Presto News | Q2 2025
VC and startup news on technologies that protect the future + updates on all things Presto
Dear partners & friends of Presto,
Q2. What a strange quarter – still on the surface, shifting everywhere else.
The global AI talent war escalated, with tech firms dangling bonuses that could rival those for elite athletes. In defense, a brief yet intense Iran-Israel conflict refocused attention on battlefield innovation. Operation Spiderweb showed skeptics that drones aren’t just flying substitutes for artillery – they’re a paradigm shift in modern warfare.
Meanwhile, cyber breaches revealed just how exposed even the most guarded systems can be. And in venture, the data caught up with conviction: defense tech is no longer niche – it’s now one of the five most funded sectors in Europe.
Change rarely announces itself.
We’re staying focused. Eyes on signal, not noise 🧭
Without further ado, feel free to jump to the sections that interest you the most:
1. Highlights
2. New PTH investments
3. Market insights
4. Brainfood
5. #MeetPresto
6. Department of memes
⭐ Highlights
- From Budapest to the Bay – and from scarcity to scale. DiffuseDrive is redefining how autonomous systems get trained: with photorealistic data that looks, feels, and functions like the real world. Congrats on the seed round and major deployments with Fortune 500 leaders across automotive, aerospace, defense, and robotics! Welcome to PTH 💙
- PDTW | Prague Defense Tech Week: 6 events in 6 days – from a summit to a hackathon. In June, we turned Prague into a defense innovation hub, together with Invest in Bravery, European Defense Tech Hub, and many great partners. Defense tech got the spotlight it deserves – including a primetime segment on the country’s largest commercial TV network 🎥
The Recursive
- Who’s protecting Europe’s future? When it comes to defense, dual-use, and resilience tech, CEE is no longer a buffer zone. A region shaped by war, hackers, and system collapse is now deploying faster, more adaptive solutions than ever before 🦾 The Recursive has mapped it all in their first-ever benchmark report: Grab your copy 📊
🔔 New PTH investments
Very happy to welcome the newest member of the Presto Tech Horizons portfolio family 👋🏼
🇺🇲/🇭🇺 DiffuseDrive | $3.5M seed | Outlander VC, Presto Tech Horizons
Coming soon: More companies that help create a safer, more resilient future.
💡 Market insights
Global and European market news
- Global VC funding dropped to $101.05B in Q2 '25 from $128.4B in Q1, mainly due to OpenAI’s $40B megadeal skewing prior totals. Excluding that outlier, Q2 activity held steady, showing resilience and continued investor interest in AI, defense tech, and space tech despite broader market headwinds.
- While early-stage investment held up in the U.S., Asia and Europe experienced sharper declines, especially in Seed and Series A rounds. Investors are exhibiting greater selectivity and demanding stronger fundamentals, pushing many early-stage startups to delay fundraising or seek alternative capital sources.
- European VC is increasingly driven by specialist funds with clear, vertical theses. Rather than chasing hype, investors now back mission-critical, IP-rich startups in sectors like AI, deeptech, or defense.
Market outlook
- Hard Tech captured 6 of the 10 largest global VC deals in Q2 2025, totaling $8.7B in funding. This includes massive rounds such as World View ($2.6B), Anduril ($2.5B), and Montera Infrastructure ($1.5B), signaling a decisive investor shift toward capital-intensive, defensible technologies.
- AI remains the primary magnet for capital, accounting for 29% of global VC investment in Q2. In Europe, agentic AI was the fastest-growing sector, with deal volume up 226% YoY, raising €1.7B. Median deeptech deal size hit €4.4M, the highest of any vertical.
- Overall global M&A activity continues to decline, due to US regulatory tightening. However, AI acquisitions are bucking the trend, hitting a record 177 deals in Q2’25 – more than double the 5-year average. Big Tech firms are pivoting to strategic minority investments – such as Meta’s $14.8B investment in Scale for a 49% stake. This trend is reshaping exit dynamics, favoring strategic alignments over full buyouts and contributing to the broader slowdown in traditional M&A activity.
