One company's stock market debut produced more exit value in a single quarter than the previous decade had.

SpaceX's $1.7 trillion IPO dominated the second-quarter PitchBook-NVCA Venture Monitor, released in July, and it sat on top of another record.U.S.

startups raised $412.7 billion in the first half of 2026.

That was 29 percent more than in all of 2025 and 15 percent above the previous full-year high set in 2021, according to the report and Axios's coverage of it.PitchBook itself cautioned that the details tell a narrower story.

Megadeals of $100 million or more captured 87.5 percent of the money deployed in the half, and artificial intelligence accounted for 86 percent of dollars invested.

Seven rounds of $1 billion or more closed in the second quarter alone.The concentration was even sharper earlier in the year.

In the first quarter, when U.S.

startups raised $267.2 billion, PitchBook counted $195.6 billion invested in just five companies.

The first quarter also outpaced the second, which means much of the half's record rested on some enormous deals struck early in the year.In other words, a record year for venture capital has been a record year for some massive companies.

Everyone else is raising in the shadow of it, and it is those overlooked founders that Baden Bower, the PR agency run by CEO AJ Ignacio, is courting with guaranteed placements in named publications.A crowded top leaves a quiet middleFor the thousands of founders raising ordinary rounds outside AI, the headline numbers can be misleading.

Investors, reporters, and customers are all watching the same handful of names, and a company outside that circle has to work harder simply to be noticed.When attention is concentrated, the first search matters more.

A partner who hears about a company is likely to look it up before replying, and a result with nothing credible in it gives that partner one less reason to keep reading.

Customers and senior hires run the same search before they commit, and they form their impressions just as quickly.Those founders are the market Baden Bower is courting.

The firm, run by CEO AJ Ignacio, publishes a page for San Francisco tech clients that describes guaranteed placements in....