Startups Weekly: Big changes for AI heavyweights

Welcome to Startups Weekly — your weekly summary of everything you can’t miss in the world of startups. Register here to receive it in your inbox every Friday.

Not much news from me this week, but I’ve been doing a lot of prep for TechCrunch Early Stage taking place in Boston on April 25th. It will be a fantastic show and You still have time to get tickets at early bird pricesif you are fast.

The most interesting startup stories of the week

Stability AI says goodbye to its founder and CEO, Emad Mostaque, who decided to pursue the dream of decentralized AI, leaving the unicorn startup without a permanent CEO. The company, known for burning through cash faster than a teenager with his first debit card, is now in the hands of interim co-CEOs Shan Shan Wong and Christian Laforte. Mostaque, in a dramatic outing, turned to X to proclaim that his departure was about Fighting the bogeyman of “centralized AI” because, apparently, the real problem in AI is not rogue robots but who can control them.

Microsoft has orchestrated a heist worthy of a Hollywood plot, ensnaring the co-founders and much of the staff of Inflection AI, along with the rights to use its technology, for a whopping 650 million dollars. The deal, which seems to me more like a ransom payment than an M&A initiative, includes $620 million for the privilege of using Inflection’s technology and an additional $30 million to ensure that Inflection does not sue for Microsoft’s bold talent grab. Microsoft board member and Inflection co-founder Reid Hoffman took to LinkedIn to assure everyone that Inflection investors would sleep well tonight, with early backers seeing a 1.5x return and later backers a modest 1.1 times, even though the math doesn’t quite add up. By the way, it is quite bold to describe a 1.5x performance as a “nice advantage”. most early stage funds would be pretty upset.

• They said your data would be safe: Facebook (now Meta) was caught red handed with your digital hands in the Snapchat cookie jar. Facebook’s undercover operation, dubbed “Project Ghostbusters,” aimed to spy on Snapchat’s encrypted traffic, seeking to decode user behavior and gain a competitive advantage.
• The new Robinhood credit card: Robin Hood presented his Gold Card, a credit card so packed with features it might make Apple Card users pause for a second. For the low price of being a Robinhood Gold member (because who doesn’t want to pay $5 a month for the privilege of spending more money?), you can also earn 3% to 5% cash back on everything.
• Could Nvidia be the next AWS?: Nvidia and Amazon Web Services (AWS) might just be the accidental heroes of the tech world, stumbling upon their core businesses like a little kid finding a bunch of hidden cookies. AWS found it could sell its internal compute and storage services, while Nvidia found its Gaming GPUs were unexpectedly perfect for AI workloads.

Trend of the week: transportation problems

The New York Stock Exchange has given Fisker EV Startup Startup, citing its “abnormally low” stock prices. It appears that Fisker’s financial runway is more of a tightrope, with the stock falling more than 28% in a single day, a Failed deal with Nissan (or so the rumor suggests), and a triggered payment clause in their loans that they can’t pay, painting a picture of a company teetering on the edge of a precipice. Of course, it wouldn’t have helped if the electric vehicle maker I lost track of millions of dollars in customer payments..

• Can Arrival’s remains save Canoo?: the broken Arrival sells her leftovers to Canooanother EV wannabe teetering on the edge of viability, in a deal that has less to do with innovation and more to do with Canoo desperately trying to cobble together a production line from Arrival’s garage sale offerings.
• Sowwy, friends: Steve Burns, the ousted founder, chairman and CEO of bankrupt electric vehicle startup Lordstown Motors, has reached a settlement with the US Securities and Exchange Commission. for misleading investors about demand for the company’s flagship all-electric Endurance pickup truck.
• Let the car drive itself for a month: Tesla is about to start offering every US customer a One-month trial of its $12,000 driver assistance systemwhich it calls Full Self-Driving Beta, as long as they have a car with compatible hardware.

This week’s most interesting fundraisers

Super{set} is doubling down on boring but rich data and AI-powered startups, having added a cool $90 million to its war chest. This move comes on the heels of his $200 million exit from marketing firm Habu to LiveRamp. The company is not your average risk studio. With a small portfolio of 16 companies and a penchant for turning venture capital investment memos from art to science, super{set} is on a mission to design practical applications. With their new digs on an entire floor of San Francisco’s 140 New Montgomery building, they’re not just investing in startups; They are buying the future of the city itself.

Tired of cramped hotel rooms and IKEA-averse owners, Alex Chatzielefttheriou decided to fill the void himself. As we move through the pandemic-induced nomadic work boom, Blueground is now gobbling up the competition faster than a tourist with a free breakfast buffet. With the acquisition of companies such as Tabas and Travelers Haven, Blueground has expanded its empire to include more than 15,000 apartments in 17 countries, proving that there is no better place than a house that you can reserve for a month. Even though the proptech sector feels pressure from rising interest rates, Blueground’s recent $45 million Series D funding round and a large line of credit suggest that investors are still willing to bet big on Chatzielefttheriou’s vision of a world where everyone can live in a fully furnished apartment, at least temporarily.

• 10 million dollars for the microbe party: Wase has designed a compact system that treats dirty byproducts from breweries and food processors on site and converts them into biogas. This isn’t your grandmother’s anaerobic digester; It’s a microbial party, complete with electrically charged fins for the bacteria to have fun, producing about 30% more methane and leaving less residual waste.
• More money for diversity: New Summit Investments is on the verge of a significant leap in its impact investing journey. aims for $100 million target for latest fundeclipsing its previous fund of $40 million closed in 2022.
• New battery chemistry: In their bid to squeeze more capacity out of electric vehicle batteries, automakers are increasingly turning to silicon. Ionobell, an early-stage startup, which recently closed a $3.9 million extension roundclaims that its silicon material will be cheaper than established competition.

Other must-see stories from TechCrunch…

Every week, there are always a few stories I want to share with you that somehow don’t fit into the categories above. It would be a shame if you missed out, so here’s a random bag of goodies for you:

• Umm, what?: Marissa Mayer’s startup Sunshine went from being Silicon Valley’s next big thing to a pioneer in the innovative world of… manage contacts and share photosleaving the internet collectively scratching its head and wondering, “Is that it?”
• Friend, where is your data?: Three years after a hacker’s “coming soon” teaser, the personal data of 73 million AT&T customers hit the Internet and while AT&T plays the silent gamecustomers must verify their own data breaches as if it were a dystopian DIY project.
• Come on, apple: In a move that has less to do with innovation and more to do with a gatekeeper role, Apple’s dismantling of Beeper’s quest to bring iMessage to Android users is now possible. a Justice Department exposé on how to stifle competition and keep the blue bubble club exclusive.
• Who needs privacy anyway? Glassdoor, the haven of anonymous business reviews, appears to have become a privacy nightmare by Sneakingly add users’ real names to their profiles.making “anonymous” the most ironic word in his dictionary.
• Welcome to Spotify University: Spotify, not content with dominating your music, podcasts and audiobooks, is now observing your brain cells with your latest adventure in e-learningbecause apparently, we all need another reason to never leave the Spotify ecosystem.