Author: TechBrunch
You can make it look like you're on a Zoom call in the office, even when you're sipping margaritas in a faraway hammock. The proposition, courtesy of a months-old startup called Pickle, is simple. Simply submit a 5-minute training video of yourself to create an avatar and have it ready within 24 hours. Want to call a colleague from your car? No problem. Tired of getting out of bed? no problem. At a beach club? You're probably pushing it, but judging by the demo video, it's also ideal if no one on the call is paying “you” their undivided attention.…
Tesla and Rivian may have settled a lawsuit in which Tesla accused Rivian of poaching employees and stealing trade secrets. Tesla told a California judge that the two companies have reached a “conditional” settlement and plans to seek dismissal of the lawsuit by Dec. 24, Bloomberg reported. Tesla filed the lawsuit in 2020, and the trial was scheduled to begin in March. The EV maker claimed it had discovered an “alarming pattern” of Rivian recruiting Tesla employees and encouraging them to carry sensitive information while on the job. left. In response, Rivian filed a motion to dismiss the lawsuit, calling…
After more than two years of evading arrest following a hack that targeted some of the world's largest technology companies, U.S. authorities have finally announced that they have arrested at least some of the responsible hackers. In August 2022, security researchers issued a warning that a group of hackers targeted more than 130 organizations and stole the credentials of approximately 10,000 employees as part of a sophisticated phishing campaign. The hackers specifically targeted businesses using Okta, a single sign-on provider used by thousands of businesses around the world to allow employees to log in from home. Due to its focus…
The European Union looks to have clinched political agreement on the team of 26 commissioners who will be implementing President Ursula von der Leyen’s policy plan for the next five years. A final vote is still pending next week, but on Thursday, Politico’s Brussels Playbook newsletter reported a deal in the European Parliament on the appointments, suggesting it’s “now all but guaranteed” that the next European Commission will kick off on December 1. We’ve picked out three commissioner-designates to watch for tech policy moves as the next Commission takes up its five-year mandate, which runs into 2029, with responsibilities across…
Lawyers for the New York Times and Daily News, who are suing OpenAI for allegedly scraping their work without permission to train AI models, say OpenAI engineers accidentally deleted data that could be relevant to the lawsuit. states that it did. Earlier this fall, OpenAI agreed to provide two virtual machines to lawyers at The Times and Daily News to help them run searches for copyrighted content in the AI training set. (A virtual machine is a software-based computer that resides within another computer's operating system and is often used for purposes such as testing, backing up data, and running…
Sequoia says there is no problem even if there is no exit. The Silicon Valley venture giant increased the value of its 2020 Sequoia Capital US Venture That's what it means. California donations. Sequoia's rise is notable because the fund has yet to make an exit. This is also a positive change for the 2020 fund vintage, given the fact that after the frothy valuations of 2020 and 2021, funds are not expected to perform well for any VC that year. This discrepancy is probably due to the impact that high valuations due to AI have on ventures. The sense…
Illumen Capital is increasing its support for fund managers and founders from underrepresented communities. As an impact fund of funds, the company has previously supported ways to address racial bias in investing. Yesterday, the firm founded by Darrin Dodson announced it had raised a $32.75 million Catalyst Fund to once again support emerging fund managers and founders, particularly those from underrepresented backgrounds. did. This news comes at a difficult time for many diverse funding managers and founders, with less financial support than ever before. Black founders raised less than 1% of venture capital funding last year, according to Crunchbase, and…
Michael Gilroy, former head of fintech investments at Coatue, and Gokul Rajaram, a longtime technology executive and prolific angel investor, are forming an as-yet-unnamed venture. Bloomberg reported that the fund will be launched early next year, with plans to begin fundraising for a debut of $400 million to $500 million. The firm invests in early-stage fintech and software startups based in the United States. While at Coatue, Gilroy invested in fintech companies including Arta Finance, Melio Solution, Pinwheel, and Mercury. Prior to joining the hedge fund in 2019, he was a partner at Canaan for over five years. According to…
ChatGPT, OpenAI’s text-generating AI chatbot, has taken the world by storm since its launch in November 2022. What started as a tool to hyper-charge productivity through writing essays and code with short text prompts has evolved into a behemoth used by more than 92% of Fortune 500 companies. That growth has propelled OpenAI itself into becoming one of the most-hyped companies in recent memory. And its latest partnership with Apple for its upcoming generative AI offering, Apple Intelligence, has given the company another significant bump in the AI race. 2024 also saw the release of GPT-4o, OpenAI’s new flagship omni…
OpenAI funds academic research into algorithms that can predict human moral judgment. OpenAI Inc., the nonprofit organization behind OpenAI, disclosed in an IRS filing that it awarded a grant to researchers at Duke University for a project titled “Research AI Morality.” Asked for comment, an OpenAI spokesperson said the award is part of a larger three-year, $1 million grant to Duke University professors researching “creating moral AI.” He pointed to a press release indicating that. Little has been made public about this “morality” research funded by OpenAI, other than the fact that the grant ends in 2025. The study's principal…