1. Quick hits
- OpenAI — They began testing Google's TPUs for inference workloads. (Computerworld)
- xAI — $10 B round on July 2 to fund Grok AI and data centers. (techstartupsTech Startups)
- GEO Funding — >$11.8 B invested, including Genesis AI’s $105 M and Centific’s $60 M. (techstartups)
- GEO Conference 2025 — First dedicated GEO event on July 18 with leading AI speakers. (Geo-conference)
- Growth.Pro — A 472% increase in AI search visibility using "AI Citation Engineering. (Growth)
2. Deep Dives
AI Economics Are Shifting
Infrastructure costs for AI inference are plummeting as companies explore alternative hardware solutions. OpenAI began testing Google's TPUs for inference workloads, signaling potential cost reductions that could make AI-generated responses cheaper to produce. Lower costs mean more queries get AI-powered answers. Brands need to prepare for increased AI citation volume. (Computerworld).
Major Funding Reinforces GEO Infrastructure Growth
xAI's massive $10 billion funding round on July 2 represents the largest AI investment of the period, with $5 billion in debt and $5 billion in equity from marquee investors including Andreessen Horowitz, Sequoia Capital, BlackRock, and NVIDIA. This funding directly supports Grok AI platform development and data center expansion, providing critical infrastructure for generative AI optimization. (techstartupsTech Startups)
The funding landscape during this period totaled over $11.8 billion, with additional notable rounds including Genesis AI's $105 million seed round and Centific's $60 million Series A for AI data foundry services. These investments underscore the venture capital community's confidence in GEO-related infrastructure and tooling. (techstartups)
The inaugural GEO Conference 2025 was announced for July 18, featuring leaders from Anthropic, Google, Perplexity, Semrush, Adobe, and OpenAI. This first-ever conference dedicated to Generative Engine Optimization indicates the field's maturation from experimental practice to an established discipline. (Geo-conference)
Thus, Record funding and the GEO Conference launch show strong backing for infrastructure expansion. This support lays the groundwork for rapid progress and widespread uptake.
Record Funding Validates GEO as an Institutional Investment Category
Two major funding rounds totaling $27 million occurred during this narrow timeframe, signaling institutional confidence in GEO's commercial viability:
Profound raised $20 million in Series A funding (announced June 19, 2025) led by Kleiner Perkins, with participation from NVIDIA's NVentures, Khosla Ventures, and notable angels including Vercel's Guillermo Rauch. (Pulse 2.0 +4)
Peec AI secured €7 million total funding (€5.2M seed round in July 2025) led by 20VC, building on their €1.8M pre-seed from April. (EU-StartupsVestbee)
The Berlin-based startup achieved €650,000 annual revenue with €80,000 weekly growth, (Vestbee) targeting mid-market companies with AI search analytics.
These funding rounds validate GEO as a legitimate category worthy of institutional investment, moving beyond experimental marketing tactics to essential business infrastructure.
3. Fresh Stats
- The first week of July 2025 marked a pivotal moment for Generative Engine Optimization (GEO), with xAI securing $10 billion in funding (Inbenta)
- 68% of organizations actively shifting search strategies to adapt to AI-powered search engines. (Search Engine Land)
- This period revealed the GEO market's explosive growth, with AI search traffic increasing 1,200% in just 9 months and AI search visitors proving 4.4x more valuable than traditional search traffic. (medium)
- 90% of AI search referrals come from desktop devices, suggesting mobile optimization remains underdeveloped across AI platforms. (Search Engine Land)
- The citation analysis of 30 million citations revealed platform-specific source preferences: Wikipedia dominates ChatGPT citations (47.9%), while Reddit heavily influences Perplexity results (46.7% of citations). (Profound)
- Wikipedia dominates ChatGPT citations with 47.9% of references, while Reddit represents 46.7% of Perplexity citations and 21% of Google AI citations. (The GEO Whitepaper)
- 90% of ChatGPT citations come from pages ranking 21+ in Google, indicating traditional SEO rankings have minimal correlation with AI search visibility. (The GEO Whitepaper)
- Only 26% overlap exists between ChatGPT and Bing results despite ChatGPT's integration with Bing. (The GEO Whitepaper)
- Brand case studies demonstrated measurable ROI, with small businesses experiencing up to 115% gains in AI visibility (Writesonic)
- Fortune 500 companies achieving 32% increases in AI search-attributed SQLs within six weeks. (contently)
- The research identified listicle content as dominating with 32.5% preference in AI citations. (SEOmator)
4. Brand Spotlight
Growth.pro's Enterprise Tech Client
What changed? A 472% increase in AI search visibility using "AI Citation Engineering." They became the primary source Google cites for industry questions. Also, the multimodal strategy boosted Google clicks 53.6%, Bing clicks 85.6%, social traffic 41%, ChatGPT sessions 321%, and Perplexity sessions 450% growth. (Growth)
Evidence: Their e-commerce retailer client saw 97% revenue growth despite industry-wide CTR declines. (Growth)
Takeaway for marketers: Stop chasing links. Start becoming the source everyone cites. (Growth.pro Case Studies)
5. How Should You Prepare to Get a Cutting Edge in GEO?
- Test Alternative Inference Hardware by running a small batch of queries on Google TPUs to compare cost and latency versus your current setup.
- Apply AI Citation Engineering: audit a top-performing page, add schema markup and concise bullet facts, then track any lift in AI-driven traffic.
- Plan for GEO Conference: register for the July 18 event, draft 1-pager on your current GEO challenges, and schedule meetings with potential partners.