AI Startups Raise 1220 Billion Dollars in 2025, U.S. Leads with 85.5%

Since the beginning of this year, global artificial intelligence startups have raised a staggering 1220 billion dollars in venture capital funding. The U.S. market accounted for 1043 billion dollars, or 85.5% of the total funds raised so far this year. This intense competition for AI dominance shows no signs of abating, with significant investments pouring into the sector.

Data from a provider focused on startups indicates that global AI startups raised approximately 1100 billion dollars in 2024. In contrast, the heated global AI funding race has driven the fundraising scale of AI startups like OpenAI and Anthropic to exceed last year's totals in just the first half of 2025.

According to investment trend data, the total funding for global AI startups in the second quarter reached 500 billion dollars, accounting for nearly half of the total 1015 billion dollars invested by venture capital firms during the same period. While this represents a slight decrease from the previous quarter's record high of 731 billion dollars, it remains at a historically high level compared to previous years.

The largest funding round this quarter was a 143 billion dollar investment in Scale AI by Meta. This investment gave Meta's founder and CEO a 49% stake in the company. Meta also appointed Scale AI's CEO as the company's Chief AI Officer and led a new superintelligence team within Meta. Other notable investments include a 25 billion dollar funding round for Anduril, which increased the startup's valuation from 140 billion dollars to 305 billion dollars, and a 20 billion dollar investment in Safe Superintelligence by Greenoaks, Alphabet's Google, and Andreessen Horowitz.

The trend towards investing in AI-related projects with "dense infrastructure" is becoming more pronounced, with both public and private sectors increasing their investment in AI. This shift is supported by a pledge of a 920 billion dollar investment package for AI and the power system across the nation, which is expected to bring about larger-scale investments in these two areas.

Despite these positive developments, the overall venture capital market faces challenges due to sustained high-interest rates and long-term U.S. Treasury yields remaining near historical highs. The total venture capital funding for the second quarter of 2025 decreased slightly to 1015 billion dollars, down from the first quarter's record high of 1284 billion dollars. One key factor contributing to this slowdown is the ongoing IPO drought, which has constrained venture capital firms' ability to raise new funds in the absence of public market exits.

Major AI startups have chosen to remain private, relying on later-stage funding and an active secondary market for support. Capital is increasingly concentrating on the world's leading AI startups. In 2025, companies like OpenAI, Anthropic, Scale AI, and Infinite Reality each secured tens of billions of dollars in funding. This concentration has created an imbalanced funding environment, making it difficult for smaller AI startups to secure investments. In the current economic climate, characterized by high long-term U.S. Treasury yields and benchmark interest rates, venture capital firms are increasingly favoring safer bets over high-risk, high-reward companies.

Large venture capital firms continue to dominate the global AI startup funding landscape with their multi-billion-dollar portfolios. The CEO of OpenAI, the global AI super-unicorn, stated that the company plans to invest tens of billions of dollars in the near future to develop the core infrastructure for AI. This includes AI chips, high-performance network equipment for data centers, and advanced power systems that support the increasingly complex AI training and inference systems. The CEO believes that AI will be the most important global development in the long term, and society as a whole will not regret investing heavily in AI.

Analysts predict that the four tech giants—Google, Microsoft, Meta, and Amazon—will collectively spend over 3500 billion dollars this year on data center expansions or new constructions centered around AI computing infrastructure. This represents a nearly 50% year-over-year increase from the strong growth in 2024, with projections exceeding 4500 billion dollars by 2026.

Strategists have recently stated that the AI investment boom, driven by increased profits, productivity gains, and cost reductions, could add 13 to 16 trillion dollars in value to the S&P 500 index. According to the highest value projection, this would result in a 30% increase in the benchmark index's market value. Since hitting its year-to-date low on April 8, the S&P 500 index has surged 25% and is currently hovering near its all-time high. A significant portion of this rally can be attributed to the unprecedented AI frenzy, which has propelled the two tech giants to record market values. Additionally, the S&P 500 index's robust corporate earnings have supported this optimistic sentiment, as chaotic trade policies have not caused the expected damage to market performance.