TechCrunch Industry News

Health giant Kettering still facing disruption weeks after ransomware attack

05 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

A healthcare giant with dozens of facilities across Ohio is still recovering after shutting down nearly all its operations following a ransomware atta...

TikTok launches ‘TikTok for Artists,’ a new music insights platform

04 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

TikTok announced on Tuesday that it’s officially launching TikTok for Artists, a new music insights platform that is designed to help artists build ...

Early AI investor Elad Gil finds his next big bet: AI-powered rollups

04 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Elad Gil started betting on AI before most of the world took notice. By the time investors began grasping the implications of ChatGPT, Gil had already...

For the love of God, stop calling your AI a co-worker

03 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Generative AI comes in many forms. Increasingly, though, it’s marketed the same way: with human names and personas that make it feel less like code ...

DeepSeek’s updated R1 AI model is more censored, test finds

03 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Chinese AI startup DeepSeek’s newest AI model, an updated version of the company’s R1 reasoning model, achieves impressive scores on benchmarks fo...

Volteras wants to connect to more EVs than anyone else

02 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Volteras has raised $11.1 million to expand its connected car offerings to automakers and companies that want to interact with EVs. Learn more about y...

Tesla pleads for Senate to spare its booming energy business

02 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

If the Senate were to pass it with those repeals in tact, it could have a devastating impact on Tesla’s energy division. Learn more about your ad ch...

LoveJack, the dating app designed for users to find love using just five words

02 Jun 2025

Contributed by Lukas

As Kevin Malone from “The Office” once said, “Why waste time say lot word when few word do trick?”  For Julia LeStage and Lisa Le, the creato...

Atomic Canyon wants to be ChatGPT for the nuclear industry

30 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Atomic Canyon raised $7 million in a seed round to expand its document search AI for nuclear power plants. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit pod...

Why export restrictions aren’t the only thing to pay attention to in Nvidia’s earnings

30 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

After the market closes on Wednesday, Nvidia will report earnings for the first quarter of its fiscal year 2026, which ended on April 27. While many i...

Gridcare thinks more than 100 MW of data center capacity is hiding in the grid

29 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Gridcare raised $13.3 million for its data platform that finds underutilized capacity on the electrical grid. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit ...

Tesla loses more ground in Europe, while BYD makes gains

29 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

In April, Tesla sold 7,261 vehicles in the European Union, European Free Trade Association, and U.K., a 49% year-over-year decline. Learn more about y...

YouTube tops Disney and Netflix in TV viewing and WhatsApp launches long-awaited iPad app

28 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Nielsen’s latest report serves as another wake-up call that YouTube is rapidly gaining ground in the TV landscape. On Tuesday, Nielsen released its ...

Why a new anti-revenge porn law has free speech experts alarmed 

28 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The newly signed Take It Down Act makes it illegal to publish nonconsensual explicit images – real or AI-generated – and gives platforms just 48 h...

Why Intempus thinks robots should have a human physiological state

27 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Teddy Warner, 19, has always been interested in robotics. His family was in the industry, and he says he “grew up” working in a machinist shop whi...

Anthropic CEO claims AI models hallucinate less than humans

27 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei believes today’s AI models hallucinate, or make things up and present them as if they’re true, at a lower rate than hum...

Mysterious hacking group Careto was run by the Spanish government, sources say

26 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The elusive hacking group Careto was never publicly linked to a specific government, but TechCrunch has learned researchers concluded privately that t...

Jony Ive to lead OpenAI’s design work following $6.5B acquisition of his company

26 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Famed Apple product designer Jony Ive will now lead creative and design work at OpenAI, the result on an usual deal announced on Wednesday. OpenAI CEO...

Spotify says support for external payments on iOS has already boosted subscriptions

23 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Spotify says its ability to direct its customers to external payment links in its iOS app has already had a positive impact on sales. Learn more about...

Google’s Sergey Brin: ‘I made a lot of mistakes with Google Glass’

23 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Google co-founder Sergey Brin said he “made a lot of mistakes with Google Glass” during an onstage interview at Google I/O 2025 on Tuesday. Brin w...

