a wrap on issue #12.
WINS LIST tracks the signals shaping women founders and investors.
In today’s ecosystem, visibility matters.
👀 We are seeing founders and VCs leveraging their own channels to amplify their traction.
👀 We are seeing startup storytelling begin six to twelve months before a raise.
👀 We are seeing funding announcements lead to press tours.
👀 We are seeing women founders showcasing credibility, momentum, and demand.
Follow along with us as we unbox investor perspectives and frame out the fundability metrics they evaluate when considering not only where their investments should go, but also which founders to meet.
We do not represent nor are we compensated by any of the businesses we cover.
Thank you for being a valued subscriber.
See you next week.
— WINS LIST
