Fabled startup investor and accelerator Y Combinator has some choice words for Google in an amicus brief it just submitted in the U.S.’s monopoly case against the search giant. In the brief, YC charged that Google is a “monopolist” that has “stunted” the U.S. startup ecosystem by making VC firms like itself hesitate to fund…
Federal railroad regulators are in talks with Elon Musk’s tunneling firm, The Boring Company (TBC), over a multi-billion Amtrak project, according to The New York Times. Citing sources familiar with the matter, the NYT reports that Federal Railroad Administration officials have spoken with TBC to learn whether the Musk-owned company could save the agency money…
Apple Music is introducing a new “audio wellness” collection of songs called Sound Therapy. Designed in partnership with Universal Music Group (UMG), the feature combines songs that subscribers already know with other sound waves that promote focusing, relaxing, or sleeping. Songs may include auditory beats or colored noise, sound waves where the intensity varies at…
Meeting transcription space is a hot commodity for all productivity suites. Companies like ClickUp and Zoom have added transcription with an AI summary to take on another upstart in this vertical, including Read AI, Zoom’s assistant, Circleback, Granola, or Otter. The latest entrant in the race to build meeting transcription tools is Notion. The company is rolling out an…
In a bid to make its AI DJ feel more interactive, Spotify is updating the feature to let users request music or change the mood of a playlist using voice commands. The company is rolling out this feature, supported only in English, in over 60 markets for its premium subscribers. Until now, you could only…
Some fusion companies might be hitting a rough patch, but Realta Fusion is bucking the trend with a new fundraising round it says will allow it to finalize the design of its Anvil prototype reactor. “By the end of our Series A investment period, we’ll have said, ‘Hey, we have a design. We’re shovel ready…
Google is gearing up to hold its largest developer conference of the year, Google I/O 2025, on May 20 and May 21. CEO Sundar Pichai, DeepMind CEO and co-founder Demis Hassabis, and executives in charge of Search, Cloud, and Android will announce major updates to Google’s product offerings. We’re expecting Google I/O 2025 to focus…
Meta said on Tuesday its Ray-Ban Meta smart glasses would be available for sale in India starting May 19 at a starting price of ₹29,990 (about $353). The smart glasses are currently available for pre-order on Ray-Ban’s site, and will be stocked in Ray-Ban stores at launch. Meta said the smart glasses launching in India…
Federal safety investigators have sent Tesla a detailed list of questions on its upcoming robotaxi service as part of an investigation into how the company’s “Full Self-Driving (Supervised)” software operates in low-visibility conditions. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s Office of Defects Investigation wants the additional information about Full Self-Driving (Supervised) — or “FSD” —…
Hungry to learn more about Anthropic, directly from Anthropic? You aren’t alone if so, which is why we’re so delighted to announce that Anthropic co-founder and Chief Science Officer Jared Kaplan is joining the main stage at TechCrunch Sessions: AI on June 5 at UC Berkeley’s Zellerbach Hall. And TechCrunch Sessions: AI is right around…
