Ireland’s data regulator, the Data Protection Commission (DPC), said Friday that it has opened an investigation into Elon Musk’s X over the social media platform’s use of personal data collected from European users to train Grok. The DPC will investigate how X processes personal data “comprised” in publicly accessible posts by European users for the […]

The business of moving goods in the United States is dominated by trucks, which handle about two-thirds of the 20.2 billion tons of freight that’s transported annually. Parallel Systems founder and CEO, Matt Soule, wants to change that by putting a modern autonomous and electric twist on the centuries-old railroad system.  The Los Angeles-based company […]

A recent breach of Berkshire Hathaway-owned private jet company NetJets has revealed a guide for flight attendants serving Elon Musk, per a Bloomberg report. The memo offers an interesting glimpse into the personal preferences of the world’s richest man. Some of the preferences are surprising for the CEO of Tesla, a company dedicated to sustainability. […]

Matt Rogers says Quilt is picking up where his old startup, Nest, left off.

Spotify announced on Friday that it plans to invest €1 million — or approximately $1.1 million — to boost audiobook production in languages other than English, beginning with French and Dutch. The investment indicates that Spotify is eager for more non-English titles in its limited library as it tries to compete with major players like […]

OpenAI will soon retire GPT-4, an AI model it launched over two years ago, from ChatGPT, according to a changelog posted on Thursday. Effective April 30, GPT-4 will be “fully replaced” by GPT-4o, the current default model in ChatGPT, OpenAI said. GPT-4 will remain available for use via OpenAI’s API. “In head‑to‑head evaluations, [GPT-4o] consistently […]

TechCrunch Sessions: AI is fast approaching. So, what does that mean for you? It means exhibit tables are nearly gone — and now’s your chance to grab one before they’re all sold out. If you’ve got a game-changing product to showcase to the AI world, don’t keep it quiet. Exhibit your brand in front of […]

Dropbox’s chief customer officer, Eric Cox, plans to step down, according to a document filed with the SEC on Friday. Cox will remain in his current role for “a period of time” to help with the transition, per the filing, and then will continue as a “non-executive” employee through mid-August. The filing did not mention […]

Welcome to Startups Weekly — your weekly recap of everything you can’t miss from the world of startups. Want it in your inbox every Friday? Sign up here. Startups aren’t isolated from the world. But this week, funding news felt positively uncorrelated from the overall news cycle, offering somewhat of a reprieve — or perhaps […]

The purchase covers 12 years of emissions from CO280’s first carbon capture project at a mill on the Gulf Coast.

Mark your calendar — StrictlyVC London is just around the corner on May 13. Designed for founders, entrepreneurs, and investors, this exclusive gathering promises deep VC insight and high-value connections. We’re thrilled to welcome our first pair of confirmed speakers: Nazo Moosa, managing director of Paladin Capital Group, and Sonali De Rycker, partner of Accel […]

EV startup Lucid Motors has emerged as a surprise winner in the bankruptcy auction for electric trucking company Nikola’s Arizona factory and other assets, according to a late Thursday night court filing. Lucid committed around $30 million in cash and non-cash considerations in exchange for the factory, Nikola’s lease on its Phoenix headquarters, and “certain […]

A growing number of Tesla owners are putting their used vehicles up for sale, as consumers react to Elon Musk’s political activities and the global protests they have fueled. In March, the number of used Tesla vehicles listed for sale on Autotrader.com skyrocketed, Sherwood News reported, citing data from Autotrader parent company Cox Automotive. The […]

Digital payments platform Stripe invites customers to join its management team meetings on a bi-weekly basis so it can get “candid feedback,” according to co-founder Patrick Collison. In an April 8 post on X, the fintech giant’s CEO said the company has a customer join for the first 30 minutes of the meeting, which is […]

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.

Albert Saniger, the founder and former CEO of Nate, an AI shopping app that promised a “universal” checkout experience, was charged with defrauding investors on Wednesday, according to a press release from the U.S. Department of Justice. Founded in 2018, Nate raised over $50 million from investors like Coatue and Forerunner Ventures, most recently raising […]

Several tech companies have scaled back public commitments to DEI amid a broader crackdown by the Trump administration.

In a recent appearance on Possible, a podcast co-hosted by LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman, Google DeepMind CEO Demis Hassabis said the search giant plans to eventually combine its Gemini AI models with its Veo video-generating models to improve the former’s understanding of the physical world. “We’ve always built Gemini, our foundation model, to be multimodal […]

In recent years, focus on career and delayed marriage age is driving some women to consider preserving their fertility through egg freezing. But the steep cost of the procedure, estimated at $10,000 to $15,000 per attempt, means many women can’t afford it during their most fertile years: 20s and early 30s. Cofertility, a startup founded […]

Thinking Machines Lab, the new AI startup from ex-OpenAI CTO Mira Murati, is reportedly attempting to close one of the largest seed rounds in history. Business Insider reported on Thursday that Thinking Machines Lab has doubled the target for its seed funding round to $2 billion. The round, should it close according to plan, would […]