Author: TechBrunch
OpenAI has appointed executives from investment firm BlackRock to its board of directors. OpenAI announced Tuesday that Adebayo “Bayo” Ogunlesi, a managing director at BlackRock and CEO of Global Infrastructure Partners, an infrastructure investment platform, has joined OpenAI's board of directors. Brett Taylor, chairman of the OpenAI board of directors, said in a statement that Ogunlesi has an “extraordinary track record of operating globally, navigating complex and dynamic commercial environments, and driving the success of organizations.” . Mr. Ogunlesi worked for the financial services company Credit Suisse for 23 years, including as executive vice chairman of Credit Suisse's investment banking…
After testing live video features in the fall, newsletter platform Substack announced Tuesday that it will make live streaming available to all publishers. This new feature allows creators to engage with their audience and collaborate with other publishers. The introduction of live streaming shows that Substack is following in the footsteps of other platforms such as Instagram and TikTok. Given the looming ban of TikTok in the US, this addition comes at a timely time, giving creators new ways to connect with their audiences. To use the live video feature, users must have at least 10 free subscribers in the…
US TikTok users maliciously joined another Chinese social media app, RedNote (also known as Xiaohongshu), sending it to the top of the US App Store on Monday, en masse over the US government's decision to ban TikTok. He's snorting. Unfortunately, many of those who have already made the transition face issues with their accounts being suspended or banned for various reasons. Initially, RedNote seemed like a promising alternative to ByteDance's TikTok in terms of app functionality due to its focus on short-form video feeds and creator content. However, the app is not a one-to-one replacement for TikTok, but is also…
With less than a week left until his term ends, President Joe Biden is far from done making his mark on the AI industry. President Biden on Tuesday issued an executive order allowing private AI companies to lease federal land owned by the Department of Defense and Department of Energy to build AI data centers. Companies building data centers at these sites must bring enough clean energy resources online to match the power needed to power the data centers. This is not a grant program. AI companies that build data centers at these federal sites will have to pay the…
Welcome to TechCrunch FinTech! This week we cover the latest on the beleaguered fintech bench, Robinhood's $45 million settlement, some M&A deals, some great funding, and more. Get TechCrunch's roundup of the biggest and most important fintech stories delivered to your inbox every Tuesday at 8:00 AM PT. Subscribe here. big story Image credit: Getty Images After accounting startup Bench abruptly shut down on Dec. 27 and was acquired in a fire sale by Employer.com, Bench customers are now learning they can't simply walk away with their financial data. And some people are very unhappy about it. Meanwhile, Bench said,…
The tech layoff wave continued through 2024. Following significant workforce reductions in 2022 and 2023, 2024 saw more than 150,000 job cuts across 542 companies, according to independent layoffs tracker Layoffs.fyi. Large companies like Tesla, Amazon, Google, TikTok, Snap, and Microsoft conducted sizable layoffs in 2024, while smaller-sized startups also experienced cuts, and in some cases, shut down operations altogether. We’re continuing to track the industry’s layoffs into 2025 so you can see the trajectory of the cutbacks. Later this year, we will break out our 2024 and 2025 lists in order to make the trends easier to parse. By…
Paid users of OpenAI's ChatGPT can now ask their AI assistant to schedule reminders and recurring requests. A new beta feature called Tasks will begin rolling out to ChatGPT Plus, Team, and Pro users worldwide this week. Tasks allows users to set simple reminders in ChatGPT, such as “Notify me when my passport expires in 6 months,” and on any platform where Tasks is enabled, the AI assistant will follow up with a push notification. Users can now make recurring requests to ChatGPT, such as “Every Friday, tell me your weekend plans based on my location and weather forecast” or…
Meta is cutting its workforce by about 5% through performance-based layoffs, Bloomberg reported on Tuesday. CEO Mark Zuckerberg said in an internal memo to employees that the company plans to hire a new person to fill the role. “We have decided to raise the bar on performance management and fire poor performers sooner,” Zuckerberg said in the memo. “We typically spend a year removing people who don't meet expectations, but this time we plan to make broader performance-based reductions during this cycle.” Meta employed about 72,000 people as of September, so a 5% layoff would affect about 3,600 people. Affected…
Apple has joined a consortium to develop next-generation technology to link chips in AI data centers together. The consortium, the Ultra Accelerator Link Consortium, is developing a standard called UALink to connect AI accelerator chips in a growing number of server farms. As of Tuesday, Apple is a member of the consortium's board of directors, along with Alibaba and semiconductor company Synopsys. Becky Loop, Apple's director of platform architecture, said in a statement that UALink “shows great potential” in addressing connectivity challenges and creating new opportunities to expand AI capabilities and demand. “There is,” he said. “Apple has a long…
Price Iebesi, 24, already has one way out. He is selling his cryptocurrency billing company, Utopia Labs, to Coinbase for an undisclosed amount. Some founders don't just have one company. Yebesi on Monday announced the launch of Open Ledger, a new company that will integrate automated accounting software into products that businesses and small businesses already use. He has already raised $3 million in a round led by Kindred Ventures and Blank Ventures. Yebesi said he came up with Open Ledger while still serving as chief product officer at Utopia Labs. He said he noticed that the companies he worked…