AI Funding Momentum, Materials Science Models, and Persistent Agent Memory | UpNext AI – May 13, 2026

Kevin Hartz’s venture firm A* has closed a new $450 million fund, reinforcing that major venture capital continues flowing into AI startups despite broader uncertainty around model cycles and platform competition. The firm says it plans to back companies across AI applications, infrastructure, healthcare, fintech, and security.  Meanwhile, Microsoft Research published a major update to MatterSim, its AI system for materials science. The company says the platform now supports faster simulation, experimental synthesis validation, and new multi-task modeling capabilities designed to move AI-assisted scientific discovery closer to practical research workflows.In research, we look at MEME — Multi-entity & Evolving Memory Evaluation — a new benchmark examining whether AI agents can reliably remember, update, and reason across long-running interactions. The results suggest current agent memory systems remain fragile, especially when facts evolve or depend on one another over time.In the headlines: Meta tests deeper AI integration inside Threads, OpenAI highlights AI-assisted research workflows through Parameter Golf, Simon Willison explores new OpenAI reasoning APIs and secure sandbox tooling, and Amazon continues to leave the door open to future AI-focused hardware experiments.SourcesTechCrunch – A* closes $450M fund https://techcrunch.com/2026/05/12/kevin-hartzs-a-just-closed-its-third-fund-with-450-million/Microsoft Research – MatterSim update https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/research/blog/advancing-ai-for-materials-with-mattersim-experimental-synthesis-faster-simulation-and-multi-task-models/arXiv – MEME benchmark https://arxiv.org/abs/2605.12477v1The Verge – Meta AI on Threads https://www.theverge.com/tech/929091/meta-ai-threads-account-blockSimon Willison – LLM 0.32a2 / OpenAI responses API https://simonwillison.net/2026/May/12/llm/#atom-everythingOpenAI – Parameter Golf https://openai.com/index/what-parameter-golf-taught-usSimon Willison – CSP Allow-list Experiment https://simonwillison.net/2026/May/13/csp-allow/#atom-everythingThe Verge – Amazon AI phone rumors https://www.theverge.com/tech/929412/amazon-panos-panay-interview-phone-transformer