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Welcome to Startups Weekly — your weekly recap of everything you can’t miss from the world of startups. Want it in your inbox every Friday? Sign up here. This week…

AI dominated both YC Demo Day and startup news

Three Iranian hackers working for the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) targeted the Trump campaign in an attempted hack-and-leak operation, according to the Department of Justice.

US government charges three Iranian hackers with Trump campaign hack

This episode of Equity had so many themes: VC karaoke, the SpaceX economy, no moats for AI, OpenAI versus open source. You know it’s going…

Green flags for defense tech and Silicon Valley’s longevity obsession

Wordy is a new iOS app that offers a unique way to learning English. The app automatically translates and defines unknown words while you watch your favorite movies or TV…

Wordy’s new app helps you learn vocabulary while watching movies and TV shows

The WSJ reports that OpenAI’s next funding round, worth around $6.5 billion, could close as soon as the first week in October.

OpenAI’s $6.5B funding round may close as soon as next week

We’re thrilled to welcome Bret Taylor to TechCrunch Disrupt 2024. As the former co-CEO of Salesforce, founder of Quip, former CTO of Facebook, the co-creator of Google Maps, and current…

Bret Taylor of Sierra joins TechCrunch Disrupt 2024

The U.K.s’ antitrust authority has concluded that Amazon’s partnership and equity investment in AI startup Anthropic can’t be investigated under current merger rules due to the size and scope of…

Amazon dodges antitrust scrutiny in UK over Anthropic investment

We’re in the final hours to save up to $600 on TechCrunch Disrupt 2024 tickets! Grab your tickets now and seize this final opportunity for major savings before the countdown…

Last hours to snag up to $600 off TechCrunch Disrupt 2024 passes

Reset your clocks: Meta has been hit with yet another privacy penalty in Europe. On Friday, Ireland’s Data Protection Commission (DPC) announced a reprimand and a €91 million fine —…

Meta fined $101.5M for 2019 breach that exposed hundreds of millions of Facebook passwords

The world’s second-largest money transfer provider, which filed a data breach notice with U.K. authorities, serves over 50 million people.

UK data watchdog confirms it’s investigating MoneyGram data breach

Where we’ll be next

Note-taking apps typically aim to make you more efficient and productive. A lot of those apps concentrate on quickly jotting down your thoughts, organizing them better, or a mix of…

Napkin is a note-taking app that is not about making you more productive

Here are the startups from YC Demo Day 2 that we thought stood out from the flock.

9 startups that stood out on YC Demo Day 2

UAE-based Redwood has acquired a majority stake in the game streaming platform Loco as the Indian firm looks to expand focus to international markets, TechCrunch has learned and confirmed. Redwood,…

Indian game streaming startup Loco sells majority stake to Redwood

SpaceX’s Starlink satellite internet network is expected to hit a new customer milestone this week, company President Gwynne Shotwell told Texas legislators on Tuesday.  “This week, by the way, we…

Starlink hits 4 million subscribers

AI video generators need to believe that filmmakers will use their models in the production process. Otherwise why exist? To jump-start the new AI film ecosystem, Runway has set aside…

Runway earmarks $5M to fund up to 100 films using AI-generated video

Departures might be dominating the week’s OpenAI-related headlines. But comments on AI bias from Anna Makanju, the company’s VP of global affairs, also grabbed our attention. Makanju, speaking on a…

OpenAI’s VP of global affairs claims o1 is ‘virtually perfect’ at correcting bias, but the data doesn’t quite back that up

Lending startup Figure will be launching an AI tool powered by GPT-4 to help catch errors in lending documents. 

Former Brex COO who now heads unicorn fintech Figure says GPT is already upending the mortgage industry

Drata, a security compliance automation platform that helps companies adhere to frameworks such as SOC 2 and GDPR, has laid off 9% of its workforce, amounting to 40 people. Founded in 2020, Drata integrates…

Security compliance unicorn Drata lays off 9% of its workforce

As OpenAI boasts about its o1 model’s increased thoughtfulness, small, self-funded startup Nomi AI is building the same kind of technology. Unlike the broad generalist ChatGPT, which slows down to…

Nomi’s companion chatbots will now remember things like the colleague you don’t get along with

The company recently closed a $130 million round, according to an SEC filing, bringing the total to $327 million.

Zap Energy investors in recent $130M round included Soros Fund and Laurene Powell Jobs’ Emerson Collective