AI coding assistant Cursor acquired Graphite, an AI startup specializing in code review and debugging.
The acquisition terms remained undisclosed. However, Axios reported that Cursor paid a figure substantially exceeding Graphite’s last valuation of $290 million. Graphite, a five-year-old company, achieved this valuation earlier this year after raising a $52 million Series B round.
This integration aims to streamline the code development lifecycle. AI-generated code frequently contains errors, necessitating significant engineering time for corrections. Although Cursor’s Bugbot product offers AI-powered code review, Graphite provides a specialized “stacked pull request” capability. This feature allows developers to manage multiple interdependent code changes concurrently without awaiting individual approvals, thereby accelerating the process from drafting to shipping code.
Other companies operating in the AI-powered code review sector include CodeRabbit, which received a $550 million valuation in September, and Greptile, a smaller competitor that announced a $25 million Series A funding round this fall.
Michael Truell, co-founder and CEO of Cursor, met Graphite’s co-founders, Merrill Lutsky, Greg Foster, and Tomas Reimers, prior to Cursor’s launch. Truell was a Neo Scholar, a program for college students run by Neo, Ali Partovi’s early-stage venture firm. Neo supported Graphite at its seed stage, according to PitchBook data. Accel and Andreessen Horowitz also hold investments in both Cursor and Graphite.
Cursor, last valued at $29 billion in November, has engaged in multiple acquisitions. Last month, it purchased Growth by Design, a technology recruiting strategy company. In July, Cursor acquired talent from the AI-powered CRM startup Koala for a post-money valuation of $129 million, according to PitchBook.
