Author: TechBrunch
Investor interest in AI coding assistants is exploding. Anysphere, developer of AI-powered coding assistant cursors, is in talks with venture capitalists to raise capital at a valuation of nearly $10 billion, Bloomberg reported. If a round occurs, it will take place roughly three months after Anysphere completed its previous $100 million donation at $2.5 billion, as first reported by TechCrunch. The new round is expected to be led by returning investors' thriving capital. Thrive Capital and Anysphere did not respond immediately to requests for comment. While Anysphere's previous round valued the company at 25 times the New York Times, it…
TechCrunch is on the ground at SXSW 2025, the annual technology, music, comedy and film conference launched in Austin on Friday in pursuit of this AI-centric era. Yes, we're one sentence and the AI is already in the entrance. And why? A quick scan of the large SXSW schedule shows that the AI is at Austin's center stage. It is worth noting that this year there appears to be a focus on how AI is applied to the real world. SXSW tends to reflect what the tech ecosystem of founders and supporters is working on. And it often coincides with…
According to a report by the New York Times, Discord has a chat app with over 200 million users each month that offers IPOs and early stage talks. According to NYT sources, discussions with Discord's investment bankers are still exploratory and could change plans. Discord understands there is a lot of interest in the plan, but has not commented on rumors or speculation, a spokesman told TechCrunch. This is not the first time I have thought about an IPO. The San Francisco-based startup thought it was independently public, leaving Microsoft's $10 billion purchase in 2021. Discord was valued at $14.7…
Twitter alternatives – New and oldest have discovered viewers who are willing to try out new social networks since Elon Musk took over the company in 2022. Mastodon, Blueski, Spill and T2 are some of the social media platforms people are among them. The same goes for Meta's threading platform. What is a thread? How do you create an account? The thread is Meta's text-based Twitter rival. Because it is tied to an Instagram account, you can create an account by logging in using your Instagram credentials. How is it different from Twitter? Currently, there are no paid classes or…
Meta's thread has begun testing a new feature that will allow people to add interest to their profiles on social networks. Instead of profiling topics like topics you might post with only ads to profile visitors, the new interest feature will direct users to active conversations about the topic. The company believes this will help users find discussions to join with their platform X rivals without knowing which people to follow on specific topics like technology or sports. This feature can also make threads more appealing for newcomers who want to quickly connect with others who discuss their favorite subjects.…
Just a few weeks after Google said it would review its diversity, equity and comprehensive program, the Startup Founders Fund webpage is packed with changes. Most notably, Google uses past tenses to describe all fund programs for underrated founders. According to the Internet Archives, this is a change made since December. The site also states that there are currently zero fund programs available. Google's Startup Founders Fund was launched in 2020 and provided currency grants, mentorship and product support with underrated founders, including women and people of African and Latinx descent. The site says it provides over $50 million in…
June 5th, TechCrunch Sessions: AI kicks off. And you can be part of the industry-changing conversations that take place. Members of the AI community have open invitations to lead breakout sessions and discussions with more than 1,200 startup founders, VC leaders, and AI enthusiasts taking part in the latest event at Zellabach Hall in Berkeley, California. There's only one catch. By midnight on March 7th, we will need to apply to be considered a speaker, so we head here to do so. You only have 4 days left to get your application before our team before we choose! As the…
Welcome to Startups Weekly – Summary every week everything you need to miss from the startup world. Want to put it in your inbox every Friday? Sign up here. That's exactly the problem: the problem. But in many cases, they are also feed. This week has brought a mixture of startups facing adversity, sometimes things they do, and other people who are thriving. The most interesting startup story of the week Image credits: Lamp/co-founders Karim Atiyeh, Eric Glyman, and Gene Lee Some startups have earned revenue and contracts. Others filed lawsuits. Ramp Up: Fintech Start Up Lamp has more than…
The U.S. Department of Justice on Friday announced criminal charges against the administrators of Russian cryptocurrency exchange Garantex, promoting money laundering by criminals and terrorist organisations, allegedly violating US sanctions. The two managers are Alexedz Beshkov, 46, a Lithuanian national and resident of Russia, and Alexander Mira Serda, 40, a Russian national living in the United Arab Emirates. The DOJ said Garantex “received hundreds of millions of criminal revenues and was used to promote a variety of crimes, including hacking, ransomware, terrorism, drug trafficking, and processed at least $96 billion in cryptocurrency transactions since 2019. In the indictment, prosecutors accused…
California's most controversial AI safety bill of 2024 may be dead, but its author has not retreated. State Sen. Scott Winner is back with SB 53, the new AI bill that takes away the most controversial portion of last year's failed legislation, while maintaining a major whistleblower protection and a public cloud computing initiative called CalCompute. Will the bill gain some traction as the AI industry and even the federal government support innovation away from AI safety regulations? Today, TechCrunch's equity podcast is hosted by Kirsten Korosec, Max Zeff and Anthony HA, unpacking the latest AI regulation moves alongside Tech…