Hiya, folks, welcome to TechCrunch’s regular AI newsletter. Last Sunday, President Joe Biden announced that he no longer plans to seek reelection, instead offering his “full endorsement” of VP Kamala Harris to become the Democratic Party’s nominee; in the days following, Harris secured support from the Democratic delegate majority. Harris has been outspoken on tech […]
This Week in AI: How Kamala Harris might regulate AI Read More »
Today’s story takes us to a high school on the outskirts of Essex, which has ended up on the wrong side of the UK’s GDPR laws. This may alarm you if you used to carry lunch money to school, but kids these days can do biometric facial scans to pay for their meals. But as
Should facial recognition technology be used in schools? Read More »
When you see the mythical Ouroboros, it’s perfectly logical to think, “Well, that won’t last.” A potent symbol — swallowing your own tail — but difficult in practice. It may be the case for AI as well, which, according to a new study, may be at risk of “model collapse” after a few rounds of
‘Model collapse’: Scientists warn against letting AI eat its own tail Read More »
Lakera, a Swiss startup that’s building technology to protect generative AI applications from malicious prompts and other threats, has raised $20 million in a Series A round led by European venture capital firm, Atomico. Generative AI has emerged as the poster child of the burgeoning AI movement, driven by popular apps such as ChatGPT. But
Lakera, which protects enterprises from LLM vulnerabilities, raises $20M Read More »
Ahead of Tuesday’s earnings, Tesla CEO Elon Musk announced that the carmaker will begin selling its Optimus humanoid robot in 2026. In fact, Optimus has already started performing tasks autonomously, like handling batteries, in one of Tesla’s facilities, according to its earnings report. “Tesla will have genuinely useful humanoid robots in low production for Tesla
Elon Musk sets 2026 Optimus sale date. Here’s where other humanoid robots stand. Read More »
The Federal Trade Commission announced on Tuesday that it’s ordering eight companies that offer AI-powered “surveillance service pricing” to turn over information about the potential impact these products have on privacy, competition and consumer protection. With this investigation, the agency is seeking to learn more about how artificial intelligence and other technologies are being used
FTC is investigating how companies are using AI to base pricing on consumer behavior Read More »
Adobe released new Firefly tools for Photoshop and Illustrator on Tuesday, offering graphic designers more ways to use the company’s in-house AI models. Adobe’s new features let creative workers describe what they want with brief prompts, and receive AI generated textures or images that could otherwise take hours to create. As Adobe doubles down on
Adobe releases new Firefly AI tools for Illustrator and Photoshop Read More »
LiDAR has been a cornerstone of autonomous vehicle and robotics industries. While it’s become an industry standard, the technology has its drawbacks. Chief among them is high cost. As the former CTO and CEO of LiDAR leader Velodyne, Anand Gopalan is aware of the tech’s pluses and minuses. It’s telling, then, that the executive’s latest
Former Velodyne CEO’s delivery robot startup is ditching LiDAR for foundation models Read More »
When is a startup not a startup? When it’s a public company with 1,300 employees and $2.5 billion in capital. If that failed to conjure so much as a smile, that’s because it’s not a joke — it’s very much the reality for Nebius, a fledgling AI infrastructure business that has emerged from the ashes
There comes a time in every startup’s life when the leaders and stakeholders have to seriously start thinking about the endgame: What to do when you’ve raised $150 million in VC cash over 15 years en route to building a 100 million-plus community? And how do you go about executing that next step to ensure
Strava’s next chapter: New CEO talks AI, inclusivity, and why ‘dark mode’ took so long Read More »
