Cantos is a pre-seed and seed venture capital firm that backs deeply technical founders building 'near frontier' companies across climate, biotech, aerospace, defense, and advanced manufacturing. The firm provides initial capital and ongoing counsel to founders tackling critical infrastructure and existential challenges.
Founded —
Type Venture capital 2 Canto IV / Fund 4 2026-06-30 2026-06-30 $70M Closedoversubscribedearlier2026, partnerannouncedJune30 notexactclose; secondinstitutionalfund. Preseedseedfirst-investor focus.
Cantos 3 2022-09-01 2022-09-01 $50M HistoricalUSD50mannouncedfund, noaggregateAUMinference.
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$20M $500K – $40M New York, New York $10M $4M – $40M United States $750K $400K – $1M San Francisco, California — — – — — — – —
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$8M 2023-06-01 Modulo Bio Cantos $25M 2025-10-21 Faeth Therapeutics Khosla Ventures , Future Fund , B Capital , Koch Disruptive Technologies , S2G Investments , Cantos $14M 2025-10-20 Adaptyx Cantos $— 2025-09-18 Moldco Cantos $— 2025-04-09 Remedy Scientific Eclipse , BoxGroup , Cantos $70M 2025-01-31 Castelion Lightspeed , Silicon Valley Bank , Interlagos , BlueYard Capital , Cantos , Lavrock Ventures $20M 2025-01-27 Earth AI Y Combinator , Tamarack Global , Spark Capital , Cantos , Overmatch Ventures , Alpaca VC $14M 2024-08-15 Intramotev Cantos $6M 2024-04-29 Shinkei Cantos , 8VC , Primary Venture Partners $8M 2023-10-11 Bedrock Energy Cantos $— 2023-01-27 Atomos Space Cantos $47M 2022-06-30 Faeth Therapeutics Khosla Ventures , Alex Morgan , AgFunder , Future Fund , Koch Disruptive Technologies , S2G Investments , Cantos $20M 2022-04-05 Venus Prime Movers Lab , Cantos $20M 2022-01-18 Faeth Therapeutics Khosla Ventures , Alex Morgan , AgFunder , Future Fund , Koch Disruptive Technologies , S2G Investments , Cantos $11M 2021-12-07 Nabla Bio Khosla Ventures , Fifty Years , Zetta Venture Partners , Cantos $— 2021-11-24 Tiamat Sciences Cantos $72M 2021-08-05 Knowde Sequoia , TQ Ventures , Coatue Management LLC , Mantis VC , Refactor Capital , Cantos $6M 2021-07-26 Glyphic Biotechnologies Cantos , CIV , Osage University Partners , Wing Venture Capital $14M 2020-05-01 Knowde Sequoia , Refactor Capital , BEE Partners , Knollwood Investment Advisory , Cantos $14M 2020-03-11 Knowde Sequoia , Refactor Capital , Canvas Prime , BEE Partners , Cantos $— Unknown date SoloPulse Cantos $— Unknown date Salient Motion Cantos $— Unknown date Pow.bio Cantos $— Unknown date Heaviside Cantos $— Unknown date Heaviside Cantos $— Unknown date Furno Cantos $— Unknown date Cache Energy Cantos $— Unknown date Sixfold Bioscience Y Combinator , Innovate UK , Pi Campus , Cantos , private angel investors $35M Unknown date Prellis Bio Khosla Ventures , SOSV , Celesta Capital , True Ventures , Cantos , Lucas Venture Group $25M Unknown date Faeth Khosla Ventures , Future Fund , B Capital , Unshackled Ventures , S2G Investments , Cantos $24M Unknown date Vital Lyfe General Catalyst , Interlagos , Cantos , Generational Partners , Space VC $60M 2026-08-12 Heaviside Industries Cantos , Felicis , Jake Storm $— 2026-05-11 Heaviside Industries Cantos $— Unknown date Phenomic AI Cantos
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team@apexlogos.ai · yesterday
Investment-fund research reviewed 2026-10-06. Publicly identified funds, dates, amounts and fundraising status are below. Undisclosed commitments remain unknown; this is not a complete register of private SPVs or parallel entities.
