Journals

Manish Singh / TechCrunch: Ola Group CEO Bhavish Aggarwal’s Krutrim, which is building a multilingual LLM, raised a $50M “first round” led by Matrix Partners India at a $1B valuation  —  Krutrim, an AI startup founded by Ola founder Bhavish… Read More »Ola Group CEO Bhavish Aggarwal’s Krutrim, which is building a multilingual LLM, raised a $50M “first round” led by Matrix Partners India at a $1B valuation (Manish Singh/TechCrunch)

Financial Times: Sources: Elon Musk’s xAI is in talks to raise up to $6B from family offices in Hong Kong and sovereign wealth funds in the Middle East at a $20B valuation  —  Tesla chief targets $20bn valuation in bid… Read More »Sources: Elon Musk’s xAI is in talks to raise up to $6B from family offices in Hong Kong and sovereign wealth funds in the Middle East at a $20B valuation (Financial Times)

Ben Thompson / Stratechery: An interview with Netflix co-CEO Greg Peters on the lack of a Netflix app on the Apple Vision Pro, the WWE deal, content strategy, ads, competition, and more  —  I am pleased to welcome Netflix Co-CEO… Read More »An interview with Netflix co-CEO Greg Peters on the lack of a Netflix app on the Apple Vision Pro, the WWE deal, content strategy, ads, competition, and more (Ben Thompson/Stratechery)

Chance Miller / 9to5Mac: Apple adds support for transcripts to the Podcasts app in iOS 17.4 beta and says transcripts will be generated automatically after an episode is published  —  Apple released the first developer beta of iOS 17.4 today,… Read More »Apple adds support for transcripts to the Podcasts app in iOS 17.4 beta and says transcripts will be generated automatically after an episode is published (Chance Miller/9to5Mac)

Winston Cho / The Hollywood Reporter: The George Carlin estate sues Dudesy, which released a comedy special featuring an AI-generated recreation of George Carlin, alleging copyright infringement  —  “We have to draw a line in the sand,” says daughter Kelly… Read More »The George Carlin estate sues Dudesy, which released a comedy special featuring an AI-generated recreation of George Carlin, alleging copyright infringement (Winston Cho/The Hollywood Reporter)

Juli Clover / MacRumors: Apple’s €0.50 Core Technology Fee in the EU would lead to a free or freemium app with 2M annual “first installs” paying $500K+ a year even if no money is earned  —  App developers in the… Read More »Apple’s €0.50 Core Technology Fee in the EU would lead to a free or freemium app with 2M annual “first installs” paying $500K+ a year even if no money is earned (Juli Clover/MacRumors)

Katie Roof / Bloomberg: Source: Sierra, an enterprise-focused AI startup co-founded by Bret Taylor, plans to raise $85M led by Sequoia at a ~$1B valuation; Taylor is on OpenAI’s board  —  – Taylor is an OpenAI board member and former… Read More »Source: Sierra, an enterprise-focused AI startup co-founded by Bret Taylor, plans to raise $85M led by Sequoia at a ~$1B valuation; Taylor is on OpenAI’s board (Katie Roof/Bloomberg)

Bloomberg: Sources: chipmaking startup Cerebras is weighing an IPO as soon as this year at a valuation higher than the $4B it achieved for its $250M Series F in 2021  —  – AI supercomputer maker in early talks with potential… Read More »Sources: chipmaking startup Cerebras is weighing an IPO as soon as this year at a valuation higher than the $4B it achieved for its $250M Series F in 2021 (Bloomberg)

Jennifer Creery / Bloomberg: Taiwan plans to spend ~$7.4M on the Trustworthy AI Dialogue Engine, or Taide, an LLM for businesses, banks, and other customers, to counter China’s influence  —  – Island developing secure tool for companies, lenders to use … Read More »Taiwan plans to spend ~$7.4M on the Trustworthy AI Dialogue Engine, or Taide, an LLM for businesses, banks, and other customers, to counter China’s influence (Jennifer Creery/Bloomberg)

Stuart A. Thompson / New York Times: LA County agrees to pay $5M to election software maker Konnech CEO Eugene Yu, who was wrongly arrested and charged in 2022 with mishandling voter data  —  Eugene Yu, the owner of an… Read More »LA County agrees to pay $5M to election software maker Konnech CEO Eugene Yu, who was wrongly arrested and charged in 2022 with mishandling voter data (Stuart A. Thompson/New York Times)