Humanoid robotics company Agility Robotics announced plans to go public through a merger with a special purpose acquisition company (SPAC), Churchill Capital Corp XI. The deal values the company at approximately $2.5 billion and is expected to provide capital to expand production of its Digit robot.
At its Config conference, design platform Figma announced major updates, including AI-powered tools for generating motion graphics and shader effects from text prompts. The company also introduced a reimagined canvas that integrates coding layers, allowing for a more seamless workflow between design and development.
TechCrunch is promoting its Founder Summit 2026, an event for founders and investors scheduled for November 4 in Boston. The organization has been announcing early-bird discount deadlines, which offer savings of up to $190 and end on June 26.
OpenAI announced it has begun testing its first in-house AI processor, named 'Jalapeño,' developed in collaboration with Broadcom. The custom chip is optimized for large language model inference and is expected to be deployed for commercial use by the end of 2026.
OpenAI has released a more capable version of its cybersecurity model, GPT-5.5-Cyber, designed for advanced security work. Alongside the model update, the company announced initiatives like the "Patch the Planet" program in partnership with Trail of Bits to help find and fix vulnerabilities in open-source software.
Meta has invested $900 million for a 20% stake in Indian fintech company Cred and has appointed its founder, Kunal Shah, as the new head of WhatsApp. Shah will replace outgoing leader Will Cathcart, with Meta aiming to leverage his expertise to advance WhatsApp's monetization and commerce goals.
The U.S. government, citing national security concerns, has ordered AI company Anthropic to restrict access for foreign nationals to its newest models, Fable 5 and Mythos 5. The move, which led Anthropic to suspend all user access, sparked debate over AI export controls and prompted a lawsuit from AI startup Legion.
Following its recent IPO, SpaceX is planning to raise at least $20 billion through its first sale of investment-grade bonds. The company intends to use the funds to refinance a bridge loan and for general corporate purposes, including financing its expansion into artificial intelligence.
Oracle has reduced its global workforce by 21,000 employees, or about 13%, over the past year. In regulatory filings and statements, the company attributed the job cuts to its adoption and deployment of artificial intelligence technologies.
Anthropic's AI chatbot, Claude, experienced an outage causing elevated error rates across multiple models. The company reported that it had identified the issue and was implementing a fix.
Meta has launched its own brand of smart glasses, moving away from its Ray-Ban partnership for its lower-priced models. The new "Adventurer" and "Fury" models are priced at $299 and feature the same hardware as the more expensive Ray-Ban Meta Gen 2 glasses.
SpaceX has signed a multi-year deal to lease AI compute capacity to open-source startup Reflection AI. Reflection will pay SpaceX $150 million per month through 2029 for access to Nvidia chips at SpaceX's Colossus 2 data center in Memphis, with the deal's total value reaching approximately $6.3 billion.
AI lab Midjourney, known for its image generator, has announced a new venture into medical imaging with an ultrasound-based, full-body scanner. The company aims to make internal body imaging routine and consumer-friendly, though medical experts have expressed skepticism about the project's claims.
AI chipmaker Groq has confirmed a $650 million funding round. The new capital comes after Nvidia licensed Groq's IP and hired key personnel, prompting Groq to pivot its focus to its AI inference cloud service.
The AI email client Superhuman has announced its acquisition of GPTZero, a startup known for its AI content detection tool. GPTZero, founded by Princeton graduate Edward Tian, will be integrated into Superhuman's AI assistant to enhance its authenticity tools.
A new initiative called the 'Human Consent Registry' has been launched by Cate Blanchett's nonprofit RSL Media. The platform, backed by celebrities including George Clooney, Tom Hanks, and Meryl Streep, allows individuals to set terms for how AI systems can use their name, image, and voice.
Anthropic has launched "Claude Tag," an AI agent designed to be an "always-on" teammate within Slack channels. The feature, available for Claude Enterprise and Team customers, can be tagged into conversations to learn context, perform tasks, and proactively provide updates.
The U.S. government has directed AI company Anthropic to disable its latest models, Fable 5 and Mythos 5, citing national security concerns. The directive, which restricts access for foreign nationals, followed reports that the models' safeguards could be bypassed, sparking a debate on AI regulation and export controls.
Richard Liu, the founder of Chinese e-commerce giant JD.com, announced a plan to retrain the company's 700,000 delivery workers for new office-based roles. The move comes as Liu predicts that robots will eventually replace the human courier workforce, with the retraining program focusing on skills like robot maintenance and AI training.
Meta has paused its AI training program, known as the Model Capability Initiative (MCI), after an internal leak revealed that sensitive employee data, including private conversations and performance details, was widely accessible within the company. The company is now investigating the incident to determine if any data was improperly accessed.