If the decisions made by corporate boards of directors can indicate where a company wants to be focusing, Amazon’s board just made an interesting move.
The company announced on Thursday that Andrew Ng, known for building AI at large tech companies, is joining its board of directors.
And given the AI whiplash that every big tech company is currently dealing with, it feels timely that McGrath is stepping away from the board now.
To stay at the forefront of the tech industry, Amazon will be looking for better thought leadership on the next steps in its artificial intelligence strategy.
It’s worth remembering that Amazon has been a leading player in AI for a long time.
Can AI eat the jobs of the developers who are busy building AI models?
News this week that Google has a new AI-powered coding tool for developers means that competitive pressures between major tech companies to build the best service to help coders write more code, more quickly is still heating up.
Both companies want to eventually build developer-helping tech that can understand a company’s codebase, allowing it to offer up more tailored suggestions and tips.
Everywhere you look, developers are building tools and services to help their own professional cohort.
Developers learning to code today won’t know a world in which they don’t have AI-powered coding helps.
The global demand for wood could grow by 54% between 2010 and 2050, according to a study by the World Resources Institute.
While some building materials like steel get consistently recycled back into the supply chain, wood does not.
Cambium looks to build the supply chain that keeps wood from being wasted by connecting those with already-been-used wood to the businesses and folks that need it.
“We’re building a better value chain where you can use local material, you can use salvaged material, and all of that is connected through our technology,” Christensen said.
And we do that in a really efficient and cost competitive way.”Demand for more sustainable wood has been growing in recent years, Christensen said, but before Cambium there wasn’t a good system to find the recycled wood.
Metalab goes from quietly building the internet to investing in itNearly 20 years after finding success in helping startups build products, Canadian interface design firm Metalab launches Metalab Ventures to invest in many of those product-led startups.
Then Metalab “lets them loose” to grow, CEO Luke Des Cotes told TechCrunch.
With Metalab Ventures, the venture arm will play the role of a long-term value investor, essentially “putting our money where our mouth is,” Des Cotes said.
When determining who to invest in Metalab Ventures, the process includes getting to know the founders and if the firm can add value.
“We’ve already operated very much like a venture fund,” Des Cotes said.
Just last year, Klaviyo went public, adding to the parade of startup success stories.
But they all showed what’s possible for the many people who dream of building a successful business in the Boston area.
When you put it all together, Lyman says, you get some of the primary building blocks for a successful startup ecosystem.
And what Boston may lack in nightlife, it surely makes up for in brain power and long history of startup success.
As Seseri says, success begets success.
Logspace co-founder and CEO Rodrigo Nader previously worked on machine learning problems at enterprise AI company Bitvore, together with co-founder and CTO Gabriel Luiz Freitas Almeida.
“This acquisition will provide current Langflow developers and current DataStax developers additional resources and integrations to elevate their applications to match the scale of their ambitions,” said Chet Kapoor, CEO and chairman of DataStax.
“Langflow is focused on democratizing and accelerating generative AI development for any developer or company, and in joining DataStax, we’re working together to enable developers to put their wild new generative AI ideas on a fast path to production.”The DataStax team argues that this acquisition effectively completes its effort to build a one-stop generative AI stack.
Langflow will continue to operate as a separate entity, so existing users shouldn’t notice any immediate changes.
“We couldn’t be more excited about joining the DataStax team and supercharging our ability to grow the Langflow platform, bringing it to more researchers, developers, enterprises and entrepreneurs working on generative AI applications,” said Nader.
Thrive Market is well, thriving.
The billion-dollar e-commerce company splashed onto the scene in 2016 with its idea of online grocery delivery.
Nick Green, one of the company’s co-founders, stopped by Found to chat about his company and the market’s evolution since he first launched it.
This argument is what helped Thrive Market become the first online grocery retailer that the USDA approved to accept food stamps.
Thrive Market had to raise money from content creators and influencers until VCs picked up on the craze.
Seso was founded five years ago to help streamline that process and now looks to expand into a one-stop-shop HR platform for the agriculture industry.
Michael Guirguis co-founded the startup after his cousin asked for his advice on whether or not her organic farm should expand.
Once he started talking to potential farm customers, he realized that farms could use a lot more help with their HR beyond just finding workers.
“When it comes to the back office, every farm we visited had thousands of filing cabinets,” Guirguis said.
“Your HR team is in the back office doing traditional HR work,” Guirguis said.
Startup studio super{set} has a fresh exit under its belt with the sale of marketing company Habu to LiveRamp for $200 million in January.
Now, super{set} is adding another $90 million to its coffers as it doubles down on its strategy of building enterprise startups.
We remain a venture studio focused on building companies rooted in data and AI.
We found, fund and build new technology startups, mostly in the enterprise space,” founding managing partner Tom Chavez told TechCrunch.
That’s one aspect in which super{set} has changed compared to 2019, Chavez said, as its method went from art to science.
Now, Coro — one of the startups building tools specifically for smaller businesses — is announcing a big round of funding after seeing its recurring revenues shoot up 300% in the last year.
Sources close to the deal tell TechCrunch that its valuation is over $750 million post-money.
And among SMBs responding to a survey from Digital Ocean, 74% named data privacy a top concern.
The opportunity in the security market for SMBs that Coro has identified is that these businesses typically lack the teams and internal IT budgets to dedicate to building and managing their defenses.
Its round last year, in April 2023, was $75 million at a $575 million valuation (also post-money).
