The AI startup Mirendil is negotiating a new funding round of up to one billion dollars, as Bloomberg first reported. The targeted valuation of five billion dollars would be five times the level from three months ago. Kleiner Perkins is said to lead the round, with Andreessen Horowitz participating again.
Kleiner Perkins negotiates the follow-up round
The venture capital firm Kleiner Perkins is taking the lead in the discussions, while Andreessen Horowitz is said to want to participate in the round again. An agreement is considered open, and the mentioned figures could change before the closing. The fresh capital of up to one billion dollars is primarily intended to flow into the development of its own AI models and training runs, reports the trade publication PYMNTS, citing Bloomberg.
Just in June 2026, Mirendil completed a seed round of 200 million dollars at a valuation of one billion dollars. At that time, Kleiner Perkins and Andreessen Horowitz also led the round, with chip manufacturer Nvidia additionally participating. Within a single quarter, the valuation would thus have increased fivefold – a pace only a few AI startups have matched, among them programming-assistant provider Cognition, whose valuation climbed to 48 billion dollars within a few months. The new valuation of five billion dollars has not yet been independently confirmed – there are no official statements from Mirendil, Kleiner Perkins, or Andreessen Horowitz.
Former Anthropic researchers want to automate research itself
Mirendil emerged from stealth mode in June 2026. The company is led by Behnam Neyshabur as CEO and Harsh Mehta as CTO, who previously worked together at Google and Anthropic on AI models. Around 20 other researchers and engineers came from Anthropic, OpenAI, Google DeepMind, and xAI.
Unlike chat assistants such as ChatGPT or Claude, Mirendil does not target private users. According to the company, it develops AI systems meant to accelerate research processes themselves – for example, by giving scientists in drug development, chemistry, biology, or robotics tools for which a dedicated AI lab would otherwise be necessary. A first proprietary frontier model is expected to launch in early 2027, also funded from the currently negotiated capital round.
It remains to be seen whether Kleiner Perkins and Andreessen Horowitz will actually agree on the five-billion-dollar valuation or whether the negotiations, like those of other AI startups, will still be adjusted. The rapid valuation jump within a single quarter shows, in any case, that investors, despite some warnings about inflated AI valuations, remain willing to invest in labs that do not compete directly with OpenAI, Anthropic, or Google but instead want to supply their tools.
