Top Series B sectors
This post explores the sectors into which top ranked Series B investors are deploying capital in 2026.
AI is clearly the dominant theme. As your favorite LLM might say, “it’s not just a trend, it’s a structural shift.”
Beyond AI, the sectors of focus for the highest-ranked Series B investors in our methodology are defense, robotics, and FinTech. These four sectors account for over 85% of SignalRank’s Series B investments in 2026 (13 out of 15 investments).
Crunchbase data on Series B sectors
If we look at the Crunchbase dataset, we see this sectoral trend for all 2026 Series Bs to date.
One caveat: the Crunchbase sector designation can be somewhat vague. The “AI” category, at least with the Crunchbase definition, can be so broad as to be somewhat meaningless, from data centers and infrastructure to vertical applications and neolabs. And indeed you could argue that almost all of the other sectors are themselves leveraging AI.
“Manufacturing” and “Hardware” sectors include many defense companies and many robotics companies.
Figure 1 shows the percentage of Series B per sector for 2026 Series Bs (using the Crunchbase sector designation).
Figure 1. % of 2026 Series Bs per sector
Source: Crunchbase
SignalRank only seeks to invest in high quality Series Bs which have also raised high quality seed & Series A rounds based on their investor syndicates. We call these high quality post Series A / pre Series B companies “Candidates” for our product. This Candidate list gives a good indication of where we anticipate capital being deployed at Series B in the next 2-3 years.
Figure 2 shows the percentage of current Candidates per sector.
The themes within the “Other” section increasingly include emerging sectors such as space, nuclear, fusion, and quantum. Note how few and far between the consumer companies are.
Figure 2. % of post Series A /pre Series B candidates per sector
Source: SignalRank; Crunchbase
Where is SignalRank deploying capital?
SignalRank is in many ways a mirror on where the top ranked investors are deploying capital, given that 100% of our Series B investments are alongside the highest ranked investors in the ecosystem. As such, we are also deploying into AI, defense, robotics and FinTech.
Here is a list of announced Series B rounds in the SignalRank Index in these four sectors since we started investing in mid 2023:
1. AI
Consensus (2026 Series B): AI search engine for scientific research
Cowboy Space (2026): data centers in space
Deepset (2023): semantic search for enterprises
Earth AI (2024): AI for mineral exploration
HappyRobot (2025): operating system for managing AI workforce
Mercor (2025): data-labeling for foundational models
Pika (2024): generative AI for images & video
Sesame (2025): voice AI assistants
Solve Intelligence (2026): generative AI for patent law
Squint (2025): AI training for factory operators
Together AI (2025): open-source AI infrastructure
2. Defense
Amca (2026 Series B): designs hardware & subsystems for aircraft
Armada (2026): data centers for the edge
Cambium (2025): AI for biomaterial development
Cybertoka (2023): cyber defense for governments
Nominal (2025): testing platform for hardware engineers
Northwood Space (2025): hardware for ground to satellite communications
Saronic (2024): autonomous naval vessels
3. Robotics
Hyphen (2024 Series B): automatic culinary operations
Machina Labs (2023): robotics for sheet metal manufacturing
Mendaera (2024): surgical robots
Nomagic (2025): robotic solutions for order fulfillment
Skild AI (2025): operating system for robots
4. FinTech
Aleph (2025 Series B): FP&A AI solution
Anrok (2024): sales tax solution
Cents (2024): payments for laundromats
Monarch Money (2025): personal finance app
Navro (2025): simplifies international payments
Nitra (2025): healthcare payments
Simetrik (2024): no-code solution for CFOs
Tabs (2025): AI revenue automation platform
Wingspan (2025): freelancer payments platform
Concluding thoughts
There is an ongoing conversation within VC about the pros/cons of whether companies need to be “legible” to capital.
The YC “request for startups” list even starts this legibility topic from inception.
Yet outlier outcomes often come from seemingly weird ideas at seed & Series A (think Airbnb, and even Anthropic which was rejected by 20+ VCs initially).
However, by the time a company is at Series B, it starts to become increasingly important to be legible to capital.
In part, this is because investors have one eye on what growth stage & pre-IPO investors are looking for:
Series Bs represent the first round where growth & pre-IPO investors start to take notice. The sectors backed at Series B today will be the IPO candidates of the future.