Founders Fund Portfolio: AI Startups Backed by Peter Thiel’s Firm (2025 Tracker)
Founders Fund’s AI playbook at a glance. See the startups that Peter Thiel–backed firm has funded, from Anthropic and Scale AI to emerging bets like Netic AI.
Founded by Peter Thiel, Brian Singerman, and other PayPal Mafia alums, Founders Fund has a reputation for swinging early and swinging big on frontier tech (SpaceX, Palantir, Facebook).
In the GenAI era, they’re leaning hard into:
- Defense & dual-use AI – aligning with the firm’s “competing with nation-states” thesis.
- Compute & chip efficiency – anything that breaks the GPU bottleneck.
- Agentic software that replaces, not just augments, knowledge work.
Below is a live tracker of the AI-first companies they’ve funded in the last 18 months.
💸 Founders Fund AI Portfolio (Live Tracker)
| Company | Sector | Latest Round | $$ Raised | Year | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Anthropic | Foundation models | Series C | $450 M | 2023 | FF joined Google & Spark in the round |
| Anduril | Autonomous defense systems | Series E | $1.48 B | 2022 | FF invested at seed and every follow-on |
| Scale AI | Data-labeling & RAG infra | Series F | $325 M | 2024 | Early backer (Series B) — re-upped in later rounds |
| Netic AI | Cybersecurity / SOC automation | Seed | $10 M | 2025 | Seed led by Founders Fund + Lightspeed |
| Rescale | Cloud HPC for AI | Series C | $105 M | 2023 | FF participated alongside Insight & a16z |
| Vercel | AI-powered DX tooling | Series D | $150 M | 2024 | FF joined Tiger Global to back Next.js + v0 AI |
| Palantir | AI-driven data platforms | Public (NYSE: PLTR) | – | IPO 2019 | FF’s OG bet — cornerstone of its AI thesis |
| Neuralink | Brain–machine interface | Series C | $280 M | 2023 | AI-adjacent; FF is a long-time participant |
(All dollar figures = total capital raised in the most recent round.)
*Estimate based on public filings & press; Anthropic’s 2025 mega-round has not formally closed.
This page is updated monthly. Know a startup we missed? Email us to get it added.
Why Founders Fund makes these bets
| Strategic Angle | How a Founders Fund check helps |
|---|---|
| Demand driver for new compute | Chips & defense autonomy push the limits of current GPUs → future Groq/Rain/L4 stack. |
| Regulation-proof domains | Defense & critical infra have high moats and fewer consumer-privacy headwinds. |
| “Zero-to-one” culture fit | FF likes contrarian founders tackling hard tech; frontier-model labs & hardware start-ups match that DNA. |
Related Trackers
- NVentures (Nvidia) AI Portfolio
- a16z AI Portfolio: Startups Backed by Andreessen Horowitz
- Thrive Capital Portfolio: AI Startups Backed by Thrive
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