For a deep-dive on these market highlights 👆🏼 follow these resources 👇🏼
- Venture Pulse Q2 2025 | KPMG
- State of Venture Q2’25 Report | CB Insights
- Venture Capital Industry Update – Q2 2025 | Stout
- H1 2025 Review | Sifted
- Where the smart money went: Spring 2025’s lessons for EU VCs | Yahoo Finance
🧠 Brainfood
In-house thoughts worth sharing 🙌🏼
- From Conflict to Capability | Lucie Bresova
Strategic infrastructure isn’t built in peace – often, it’s born of crisis. Our partner Lucie explains why defense and resilience tech will shape tomorrow’s innovation landscape. ICYMI: Lucie made Forbes Czechia's list of 100 most influential women. Yup, we’re pretty proud. - Why Defense Tech Matters. Always. | Premysl Rubes
Defense tech ≠ war. It’s about resilience, innovation, and stability – even in peacetime. In this feature, our partner Premek explains why investing in dual-use and deeptech solutions is both a strategic necessity and a civilizational win. - Next-Gen Defense Is Born on the Frontlines | Matej Luhovy
Matej explains how Presto Tech Horizons spots and supports founders working on high-impact resilience tech – especially those emerging from Ukraine, where solutions are battle-tested and future-ready.
More tech thoughts to feed your mind 📚
- How Distillation Makes AI Models Smaller and Cheaper | Amos Zeeberg
Amos explains how distillation compresses large AI models into smaller, cheaper ones without sacrificing performance. - Levered Beta Is All You Need | Ethan Ding
How to win by riding waves you didn't make: Ethan proposes a simple investment strategy in times of AI boom that beats most alpha-chasing approaches. - DoD Contracting for Startups 101 | Ryan McEntush & Leila Hay
Working with DoD can be daunting – Ryan and Leila of a16z offer a tactical guide to navigating Pentagon procurement as a startup. - Scientific Discovery in the Age of Artificial Intelligence | Jessica Rumbelow
Jessica explores how AI might reshape the scientific method itself, challenging the centrality of human intuition in future discovery.
👋🏼 #MeetPresto
One look at the calendar, and you know – the event season is back. We’ll be hitting defense and deeptech events on both sides of the pond: showing up where it counts, listening, and sharing insights 🎤 Catch us on the move.
September 2025
🇨🇿 IISS Prague Defence Summit 2025 | Sep 3-5 | Prague, Czechia 🎤
🇲🇩 TechVillage | Sep 5-7 | Butuceni, Moldova
🇬🇧 DSEI 2025 | Sep 9-12 | London, UK
🇺🇦 Defense Tech Valley | Sep 16-17 | Lviv, Ukraine 🎤
🇨🇿 NATO Days | Sep 20-21 | Ostrava, Czechia
🇬🇧 EDTH London | Sep 25-28 | London, UK
🇺🇦 IT Arena 2025 | Sep 26-28 | Lviv, Ukraine 🎤
🇬🇧 London Defence Tech Week | Sep 26-Oct 3 | London, UK
🇬🇧 Resilience Conference 2025 | Sep 29-30 | London, UK
🇸🇰 SAPIE Forum 2025 | Sep 30-Oct 1 | Bratislava, Slovakia 🎤
October 2025
🇬🇧 Future Forces Demo Day | Oct 1-2 | London, UK
🇺🇸 San Francisco Fleet Week | Oct 5-13 | San Francisco, USA
🇺🇸 SF Tech Week | Oct 6-12 | San Francisco, USA
🇨🇿 CASSINI Entrepreneurship Days | Oct 8-9 | Prague, Czechia
🇨🇿 Innovation Week | Oct 9-10 | Prague, Czechia 🎤
🇩🇪 High Tech Ventures Days | Oct 14-15 | Dresden, Germany
🇨🇿 Czech Startup Week 2025 | Oct 20-26 | Prague, Czechia 🎤
🇨🇿 Engaged Investments Conference | Oct 22-23 | Prague, Czechia
🇩🇪 Global Defense Tech Summit | Oct 22-23 | Berlin, Germany
🇺🇸 TechCrunch Disrupt 2025 | Oct 27-29 | San Francisco, USA
🇫🇷 European Defence Week | Oct 27-31 | Paris, France
🇧🇬 Regional Defence Summit | Oct 28 | Sofia, Bulgaria 🎤
🇫🇷 Tech Tour Defence 2025 | Oct 30-31 | Paris, France
🤓 Department of memes
That's it from Presto.
Stay tuned for the next issue ✌🏼