TechCrunch

Here are the top AI agents that can live in your text messages

We created a list of the most notable AI agents that can live in your text messages, from general assistants to agents designed for families, travel, and work....

3 days ago

Startups don’t need to go viral to win customers

At TechCrunch Disrupt last week, two founders and a VC discussed how to not just gain an early following but keep one....

4 days ago

OpenAI says it will no longer train its AI models on the live internet, citing “significant risks”

OpenAI will cut frontier models off from the internet weeks after one of its engineers said that solution wouldn't work....

4 days ago

Hottest toy for Christmas? Nvidia CEO plays with adorable Microduck robots, 20,000 sell

The robots, stomping their little feet and making tiny R2D2 noises, sat, fell down dead for a "nap," and summersaulted on voice command....

4 days ago

VCs, Superhuman Mail founder share red flags about product market fit

Top investors from Iconiq and Sapphire Ventures, along with Rahul Vohra, the founder of Superhuman Mail share the do's and don'ts for building hit products....

4 days ago

TechCrunch Founder Summit 2026 roundtables: Go deeper on the challenges founders are solving right now

TechCrunch Founder Summit 2026 is coming to SoWa Power Station in Boston on November 4, bringing founders, investors, and operators together for a full day of candid conversations, practical sessions,...

4 days ago

Carta and NewView partner, hoping to entice more startups to let employees sell shares early

A new program wants to encourage more startups to allow workers to cash out early by making it easier to transact tender offers....

4 days ago

From Toast to Bessemer: Who founders will hear from at TechCrunch Founder Summit 2026

Hosted by TechCrunch in partnership with Fidelity Private Shares, the full-day event goes beyond fundraising and AI to explore the realities of finding customers, building teams, sharpening a pitch, d...

4 days ago

Agent cloud startup Daytona hits $1B valuation backed by FirstMark and a who’s who of angels

Daytona is building a cloud for agents that's like giving every agent its own computer. It has attracted founders of Stripe, Perplextity, Datadog, Mercor and others as angels, it says....

4 days ago

Commonwealth Fusion Systems gets $85M to build better fusion-ready semiconductors

Top-funded fusion startup Commonwealth Fusion Systems received an $85 million award from the federal government to advance conductors for fusion power plants....

4 days ago

Lab testing giant Quest Diagnostics confirms patients’ personal and health data was compromised during breach

Quest is the latest in a series of healthcare technology companies that have been hacked in recent months....

4 days ago

Oura sues rival Ultrahuman again, threatening its U.S. smart ring comeback

Oura alleges in its newest lawsuit that Ultrahuman's Ring Pro infringes two of its patents....

5 days ago

Uber rival inDrive eyes 2027 robotaxi tests in Central Asia with Pony.ai and Nvidia

inDrive plans to begin testing Pony.ai's robotaxis in Kazakhstan's capital in the first half of 2027....

5 days ago

Left alone with nothing to do, AI agents started playing

MIT researchers marooned 13 AIs on a virtual island, and they responded by inventing games, mourning a lost ring and, eventually, getting better at their jobs....

5 days ago

Mark Zuckerberg’s creative plan to pay California’s proposed billionaire tax without losing control of Meta

A newly launched stock class being offered was partially engineered to help Meta founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg pay the "billionaire's tax," should the measure be voted into law....

5 days ago

Warhound raises $200M to engineer war dogs and arm them with Anduril gear

Warhound, the brainchild of Ben Lamm and Palmer Luckey, emerges from stealth to genetically engineer dogs for military and law enforcement....

5 days ago

As blockchain investing falls out of vogue, a16z Crypto rebrands as a16z Frontier

The digital asset unit, helmed by Chris Dixon, broadens its scope....

5 days ago

OpenAI working on new $30B raise at $1.25T valuation ahead of IPO

Should OpenAI command an over $1 trillion valuation with this round, it would break records as the most highly valued private company ever....

5 days ago

Rivian buys world model startup to accelerate self-driving ambitions

Terms of the deal weren’t disclosed....

5 days ago

Arc browser sunsets December 22 as The Browser Company doubles down on Dia

Arc was fiercely beloved by a dedicated group of enthusiasts, but it never quite became the mass-market Chrome alternative its makers once envisioned....

5 days ago

The secret to fast startup growth isn’t early sales, top names in tech say

At this year’s Disrupt, Lovable GTM lead Luke Arno, Polska’s Ben Broca, and Theory Ventures’ Tomasz Tunguz gave founders some tips on how to achieve true sales success in the first 90 days....

5 days ago

1Password launches a way for AI agents to log in on your behalf without seeing your password

The new feature allows agents to log into a customer's personal accounts while still protecting the private credentials that secure those accounts....

5 days ago

OpenAI makes its Jev competitor widely available as decision model competition heats up

OpenAI is launching its decision model to the world. Can it compete with the original Jev?...

