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Nothing launched Essential Voice AI dictation for smartphones with support for over 100 languages
Nothing released Essential Voice — a built-in AI dictation that converts speech to clean text, removes filler words, and translates input ac

DeepSeek unveiled new AI models and claimed to have nearly closed the gap with market leaders
DeepSeek presented preliminary versions of two new AI models, claiming better efficiency, improved performance relative to V3.2, and a nearl

Skye from Signull Labs raised $3.58M before AI home screen launch for iPhone
Signull Labs hasn't launched Skye yet, but has already raised $3.58M: the app promises to turn an iPhone home screen into a proactive AI int

OpenAI develops smartphone where AI agents will replace traditional apps
According to analysts, OpenAI is creating a next-generation smartphone where AI agents will completely replace traditional applications — ma

China blocks Meta's $2 billion acquisition of AI startup Manus after months-long investigation
Chinese regulators have ordered Meta to terminate its deal to acquire AI-agent startup Manus for approximately $2 billion—a blow to Zuckerbe

Meta acquires Moltbook: a bet on the agentic internet and the future of advertising with AI
The acquisition of Moltbook seems unexpected, but it signals Meta’s strategy for the era of the agentic internet, where AI agents become the

Netflix could pay $600 million for Ben Affleck's AI startup — one of Netflix's biggest deals
Netflix is in talks to buy Ben Affleck's AI startup for about $600 million — potentially the largest acquisition in Netflix's history.

Zendesk acquires Forethought, a pioneer in agentic customer service
Zendesk is acquiring Forethought, the TechCrunch Battlefield 2018-winning startup specializing in AI agents for customer support.

Ford launched an AI assistant for fleets — it monitors drivers' seat belt use
Ford Pro AI debuted at Work Truck Week and is available to Ford Pro Telematics subscribers: the system signals in real time whether the driv

Google taught AI to predict floods using old newspaper reports
Google found an original way to solve the shortage of flood data: an LLM converts archival news texts into numerical indicators to train a f

Google Maps gets AI feature Ask Maps and updated Immersive Navigation
Google calls the launch of Immersive Navigation the biggest Maps update in a decade — alongside the AI assistant Ask Maps for conversational

Gumloop raises $50M from Benchmark so every employee can build AI agents
Venture capital firm Benchmark invested $50 million in Gumloop, a no-code platform for building AI agents that any employee can use.

Grammarly turned writers into “AI editors” without consent — class action filed
Journalist Julia Angwin is leading a class action against Grammarly: the service is accused of using writers’ texts to train AI without noti

Atlassian cut 1,600 employees to invest in artificial intelligence
The company behind Jira and Confluence laid off 10% of its staff — about 1,600 people — redirecting the savings to AI feature development.

Tinder Reboots: Offline Events, Virtual Speed Dating, and AI for Matchmaking
Tinder unveiled a major redesign: live events, virtual speed dating, and AI features — an attempt to win back Gen Z, disillusioned with onli

Meta AI in Facebook Marketplace now automatically replies to buyers on behalf of sellers
Facebook Marketplace lets sellers use Meta AI to automatically draft replies to buyers based on information from the product listing.

Bumble launched AI assistant Bee for matching based on goals and compatibility
Bumble unveiled Bee, an AI assistant that changes the dating format: instead of swipes, it matches partners based on goals and compatibility

AI startup Rox valued at $1.2 billion: a new competitor in the CRM market
Rox AI, a startup founded by former New Relic chief growth officer, has been valued at $1.2 billion, offering an AI-native replacement for C

Peacock bets on AI video, mobile sports and games to grow streaming
NBCUniversal's streaming service Peacock is expanding into AI video, vertical clips and mobile games in an attempt to find growth without jo

Google bought Wiz for $32 billion — the largest venture-backed acquisition in history
Google has closed its purchase of cybersecurity startup Wiz for a record $32 billion — after a rejection a year ago, antitrust reviews, and

xAI starts from scratch again: Musk builds an AI coding tool with a team from Cursor
The xAI lab admitted that its first approach to building an AI coding tool failed and is starting over — with two senior executives poached

TechCrunch: the biggest AI events of 2026 — deals, protests, and high-stakes negotiations
TechCrunch took stock of the first months of 2026: major acquisitions, successes by independent developers, public protest, and negotiations

Nyne raises $5.3 million to give AI agents personal user context
Father-and-son startup Nyne has closed a $5.3 million seed round from Wischoff Ventures and South Park Commons to build personal context inf

Meta considers laying off 20% of staff to fund AI infrastructure
Mark Zuckerberg's company could lay off one in five employees, with the savings directed toward aggressive investment in AI infrastructure a

Lawyer in AI psychosis cases: chatbots are now linked to mass-casualty risk
A lawyer handling AI psychosis lawsuits warns that chatbots are already appearing in cases involving mass-casualty threats, while the techno

Google and Accel selected 5 Indian startups from 4,000 applications — and none was an AI wrapper
Google and Accel reviewed more than 4,000 applications for the Atoms accelerator and found that 70% of applicants were building wrapper prod

Jensen Huang at GTC 2026: Nvidia sets the course for the future of AI and computing
Nvidia is holding its flagship GTC 2026 conference — Jensen Huang's keynote will define the company's AI and computing strategy for the comi

Merriam-Webster and Encyclopedia Britannica Sue OpenAI Over 100,000 Articles
Encyclopedia Britannica and Merriam-Webster accuse OpenAI of unlawfully using nearly 100,000 copyrighted articles to train language models —

Fuse raised $25 million to displace legacy systems in U.S. credit unions
Startup Fuse built an AI-native platform for U.S. credit unions and announced a $5 million rescue fund that covers penalties for early termi

Nvidia DLSS 5 uses generative AI for photorealism in games and beyond
Nvidia’s fifth-generation DLSS creates pixels from scratch using generative AI and structured scene data — Jensen Huang already sees applica