Fund size and stages
| Vehicle | Amount and status | Evidence and date | Interpretation |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Fund 4 / Canto IV | **USD 70M; closed, oversubscribed** earlier in 2026 | [Grant Gregory, Our Fourth Canto](https://grantgregory.substack.com/p/our-fourth-canto-for-legends-in-the ), **2026-06-30**; [Cantos company announcement](https://www.linkedin.com/posts/cantos-ventures_we-have-two-exciting-announcements-today-activity-7477769569135132672-97vh ), undated accessible post | Partner announcement says second institutional fund. Exact legal closing day is not stated. Company announcement explicitly describes leading pre-seed and seed rounds. Latest-known fund found in newer-fund searches through research date. |
| Cantos 3 | **USD 50M announced fund** | [Official Cantos announcement](https://medium.com/cantos-ventures/introducing-cantos-3-50m-to-back-near-frontier-startups-e4a38e9c0cb6 ), **2022-09-01** | Historical vehicle, not current fund or aggregate AUM. Announcement states pre-seed/seed technical climate, TechBio, aerospace and next-generation computing focus. |
The current website's portfolio cards also label historical entry rounds at Series A and Series B (for example Astranis at Series B). Historical later-stage holdings should not override Fund 4's stated first-check pre-seed/seed mandate. The checked sources do not disclose verified aggregate AUM, remaining dry powder or a current official check-size range. Reporting/index leads suggest USD 1.5–4M Fund IV checks, but this was not promoted to a verified official profile value. A [July 6, 2026 secondary summary](https://cryptorank.io/insights/deals/cantos-raises-70-m-fund-iv ) corroborates the USD 70M close but is weaker evidence than the named partner's announcement.
Funds recorded in Adex after this review:
| Fund | Disclosed amount | Announcement / filing date |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Cantos 3 | USD 50000000 | 2022-09-01 |
| Canto IV / Fund 4 | USD 70000000 | 2026-06-30 | SHOW MORE
team@apexlogos.ai · yesterday
Match research 2026-10-06 / GoldiCantos / sha256:2cda2376a95ebbf29d816ab9ac89d56b4af7b677f45f20da37c93b6ca121e07b / part 2 of 2
Imported completed research. Baseline Adex/Signal statements describe prior state, not independent verification. Retain cited attribution, date, currency and classification caveats.
Adaptyx's biochemical sensing is adjacent health technology; its cited release does not establish neural measurement. Shinkei's fish-processing method involves fish nervous-system anatomy, but its business is food-processing robotics and should not be counted as human neurotech.
Sources checked for this finding: saved Adex record, Signal firm page, current official Cantos portfolio, Modulo and Adaptyx primary materials, and web searches combining Cantos with neurotech, brain and brain-computer interface. Those searches did not establish a named direct-neurotech investee attributable to this firm.
## Conflicts, missing information and later Adex review
1. **Fund currency/status:** add/review USD 70M Fund 4 as a distinct closed fund announced June 30, 2026. Retain USD 50M Cantos 3 as historical, and do not sum vehicles into AUM. The exact Fund 4 closing day remains undisclosed by the primary announcement. [CB Insights](https://www.cbinsights.com/investor/cantos-ventures ), undated accessible table, assigns July 1, 2026; that should not replace the primary description of a close earlier in the year.
2. **Round versus investor amount:** snapshot amounts for Shinkei, Bedrock, Intramotev, Adaptyx and Modulo reflect total rounds. No Cantos check was disclosed in these releases. Correct semantics only in a later authorized review.
