Phoebe Gates and Sophia Kianni turned their Stanford dorm room right into a startup lab.
It’s a time-honored custom at Stanford, a ceremony of passage many tech bigwigs have undertaken. Gates and Kianni began as randomly assigned roommates, however quickly bonded over their shared love of activism and enterprise. And, like many aspiring Stanford founders earlier than them, they have been in search of an concept—pinning up articles of their kitchen, calling potential clients from their flooring, and scribbling on a whiteboard.
One subject stored rising again and again: garments, each those scattered about their dorm room and what they have been trying to purchase. Each avid secondhand consumers, Kianni and Gates realized they did a whole lot of analysis earlier than shopping for something—and that they weren’t alone.
“We wanted to create something that could do all of our shopping for us,” mentioned Kianni. “Do it instantly and effortlessly, rather than all the manual price comparison and tab-opening we were doing on our computers.”
The thought took a minute to take off. They have been rejected from one entrepreneurship class, then accepted into one other, attracting some early pre-seed funding from Soma Capital and a Stanford professor who appreciated their pitch. The pitch was an early iteration of what they’re doing now: In 2023, Gates and Kianni moved to New York to begin Phia, an AI-driven procuring agent. Phia—an app and cell browser extension—launched in April 2025, and has since reached 500,000 customers and greater than 5,000 direct model companions. (Kianni and Gates even have their very own podcast, The Burnouts, by way of Alex Cooper’s Unwell Community, launched in April.)
“During the time we were building the MVP [minimum viable product], we ended up going out and—even though it was awful—giving it to about 500 different users,” mentioned Gates (who, sure, is the daughter of Invoice and Melinda). “The stats we were seeing were incredible, huge repeat purchase rates, retention was huge. Mind you, at the time Phia was not perfect… But I remember there was one day we took the MVP down, because it wasn’t working the way we wanted. And people reached out: ‘Where’s Phia?’”
Phia, a portmanteau of each Kianni and Gates’ first names, has now raised $8 million in seed funding, Fortune has completely discovered. Kleiner Perkins led the spherical. It’s a star-studded affair, with participation from Hailey Bieber, Kris Jenner, Sheryl Sandberg, Spanx’s Sara Blakely, Fanatics CEO Michael Rubin, and eBay Ventures, amongst others. To Kleiner Perkins associate Annie Case, Phia is constructing on broader financial and shopper tailwinds.
The U.S. e-commerce attire market, as Case factors out, is big, crossing $200 billion this 12 months and closely skewed in direction of cell. Regardless of the market’s measurement, the digital procuring expertise hasn’t developed over the past decade as a lot as you’d suppose.
“I think there’s been so little innovation in the shopping space for so long because it seems like ‘well, that’s a hobby for girls,” mentioned Kianni. “The reality is that the fashion industry is worth between $1.7 and $2.5 trillion.”
E-commerce instruments have fallen out and in of vogue with VCs over the previous couple of years. It’s a troublesome market, with plenty of unanswered questions in regards to the future. As a result of procuring on a discretionary stage isn’t simply private—it’s sociological and expressive. And infrequently, why we wish what we wish is mysterious, even to us. However Kianni and Gates are in search of solutions in a course of that’s about dialog and experimentation.
“We’re talking to over four users a day,” mentioned Gates. “Every other week, we have 40 young women come to our office who are power users. And we tell them: ‘Roast our app. Tell us what you hate. What do you want to see in the future?’”
Like that Stanford dorm room, Phia is its personal form of lab.
“We are scientists,” Gates added. “We need to be consistently running experiments. If users don’t like it, we go back to the drawing board… We ask: Why is that? What can we fix here?”
Time period Sheet Podcast…This week, on the Time period Sheet Podcast, now we have Phia! I spoke with Phoebe, Sophia, and Annie about what’s flawed with on-line procuring as we speak, tips on how to construct a shopper firm, why there aren’t extra ladies constructing firms, and what AI instruments can convey to the digital procuring expertise. Hear and watch right here.
StubHub…At the moment, StubHub is anticipated to go public. This marks one other long-anticipated public markets debut because the IPO market continues to loosen up.
See you tomorrow,
Enterprise Offers
– Determine, a San Jose, Calif.-based autonomous robotic developer, raised $1 billion in Sequence C funding. Parkway Enterprise Capital led the spherical and was joined by Brookfield Asset Administration, NVIDIA, Macquarie Capital, Intel Capital, Align Ventures, Tamarack World, LG Expertise Ventures, Salesforce, T-Cellular Ventures, and Qualcomm Ventures.
