LLM & Models
AI voice startup ElevenLabs doubles valuation to $22B
The $300 million employee tender was co-led by Wellington and T. Rowe Price.
TechCrunch AI Original
AI news, distilled.
The latest on models, products, research and policy — curated from trusted sources.
Product Launches
The AI Tamagotchis are coming
While AI has made plenty of inroads on people's phones and computers, it's largely failed in dedicated devices. But over the next year, two major AI companies, Meta and OpenAI, will attempt to change that. And they're apparently betting on a similar path: testing appetite for physical hardware with their cutesy software agents. "Hardware is […]
The Verge AI Original
LLM & Models
Reddit is killing RSS feeds and ending public API access because of AI bots
Reddit is ending support for RSS feeds, as the company continues tightening access to its trove of user-generated content.
TechCrunch AI Original
LLM & Models
The ugly economics of consumer AI
There’s a reason frontier labs have gotten gunshy about consumer AI — and it’s not because the tech isn’t good enough.
TechCrunch AI Original
Product Launches
Here’s what AI leaders are saying about Trump’s new safety plan
After hosting a meal with Big Tech leaders on Tuesday, President Donald Trump responded to journalist questions about his artificial intelligence announcements in typical fashion. He said his previous claims regarding fears around AI safety being a "hoax" cooked up by Democrats no longer apply now that he's renamed the technology to "Super Intelligence." He […]
The Verge AI Original
LLM & Models
Meta disputes claim that Muse read a user’s private messages without permission
Meta says its Muse AI agent cannot access a user’s Messages without explicit permission, disputing a journalist’s account that the agent read his private messages while the required Mac setting was turned off.
TechCrunch AI Original
LLM & Models
DoorDash launches an AI agent you can text to order food
By launching an AI agent for food ordering, DoorDash is looking to gain an edge over rivals Uber Eats and Grubhub.
TechCrunch AI Original
LLM & Models
Destro AI’s secret sauce is getting robots and humans on the same page
"One of the biggest reasons we are winning against robotics companies is because we are not a robotics company."
TechCrunch AI Original
LLM & Models
Instinct’s new product recommendations are giving some users the ick
Instinct is rolling out human-curated product and travel recommendations, but some users aren’t happy about getting suggestions they never asked for.
TechCrunch AI Original
Product Launches
All the latest news on Meta’s cute, creepy Muse AI agent
Meta launched a new Muse AI agent it claims can help you with everything from firing off emails to buying stuff online. Muse can be surprisingly effective at delivering on those promises — if you’re willing to trust Meta with your data and hand Muse your credit card. Since the launch, Meta’s also announced plans […]
The Verge AI Original
Research
Introducing SynthID Bio
Proof of concept for watermarking AI-generated proteins while preserving biological function.
Google DeepMind Blog Original
Product Launches
Google reportedly tests paying publishers for AI search results
Google has launched a pilot program that pays publishers for their contributions to its AI-powered search features, according to a report from The Information. The pilot program reportedly includes around 100 publishers and comes as Google faces scrutiny over the impact of its AI features on web traffic. Digiday first reported on the pilot program, […]
The Verge AI Original
Product Launches
Instagram is adding an AI ‘assistant’ to tell you how to post
Instagram is the latest social media platform to add built-in AI-powered features that will give users feedback on their posts. The company announced Wednesday that its standalone Edits app will now include an AI "creative assistant" that pulls in data from a user's Instagram account and offers suggestions on what to change. Using the new […]
The Verge AI Original
LLM & Models
Cerebras Systems’ Andrew Feldman on whether AI can keep scaling at TechCrunch Disrupt 2026
At TechCrunch Disrupt 2026, Cerebras Systems CEO and co-founder Andrew Feldman will explore the growing demand for compute, energy, and infrastructure, how Cerebras is approaching those constraints differently, and what comes next if today’s AI hardware reaches its limits.
TechCrunch AI Original
LLM & Models
Restate lands $20M as the need for durable infrastructure increases with AI agents
Founded by Apache Flink veterans, the startup is taking on workflow heavyweight Temporal.
TechCrunch AI Original
LLM & Models
3 days left to exhibit: Turn visibility into your next opportunity at TechCrunch Disrupt 2026
Three days left to exhibit at TechCrunch Disrupt 2026. Book by October 2 at 11:59 p.m. PT to showcase your startup to 10,000+ founders, investors, operators, and tech leaders.
TechCrunch AI Original
Product Launches
Here’s how tech leaders will self-police AI safety under Trump’s deal
We now have the full details of the "morally binding" AI safety deal announced by President Trump yesterday, in which top executives agreed to self-regulate their artificial intelligence technology. The accord, officially titled the Joint Commitment On Frontier Responsibilities, was shared online by tech founder and presidential advisor David Sacks, and has been signed by […]
The Verge AI Original
LLM & Models
Airbnb adds AI search, more social features
Airbnb is also launching new services such as meal delivery and laundry in select locations
TechCrunch AI Original
Research
“We’re not going to shoot ourselves in the foot” over hack fallout, says OpenAI’s chief research officer
Two months after the bombshell news that a swarm of its agents had broken their containment and hacked into the computers of the AI company Hugging Face, OpenAI is still putting out fires. A steady drip of disclosures about other hacks in the weeks since has kept OpenAI in the spotlight and raised serious questions…
MIT Technology Review AI Original
LLM & Models
Disrupting a coordinated model-distillation campaign
Learn how OpenAI disrupted a campaign to extract protected model reasoning and is strengthening defenses against adversarial distillation.
OpenAI Blog Original