Investors Pivot to Agentic AI and on-Device Hardware

From agentic finance platforms to on-device artificial intelligence (AI) hardware and late-stage model builders in China, this week’s deals point to a market prioritizing deployment over experimentation.

Several new funding announcements supported AI systems designed to run locally rather than in the cloud, reflecting growing concern over latency, privacy and compute costs.

In a Monday (Jan. 5) press release, Clipto AI disclosed new funding to accelerate the development of its on-device multimodal AI platform, which processes video, audio and images directly on consumer devices. The company said the capital, which brings its valuation to over $250 million, would support product development and global expansion ahead of a planned 2026 launch.

Clipto’s positioning reflects a broader investor bet that meaningful AI adoption will increasingly happen at the edge. As generative models become more capable, running inference locally can reduce cloud expenses and address privacy constraints, particularly for consumer media and enterprise use cases involving sensitive data.

A similar thesis underpins NeoSapien’s seed funding round. The India-based startup raised $2 million to build AI-native wearable devices designed to function as always-on personal assistants. Unlike software-only assistants, NeoSapien’s hardware is built for continuous context capture and local intelligence. The company said the funding would be used to expand its engineering team and prepare for market entry.

Agentic AI Moves Deeper Into Financial Operations

Enterprise automation also featured prominently in this week’s funding activity. OnCorps AI raised $55 million to scale its agentic AI platform for asset managers and fund administrators. The company focuses on automating operational workflows such as reconciliations, dispute resolution and reporting, areas that remain heavily manual across much of the investment industry.

OnCorps positions its software as agentic, meaning systems can interpret exceptions, initiate actions and coordinate across workflows without human prompts at every step. Investors backing the company are betting that financial institutions are now ready to deploy AI systems that go beyond assistance and into execution, particularly in cost-pressured operational functions.

Late-Stage Capital Backs Model Developers With Scale

At the other end of the market, late-stage funding activity highlighted continued appetite for large AI model developers, particularly outside the United States. China-based Moonshot AI reportedly raised $500 million in its latest funding round, boosting its valuation and reinforcing its position among the country’s most well-capitalized AI companies.

Moonshot’s ability to raise at that scale underscores two dynamics. First, investors remain willing to back model developers that have achieved user traction and platform visibility. Second, capital formation in AI is increasingly shaped by regional ecosystems, with domestic champions attracting funding aligned with local regulatory and market structures.

While Moonshot’s business differs markedly from enterprise automation or on-device AI startups, its funding round reflects the same underlying investor preference for scale, defensibility and deployment.

Venture Firms Channel More Disciplined AI Investments

Venture capital firms themselves are also recalibrating. According to The Wall Street Journal, Antler disclosed a $160 million U.S. fund after making more than 400 investments last year, many of them AI-focused. The firm’s model of backing large numbers of early-stage companies reflects a belief that the next wave of AI winners will emerge from applied use cases rather than foundational breakthroughs alone.

At the same time, broader venture sentiment suggests enterprises are becoming more selective in where they deploy AI capital. As reported by PYMNTS, venture capital firms say enterprises are likely to increase AI spending in 2026 but concentrate that spend on a narrower set of proven solutions after years of broad experimentation. Investors also speculate that enterprises will focus budgets on areas such as AI safeguards and oversight, stronger data foundations, model post-training optimization, consolidation of tools, vertical solutions and products built on proprietary data rather than testing many vendors.

The shift reflects investor expectations that enterprises will prioritize technologies with demonstrated operational value.