3. **Duplicates:** review Modulo and Modulo Bio against the same USD 8M funding lead; Heaviside and Heaviside Industries against the same claimed USD 28M/60M rounds; Faeth and Faeth Therapeutics likewise. Do not merge solely from name similarity. Snapshot Knowde has two USD 14M records with different 2020 dates, another potential duplication needing primary verification.
4. **Partner prior-firm attribution:** official biography says Grant Gregory led Castelion and Salient Motion investments **at a16z**. These personal credentials alone cannot support Cantos investment or lead status. Cantos also lists both companies in its own portfolio, establishing a separate firm claim without identifying which Cantos transaction. Keep the histories distinct.
5. **Heaviside dates not resolved:** the snapshot claims Series B on 2026-08-12 and Series A on 2026-05-11. The [official press index](https://www.theheaviside.com/press ), undated accessed page, contains a **2026-08-31** entry headed “Heaviside Raises $60 Million, Partners with Nammo.” A press-index date can differ from financing announcement date, so no correction is inferred. Detailed rounds and Cantos's participation were not independently verified here; retain as leads.
6. **Other snapshot claims remain unverified at transaction level:** Faeth, Nabla, Glyphic, Tiamat, Venus, Atomos, Earth AI, Castelion, Remedy, Cache, Furno, Phenomic, Pow.bio, SoloPulse, Vital Lyfe, Prellis and Sixfold. Portfolio membership alone does not validate every stored round/amount/date. A Venus issuer URL was opened but returned inconsistent extraction on follow-up; the Furno FinSMEs URL produced an internal error. Neither access failure disproves the historical claims.
7. **Current team:** dated review required for Achal Upadhyaya. The official team and the Adaptyx release favor current Interlagos attribution. Do not treat an undated snapshot role as an active Cantos affiliation.
8. **Unknowns:** current official check range, aggregate AUM, reserve policy, exact fund close date, undisclosed investments, and individual contributions. This dossier is a substantive verified selection, not a transaction audit of all 36 imported participation records or proof of exhaustive portfolio coverage.
No Adex/database update, MCP Patch, commit or unrelated workspace changes were made for this firm. SHOW MORE
team@apexlogos.ai · yesterday
Match research 2026-10-06 / GoldiCantos / sha256:2cda2376a95ebbf29d816ab9ac89d56b4af7b677f45f20da37c93b6ca121e07b / part 1 of 2
Imported completed research. Baseline Adex/Signal statements describe prior state, not independent verification. Retain cited attribution, date, currency and classification caveats.
# Cantos — GoldiCantos
- Exact Adex ID: `GoldiCantos`; canonical webpage: https://adex.page/firms/GoldiCantos .
- Research date and access date for all sources below: **2026-10-06**.
- Status: **complete research dossier**, with explicit verification limits; research only, no Adex changes.
Cantos is a physical-world and science venture investor. The latest-known verified fund is **USD 70 million Fund 4**, announced closed in 2026. Its current first-investor focus remains pre-seed and seed. Named investments establish robotics, geothermal technology, electric rail hardware and molecular biosensors exposure. Modulo Bio establishes neuroscience drug-discovery exposure, but does not establish neural-interface or neurodevice investing.
## Starting evidence and identity
The saved exact-ID Adex MCP snapshot, `data/research/_sources/GoldiCantos.adex.json` (retrieved 2026-10-06T19:29:03Z), names Cantos, San Francisco and a pre-seed/seed mandate across climate, biotech, aerospace, defense and advanced manufacturing. It has no fund amount or check-size values, five team roles, and 36 investment participations. Its Goldi.ai-derived and prior research claims are leads, not independent verification. It includes apparent duplicates for Modulo/Modulo Bio, Heaviside/Heaviside Industries and Faeth/Faeth Therapeutics; several amounts stored as participation amounts equal whole-company rounds.
