Instinct AI raised $350M at a $2.5B valuation for an assistant you text. The model isn't the moat — the permissions users hand over are. What SL builders should copy, and what to skip.

A hot new AI agent called Instinct was valued at $500 million earlier in August, sources say. Now it's raising a new round at a $2.5 billion valuation from Benchmark and Index.

The startup is only a year old but it has already generated a massive amount of hype (and money) while also spurring privacy concerns.