– Dyna Robotics, a Redwood Metropolis, Calif.-based developer of general-purpose robots, raised $120 million in Sequence A funding. Robostrategy, CRV, and First Spherical Capital led the spherical and was joined by Salesforce Ventures, NVentures, and others.
– Chestnut Carbon, a New York Metropolis-based developer of nature-based carbon credit, raised $90 million in extra Sequence B funding from Canada Pension Plan Funding Board.
– PassiveLogic, a Salt Lake Metropolis, Utah-based developer of bodily AI expertise for buildings, raised $74 million in Sequence C funding. noa led the spherical and was joined by Prologis Ventures, Johnson Controls, and PSP Progress.
– Luminary Cloud, a San Mateo, Calif.-based physics AI platform for engineering groups, raised $72 million in funding. N47 led the spherical and was joined by Sutter Hill Ventures and NVentures.
– Dualitas, a South San Francisco, Calif.-based developer of novel antibody therapies for immunology and irritation, raised $65 million in Sequence A funding. Versant Ventures and Qiming Enterprise Companions USA led the spherical and have been joined by SV Well being Buyers and others.
– CodeRabbit, a San Francisco-based AI code evaluation platform, raised $60 million in Sequence B funding. Scale Enterprise Companions led the spherical and was joined by Nventures and others.
– Vega, a Tel Aviv, Israel and New York Metropolis-based safety operations platform, raised $65 million throughout seed and Sequence A rounds from Accel, Cyberstarts, Redpoint, and CRV.
– AllRock Bio, a Natick, Mass.-based developer of therapies for cardiopulmonary and fibrotic ailments, raised $50 million in Sequence A funding. Versant Ventures and Westlake Bio Companions.
– Nory, a London, U.Ok.-based AI-powered restaurant administration system, raised $37 million in Sequence B funding. Kinnevik led the spherical and was joined by Accel and present traders.
– Stablecore, a Dallas, Texas-based platform designed for regional banks and credit score unions to supply stablecoins, raised $20 million in funding. Norwest Enterprise Companions led the spherical and was joined by Coinbase Ventures, Curql, BankTech Ventures, Financial institution of Utah and others.
– Envive AI, a Seattle, Wash.-based AI platform for retail manufacturers, raised $15 million in Sequence A funding. FuseVC led the spherical and was joined by Point72 Ventures.
– MetalBear, a Tel Aviv, Israel-based developer of the open supply Kubernetes improvement answer mirrord, raised $12.5 million in seed funding. TLV Companions led the spherical and was joined by TQ Ventures, MTF, and Netz Capital.
– Plumerai, a London, U.Ok. and Amsterdam, The Netherlands-based developer of an on-device AI for cameras, raised $8.7 million in Sequence A funding. Partech and OTB Ventures led the spherical and have been joined by Acclimate Ventures and present traders.
– Iris Finance, a Chicago, Ailing.-based AI-powered revenue planning platform for shopper manufacturers, raised $6.2 million in seed funding. Glasswing Ventures led the spherical and was joined by Founder Collective, Hyde Park Angels, and others.
– Overmind, a London, U.Ok.-based predictive change intelligence firm, raised $6 million in seed funding. Renegade Companions led the spherical and was joined by 4 Rivers, Operator Collective, Dan Scheinman, and Walter Kortschak.
– Nestimate, a Lincoln, Neb.-based retirement revenue options platform, raised $3 million in funding. S3 Ventures led the spherical and was joined by PruVen Capital, TIAA Ventures, and Make investments Nebraska.
– Time Atlas Labs, a Helsinki, Finland-based app that mechanically tracks train actions, raised €1.8 million ($2.1 million). Lifeline Ventures led the spherical.
Personal Fairness
– GHO Capital Companions agreed to accumulate Scientist.com, a Solana Seaside, Calif.-based life sciences analysis and improvement procurement platform. Monetary phrases weren’t disclosed.
– Momentum, a portfolio firm of CORE Industrial Companions, acquired Superior Lithographics, a Los Angeles, Calif.-based supplier of folding cartons, corrugated prime sheets, and litho labels. Monetary phrases weren’t disclosed.
– PriceShape, a portfolio firm of Copilot Capital, acquired Priceindx, a Stockholm, Sweden-based retail pricing platform. Monetary phrases weren’t disclosed.
– Spectrum Fairness acquired a majority stake in Poppins Payroll, a Boulder, Colo.-based family payroll platform for households and caregivers. Monetary phrases weren’t disclosed.
