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Sony Music, DNS Capital lead $16m Series A funding round for AI licensing platform Vermillio

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An AI “licensing and protection” platform called Vermillio has raised $16 million in a Series A funding round led by Sony Music Entertainment and DNS Capital.

Vermillio said on Monday (March 3) that it plans to use the funds to scale its operations and continue “building out solutions for a generative AI internet that enables talent, studios, record labels, and more to protect and monetize their content”.

Sony Music has previously worked with Vermillio, co-founded by entrepreneur Dan Neely, on a project with The Orb and David Gilmour in collaboration with Legacy Recordings, where fans could “remix” their album and create original artwork.

Neely, who recently made TIME’s list of 100 most influential individuals in AI, is said to have provided key guidance for the introduction of the landmark NO FAKES Act.

Commenting on participating in the funding round, Dennis Kooker, President, Global Digital Business, Sony Music Entertainment, said: “Sony Music is focused on developing responsible generative AI use cases that enhance the creativity and goals of our talent, protect their work, excite fans, and create new commercial possibilities.”

“Sony Music is focused on developing responsible generative AI use cases that enhance the creativity and goals of our talent, protect their work, excite fans, and create new commercial possibilities.”

Dennis Kooker, Sony Music Entertainment

Added Kooker: “Dan Neely and the team at Vermillio share our vision that prioritizing proper consent, clear attribution and appropriate compensation for professional creators is foundational to unlocking monetization opportunities in this space.

“We look forward to expanding our successful collaboration with them as we work to support the growth of trusted platforms by enabling secure AI solutions that are mutually beneficial for technology innovators, artists and rightsholders.”

Vermillio claims to be the first AI platform that “securely licenses IP and allows IP holders and talent to safely engage with generative AI technologies”.

The company achieves this via its ‘TraceID’ protection and third-party attribution tool, which Vermillio claims “enables talent and IP holders to take advantage of the benefits of Generative AI with secure control of their data and AI rights”.

According to Vermillio, TraceID “offers the ability to manage terms, conditions, and usage rights while capitalizing on new revenue streams made possible with Generative AI”.

Vermillio said that its team designed TracelD to “eliminate key concerns around consent, credit, and compensation with Generative AI”.

Monday’s announcement noted that Vermillio struck what’s claimed to be a “first-of-its-kind partnership with talent agency WME” in 2024 “to shield their clients from IP theft and deliver opportunities to monetize their name, image and likeness (NIL) by securely licensing their data”.

Meanwhile, to demonstrate “the unique opportunity that authenticated AI with TraceID presents”, Vermillio said that it launched a Spider-Verse AI engine with Sony Pictures where fans created their own unique digital version of themselves in the animation style of the Spider-Verse artists.

According to Vermillio, each of the 1.5 million unique fan creations during the project was tracked using TraceID and with the ability to trace back to the filmmakers’ source IP.

“We are setting a new standard for AI licensing — one that proactively enables consent, credit, and compensation for innovative opportunities.”

Dan Neely, Vermillio

“We are setting a new standard for AI licensing—one that proactively enables consent, credit, and compensation for innovative opportunities,” said Dan Neely, Co-Founder & CEO of Vermillio.

“With the support of an innovation leader like Sony Music, Vermillio will continue building our products that ensure generative AI is utilized ethically and securely.

“At this critical moment in determining the future of AI and how to hold platforms accountable, we are proud to protect the world’s most beloved content and talent.”Music Business Worldwide



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Funding & Business

Q2 Global Venture Funding Climbs In A Blockbuster Quarter For AI And As Capital Concentrates In Larger Companies

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Global venture funding ticked up year over year in Q2 2025, with a greater concentration of capital into the largest funding rounds compared to a year ago, Crunchbase data shows.

Q2 funding reached $91 billion, up from $82 billion in Q2 2024, per Crunchbase data. However, quarter-over-quarter funding fell from $114 billion in Q1, which marked the highest quarter for funding since Q3 2022.

Global funding has increased year over year for the past three quarters, driven primarily by billion-dollar-plus rounds into AI research labs as well as data and infrastructure providers in the sector.

While Q2 capital concentration into the largest rounds was not quite as high as in the prior two quarters, it was still well above historical proportions. Close to a third of all capital in Q2 went to 16 companies that raised funding rounds of $500 million or more, including a $14.3 billion funding to Scale AI, per Crunchbase data.

Table of Contents

AI blockbuster quarter

In another blockbuster quarter for AI funding, $40 billion — or around 45% of global funding — went to the sector, with more than a third invested in Scale AI alone.

All in all, the past three quarters saw record funding to the AI sector.

Foundation model companies raised $5.5 billion last quarter. That included two AI research labs — Thinking Machines Lab and Safe Superintelligence — both a year old or less, raising $2 billion each. Other large rounds in the AI sector were raised by Anduril Industries ($2.5 billion), Grammarly ($1 billion), Anysphere ($900 million) and Helsing ($694 million).

Healthcare and biotech companies raised $14.8 billion in venture funding in Q2, making it the second-largest sector for the quarter. The financial services sector, the third-largest, raised $10.8 billion, per Crunchbase data.

