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If you’ve been following this newsletter, you may have noticed that I’m a little curious about ai, especially generative ai. I’m probably not the first person to make this observation, but AIs are extremely average. I guess that’s their goal: train them in all the knowledge and mediocrity will rise to the surface.
The trick is to only use ai tools for things that you yourself are not very good at. If you are a skilled artist or writer, you will be disappointed. The truth, however, is that most people are not great writers, so ChatGPT and its siblings will be a huge benefit to white-collar workers everywhere. Well, until we collectively discover that a house cleaner has greater job security than an office manager or at least a secretary.
On that cheerful note, let’s poke around the startup bushes and see what tasty morsels we can find in the depths of last week’s TechCrunch archive. . . .
Okay, okay, let’s start with the ai.
Image credits: Kirillm (Opens in a new window) / Fake images
I know, this happens every damn week: I start with the intention of writing this newsletter without getting up to my eyelashes in the ai swamp, and every week, you all continue reading our ai news as if your livelihood depends on it. Because, well, that’s very possible, I guess.
The GPT Store, brought to you by OpenAI, allows developers to create custom conversational ai models based on GPT and sell them in a new market. This initiative is designed to expand the accessibility and commercial use of ai, similar to how app stores revolutionized software distribution. Developers can not only build but also monetize their ai creations, opening a new avenue for innovation and entrepreneurship in the field of artificial intelligence. Of course, that small update, and the platform now being able to read PDFs and websites natively, is a substantial threat to startups that had previously filled this gap in ChatGPT’s offerings, especially those whose business models are based on these characteristics. It’s a reminder that building a business around another company’s API without a sustainable, independent product is, perhaps, not the most astute business move.
Of course, ai isn’t just for startups. During Apple’s fourth-quarter earnings conference call, the company’s CEO Tim Cook emphasized that ai is a critical technology and highlighted recent ai-powered features such as Personal Voice and Live Voicemail in iOS 17. He also confirmed that Apple continues to develop generative ai technologies, tellingly. , without revealing details.
Heinlein would be horrified: Elon Musk announced that Twitter Premium Plus subscribers will soon have early access to xAI’s new ai system, Grok, once it comes out of early beta, positioning the chatbot as a benefit to the $16 ad-free service tier. per month on the platform.
Brother, can you do without a GPU?: AWS introduced Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2) and Capacity Blocks for ML, a new service that allows customers to rent Nvidia GPUs for a specified period, primarily for ai tasks such as training or experimenting with machine learning models.
From zero to ai founder in one easy start: In “How to Start an ai Startup” on TC+, Michael Koch advises founders how to maintain control over their startup’s strategy and product by bootstrapping—yes, even in the world of ai startups, which often They require a lot of capital.
The rocky ocean of venture-backed startups
Image credits: Darrell Etherington with Getty assets under license
WeWork, once a high-flying startup valued at $47 billion, filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection, highlighting a stunning collapse. The company, which has more than $18.6 billion of debt, received an agreement from about 90% of its lenders to convert $3 billion of debt into equity in a bid to improve its balance sheet and address its costly leases. At TC+, Alex points out what we knew all along: that the core business just didn’t make sense.
In other entrepreneurship news. . .
Former Twitter CEO Creates Third Venture Fund: 01 Advisors, the venture firm founded by former Twitter executives Dick Costolo and Adam Bain, has secured $395 million in capital commitments for its third fund, aimed at investing in Series B stage startups focused on enterprise software and services fintech.
Happy 10th Unicornaversary: Alex reflects on the 10th anniversary of the term “unicorn,” which was initially coined here at TechCrunch, to describe startups valued at over $1 billion.
You get a chip! You get a chip!: In response to the shortage of ai chips, Microsoft is updating its startup support program to offer selected startups free access to advanced Azure ai supercomputing resources to develop ai models.
Let’s talk about Sam Bankman-Fried
Image credits: Bryce Durbin/TechCrunch
Look, I’m not going to lie, I think most cryptocurrencies are dumb, and I’ve only seen a handful of startups using blockchains in a way that makes any sense; most of them would have done well with a simple database, so I’ve been following Jacquelyn’s coverage of the Bankman-Fried trial with a not insignificant amount of schadenfreude. It’s human to make mistakes, and startup founders are human, but if you’re letting people down, you deserve all the punishment you can get.
Sam Bankman-Fried was the co-founder and CEO of the FTX cryptocurrency exchange and trading company Alameda Research (specifically named so as not to sound like a cryptocurrency company). He has been found guilty of all seven counts of fraud and money laundering.
The charges were related to a scheme involving the misappropriation of billions of dollars of client funds deposited with FTX and deceiving investors and lenders of both FTX and Alameda Research. After the five-week trial, the jury took only four hours to reach its verdict.
The collapse of FTX and Alameda Research, which led to the indictment of Bankman-Fried about 11 months ago by the US Department of Justice, was significant, as the executives allegedly stole more than $8 billion in funds from customers.
The sentence will be handed down next March, but if he receives the full weight of his actions, he will face a possible total sentence of 115 years in prison.
Jacquelyn did a heroic job covering the TechCrunch test and it’s worth taking an afternoon to read it all – the details are mind-blowing.
Top Reads on TechCrunch This Week
Sometimes the house wins: Cooper, a mortgage and lending company, experienced a “cybersecurity incident” that caused an ongoing system outage. The company says it has taken steps to protect data and address the issue.
I can’t think of any disadvantages of the Hindenburg: The world’s largest aircraft, Pathfinder 1, is an electric airship prototype developed by LTA Research and funded by Sergey Brin. It was unveiled this week and promises a new era in sustainable air travel.
Arrival departure: Electric vehicle startup Arrival, which aimed to revolutionize electric vehicle production with its microfactory model, is now facing serious operational challenges, including multiple layoffs, missed production targets, and failure to comply with SEC filing requirements, which has resulted in a plummeting valuation of $13 billion. .
