News

Sheila Chiang / CNBC: Meituan’s market cap fell ~60% from ~$138.2B to ~$56.4B since the start of 2023, weighed down by rising competition and a slowdown in its food delivery business  —  – Chinese food delivery giant Meituan lost about… Read More »Meituan’s market cap fell ~60% from ~$138.2B to ~$56.4B since the start of 2023, weighed down by rising competition and a slowdown in its food delivery business (Sheila Chiang/CNBC)

Stephen Nellis / Reuters: Aeva, founded by Apple veterans, reaches a $1B deal with Germany’s Daimler Truck for self-driving sensors for trucks expected in 2027, but offers few details  —  Aeva Technologies (AEVA.N) on Tuesday said that it has reached… Read More »Aeva, founded by Apple veterans, reaches a $1B deal with Germany’s Daimler Truck for self-driving sensors for trucks expected in 2027, but offers few details (Stephen Nellis/Reuters)

Bloomberg: Magnitt: startups in Saudi Arabia raised $1.4B in 2023, up 33% YoY, for a 52% share of VC funding in the MENA region, beating the UAE for the first time  —  – Saudi Arabia dominates tech scene with 52%… Read More »Magnitt: startups in Saudi Arabia raised $1.4B in 2023, up 33% YoY, for a 52% share of VC funding in the MENA region, beating the UAE for the first time (Bloomberg)

Jason Koebler / 404 Media: An investigation finds over 1,600 YouTube videos featuring celebrity deepfakes promoting Medicaid and Medicare scams; the videos have over 195M views in total  —  Joe Rogan, Taylor Swift, Andrew Tate, Steve Harvey, The Rock, and… Read More »An investigation finds over 1,600 YouTube videos featuring celebrity deepfakes promoting Medicaid and Medicare scams; the videos have over 195M views in total (Jason Koebler/404 Media)

Corrie Driebusch / Wall Street Journal: Some startup founders are building up protections, including implementing supervoting shares or dual-class shares, to avoid getting ousted like Sam Altman  —  They are building up protections and share classes after watching OpenAI saga… Read More »Some startup founders are building up protections, including implementing supervoting shares or dual-class shares, to avoid getting ousted like Sam Altman (Corrie Driebusch/Wall Street Journal)

Financial Times: Demis Hassabis, chief of DeepMind spinout Isomorphic Labs, believes the company would halve drug discovery times after inking deals with Eli Lilly and Novartis  —  Chief of Google’s AI unit and Isomorphic Labs spells out targets following $3bn… Read More »Demis Hassabis, chief of DeepMind spinout Isomorphic Labs, believes the company would halve drug discovery times after inking deals with Eli Lilly and Novartis (Financial Times)

Mike Wheatley / SiliconANGLE: Intel unveils AI-enabled SoCs for cars and agrees to buy Silicon Mobility, a French fabless silicon and software company that develops EV energy management SoCs  —  Intel Corp. is making an ambitious play for the automotive… Read More »Intel unveils AI-enabled SoCs for cars and agrees to buy Silicon Mobility, a French fabless silicon and software company that develops EV energy management SoCs (Mike Wheatley/SiliconANGLE)

Jane Lanhee Lee / Bloomberg: TSMC reports December 2023 revenue down 8.4% YoY to ~$5.7B, Q4 revenue flat YoY to ~$20.1B, beating estimates, and 2023 revenue down 4.5% YoY to ~$69.56B  —  – Chipmaker’s holiday period stopped bleeding of prior… Read More »TSMC reports December 2023 revenue down 8.4% YoY to ~$5.7B, Q4 revenue flat YoY to ~$20.1B, beating estimates, and 2023 revenue down 4.5% YoY to ~$69.56B (Jane Lanhee Lee/Bloomberg)

Qianer Liu / Financial Times: Sources: Chinese companies are repurposing Nvidia’s gaming chips for AI to counter US’ sanctions; RTX 4090 is one of the most popular models to be repurposed  —  US export controls force developers to strip components… Read More »Sources: Chinese companies are repurposing Nvidia’s gaming chips for AI to counter US’ sanctions; RTX 4090 is one of the most popular models to be repurposed (Qianer Liu/Financial Times)

Manish Singh / TechCrunch: Bank of America values Jio Platforms at $107B, up 64.6% from $65B in 2020 when the Indian telecoms and digital conglomerate raised $20B+ from Meta and others  —  Bank of America has pinned a $107 billion… Read More »Bank of America values Jio Platforms at $107B, up 64.6% from $65B in 2020 when the Indian telecoms and digital conglomerate raised $20B+ from Meta and others (Manish Singh/TechCrunch)