Author: TechBrunch

After months of speculation, Apple Intelligence made headlines at WWDC 2024 in June. The platform was announced following a torrent of generated AI news from companies such as Google and Open AI, raising concerns that the notoriously tight-lipped tech giant had missed the latest tech boom. . But contrary to such speculation, Apple had a team working on what turned out to be a very Apple-like approach to artificial intelligence. It's still lively during demos, and Apple always loves to put on a show. But Apple Intelligence ultimately has a very pragmatic take on the category. Apple Intelligence (yes, AI…

Welcome to Startups Weekly — a weekly roundup of must-sees from the world of startups. Want it delivered to your inbox every Friday? Sign up here. This week, several startups announced new rounds without disclosing their valuations. This does not mean these were down rounds, but rather confirms that our overall focus is far from unicorns. These days, the ARR (annual recurring revenue) figure a company wants to achieve before going public can be $1 billion. This week's most interesting startup stories Image credit: Vinted IPOs are back in the news, but not everyone is lamenting their absence. Used: Vinted…

In August, the cryptocurrency news website Web3 Is Going Just Great published an article about the arrest of Roman Ziemian, founder of the cryptocurrency trading platform FutureNet, who was suspected of defrauding victims of a total of $21 million. . For news site administrator Molly White, a software engineer and one of the world's fiercest critics of the cryptocurrency industry, it was a routine post. Over the years, Mr. White has documented scams, hacks, and scams committed by influencers, cryptocurrency project founders, and Web3 companies on his website. And last week, things got a little less routine. On October 18,…

Just as Mastodon offers an open source decentralized version of X, Fediverse is getting its own TikTok competitor. This week, an app called Loops started accepting sign-ups for a new platform for sharing short, looping videos. Loops is still in its infancy, not yet open sourced, and not fully integrated with ActivityPub, the protocol that powers Mastodon, Pixelfed, PeerTube, and other federated apps. But both of these efforts are ongoing, and once completed, Loops will join the growing open social web known as the Fediverse, which currently has over 11.6 million users and over 1 million monthly active users. It…

OpenAI has disputed recent reports about its product roadmap, saying it does not intend to release its AI model, codenamed “Orion,” this year. “We have no plans to release a model codenamed Orion this year,” a spokesperson told TechCrunch via email. “We have a lot of other great technology coming out.” The Verge reported Thursday that Orion, expected to be OpenAI's next frontier model, will be available by December and trusted partners will be the first to preview it ahead of deployment through ChatGPT. According to The Verge, Microsoft, a close OpenAI collaborator and investor, expects to have access to…

We would like to thank SAP for their support. Listen to our roundtable session, “Visionary Companies Leverage Innovation to Thrive in a Fast-Paced Economy,” on Tuesday and Wednesday. TechCrunch Disrupt 2024 breakout sessions will include speakers from The Webby Awards and Silicon Zombies on panels, and we thank these companies for their support. Check the Disrupt app for details on breakout session dates and times. For even more great Disrupt content, check out the following partners who bring their wisdom to our roundtable sessions: Women's Tech Network computer science girls Bentley Aishwarya Srinivasan better technology Stroll through the Expo Hall…

In the decades since its 1958 release, Brenda Lee's rockabilly-flavored “Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree” has earned its place as a timeless holiday classic. Sixty-six years later, Spanish has been fixed thanks to “responsible” AI. Universal on Friday announced the release of “Noche Buena y Navidad,” which uses SoundLabs AI's MicDrop technology to reimagine the Spanish vocals based on the then-13-year-old Lee's original. Lee, now 79, seems to agree. “Throughout my career, I have performed and recorded many songs in different languages, but I had never recorded 'Rockin'' in Spanish, and I wanted to do that,” says the singer. “It's…

Medical and administrative staff are increasingly overwhelmed by the mountains of paperwork they must fill out every day. Dozens, if not hundreds, of startups are seeing an opportunity to reduce the burden of these bureaucratic processes with the help of generative AI. These companies are building AI medical scribes, platforms for pre-authorizing health insurance payments, and products that automatically extract medical codes from patients' electronic medical records (EMRs). But Pharos, a company in Y Combinator's Summer 2024 cohort, is applying AI to another, somewhat less obvious administrative function for hospitals: quality reporting to external clinical registries. Organizations such as the…

Alongside the iOS 18 update for consumers and developers powered by Apple Intelligence, Apple is rolling out a major update to TestFlight, its app testing platform for developers. Developers will have more control over who can participate in betas and how new features in their apps are shared with testers. You'll also be able to see metrics related to your beta's success, such as how many people viewed your invite and opted in, and why others didn't. This change will make it easier for developers to target beta versions and get more feedback before their apps' public debut on the…

It's no secret that Stripe has doubled down on its cryptocurrency offerings, enabling crypto purchases in the EU in July and announcing its Pay with Crypto feature earlier this month. This week, the fintech giant further made its dedication clear with its biggest deal to date, acquiring stablecoin platform Bridge for an eye-watering $1.1 billion. Today on TechCrunch's Equity Podcast, hosts Kirsten Kolosek, Anthony Ha, and Devin Caldwee opened the show with their thoughts on the deal. Mainly how surprising it is that people will spend over $1 billion on cryptocurrencies in 2024. But of course, there was a lot…