# Venice Joins the Unicorn Club, Now Valued at $1B

*Author: Bankless*
*Published: Jul 1, 2026*
*Source: https://www.bankless.com/es/read/news/venice-private-ai-unicorn-1-billion*

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Private AI platform Venice just closed [$65 million in Series A funding](https://venice.ai/blog/venice-raises-65-million-series-a) led by crypto VC Dragonfly, pushing Venice's equity valuation to $1 billion. It's the new unicorn's first outside funding round since launching two years ago.

> This capital will be used to uphold the First and Fourth Amendments to the Constitution as they relate to mankind’s interaction with AI.To those hearing about us for the first time, consider switching to an AI platform that doesn’t demand control over you; that doesn't demand… [https://t.co/l800YFWnzr](https://t.co/l800YFWnzr)— Erik Voorhees (@ErikVoorhees) [July 1, 2026](https://x.com/ErikVoorhees/status/2072329637737136406?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw)

### **What's the Scoop?**
- **The pitch:** Venice routes users to more than 200 multimodal models, including closed-source ones from Anthropic and OpenAI, without logging prompts or storing conversations on its servers. It's an uncensored, privacy-preserving alternative to mainstream AI chatbots.
- **The traction:** Venice says it now serves 3.5M registered users processing 1.3T tokens monthly, and the platform turned profitable in Q1 2026 despite skipping the data-collection playbook most AI providers rely on for revenue.
- **The structure:** Rather than sell treasury VVV, Venice's native token, to raise cash, the Venice team gave Series A investors 8.98% equity plus a 1.5M VVV vesting grant and warrants on 5M more VVV, exercisable over eight years. Investors can't touch any of it for the first twelve months, after which it vests in equal portions over the following three years.
- **The vision:** Voorhees framed this [equity-plus-warrant structure](https://x.com/ErikVoorhees/status/2072336114950545755) as a way to keep VCs, the company, and token holders pulling in the same direction long-term.
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