Uber Freight bets big on AI tools to grow its business

22 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Three years ago, as the pandemic caused chaos for companies big and small, Colgate-Palmolive’s chief supply chain officer Luciano Sieber orchestrate...

South Loop Ventures closes $21M fund in Houston to build up local tech ecosystem

22 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

South Loop Ventures, a Houston-based venture firm, announced a $21 million Fund I, with Rice Management Company and Chevron Technology Ventures servin...

SparkCharge raises $30M to help fleets electrify without commitments

21 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

SparkCharge raised $15.5 million in equity and secured a $15 million loan to expand its fleet charging operations. Learn more about your ad choices. V...

MIT disavows doctoral student paper on AI’s productivity benefits

21 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

MIT says that due to concerns about the “integrity” of a high-profile paper on the effects of artificial intelligence on the productivity of a mat...

VUZ gets $12M to scale immersive video experiences across emerging markets and the U.S.

20 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

VUZ, a startup known for offering immersive video experiences from red carpets and football stadiums, has raised $12 million as it doubles down on its...

Cognichip emerges from stealth with the goal of using generative AI to develop new chips

20 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Chips are a critical component of the AI industry. But new chips don’t hit the market with the same speed as new AI models and products do. Cognichi...

Sam Altman’s goal for ChatGPT to remember ‘your whole life’ is both exciting and disturbing

19 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman laid out a big vision for the future of ChatGPT at an AI event hosted by VC firm Sequoia earlier this month.  When asked by one...

Airbnb expands into services and experiences, plans more social and AI features

19 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

As part of a broader app update, Airbnb on Tuesday introduced a new feature that allows travelers to book services and experiences, like getting a mes...

Grok is unpromptedly telling X users about South African genocide ... and more

16 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Elon Musk’s AI chatbot Grok appeared to experience a bug on Wednesday that caused it to reply to dozens of posts on X with information about genocid...

White House scraps plan to block data brokers from selling Americans’ sensitive data ... and more news

16 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The decision to reverse course comes after an industry lobby group called for the rule change to be withdrawn. Also, speaking during a business summit...

Sam Altman apparently does not respect olive oil

15 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman is using his olive oil inefficiently in an “offense to horticulture,” the Financial Times humorously reports. For its “Lun...

GM’s new ‘manganese rich’ battery promises cheaper EVs in 2028

15 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Lithium-manganese-rich (LMR) batteries should slash costs without sacrificing much range. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/a...

VCs are known to move in herds, which is why Eric Slesinger stands out a bit. While most American investors chase AI startups or U.S.-based defense tech startups, the former CIA officer is hunting for defense tech deals in Europe. I

14 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The mobile controller company Backbone unveiled its Backbone Pro controller this week, which brings iOS and Android gaming experiences to the next lev...

InventWood is about to mass produce wood that’s stronger than steel

14 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The material has 50% more tensile strength than steel with a strength-to-weight ratio that’s ten-times better. Learn more about your ad choices. Vis...

Remember Moviefone? Well, it’s back.

13 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

For millions of movie enthusiasts in the ’90s, Moviefone’s 777-FILM number was the go-to source for obtaining showtimes. Now, under new ownership,...

Microsoft employees are banned from using DeepSeek app

13 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Microsoft employees aren’t allowed to use DeepSeek due to data security and propaganda concerns, Microsoft vice chairman and president Brad Smith sa...

The Greek revival you’re not watching (but probably should be)

12 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Much of the world isn’t paying close attention to Greece right now. That may be a mistake. Best known for its stunning islands, sun-soaked cities, a...

Rove, founded by a 22-year-old, is helping Gen Z earn airline miles without credit cards

12 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

During his junior year study abroad, Max Morganroth, traveled to 30 countries, primarily flying in business and first class. His jet setting was funde...

AI data startup WisdomAI nabs $23M with a smart way to avoid hallucinations

09 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Rubrik co-founder Soham Mazumdar has a new data startup called Wisdom AI. It offers an agentic data analyst that works with structured, unstructured,...

Employer.com scoops up another fintech in purchase of MainStreet.com

09 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Employer.com has acquired MainStreet.com for an undisclosed amount, the latest fintech startup to get snapped up by the workforce management company. ...

