The short week following Memorial Day weekend didn’t stop the Seattle tech sector from stacking up some wins. A stealth startup raised a seed round for artificial intelligence-powered education, and a fusion energy company received government funding for a pilot plant. Read on for more details in the Built In Seattle Weekly Refresh.
Zap Energy got a $5M award for a nuclear fusion plant. The award is part of a Department of Energy program providing up to $50 million to “bring fusion toward technical and commercial viability,” as an alternative to carbon-based power. Zap Energy builds scalable and low-cost fusion energy tools to compress plasma without using expensive magnetic coils. [Business Wire]
Seattle Tech Quote of the Week
“The ability to understand the learner and their intent, and then personalize a response to them — at this level, it’s never been possible before.” — Eran Megiddo, co-founder of Maximal Learning
Maximal Learning raised a $5.7M seed round. The edtech startup, founded by two Microsoft veterans, will use generative AI to provide personalized learning in K-12 as well as higher education. Investors include Honeystone Ventures, Pioneer Square Labs, GSV Ventures and Owl Ventures, as well as Trilogy Equity Partners, which led the round. [GeekWire]
These startups raised Seattle’s largest funding rounds in May. Five companies raised a combined $92.8 million in May to develop technologies ranging from 3D printing to intellectual property protection. Companies raising funds include Strike Graph, a security certification company; Stacklok, which mitigates open source software security risks; Kubernetes-native AI startup Union.ai; Glowforge, the maker of a versatile 3D laser printer; and Story Protocol, which is developing a Web3 platform for managing intellectual property. [Built In Seattle]
