Texas startups are attracting stepped-up funding this year, largely thanks to enthusiasm around cybersecurity, defense tech, robotics and de-extincting mammoths.
In the first three months of 2025, venture investors have poured nearly $2.9 billion into Lone Star State companies, per Crunchbase data. That represents a clear high point for the past year, charted below, as well as the largest quarterly total in more than two years.
All about the mega-rounds
It’s all about big rounds. Per Crunchbase data, roughly two-third of this year’s Texas investment has gone to just five companies.
Of those, the largest funding recipient was Saronic, a developer of autonomous nautical vessels that picked up $600 million at a $4 billion valuation in February. Elad Gil led the financing for the Austin-based company, which is scaling up amid a boom period for defense tech venture investment.
Two later-stage security-related deals also provided much of the Q1 total. Austin-based NinjaOne, a provider of automated endpoint management, secured $500 million at a $5 billion valuation in February. And Dallas-based Island, developer of a secure enterprise browser, locked up $250 million last week.
Robots and mammoths
Robotics is another growth sector for venture funding, and Texas is no slouch in this space either.
Austin-based Apptronik, which is developing workplace humanoid robots, announced two weeks ago that it added another $53 million to its Series A, bringing total funding to more than $403 million.
For those who prefer our lab-engineered creatures a bit more warm and furry, meanwhile, it was encouraging to see Colossal Biosciences secure a $200 million Series C in January. The Austin-based startup is applying gene editing technology to de-extinct woolly mammoths and other species.
Fewer rounds, larger investments
While overall funding to Texas startups is on the rise this year, fewer rounds are getting done.
Some of this may be attributable to delays in reporting of seed deals, so round count totals should rise a bit over time. Even accounting for this, however, it’s apparent that investments are skewing larger.
To illustrate, we charted round counts and investment totals for the past few years below.
If 2025 continues at the current pace, funding round counts would hit the lowest level in years. That said, when investors do like a Texas company, they’re willing to write very large checks, which goes a long way toward balancing out the drop in deal numbers.
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Illustration: Li-Anne Dias
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