Energy Star program getting scrapped, Ford raising prices due to tariffs, and Mark Zuckerberg’s AI ad tool sounds like a social media nightmare

08 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The Energy Star program's signature yellow labels appear on appliances and electronics for sale throughout the U.S.; Ford is raising the price of the ...

Cnaught wants to make carbon credits easy for businesses small and large

08 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Cnaught is a market maker seeking to ease the pain of buying carbon credits for companies without dedicated teams. Learn more about your ad choices. V...

MoneyFellows raises $13M to take its group savings model outside Egypt

07 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

While most African digital lenders depend on working capital to fuel growth, MoneyFellows has quietly done what few others have: lend billions of Egyp...

Pinterest updates visual search with more AI-powered features

07 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Pinterest is upgrading its visual search feature with a handful of new capabilities. On Monday, the company announced it’s rolling out new functiona...

Tinder and Visa to bring ID-verifying tech to more places and Airbnb rolled out an AI customer service bot in the US

06 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

World, the biometric ID company best known for its eyeball-scanning Orb devices, at an event late on Wednesday announced several partnerships aimed at...

OpenAI pledges to make changes to prevent future ChatGPT sycophancy

06 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

OpenAI says it’ll make changes to the way it updates the AI models that power ChatGPT, following an incident that caused the platform to become over...

Meta forecasted it would make $1.4T in revenue from generative AI by 2035

05 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Meta made a prediction last year its generative AI products would rake in $2 billion to $3 billion in revenue in 2025, and between $460 billion and $1...

Amazon launches Nova Premier, its largest AI model yet

05 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Amazon on Thursday released what it claims is the largest, most capable AI model in its Nova family, Nova Premier. Nova Premier, which can process tex...

Cast AI raises $108M to get the max out of AI, Kubernetes and other workloads

02 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The crush of traffic going into training and running AI has quickly turned into a major cost and resource headache for organizations. Cast AI is a sta...

JetBrains releases Mellum, an ‘open’ AI coding model

02 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

JetBrains, the company behind a range of popular app development tools, has released its first “open” AI model for coding. On Wednesday, JetBrains...

Yelp debuts AI voice agents for restaurants and service providers

01 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Yelp said on Tuesday that it’s working on deploying AI-powered “voice agents” to help service providers and restaurants handle calls, answer bas...

Spotify adds 5M premium users and hits record operating income

01 May 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Spotify reported on Tuesday that its premium subscriber base grew by 5 million in the first quarter, representing a 12% increase year-over-year. This ...

Lightrun grabs $70M using AI to debug code in production

30 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

AI-based coding has exploded in popularity on the promise that it will make developers’ jobs faster and easier. But it’s also resulted in somethin...

Amazon-backed Glacier gets $16M to expand its robot recycling fleet

30 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The world has a trash problem. The amount of stuff we throw away is expected to nearly double, to 3.8 billion metric tons, by 2050. Reducing what we u...

Anthropic CEO wants to open the black box of AI models by 2027

29 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei published an essay Thursday highlighting how little researchers understand about the inner workings of the world’s lead...

Chess.com reaches 200 million members

29 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Chess.com reaches a new membership milestone as it nears its 20th birthday. Chess.com, the online chess platform that was founded in 2005 and launched...

Adobe wants to create a robots.txt styled indicator for images used in AI training

28 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

For years, websites included information about what kind of crawlers were not allowed on their site with a robots.txt file. Adobe, which wants to crea...

Uber, Volkswagen pair up to launch robotaxi service in US with self-driving, electric microbuses

28 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Volkswagen of America and Uber on Thursday unveiled an ambitious plan to launch a commercial robotaxi service — using autonomous electric VW ID. BUZ...

Government censorship comes to Bluesky, but not its third-party apps … yet

25 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Government censorship has found its way to Bluesky, but there’s currently a loophole thanks to how the social network is structured. Earlier this ...

Linktree rolls out a suite of monetization features for creators

25 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Linktree is launching a set of new features aimed at helping creators earn more money directly from its platform. The new tools include the ability to...