[NFX Signal firm profile](https://signal.nfx.com/firms/cantos-ventures ), undated, was **directly read**. It identifies Cantos Ventures in Los Angeles and San Francisco and lists co-investors including Refactor Capital and Andreessen Horowitz. The accessible text contains a team heading but no populated investor details, check sizes, fund sizes or stage information. Thus Signal confirms directory identity/location only; it does not independently validate snapshot investments. A related investor-profile search did not yield substantive directly readable team profiles.
[Official Cantos website](https://cantos.vc/ ), undated, identifies founder Ian Rountree (2016), Grant Gregory as Partner, Amee Kapadia as Principal and Sofia Garcia as CFO. It lists Modulo Bio and the investments verified below. Achal Upadhyaya appears in Adex but not the current official team. Adaptyx's 2025 issuer release identifies him with Interlagos, so the old Cantos role needs dated review rather than presumed currency.
## Fund size and stages
| Vehicle | Amount and status | Evidence and date | Interpretation |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Fund 4 / Canto IV | **USD 70M; closed, oversubscribed** earlier in 2026 | [Grant Gregory, Our Fourth Canto](https://grantgregory.substack.com/p/our-fourth-canto-for-legends-in-the ), **2026-06-30**; [Cantos company announcement](https://www.linkedin.com/posts/cantos-ventures_we-have-two-exciting-announcements-today-activity-7477769569135132672-97vh ), undated accessible post | Partner announcement says second institutional fund. Exact legal closing day is not stated. Company announcement explicitly describes leading pre-seed and seed rounds. Latest-known fund found in newer-fund searches through research date. |
| Cantos 3 | **USD 50M announced fund** | [Official Cantos announcement](https://medium.com/cantos-ventures/introducing-cantos-3-50m-to-back-near-frontier-startups-e4a38e9c0cb6 ), **2022-09-01** | Historical vehicle, not current fund or aggregate AUM. Announcement states pre-seed/seed technical climate, TechBio, aerospace and next-generation computing focus. |
The current website's portfolio cards also label historical entry rounds at Series A and Series B (for example Astranis at Series B). Historical later-stage holdings should not override Fund 4's stated first-check pre-seed/seed mandate. The checked sources do not disclose verified aggregate AUM, remaining dry powder or a current official check-size range. Reporting/index leads suggest USD 1.5–4M Fund IV checks, but this was not promoted to a verified official profile value. A [July 6, 2026 secondary summary](https://cryptorank.io/insights/deals/cantos-raises-70-m-fund-iv ) corroborates the USD 70M close but is weaker evidence than the named partner's announcement.
## Verified previous deep-tech investments
Amounts below are **total financing rounds, not Cantos's individual contributions**. Technology classification is the researcher's assessment of the described engineering/scientific work. Issuer releases establish disclosed investor participation; they do not establish ownership or realized performance.
| Company | Technology and rationale | Cantos attribution, round and date | Supporting source |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| **Shinkei** | Robotics, machine learning and precision motion control automate fish processing; substantive physical automation, rather than ordinary food software. | **Lead** investor in **USD 6M seed**, announced **2024-04-29**. | [Shinkei issuer release via PR Newswire](https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/shinkei-announces-6-million-in-seed-funding-for-sustainable-robotic-fish-harvesting-302129539.html ), 2024-04-29. |
| **Bedrock Energy** | Autonomous drilling and subsurface modeling for geothermal heating/cooling in constrained urban sites. | Named participant in **USD 8.5M seed**, **2023-10-11**; Wireframe Ventures led. | [Bedrock Energy issuer release](https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/bedrock-energy-raises-8-5m-to-decarbonize-commercial-real-estate-with-geothermal-energy-301953073.html ), 2023-10-11. |
