Also: Tesla testing robotaxis with human drivers in Austin, Bay Area
Welcome to TechCrunch AM! This morning, we're looking at Revolut's hot year, Tesla's robotaxi moves, and censorship on BlueSky. We've also got VW entering the robotaxi race, funds for a startup helping Europe onshore manufacturing, robots.txt for images, the DOGE effect on IBM, Windsurf's price cutting, the electricity cost of chatbots, and more. | | | 1. Banking Kung Fu: Neobank startup Revolut just reported a net profit of $1 billion in 2024, with a customer base that grew 38%, and revenues that skyrocketed 72% to $4 billion from a year earlier. Who needs an IPO when you're crushing the private markets? Read More 2. Robotaxi dreams: Tesla has begun testing "FSD Supervised" with employees in Austin and the Bay Area as it prepares for what is meant to be a commercial launch in Austin this June. There are thousands of Teslas with this tech out there, so the announcement seems to hinge on the addition of a "Robotaxi" app that can be used to hail a ride. Read More 3. Censorship comes to all: BlueSky has reportedly restricted access to 72 accounts in Turkey at the Turkish government's request. Not a good look for a supposedly "open" social network, but there are ways around censorship because of how the decentralized network is structured. Read More | | | ☮️ The people mover: Volkswagen is Uber's latest autonomous vehicle conquest. The two companies have unveiled a plan to launch a commercial robotaxi service using VW ID. BUZZ vans in multiple U.S. cities over the next decade, starting with Los Angeles. Read More 🏭 Onshoring takes off: British startup Isembard has raised $9 million to bring back critical manufacturing infrastructure onshore — a trend I'm sure we'll see more of in Europe as geopolitical pressures mount and globalization becomes more unstable. Read More 🕷️ Another protocol for AI crawlers to ignore: Adobe wants to create a standard for images similar to the "robots.txt" protocol that aims to block crawlers from accessing information on sites. This tool could give image creators more control over how their content is used to train AI — provided those crawlers respect the protocol. Read More 🤕 DOGE hits IBM: Tech giant IBM had 15 of its federal contracts canceled due to DOGE-related cuts to USAID in the first quarter. That's a $100 million hit to IBM's future payments, but during the company's earnings call, IBM's CEO and CFO tried to downplay the potential impact of DOGE on future business. Read More 🥊 Undercut: AI coding assistant startup Windsurf slashed its prices, touting "massive savings" for users as competition with its rival Cursor grows. Could this be a play to boost numbers and make itself a more attractive target for OpenAI, which is said to be eyeing the firm? Read More | | | 🔍 Very shiny: In Google's antitrust trial, rival search engine DuckDuckGo's CEO Daniel Weinberg testified he reckons Chrome would be worth upwards of $50 billion if it goes on the market today, per Bloomberg. Read More 🚸 Think of the children: The U.K.'s communications watchdog published more than 40 measures to protect kids from harmful content that tech firms will have to adhere to by July 25 or risk fines and even being shut down. The rules affect everything from social media to search to gaming, per The Guardian. Read More | | | ⚡ Do I wanna know? Hugging Face engineer Julien Delavande built a tool that predicts how much electricity you're using when you use generative AI models. The goal is to push for transparency amid growing AI energy demands, so that one day, "energy usage could be as visible as nutrition labels on food!" Read More | | | Featured jobs from CrunchBoard | | | Has this been forwarded to you? Click here to subscribe to this newsletter. | | | Update your preferences here at any time | | Copyright © 2024 TechCrunch, All rights reserved.Yahoo Inc. 680 Folsom Street,San Francisco,CA | | | | |
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