The public on-ramp for AI is open, and capital is already moving. SpaceX’s index fast-track has landed it in millions of retirement accounts, Anthropic is lining up October, and K2 Space has more than doubled its valuation to $6.8 billion in seven months. Beneath the headlines, AI and space infrastructure is hardening into a new class of blue-chip ventures. Next up: a founders-first QSBS session with CapGains, followed by a members-only evening at Sisley Paris in NYC on September 3. We’re in the last few innings of the summer. Let’s get into it.
TL;DR
→ QSBS Virtual Event for Founders & Startups —A dive into the tax benefit for founders, employees, and early conviction holders
→ Pre-Labor Day Gathering at Sisley—A members event to get you in the spirit.
→ Trending News—Goodfin Inc. feature, Anthropic IPO, Together GPUs, oh my!
→ Member Poll: What do you say to investors new to private markets?
ON THE CALENDAR
QSBS for Founders & Startups
August 27th | 12 PM PT | Virtual
Goodfin is teaming up with CapGains for a founders-first session on the most powerful — and most overlooked — tax benefit in startup equity: QSBS. We'll break down how Section 1202 can exclude up to $15M (or more) in capital gains from federal taxes, how to lock in eligibility from day one, and how to extend the benefit to your team and earliest backers. Built for founders who are building now.
Pre-Fall Gathering: Sisley Paris
September 3 | 5 PM ET | New York City
Sisley Paris is opening the doors of its maison to Goodfin members for an evening of relaxation and connection. Enjoy drinks, appetizers, mini treatments, and good conversation before the long weekend. You deserve it. Limited capacity. Open to all members. Attendees must have a Goodfin account. Plus 1s welcome.
IN THE REARVIEW
Goodfin Members’ Supper Club in NYC
Goodfin members braved the rain to convene around a chef-led private dinner in Manhattan. Intimate and impactful, members across finance, medicine, tech, and VC industries discussed politics, culture, and investments. Thank you to member Nick Raffin for hosting and to Chef Raisie and her team at Cedar Catering for the delicious meal, service, and experience.
Stanford LA Summer Networking Mixer
Goodfin sponsored the Stanford Angels & Entrepreneurs of SoCal mixer — and the room delivered. The evening featured speaker Lewis Hong, Stanford alum, ex SpaceX, serial entrepreneur, investor, and mentor, bringing a personal and informative lens to building for the future.
To all the innovators, investors, and operators who came out — thank you. This is the network worth building.
IN THE NEWS
Inc. features the Goodfin QSBS Venture Fund
Inc. just spotlighted our newest launch — and the tax perk quietly becoming the hottest thing in founder circles.
The short version: the QSBS exclusion lets investors and founders exclude up to 100% of capital gains on small-business stock held more than three years — tax-free gains of up to $15 million, or 10x the original investment, whichever is greater. Last year's One Big Beautiful Bill Act widened eligibility, raising the exclusion cap and lifting the gross-asset ceiling to $75 million from $50 million.
The catch? The rules are complex, and many founders leave millions on the table at exit — often because tripwires around C-corp status and share timing kick in years before a sale.
That's the gap the Goodfin QSBS Venture Fund closes. It's built to optimize the perk for both sides — the angels, VCs, and founders investing in the fund, and the companies it backs. The focus: Y Combinator and tier-one venture-backed startups that qualify for QSBS and are designed from day one to target it, with Goodfin running founders' QSBS diagnostics from the start to sidestep those tripwires.
As founder and CEO Anna Joo Fee put it: the intention from the start is to optimize for this, so everybody gets the benefit.
FROM GOODFIN’S AI AGENT
The signal that matters surfaced for you. Here's what our AI pulled from the noise this week:
1. Anthropic lines up the first frontier-AI listing — targeting October. The company behind Claude has filed confidentially and is targeting a Nasdaq debut as early as October 2026, with reporting pointing to a raise of $60B or more. It closed a $30B Series G in February at a $380B post-money valuation, and run-rate revenue has climbed sharply this year. If it prices this fall, Anthropic would reach the public market ahead of OpenAI — which has signaled a 2027 timeline — and set the first public comparable investors have ever had for a frontier-AI company. Read More
2. Together AI raises $800M to scale the "neocloud." The AI-compute platform closed an $800M Series C at an $8.3B valuation — up from $3.3B a year ago — led by Aramco Ventures, with NVIDIA, Vista Equity Partners, and General Catalyst joining. Together rents on-demand GPU power for training and running AI models, the exact bottleneck every AI company is racing to clear, with bookings reportedly crossing $1.15B in Q2. While the labs grab the headlines, the picks-and-shovels layer underneath them is quietly becoming some of the most valuable real estate in tech. Read More
3. K2 Space raises $500M at $6.8B valuation — doubling from $3B in 7 months. The satellite manufacturer closed the Series D led by Kleiner Perkins and ICONIQ. K2 just flew the most powerful electric thruster ever operated in orbit on its Gravitas satellite and won its first Pentagon program-of-record slot with the Space Force's Protected Tactical Satcom-Global program. With $1B+ in signed contracts already locked, K2 is moving from proof-of-concept to production scale. Read More
4. Index Ventures raises $2B across three funds on the back of Wiz's $32B exit. The 30-year-old firm closed $400M for seed, $900M for venture, and added $700M to an existing growth fund — bringing total available capital to $3.5B. Index's stake in Wiz alone was worth $3.8B when Alphabet closed the acquisition earlier this year. Strong exits are turbocharging the best-performing VCs' deployment power, compressing capital concentration into fewer hands. Index is also doubling down on AI with positions in Fireworks, Physical Intelligence, and Anthropic. The flywheel is tight — exits fund mega-raise, mega-raise goes back into concentrated bets, compounding returns. Read More
MEMBER POLL
Private markets investors back category winners early. What do you tell your friends who are looking to invest in private markets where the real edge lies?
Vote and you're automatically entered to win exclusive Goodfin merch. We'll randomly select voters and send you something special.
We asked in Vol 19: Some of the most sought-after pre-IPO names are still investing heavily ahead of profitability — OpenAI is reportedly spending ~$14B this year as it scales, with a breakeven target of 2030. When sizing up a pre-IPO position, what earns your conviction?
Decisive: 75% said Back the vision — category winners invest early to build the moat, growth first, margins follow. The other 25% held the line on fundamentals.
Most telling? Zero votes for watching where secondaries price or barbelling the book. This crowd doesn't wait.
The read: Goodfin members are builders. You back vision ahead of profitability — exactly the posture that gets you into the best names early.
FROM GOODFIN SLACK
Not for the faint of heart.
Goodfin | Your inside track to elite private markets