In June 2023, Inflection announced it had raised $1.3 billion to build what it called “more personal AI.” The lead investor was Microsoft.
Today, less than a year later, Microsoft announced that it was essentially eating Inflection alive (though I think they phrased it differently).
Co-founders Mustafa Suleyman and Karén Simonyan will go to Microsoft, where the former will head up the newly formed Microsoft AI division, along with “several members” of their team as Microsoft put it — or “most of the staff,” as Bloomberg reports it.
Ultimately Microsoft got a bit of extra leverage on the company instead of eating it alive.
Whether it was OpenAI or Inflection, Microsoft was feeding their cash and compute addictions, whispering in their ear about partnerships, and then as soon as they tripped, out came the hidden fork and knife.
Naturally, Nvidia wants a piece.
Keeping things in the Marvel Cinematic Universe is Jetson Thor, a new computer designed specifically for running simulation workflows, generative AI models and more for the humanoid form factor.
Nvidia notes of the new silicon:The SoC includes a next-generation GPU based on NVIDIA Blackwell architecture with a transformer engine delivering 800 teraflops of 8-bit floating point AI performance to run multimodal generative AI models like GR00T.
Naturally, Nvidia wants a piece of the action.
The next several years will present a fascinating race for market share between humanoids and mobile manipulators, and Nvidia wants a piece of all of that action.
The occasion was the unveiling of the Rivian R2, a smaller and more affordable all-electric SUV, and a vital vehicle for the EV upstart hoping to show the world it’s here to stay.
The air was filled with conversations about their Rivian vehicles, exclamations and congratulations, hugs and handshakes, and discussions of their hopes for the R2.
When the Rivian R2 did arrive — it did not come alone.
The R2, a two-row all-electric SUV that will have an estimated range of 300 miles and a base price of $45,000, was the main event.
Today, Rivian produces four vehicles at its sole factory in Normal, Illinois: its two consumer vehicles, the R1T truck and R1S SUV, and two versions of its commercial van.
“More big partners kept coming and closing with us, pushing to get on our roadmap,” Betesh told TechCrunch.
Coverdash offers small businesses, e-commerce merchants and freelancers the ability to buy business insurance in areas like business owner’s policies, cyber and worker’s compensation.
Businesses then answer a few questions, select a policy and get coverage in minutes.
That comes with some requirements, like having liability insurance for board directors and company officers and other management, Betesh explained.
“It all kind of fell into place really quickly, and in over two weeks, we had offers from multiple firms.
Prometeo, a startup out of Uruguay building channels to enable open banking across Latin America, is today announcing that it has picked up $13 million in funding to expand its business.
A lot of open banking these days focused on national rollouts — not least because banking conventions and regulations are often very localized.
(It’s not the only company that believes that open banking has a big role to play in financial services in the future: last year, the open banking startup Ivy raised funding specifically to expand to Latin America; and Christine wrote here extensively on Finerio, an ambitious open banking startup out of Mexico.
More recently, last year it led a $14 million round into nocnoc, a Latin America cross-border commerce specialist.
It also owns the point-of-sale payments company Zettle, which has been making very big inroads into Latin America for years now.
CES has increasingly become defined by what automakers and other mobility-focused companies bring to Las Vegas, and CES 2024 has been no exception.
Hydrogen’s making a big comebackThe underlying technology for hydrogen-powered vehicles has been around for a while, though it’s been eclipsed by battery-powered electric vehicles.
But at CES 2024, a number of companies from Nikola to Hyundai and Bosch were touting its benefits.
We explore why this is the year several companies are highlighting hydrogen, with an additional deep dive into Hyundai’s plans.
Kia’s modular EV lineup is revealedModular phones may have come and gone, but Kia hopes modular vehicles will have a bit more success.
CES has increasingly become defined by what automakers and other mobility-focused companies bring to Las Vegas, and CES 2024 has been no exception.
Honda’s 0 series EVs, Saloon and Space-Hub concepts debutIf you’re tired of “thick, heavy” EVs, Honda has an alternative vision for you.
The carmaker showcased a more sleek design for its Saloon concept, while the Space-Hub takes a more family-friendly van approach.
Though like its standard form factor, the voice-powered ChatGPT could still be tricked, as we learned in a hands-on demo.
Kia’s modular EV lineup is revealedModular phones may have come and gone, but Kia hopes modular vehicles will have a bit more success.
Terran Orbital may be close to receiving a major payment from its biggest customer, CEO Marc Bell announced internally at a company-wide meeting earlier this month.
While Terran is pursuing other lucrative contracts that could comprise billions in work, its $2.4 billion contract with Rivada is by far the largest it has secured so far.
Earlier this quarter, Terran had to adjust its full-year financial outlook after Rivada delayed paying an incremental $180 million toward that total contract award.
“I had dinner with [Rivada CEO] Declan Ganley last week in DC,” Bell told staff during the meeting, a recording of which was obtained by TechCrunch.
As of November, Terran reported a backlog of future work of $2.6 billion, of which $2.4 billion is from the Rivada contract.
As 2023 comes to a close, we’re here to look back at the biggest fintech stories of the year.
In April, Apple shared that Apple Card customers in the U.S. could open a savings account and earn interest through an Apple savings account, as reported by Romain Dillet.
Another one of our most read stories of the year also involved a financial services giant rather than a startup.
X1, which offers an income-based credit card with rewards, had raised a total of $62 million in venture-backed funding.
Why X1 in particular over the many other credit card startups out there?
The Next40 and French Tech 120 rankings reflect the vibrancy of France’s startup ecosystem. With 120 startups selected from a pool of more than 11,000 submissions, these rankings indicate the…
