The Venice AI startup has raised $65 million in a Series A round at a valuation of $1 billion, becoming a “unicorn” just two years after its launch.
The platform provides access to more than 200 AI models with a strong emphasis on privacy: user data is encrypted on the client side, passes through an external proxy, and is not stored on the company’s servers.
Venice hosts “uncensored” open-source models in its own data centers and routes requests to closed models such as those from OpenAI and Anthropic. The company is already profitable, with annual revenue exceeding $70 million, serving over 3 million active users and averaging 1.7 million API requests per day.
The round was led by Dragonfly, with participation from Coinbase Ventures and North Island Ventures. The CEO is Eric Vorhies, a well-known Bitcoin entrepreneur and founder of ShapeShift, who describes the service as a “neutral platform.” The funds will be used to purchase GPUs and build its own data centers.
At the moment, VVV +20%, FDV ~$1.1 billion