| **Intramotev** | Battery-electric railcar retrofits, TugVolt and ReVolt; specialized transport hardware and controls. | Named participant in closed **USD 14.4M Series A**, **2024-08-15**; Flybridge and Alpaca led. | [Intramotev issuer release](https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/intramotev-raises-14-4-million-to-retrofit-a-new-era-of-growth-for-rail-industry-302223983.html ), 2024-08-15. |
| **Adaptyx Biosciences** | Programmable synthetic DNA molecular switches for continuous multi-analyte sensing in a wearable patch; scientific biosensor development. | **Cantos Ventures** explicitly named participant in **USD 14M seed**, **2025-10-20**, led by Interlagos; total company financing USD 23M. | [Adaptyx issuer release via GlobeNewswire](https://www.globenewswire.com/news-release/2025/10/20/3169287/0/en/adaptyx-raises-14m-in-seed-financing-to-launch-wearable-platform-for-continuous-multi-analyte-molecular-monitoring.html ), 2025-10-20. This announcement describes investigational technology, not an approved commercial device. |
| **Modulo Bio** | Stem-cell-derived brain-cell models, automation and AI map microglial biology to discover neurodegenerative-disease therapeutics. | Cantos explicitly named among investors in **USD 8M financing**, **2023-06-01**; issuer does not specify a seed label or a lead investor. | [Modulo Bio issuer Business Wire release, syndicated by FinancialContent](https://markets.financialcontent.com/stocks/article/bizwire-2023-6-1-modulo-bio-launches-to-map-the-neuroimmune-system-and-develop-treatments-for-neurodegenerative-diseases-starting-with-als-and-ftd ), 2023-06-01; [official Modulo site](https://www.modulo.bio/ ), undated. |
Additional firm-acknowledged deep-tech examples on the [official portfolio](https://cantos.vc/ ) are Radiant Nuclear (modular reactors; Series A card), Solugen (chemical production; seed), Neros (unmanned systems; pre-seed), Arbor (gas turbines; pre-seed) and Astranis (satellites; Series B). These are **firm-level portfolio/entry-stage claims**; no specific amounts or transaction dates were independently established for these examples in this review.
## Neurotech evidence and classification
**No verified neurotech investment found in the sources checked** when neurotech means neural interfaces, neural recording/stimulation devices, BCI or related nervous-system hardware. This is a bounded search finding, not a claim that Cantos has never invested in neurotech.
**Verified adjacent investment: Modulo Bio.** The June 1, 2023 issuer release names Cantos in USD 8M financing and describes ALS/FTD programs using its Neuroimmune Platform. Its [official website](https://www.modulo.bio/ ) explains microglial reprogramming and treatment discovery. This is neuroscience/brain-immune drug discovery and computational biotechnology, not evidence of a BCI, EEG system or stimulation device. A [2024–2027 Alzheimer's Drug Discovery Foundation project record](https://www.alzdiscovery.org/research-and-grants/portfolio-details/22409651 ), undated webpage, further identifies a brain-penetrant CSF1R inhibitor for FTD/ALS/related dementia. That foundation's USD 4,845,794 project funding must not be assigned to Cantos or substituted for the venture financing. SHOW MORE
team@apexlogos.ai · 23 days ago
MATCH 
Khosla Ventures
Faeth Therapeutics$25M · 2025-10-21
Nabla Bio$11M · 2021-12-07
Prellis Bio$35M · Unknown date
Faeth$25M · Unknown date
Future Fund
S2G Investments
Alex Morgan
B Capital
Castelion$70M · 2025-01-31
Vital Lyfe$24M · Unknown date
Y Combinator
Earth AI$20M · 2025-01-27
Sixfold Bioscience$— · Unknown date
BoxGroup
Remedy Scientific$— · 2025-04-09
Knowde$14M · 2020-03-11
Celesta Capital
CIV
Glyphic Biotechnologies$6M · 2021-07-26
Coatue Management LLC
Eclipse
Felicis
Fifty Years
General Catalyst
Innovate UK
Jake Storm
Lightspeed
Osage University Partners
Primary Venture Partners
Shinkei$6M · 2024-04-29
Prime Movers Lab
Venus$20M · 2022-04-05
SOSV
Spark Capital
True Ventures
Wing Venture Capital
Zetta Venture Partners