Along with a greater concentration of capital in larger companies, the U.S. predominated, with $60 billion — or two-thirds of venture capital — going to U.S.-based companies in Q2.

H1 2025 grew

H1 2025 posted the strongest half-year for venture capital since the first half of 2022. A total of $205 billion was raised through mid-year, up 32% from H1 2024.

More than a third of H1 funding — $70 billion — went to just 11 companies that raised rounds of $1 billion or more.

Both of the two largest venture fundings on record were raised this year. They were Scale AI, with $14.3 billion in Q2, and OpenAI with $40 billion in Q1. (To find the third-largest venture round on record, you would need to go back to 2018, when Hangzhou-based Ant Group raised a $14 billion Series C funding.)

M&A up in 2025

Q2 2025 was the second-strongest quarter for startup M&A dollar volume since 2021, with $50 billion in reported exit value. Last quarter’s total was down from $71 billion in Q1, although that was the quarter in which Wiz was acquired by Google in the largest-ever acquisition of a private company at a price tag of $32 billion.

OpenAI was the most-active and largest acquirer by amount in Q2, buying four companies including Jony Ive’s Io for $6 billion and Windsurf for $3 billion.

In Q2, 18 companies were acquired for more than $1 billion, Crunchbase data shows. Half of these companies were acquired by public companies, and three by private equity firms. Six of the acquisitions were by private venture-backed companies including OpenAI. They also included Databricks’ acquisition of open source SQL database Neon.

Late-stage gains

All the gains year over year were seen in late-stage funding in the second quarter. Funding reached $55 billion, up more than 53% year over year, and down quarter over quarter by close to a third, Crunchbase data shows.

Early-stage flat

Early-stage funding was flat quarter over quarter in Q2 reaching $26 billion across 1,600 companies with the largest rounds at this stage peaking around $220 million. Larger Series A and B rounds were raised in quantum, energy, self driving, therapeutics and satellite technology, as well as human resources and chat software services, with Series B rounds predominating.

Year-over-year funding was down as Q2 2024 saw multiple billion-dollar Series B fundings to AI companies.

Seed up

Seed funding reached $10.3 billion in Q2. Thinking Machines raised 20% of that with a $2 billion seed round that marked the largest on record at that stage, per Crunchbase data. If not for the Thinking Machines round, seed funding would be flat quarter over quarter and down year over year. (Seed funding totals typically increase over time, as many seed rounds are added to the Crunchbase dataset after the close of a quarter.)

M&A relief

So far in 2025, the proportion of funding to AI has continued to increase, along with funding concentrated in larger rounds. As more funding is committed to private companies, the good news is that M&A is up for a second quarter in a row, rivaling peak M&A amounts in 2021.

Methodology

The data contained in this report comes directly from Crunchbase, and is based on reported data. Provisional data reported is as of July 3, 2025.

Note that data lags are most pronounced at the earliest stages of venture activity, with seed funding amounts increasing significantly after the end of a quarter/year.

Please note that all funding values are given in U.S. dollars unless otherwise noted. Crunchbase converts foreign currencies to U.S. dollars at the prevailing spot rate from the date funding rounds, acquisitions, IPOs and other financial events are reported. Even if those events were added to Crunchbase long after the event was announced, foreign currency transactions are converted at the historic spot price.

Glossary of funding terms

Seed and angel consists of seed, pre-seed and angel rounds. Crunchbase also includes venture rounds of unknown series, equity crowdfunding and convertible notes at $3 million (USD or as-converted USD equivalent) or less.

Early-stage consists of Series A and Series B rounds, as well as other round types. Crunchbase includes venture rounds of unknown series, corporate venture and other rounds above $3 million, and those less than or equal to $15 million.

Late-stage consists of Series C, Series D, Series E and later-lettered venture rounds following the “Series [Letter]” naming convention. Also included are venture rounds of unknown series, corporate venture and other rounds above $15 million. Corporate rounds are only included if a company has raised an equity funding at seed through a venture series funding round.

Technology growth is a private-equity round raised by a company that has previously raised a “venture” round. (So basically, any round from the previously defined stages.)


Stay up to date with recent funding rounds, acquisitions, and more with the
Crunchbase Daily.



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Funding & Business

This S&P 500 Rally Is Still Leaving Many Stocks Behind

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Just 10% of the S&P 500’s stocks are powering its returns.  



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Trump Tariff Deadline Pushed Out, US Pledges More Weapons for Ukraine | The Opening Trade 07/08

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President Donald Trump unveiled a wave of letters posted letters to various nations on social media on Monday, starting with his intent to impose 25% levies on goods from Japan and South Korea. The European Union is seeking to conclude a preliminary trade deal with the US that would allow it to lock in a 10% tariff rate beyond an Aug. 1 deadline.

Trump said he’d ship more weapons to Ukraine, a reversal after the Pentagon halted flows of some air-defense missiles and artillery shells to the country. He didn’t specify what the US would provide except to say the armaments would be “defense weapons primarily.”

The Opening Trade has everything you need to know as markets open across Europe. With analysis you won’t find anywhere else, we break down the biggest stories of the day and speak to top guests who have skin in the game. Hosted by Anna Edwards, Kriti Gupta and Valerie Tytel. (Source: Bloomberg)



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