5 days ago

Microsoft’s Mustafa Suleyman says its AI outperforms doctors on hard cases as he chases ‘medical superintelligence’

Microsoft’s new AI diagnostic system beat generalist doctors on hard cases, according to a study in Science. But most of the improvement seems to come from the AI models underneath, not from Microsoft...

5 days ago

Former OpenAI science lead launches Warp Science to automate wet labs with robots

Wearing cameras and sensor gloves, the startup’s human chemists will train robots to perform various lab tasks....

5 days ago

Elon Musk made a $1 billion investment in Skydance, report says

The investment will provide a much needed financial boost as the company seeks to cut costs and lift its stock price....

5 days ago

Chinese hackers spied on thousands of companies after breaching IT giant ConnectWise

Microsoft points the blame for ConnectWise's breach at a China-aligned hacker, which relied on AI agents to rapidly hack into thousands of its customers....

5 days ago

TechCrunch Disrupt 2026 Startup Battlefield 200: Celebrating outstanding achievements

Among the Startup Battlefield 200 were many industry-defining companies exhibiting and pitching on the Showcase Stage. Here are the standouts....

5 days ago

Uber puts all 30,000 employees on ChatGPT Work

The ride share giant previously deployed a much smaller pilot for ChatGPT Work, but is now taking the enterprise agent company-wide....

5 days ago

Spotify confirms Family Plan crackdown, but calls it a ‘routine improvement’

Spotify told investors its roll out of QR code verification to ensure Family Plan members live in the same household is not a "crackdown," just a routine improvement....

5 days ago

Investors break down how founders can raise a Series A today

Raising a Series A these days isn't so simple — top investors break down what founders need to know now....

5 days ago

Fusion startup Helion is developing new semiconductors that could double output of its power plants

Helion now has another $225 million to help speed development of its first fusion power plant, due to provide Microsoft with electricity in 2028....

5 days ago

Developer platform Railway urges ‘all users’ to revoke secret keys after cyberattack

The vibe-coding platform said all of its customers should revoke and rotate their private keys, after hackers were able to decrypt some customer secrets....

5 days ago

Claude Duet app is Anthropic’s bet on agents

Claude Duet is available through waitlist for Pro and Max plan users...

5 days ago

Nirva raises $33M for a pendant that only listens to you

Nirva will ship its $249 ambient AI pendant by the end of the year....

5 days ago

DeepSeek reportedly raises $15B days after US restrictions

DeepSeek has reportedly raised $15 billion in one of China's largest funding rounds, just days after the US ordered federal agencies to remove its technology over national security concerns....

5 days ago

Tesla says it will start selling Cybercabs by end of year

Tesla said Wednesday it will start selling its Cybercab to customers by the end of the year, even as federal regulators investigate whether the vehicle meets vehicle safety standards. The gold-hued, a...

6 days ago

Blackstone’s Jas Khaira says fears over AI-buildout debt are overblown

Blackstone’s AI head on why the PE giant isn't panicked by market jitters....

6 days ago

Meta wants to pay for its broad AI buildout with a newly created class of stock

The social media giant is planning a new stock strategy to help power its broad investments in AI models and services....

6 days ago

Airbnb limits chores for guests, sparking backlash from hosts

Hosts are threatening to leave the platform after Airbnb says that they can no longer require guests to strip beds or do other time-consuming cleaning chores....

6 days ago

TechCrunch Founder Summit 2026: Everything you need to know

TechCrunch Founder Summit is a full-day gathering in Boston on November 4 where founders across all stages connect with top VCs and experienced entrepreneurs to gain tactical insights on building and ...

6 days ago

Meta says Muse has over 10M users, with shopping a top activity

Meta Muse users are adopting the app for shopping and personal productivity, the company said during Q3 earnings. The AI app now has over 10M users....

6 days ago

Year-old AI lab Flapping Airplanes raises $1B at a $6B valuation

Just 9 months after raising an $180 million seed round, Flapping Airplanes has landed $1 billion Series A for its mission to build AI models "without ingesting half the internet."...

6 days ago

Tesla stars Optimus robot production in California as profit falls 43%

Tesla's revenue was flat and its expenses skyrocketed as it pressed the accelerator on its Optimus robots, AI, and autonomous driving....

6 days ago

Recursive launches Flint, a laptop coding model it says was largely built by AI

Startup Recursive has released Flint, a free, laptop-sized coding model built largely by its own AI research system, as an early test of AI that improves itself....

6 days ago

Automattic begins layoffs following board upheaval and executive departures

Automattic has begun laying off employees across multiple teams, including WordPress.com and its enterprise business, following a board shakeup and a series of executive departures. Sources say more c...

6 days ago

GM is betting compute and AI will help it compete with Chinese automakers

To compete with Tesla, Rivian, and a host of Chinese automakers, GM’s fourth-gen EV platform will roll out a new central computer and electrical architecture that will debut in 2028 in the Cadillac Es...

6 days ago