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DOGE axes CISA ‘red team’ staffers amid ongoing federal cuts
Affected staff say more than 100 employees working to protect U.S. government networks were ‘axed’ with no prior warning © 2024 TechCrunch. All rights reserved. For personal use only.
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Podcast app Pocket Casts makes its web player free
Pocket Casts, the podcast app acquired by Automattic in 2021, is now making its web player free. The company says the move offers an alternative to the big platforms’ closed ecosystems, where algorithmic-driven content is prioritized and podcasts are kept behind paywalls. Podcasts were built on open technology — the open, decentralized standard RSS, which…
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Flower Labs launches a new service that automatically switches from local to cloud AI
Flower Labs, a Y Combinator-backed startup, on Tuesday launched a preview of its distributed cloud platform for serving AI models, called Flower Intelligence. Mozilla is already using it to power the upcoming Assist summarization add-on for its Thunderbird email client. What makes Flower Intelligence unique, Flower Labs said in a post on X, is that…
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Yet another AI robotics firm lands major funding, as Dexterity closes latest round
The intersection of robotics and AI continues to attract attention from investors and Big Tech alike. The latest indicator? Dexterity, a startup specializing in industrial robots with “human-like” finesse, has raised $95 million at a post-money valuation of $1.65 billion, per Bloomberg. The investment, which includes backing from Lightspeed Venture Partners and Sumitomo Corp., highlights…
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Geothermal could power nearly all new data centers through 2030
Geothermal resources have enormous potential to provide the sort of consistent power that data centers crave. © 2024 TechCrunch. All rights reserved. For personal use only.
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OpenAI launches new tools to help businesses build AI agents
On Tuesday, OpenAI released new tools designed to help developers and enterprises build AI agents – automated systems that can independently accomplish tasks – using the company’s own AI models and frameworks. The tools are part of OpenAI’s new Responses API, which lets businesses develop custom AI agents that can perform web searches, scan through…
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Mark Cuban says AI is ‘never the answer,’ it’s a ‘tool’
Speaking at the SXSW conference in Austin, tech investor and entrepreneur Mark Cuban shared his thoughts on how AI technology can help small businesses outperform their competition. In short, he told the crowd that AI was not the answer, in and of itself; it’s meant to serve as an aid that can help entrepreneurs by…
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Hugging Face expands its LeRobot platform with training data for self-driving machines
Last year, Hugging Face, the AI dev platform, launched LeRobot, a collection of open AI models, data sets, and tools to help build real-world robotics systems. On Tuesday, Hugging Face teamed up with AI startup Yaak to expand LeRobot with a training set for robots and cars that can navigate environments, like city streets, autonomously.…
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Waymo expands its robotaxi service across Silicon Valley
Waymo will start offering robotaxi rides to people in its “Waymo One” early rider program in Mountain View, Los Altos, Palo Alto, and “parts of Sunnyvale” starting Wednesday, an expansion that will bring its footprint in Silicon Valley to 27 square miles. The Waymo vehicles will be available around-the-clock, and the new territories add to…
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Virtual physical therapists Hinge Health files for IPO, estimated to raise $500M
Hinge Health, a 10-year-old company that offers a digital solution to treat chronic musculoskeletal (MSK) conditions, filed to go public. Although Hinge has not yet announced how many shares, nor priced them, the IPO specialists at Renaissance Capital estimate the company hopes to raise up to $500 million in its offering. Hinge’s revenue in 2024…