Meta Connect 2025 — the company’s biggest conference of the year where it unveils smart glasses and VR headsets — kicks off on Wednesday night. We’re expecting the star of Meta Connect 2025 to be the company’s new AI-powered smart glasses with Ray-Ban and Oakley, but the company may have some other surprises in store…
Amazon made same-day delivery the benchmark on Earth. Impulse Space is pitching a similar concept for satellites bound for geostationary orbit about 22,000 miles above Earth, compressing what is typically a months-long transit into a matter of hours. In the span of a week, the in-space propulsion startup announced a trio of deals aiming to…
The Altman brothers sure have a knack for being venture capitalists. On Tuesday, this especially applied to Jack Altman, co-founder of $3 billion-valuation HR software startup Lattice and brother to OpenAI CEO Sam Altman. Jack Altman just announced a second $275 million fund for his solo-run firm Alt Capital. And from start to finish, it took him…
Humanoid robotics company Figure raised its largest round of funding yet, a sign of growing investor interest in robots designed to work alongside humans in warehouses, factories, and other settings. San Jose, California-based Figure announced on Tuesday that it raised a Series C funding round that values the company at $39 billion. The round, which…
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has opened an investigation into claims that Tesla’s door handles become inoperable in certain situations on Model Y SUVs. The safety agency’s Office of Defects Investigation (ODI) revealed the probe on Tuesday, after having received nine reports from owners who were unable to get into their cars. ODI writes…
Video generation and editing platform D-ID said Tuesday that it has acquired Berlin-based B2B video creation platform Simpleshow. The companies didn’t disclose financial terms of the deal. Simpleshow’s product will operate under D-ID’s umbrella, and eventually the two platforms will merge, D-ID chief executive Gil Perry told TechCrunch. Simpleshow, founded in 2008, has raised over…
While many robotics companies are building human-sized robots, or working to automate entire factories, MicroFactory is instead trying to think big by building small. San Francisco-based MicroFactory built a general-purpose, tabletop manufacturing kit that’s about the size of my Siberian Husky’s dog crate. This compact factory includes two robotic arms and can be trained by…
Y Combinator-alum Rulebase is betting that the next wave of automation in financial services won’t be about flashy AI interfaces, but the unglamorous back-office tasks like compliance. The startup, founded by Gideon Ebose and Chidi Williams, two Nigerian engineers who met in London, just raised a $2.1 million pre-seed round led by Bowery Capital, with…
Amazon is continuing its annual tradition of hosting a second Prime event of the year, called Prime Big Deals Day, in October. Following the pattern established in recent years, the company announced the event will take place on October 7-8, with sales starting at 12:01 AM PT on October 7. Amazon is betting that shoppers…
PayPal is introducing a new way for people to send money to one another through peer-to-peer (p2p) payments made via personalized, one-time links. The system, called PayPal Links, complements the company’s existing feature called PayPal Me, which will continue to exist as a way to share your profile information and make it easier to get…
