Journals

Tage Kene-Okafor / TechCrunch: Sources: African neobank Kuda raised $20M in 2023 at a $500M valuation, same as its 2021 valuation; it has 7M retail and business users, short of projections  —  Earlier this month, Kuda co-founder and CEO Babs… Read More »Sources: African neobank Kuda raised $20M in 2023 at a $500M valuation, same as its 2021 valuation; it has 7M retail and business users, short of projections (Tage Kene-Okafor/TechCrunch)

Jason Koebler / 404 Media: Researchers studying Google, Bing, and DuckDuckGo search results over a year: search engines are losing the cat and mouse game of SEO spam, likely boosted by AI  —  “The majority of high-ranking product reviews in… Read More »Researchers studying Google, Bing, and DuckDuckGo search results over a year: search engines are losing the cat and mouse game of SEO spam, likely boosted by AI (Jason Koebler/404 Media)

Kyle Wiggers / TechCrunch: OpenAI forms a Collective Alignment team to create a system for collecting and using input from the public in its training of models’ behaviors  —  OpenAI says it wants to implement ideas from the public about… Read More »OpenAI forms a Collective Alignment team to create a system for collecting and using input from the public in its training of models’ behaviors (Kyle Wiggers/TechCrunch)

Engadget: Apple Vision Pro hands-on: eye and hand tracking are very accurate, but typing is frustrating, the killer app is watching movies, can feel heavy after 15+ min  —  We got hands-on with the device once more before its official… Read More »Apple Vision Pro hands-on: eye and hand tracking are very accurate, but typing is frustrating, the killer app is watching movies, can feel heavy after 15+ min (Engadget)

Bloomberg: OpenAI VP Anna Makanju says the company is developing tools with the US DOD on open-source software and held talks on ways to assist preventing veteran suicide  —  OpenAI is working with the Pentagon on a number of projects… Read More »OpenAI VP Anna Makanju says the company is developing tools with the US DOD on open-source software and held talks on ways to assist preventing veteran suicide (Bloomberg)

Joanna Glasner / Crunchbase News: In 2023, US metaverse VC funding was just ~$910M, the lowest in at least six years and below a $3.11B peak in 2021; no consumer metaverse company raised $100M+  —  Almost nobody these days is… Read More »In 2023, US metaverse VC funding was just ~$910M, the lowest in at least six years and below a $3.11B peak in 2021; no consumer metaverse company raised $100M+ (Joanna Glasner/Crunchbase News)

Jon Victor / The Information: Source: Google has increasingly awarded select DeepMind researchers with large grants of restricted stock worth up to millions of dollars, to fend off OpenAI  —  Even as Google makes a major round of staff cuts,… Read More »Source: Google has increasingly awarded select DeepMind researchers with large grants of restricted stock worth up to millions of dollars, to fend off OpenAI (Jon Victor/The Information)

Rachel Metz / Bloomberg: Tokyo-based Sakana AI, which is focused on building smaller AI models, raised a $30M seed led by Lux Capital, a source says at a $200M valuation  —  Lux Capital, Jeff Dean and others are backing the… Read More »Tokyo-based Sakana AI, which is focused on building smaller AI models, raised a $30M seed led by Lux Capital, a source says at a $200M valuation (Rachel Metz/Bloomberg)

Thomas Black / Bloomberg: Quantinuum raised $300M, led by JPMorgan, valuing the quantum computing company at $5B; Honeywell remains the majority owner  —  – Mitsui, Amgen also part of Quantinuum’s $300 million round  — Honeywell remains majority owner of quantum… Read More »Quantinuum raised $300M, led by JPMorgan, valuing the quantum computing company at $5B; Honeywell remains the majority owner (Thomas Black/Bloomberg)

Ingrid Lunden / TechCrunch: Tel Aviv-based Xyte, which helps hardware OEMs build subscription services for devices, raised a $20M Series A led by Intel Capital, plus a $10M credit line  —  The hardware industry is under pressure these days: slower… Read More »Tel Aviv-based Xyte, which helps hardware OEMs build subscription services for devices, raised a $20M Series A led by Intel Capital, plus a $10M credit line (Ingrid Lunden/TechCrunch)