The U.S. doesn’t refine cobalt. This startup wants to change that.

24 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Xerion says it has a new technique to produce highly refined cobalt in a single step. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adcho...

Crowdsourced AI benchmarks have serious flaws, some experts say

24 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

AI labs are increasingly relying on crowdsourced benchmarking platforms such as Chatbot Arena to probe the strengths and weaknesses of their latest mo...

Tariff turmoil may have killed the tech M&A market’s comeback

23 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The tech market doesn’t need to be soaring up and to the right to foster healthy M&A activity. Deals can get done even in down markets. But can M&A ...

Florida draft law mandating encryption backdoors for social media accounts billed ‘dangerous and dumb’

23 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

A digital rights group blasted the Florida bill, but lawmakers voted to advanced the draft law. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices...

ChatGPT is referring to users by their names unprompted, and some find it ‘creepy’

22 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Some ChatGPT users have noticed a strange phenomenon recently: occasionally, the chatbot refers to them by name as it reasons through problems. That w...

Robots run a half marathon, slowly

22 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

It looks like humanoid robots have a long way to go before catching up with human runners. Beijing’s E-Town tech hub hosted what it described as the...

Bluesky feed builder Graze raises $1M, rolls out ads

21 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Graze, a startup that lets people build and monetize custom feeds for Bluesky’s social network, has attracted new capital. Pre-seed investors, led b...

Archer Aviation wants to help New Yorkers skip airport traffic with electric air taxis

21 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

New York City — where you can get a dollar slice at 2am or a McDonald’s delivery in under 30 minutes, but still spend two hours crawling down the ...

TikTok takes on Google Maps by surfacing reviews in the comments tab

18 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

As TikTok continues to build out its search experience, the social network is now surfacing reviews for select places right within the comments tab of...

Stop doomscrolling and watch the ‘Great Moose Migration’ livestream

18 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

You could say that TikTok is ruining our attention spans, and yet, viewers around the world are tuning in to watch a monotonous livestream from a Swed...

Girls Who Code founder Reshma Saujani spills business tea with Meghan, Duchess of Sussex

17 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Reshma Saujani, founder of the non-profit Girls Who Code, got straight to the point.  “If I had applied to be the CEO of Girls Who Code, I wouldn’...

Phantom Neuro grabs $19M to help amputees put their phantom limbs to use

17 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The science fiction trope of humans superpowered by computer and bionic implants is fast becoming a reality, and today, a startup hoping for a role in...

Nvidia says it plans to manufacture some AI chips in the U.S.

16 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Nvidia says it has commissioned more than a million square feet of manufacturing space to build and test AI chips in Arizona and Texas as part of an e...

Bill Gates-backed Arnergy to expand solar access in Nigeria with $18M as demand surges

16 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Demand for solar energy in power-starved Nigeria has soared in the last decade thanks to worsening grid reliability and rising fuel costs. That’s dr...

How Chef Robotics found success by turning away its original customers

15 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

A few years ago, Chef Robotics was hurting. But founder Rajat Bhageria turned it around by doing something that early-stage founders fear to do. Lear...

AI insurtech Ominimo bags its first investment at a $220M valuation

15 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

How do you get talented engineers to work for a startup in a mundane field at a time when more exciting companies are paying well and hiring aggressiv...

Microsoft inks massive carbon removal deal powered by a paper mill

14 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The purchase covers 12 years of emissions from CO280’s first carbon capture project at a mill on the Gulf Coast. Learn more about your ad choices. V...

Revent rocks the boat with a fresh $100M to invest in people and the planet

14 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

It would appear the environment and society remain relevant, whatever you might hear in some other quarters. At least, that’s one conclusion to be d...

Google’s enterprise cloud gets a music-generating AI model

11 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

On Wednesday, Google rolled out updates to several of its first-party media-generating AI models available through its Vertex AI cloud platform. Lyria...

Governments identify dozens of Android apps bundled with spyware

11 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

The advisories say the spyware apps are used to target members of civil society who may oppose China’s state interests. Learn more about your ad cho...

Amazon says its AI video model can now generate minutes-long clips

10 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Amazon has upgraded its AI video model, Nova Reel, with the ability to generate videos up to two minutes in length. Nova Reel, announced in December 2...

