Techmeme
February 15, 2025, 12:10 PM

Top News

Michael Nuñez / VentureBeat:
Perplexity releases Deep Research, offering five queries daily to free users and 500 to subscribers, available now on the web and soon on iOS, Android, and Mac  —  Perplexity shattered the artificial intelligence market's status quo today by launching Deep Research, a tool …
New York Times:
OpenAI's board unanimously rejects the $97.4B bid by Elon Musk and a consortium of investors, calling it “Mr. Musk's latest attempt to disrupt his competition”  —  Bret Taylor, the chairman of OpenAI's board, said the artificial intelligence company was “not for sale.”
Eric Geller / Wired:
Memo: CISA orders a review of every position related to election security work since 2017, to comply with Trump's January 20 EO on “ending federal censorship”  —  The US Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency has frozen efforts to aid states in securing elections, according to an internal memo viewed by WIRED.
Emily Nicolle / Bloomberg:
Tether's venture arm acquires a minority stake in Italian football club Juventus, as part of a broader push to integrate digital assets into sports franchises  —  Tether Holdings SA de CV said it's acquired a minority stake in Juventus Football Club SpA, as one of crypto's most valuable companies continues …
Bloomberg:
Katie Roof / Bloomberg:
CB Insights: a record 1,200 VC-backed unicorns have yet to IPO or get acquired; Carta: fewer than 30% of 2021 unicorns raised funding in the past three years  —  The billion-dollar startup bubble is deflating, and more than $1 trillion in value is locked up in companies with dwindling prospects.
The Information:
Sources: Anthropic expects to burn $3B in 2025, down from $5.6B in 2024, and make up to $3.7B in revenue in 2025, as it seeks to catch up with OpenAI  —  After burning $5.6 billion in cash last year, Anthropic said it would reduce that amount by nearly half in 2025 and projected up to $3.7 billion …
Oliver Knight / CoinDesk:
Argentina's president Javier Milei backtracks on an X post promoting a memecoin called Libra, which rose to a $4.4B market cap before plunging by 95%+  —  Milei deleted his original promotional tweet and revealed that he wasn't aware of its details.  —  What to know:
Mark Gurman / Bloomberg:
Sources: Apple's overhaul of Siri faces engineering problems and software bugs; some features, planned for April, may have to be postponed until May or later  —  - Software's makeover is key to Apple Intelligence ambitions  — New Siri features slated for April at risk of being postponed
J. Edward Moreno / Sherwood News:
Analysis: consumers spent $259.1B on Uber, Lyft, and DoorDash in 2024, up from $218.5B in 2023, with $162.8B on Uber, $80.2B on DoorDash, and $16.1B on Lyft  —  Lyft and DoorDash just reported their first years with net profits.  Instacart is likely next.  —  For a long time …
Dwarkesh Patel / Dwarkesh Podcast:
Q&A with Google's Jeff Dean and Noam Shazeer on Google's path to AGI, future of Moore's Law and TPUs, inference scaling, open research, and more  —  Two of Gemini's co-leads on Google's path to AGI  —  This week I welcome on the show two of the most important technologists ever, in any field.
Olivia Poh / Bloomberg:
Sources: SoftBank-backed eFishery, Indonesia's high-profile agritech startup, cuts over 1,000 jobs, or ~90% of its workforce, and weighs a potential liquidation  —  - Indonesia's high-profile agritech startup cuts over 1,000 jobs  — Company unraveling after allegedly faking most of its revenue
More: Tech in Asia
Eric Newcomer / Newcomer:
Sources: Lightspeed, whose bets include Wiz, Anthropic, and Stripe, returned $8B from current and active funds in the past five years, with $3B+ coming in 2024  —  I've got my hands on slides from Lightspeed's $7 billion fundraising effort  —  Lightspeed Venture Partners …
Brody Ford / Bloomberg:
Sources: Dell nears a $5B deal to provide servers with Nvidia's GB200 chips for xAI's supercomputer project in Memphis  —  - Musk's AI startup developing supercomputer project in Memphis  — Dell working to win large share of xAI's Memphis build-out  —  Dell Technologies Inc …

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Featured Podcasts

Hard Fork:
Anthropic's Cybersecurity Shock Wave + Ronan Farrow and Andrew Marantz on Their Sam Altman Investigation + One Good Thing
The future is already here. Each week, journalists Kevin Roose and Casey Newton explore and make sense of the latest in the rapidly changing world of tech.
Subscribe to Hard Fork.
The Upstarts Podcast:
Decagon's Jesse Zhang: Closing Customer Service Doom Loops With AI Concierges
Veteran tech reporter Alex Konrad sits down with breakout entrepreneurs taking on the status quo to shake up their fields in AI, design, nuclear energy, space, and more.
Subscribe to The Upstarts Podcast.
Access:
OpenClaw for normies is here
A show about the tech industry's inside conversation, hosted by tech reporter Alex Heath and founder whisperer Ellis Hamburger.
Subscribe to Access.
The Nick, Dick and Paul Show:
When AI Kills
Nick Bilton, Dick Costolo, and Paul Kedrosky pull back the curtain on AI, startups, and the future rushing toward us, all with healthy dose of irreverence.
Subscribe to The Nick, Dick and Paul Show.
Big Technology Podcast:
OpenAI vs. Anthropic's Direct Faceoff + Future of Agents — With Aaron Levie
The Big Technology Podcast takes you behind the scenes in the tech world featuring interviews with plugged-in insiders and outside agitators.
Subscribe to Big Technology Podcast.
Tools and Weapons with Brad Smith:
Ryan Roslansky: Turning AI Anxiety into Skills for the Future of Work
Microsoft Vice Chair and President Brad Smith speaks with leaders in government, business, and culture to explore the most critical challenges at the intersection of technology and society.
Subscribe to Tools and Weapons with Brad Smith.
 

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More News

Bloomberg:

Earlier Picks

Ingrid Lunden / TechCrunch:
Vittoria Elliott / Wired:
Scharon Harding / Ars Technica: