• Artificial intelligence has led to a boom in new startup creation and dealmaking.
• Business Insider researched startups that have strong founding teams and investor dollars.
• These are our top picks, listed alphabetically, of startups you could bet your career on in 2025.

After years of contraction, cost-cutting, and layoffs, there's been a resurgence of tech dealmaking in Silicon Valley thanks to the AI boom. Business Insider rounded up a number of technology and AI startups that are growing. Here are our top picks.

1. Abridge

HQ: Pittsburgh

Total raised: $462.5 million

What it does: The medical scribe startup translates patient-doctor interactions into clinical notes in electronic medical records. What makes it promising: Abridge's business exploded in 2024 as investors rushed to fund companies automating administrative tasks in healthcare. The startup, which is backed by top VC firms, including Lightspeed Venture Partners and Bessemer Venture Partners, just raised $250 million in new funding at a $2.75 billion valuation. Its deals with top health systems, such as Kaiser Permanente, and its partnership with medical records giant Epic have made Abridge the healthcare AI startup to beat.

2. Anysphere

HQ: San Francisco

Total raised: $176 million

What it does: Anysphere makes AI coding software

What makes it promising: You may not have heard of Anysphere but you are likely familiar with its popular AI coding assistant, Cursor, that can predict a user's next line of code. The company recently raised $105 million at a $2.5 billion valuation. Notable investors include Benchmark, Andreessen Horowitz, and OpenAI.

3. Attention

HQ: New York

Total raised: $17.1 million

What it does: Attention uses natural language processing to fill out CRM programs and generate action items from sales calls.

What makes it promising: Some companies spend millions of dollars on customer relationship management programs, which are essentially software for sales teams that house crucial information about current and potential customers. The problem? Many teams don't properly fill out their CRM, rendering the investment useless. That's where Attention comes in — the startup uses AI to listen in on sales calls, fill out company CRMs with crucial information, and generate action items so a sales team member has the info they need to go back and close a deal. Attention raised $14 million from Alven, Eniac, Frst, Liquid 2 Ventures, 645 Ventures, and Aglaé in October 2024.

4. Clasp

HQ: Boston

Total raised: $30 million, according to the company

What it does: Clasp helps employers secure critical talent before graduation, tackling workforce shortages in hard-to-hire fields like healthcare. Think of it like ROTC for critical professions. If a hospital system is facing a shrinking pipeline of nurses, it can partner with Clasp to access a national network of universities and training programs, match with current nursing students, and commit to repaying their student loans over a multi-year word period.

What makes it promising: Founded in 2018, Clasp has over 10,000 individuals on its platform and plenty of room to grow. While it's currently focused on building critical talent pools for the healthcare industry, the company plans to expand into other hard-to-hire industries. In 2024, Clasp raised over $10 million in a funding round led by Crosslink Capital and is actively investing in its growth team to scale employer and school partnerships.

5. HQ: Boston

Total raised: $95 million

What it does: CodaMetrix uses AI to analyze clinical notes and derive medical codes for billing and claims.

What makes it promising: Coding is a critical step of the revenue cycle management process for hospitals, typically requiring providers to manually assign numerical codes to medical services and diagnoses to ensure they get paid for their care.

CodaMetrix spun out of Mass General Brigham in 2019 to automate those administrative tasks and reduce provider burden, and it's captured a wave of investor interest in the sector, last raising a $40 million Series B round in March. The startup has worked with top health systems like Mayo Clinic and Yale Medicine to develop new revenue cycle management solutions, and it added some key hires to its executive team last year, including a new chief technology officer and COO.

6. Cohere Health

HQ: Boston

Total raised: $106 million

What it does: Cohere Health automates the pre-authorization process for medical treatments.

What makes it promising: Cohere Health works with health plans like Humana and Geisinger to make the prior authorization process more efficient and accurate, using AI to save money for the plans and reduce the number of unnecessary denials for patients. The startup last raised a $50 million Series B extension in February 2024, led by Deerfield Management and including existing investors, including Define Ventures and Flare Capital Partners.

Cohere has announced a number of new products in the last year, including tools released in January to help health plans meet prior authorization compliance standards set by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services.

7. Cortica

HQ: San Diego

Total raised: Over $300 million

What it does: Cortica provides virtual and in-person pediatric care for autism, as well as commonly co-occurring conditions like behavioral issues and sleep disorders.

What makes it promising: Cortica has set itself apart by going after value-based care contracts with health plans and employers that pay the startup for better patient outcomes, a rarity in specialized mental healthcare. The startup employs more than 2,000 providers that help care for children with autism at its clinics, in the home, or virtually, aiming to deliver "whole-child care" through everything from physical therapy to speech-language pathology to neurology. Cortica most recently raised an $80 million round in November, co-led by JP Morgan's healthcare investment fund Morgan Health and Nexus NeuroTech Ventures.

8. Daedalus

HQ: Karlsruhe, Germany

Total raised: $32.6 million

What it does: Daedalus helps factories and their production robots operate more efficiently.

What makes it promising: Launched by ex-OpenAI engineer Jonas Schneider, who was a key part of the AI juggernaut's robotics team, Daedalus was part of Y Combinator's winter 2020 cohort. The startup, which also has an office in San Francisco, uses AI robotics technology to cull the need to reprogram production robots constantly. Instead, it automates a lot of the tasks associated with the manufacturing process; for example, if clients give Daedalus a CAD drawing, it will render a fully-completed version of the drawing.

In February 2024, the startup raised a fresh $21 million Series A. The funding will help Daedalus in its mission of automating the manufacturing process across various industries, from semiconductors to healthcare.

9. Decagon

HQ: San Francisco

Total raised: $100 million

What it does: Decagon develops AI support agents that autonomously resolve customer inquiries over chat, email, or voice calls.

What makes it promising: The company raised $100 million, including a $65 million Series B, late last year. Bain Capital Ventures led the Series B round, and Elad Gil, A*, Accel, Bond Capital, and Acme Capital participated. According to the company's blog, the fundraise quadrupled Decagon's valuation. Bilt, Duolingo, Eventbrite, Notion, and Rippling use Decagon to manage interactions with customers by gathering data and reviewing conversations.

10. Decart

HQ: San Francisco

Total raised: $53 million, according to the company

What it does: Decart is an AI research lab focused on efficiency. Its infrastructure platform aims to dramatically cut the costs of training and running foundation models.

Why it's promising: Last fall, Decart emerged from stealth with $21 million in seed funding from Sequoia and Oren Zeev and launched a demo, Oasis, that captivated the tech world. Oasis's video platform enables users to create interactive, open-world experiences from a single uploaded image and generates content in real time based on user input. In December, the Israeli-founded startup secured an additional $32 million from Benchmark and other investors. Since then, Decart has doubled its team size and continues developing new products.

Elise AI

HQ: New York

Total raised: $172 million

What it does: EliseAI sells AI assistants, primarily to housing operators, as well as healthcare providers. These speed up menial tasks such as maintenance requests and scheduling appointments.

What makes it promising: The startup hit a unicorn valuation in 2024 with a $75 million Series D. Its technology is revolutionary for the housing sector, which previously suffered from inefficient technology, resulting in consumers absorbing additional costs, said founder and CEO Minna Song.

When arranging house viewings and meetings, keeping up with messaging prospective tenants can take up a lot of time and energy. Elise AI's chatbot automates these interactions so they free up time for management teams to pursue more meaningful work. The tech has also been embraced by the healthcare industry, which experiences similar pain points for managing invoices and bills, as well as patient appointments.

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