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Singer and TikTok creator Adanna Duru. Photo: Dove Shore Photography
Creator Economy
startups ai

Creator Startups Prep Generative AI Features; Q&A With TikTok Singer Adanna Duru

By Kaya Yurieff · Feb. 22, 2023 3:26 PM PST
The excitement around generative AI is hitting creator economy startups, which are looking for ways to use the technology to make workloads lighter for creators, spurred by the immense success of OpenAI’s ChatGPT chatbot. Podcastle, a startup that provides audio recording and editing tools for podcasting, announced a new feature last month... The excitement around generative AI is hitting creator economy startups, which are looking for...
Art by Mike Sullivan.
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startups

The Private Tech Company That Let Employee Stock Grants Evaporate

By Cory Weinberg · Feb. 22, 2023 7:00 AM PST · 14 comments
Household tech names Airbnb and Stripe have gone to great lengths to prevent arcane tax rules from creating disaster for the employees who helped build those firms. Airbnb went public just before employees’ valuable stock grants expired, while Stripe is raising as much as $4 billion privately to avoid that fate. Foursquare—the... Household tech names Airbnb and Stripe have gone to great lengths to prevent arcane tax rules...
Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison in 2018. Photo by Bloomberg
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cloud ai

AI Startups Find an Unlikely Friend: Oracle

By Aaron Holmes · Feb. 22, 2023 6:00 AM PST · 1 comment
Top cloud providers are jostling to sign deals with artificial intelligence startups that need computing resources as they chase OpenAI, maker of ChatGPT. An improbable early leader in the race to rent servers to these startups is Oracle, a longtime laggard in the cloud field that had developed reputational problems with some longtime customers... Top cloud providers are jostling to sign deals with artificial intelligence startups that need...
Photo by Getty.
Fast-Delivery Startups Getir and Flink Held Merger Talks
By Maria Heeter and Erin Woo · Feb. 7, 2023 11:46 AM PST
Photo by Getty.
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startups

Fast-Delivery Startups Getir and Flink Held Merger Talks

By Maria Heeter and Erin Woo · Feb. 7, 2023 11:46 AM PST
Turkey-based fast-delivery firm Getir had preliminary talks late last year about merging with Flink, the Germany-based startup, in a sign that consolidation in the fast-delivery sector may have another round to go. Merging with Flink would strengthen Getir in Germany, where it expanded through last year’s acquisition of Gorillas. Flink... Turkey-based fast-delivery firm Getir had preliminary talks late last year about merging with...
Photo of Sam Altman by Bloomberg. Art by Mike Sullivan.
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startups venture capital

OpenAI Dangles Perks and Early Access to Win Investments in AI Startups

By Kate Clark · Jan. 30, 2023 11:17 AM PST
OpenAI has proven itself to be a prolific fundraiser, collecting billions of dollars from Microsoft and others to perfect its artificial intelligence software. Lately, it’s also been flexing its muscles as an investor in other AI startups, a strategy that could tie a generation of young companies to its machine-learning models and... OpenAI has proven itself to be a prolific fundraiser, collecting billions of dollars from...
The cofounders of Character.AI, Noam Shazeer (CEO) and Daniel de Freitas Adiwardana (president) at the company's office in Palo Alto, CA. Photo via Getty.
startups venture capital

Chatbot Startup Character Seeks $250 Million, Testing Investor Appetite for AI

By Jon Victor, Kate Clark and Erin Woo · Jan. 27, 2023 2:25 PM PST
Character, an AI chatbot startup founded by two former Google researchers, has told investors it wants to raise as much as $250 million in new funding, according to two people with direct knowledge of the matter. The pitch will test investors’ appetite for machine-learning startups as Microsoft’s multibillion-dollar deal with OpenAI... Character, an AI chatbot startup founded by two former Google researchers, has told investors it...