Waymo has been testing its driverless cars in Miami intermittently for the last five years, but now it’s making serious moves to launch a robotaxi service there. The Alphabet-owned company revealed on Thursday that it’ll start testing its Jaguar I-PACE autonomous cars on the streets of the city early next year, with the aim of launching a robotaxi service for residents and visitors via the Waymo One app in 2026. Waymo said it’s partnering with African mobility fintech company Moove to help it with the management of its fleet of autonomous vehicles in Miami. This is a first for Waymo,…
Author: Olsi
We hear a lot about SpaceX Falcon 9 rockets launching and landing multiple times, but what about the infrastructure that makes it possible? A key part of the Falcon 9 missions involves droneships stationed in the ocean. These floating barges function as a landing platform for the returning first-stage Falcon 9 boosters when the mission profile means the rocket will have to land at sea rather than back at the launch site. SpaceX has three of these barges—two in Florida for launches from the Kennedy Space Center and one in California for flights that lift off from the Vandenberg Space…
Some believe Klarna’s planned IPO in 2025 could set the stage for other fintech startups to go public. But with the tech IPO market still sluggish, one of the candidates hotly tipped to follow suit has instead just announced a fundraise, and its CEO says going public is “not a priority.” Zopa, the U.K. neobank that provides loans, credit cards and savings accounts to some 1.3 million customers, has raised €82 million ($86.8 million based on current exchange rates) in equity funding. The company is not disclosing an exact valuation, but from what we understand it is an upround and…
U.S. government agencies legally hack into cellphones or emails all the time: think of the FBI wiretapping a suspected drug lord or the NSA monitoring emails for terrorism plots. But now, there’s rising interest in hacking other kinds of devices people often use like WiFi-connected security cameras and other IoT products. Toka, an Israeli startup backed by Andreessen Horowitz, specializes in this type of work. It previously gained attention for a 2022 Haaretz article detailing its claims about being able to obtain and even delete security camera footage. The company is now looking to hire a “Client Director USA” to…
Fly Ventures, the Berlin-based VC that invests in seed-stage European startups within enterprise and deep tech, has launched its third fund at €80 million. The firm raised its last €53 million fund in 2020. Aiming at technical founders, the firm claims Fund III was oversubscribed and raised in a single closing. Meanwhile, the small increase in fund size reflects the firm’s desire to operate as a boutique firm. Matuschka told The Tech Spot: “We like doing things that at the time, other people think, what the… material science and AI?! These days, more people do it, but our game plan…
Ride-hail giant Uber and Chinese autonomous vehicle technology company WeRide have launched a commercial robotaxi service in Abu Dhabi. The launch marks Uber’s first international autonomous vehicle offering. Uber has been snatching up partnerships with autonomous vehicle companies across sectors, including ride-hail, delivery, and trucking. Other partners include Wayve, Serve Robotics, Aurora Innovation, Waabi, and others. Still, investors are wary that incumbents like Uber won’t be able to compete with the companies building the technology, like Waymo and potentially Tesla. On Thursday, Uber’s stock dropped nearly 10% after Waymo announced plans to launch a robotaxi service in Miami – this…
SpotifyWrapped isn’t the only service offering a year-end recap these days. In addition to the year-end reviews from other streamers and social apps, Google Photos is among the apps providing users with a look back at key moments throughout the past year. “2024 Recap,” as the feature is called, introduces a collection of memories, insights, and photos, which can also be augmented with AI captions. The latter feature is available to select users in the U.S., Google says. Users who have opted in to using AI in Photos will be able to add personalized captions to their photos, generated by…
OpenAI is in the holiday spirit, it seems. The ChatGPT creator announced “12 Days of OpenAI,” a series of reveals that will be livestreamed at 10 a.m. PT for the next 12 weekdays. Day one of the event saw the launch of ChatGPT Pro, OpenAI’s $200 per month subscription plan, and the full version of its “reasoning” o1 model. While we don’t know what else is in store, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman says the company event will feature announcements ranging from new demos to product launches, and even “stocking stuffers.” It’s possible we could see updates to its Advanced Voice…
A federal appeals court has unanimously voted to uphold a law that could ban TikTok in the U.S. unless the social network divests from Chinese ownership. The decision comes seven months after TikTok filed a lawsuit against the federal government over the ban. Friday’s ruling from the appeals court rejects TikTok’s claims that the law violates the U.S. Constitution’s commitment to free speech and individual liberty. “The First Amendment exists to protect free speech in the United States,” the court’s opinion reads. “Here the government acted solely to protect that freedom from a foreign adversary nation and to limit that…
The New York Times reported that Musk and the entities he controls disclosed about $277 million in donations to federal groups this election cycle. Fresh campaign financing data shows that Elon Musk poured more than $260 million into political groups in 2024 that helped Donald Trump win the presidential election and, consequently, secured a position for himself as the co-head of government efficiency, according to the Federal Election Commission. Musk is the CEO of Tesla, SpaceX, and xAI, and owner of X, The Boring Company, and Neuralink. His donations make Musk the largest donor of the election cycle, and they can be…