Blackbird gobbles up $50M for its blockchain-based payment-loyalty app for restaurants

10 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

A founder who has carved out a name for himself building products to help restaurants connect better with would-be diners has $50 million for his late...

IBM releases a new mainframe built for the age of AI

09 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

IBM is releasing the latest version of its mainframe hardware that includes new updates meant to accelerate AI adoption. The hardware and consulting c...

Want to stay young? Peter Diamandis says survive the next 10 years

09 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Peter Diamandis, a futurist with degrees from both MIT and Harvard, has spent much of the past two decades evangelizing a vision of an “abundant fut...

Meta releases Llama 4, a new crop of flagship AI models

08 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Meta has released a new collection of AI models, Llama 4, in its Llama family — on a Saturday, no less. There are four new models in total: Llama 4 ...

X may soon start selling inactive usernames to Verified Organizations starting at $10K, code reveals

08 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

X’s plan to boost revenue by selling off dormant usernames on its service is starting to shape up. According to recent changes found in X’s web ap...

You might be following Second Lady Usha Vance on Instagram now

07 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Starting Wednesday, Meta says it will begin combining the Instagram accounts of the Second Lady of the United States, Usha Vance, and the former Secon...

Automakers jump on Tesla’s brand woes with discount EV offers

07 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Tesla trade-ins in the U.S. are at an all time high as some owners become disillusioned with Elon Musk’s politics, and some just want to avoid their...

Researchers suggest OpenAI trained AI models on paywalled O’Reilly books

04 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

OpenAI has been accused by many parties of training its AI on copyrighted content sans permission. Now a new paper by an AI watchdog organization make...

Who are climate conscious consumers? Not who you’d expect, says Northwind Climate

04 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Rather than divide people into demographic buckets, Northwind Climate analyzes survey responses for behavioral clues. Learn more about your ad choices...

Tesla records worst deliveries in two years amid Elon Musk backlash; Rivian starts a challenging year with a big slip in deliveries

03 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Tesla recorded 336,681 deliveries, its worst quarterly performance in more than two years as the brand suffers a backlash to CEO Elon Musk’s politic...

Oracle under fire for its handling of separate security incidents

03 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Oracle has denied at least one breach, despite evidence to the contrary, as it begins notifying healthcare customers of a separate patient data breach...

Substack is rolling out a TikTok-like video feed in its app

02 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Substack continues to double down on video amid TikTok’s uncertain future in the U.S. The company announced on Monday that it’s rolling out a scro...

IPO-bound Chime hopes to boost growth by paying higher interest rates

02 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

As it gears up to go public, Chime is going all in on new features in an effort to attract more customers. The digital bank is offering customers who ...

Amazon unveils Nova Act, an AI agent that can control a web browser

01 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Amazon on Monday unveiled Nova Act, a general-purpose AI agent that can take control of a web browser and independently perform some simple actions. A...

Open source devs are fighting AI crawlers with cleverness and vengeance

01 Apr 2025

Contributed by Lukas

AI web crawling bots are the cockroaches of the internet, many developers believe. FOSS devs are fighting back in ingenuous, humorous ways. Learn mor...

Trump’s auto tariffs are a gift to Tesla 

31 Mar 2025

Contributed by Lukas

President Trump is slapping 25% tariffs on all cars imported to the United States, including from our immediate North American neighbors. He’s also ...

TikTok ban is losing support among Americans, study says

31 Mar 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Americans’ support for a TikTok ban is declining, according to a study from the Pew Research Center. This survey of over 5,000 U.S. adults found tha...

SpaceX reportedly has a secret backdoor for Chinese investment

28 Mar 2025

Contributed by Lukas

Elon Musk’s rocket company SpaceX has allowed Chinese investors to buy stakes as long as the funds are routed through the Cayman Islands or other of...

AI’s coming to the classroom: Brisk raises $15M after a quick start in school

28 Mar 2025

Contributed by Lukas

It’s virtually impossible today to determine when a student’s writing has been composed using ChatGPT or another GenAI tool, and it can be a night...