Techmeme: Writer, which makes enterprise generative AI tools, raised a $200M Series C led by Premji, Radical Ventures, and Iconiq at a $1.9B valuation, for $326M raised (Kyle Wiggers/TechCrunch)

Top News

Meta plans to ask Facebook and Instagram users in Europe if they want to get “less personalized ads” and cuts subscription prices by 40%, a concession to the EU — Facebook and Instagram owner faces pressure in Europe to ask users before using their data to target ads or train artificial intelligence

More: Meta, RTÉ, Silicon Republic, PYMNTS.com, Thurrott, TechCrunch, Associated Press, Reuters, Hindustan Times, noyb, Bloomberg, WinBuzzer, Axios, Irish Independent, and The Verge

Bluesky: @kint.bsky.social. X: @laz_radic, @laz_radic, @laz_radic, @lexzard, @mikeryanretail, @eric_seufert, and @metanewsemea

Ming-Chi Kuo:

Kuo: Apple schedules production of a smart home IP camera for 2026 and is aiming for 10M+ annual shipments; Goertek will be the exclusive assembly supplier — 1. Apple is making its first foray into the smart home IP camera market, with mass production scheduled for 2026, targeting annual shipments in the tens of millions.

More: PCMag, The Verge, MacRumors, 9to5Mac, MacRumors, Thurrott, Digital Trends, PhoneArena, The Ankler, Wccftech, Android Headlines, Neowin, Android Authority, Supercharged, The Shortcut, Tom's Guide, BGR, T3, Cult of Mac, The Information, AppleInsider, Benzinga, iClarified, Sherwood News, and The Mac Observer

Threads: @rsgnl. Bluesky: @ravi64.com. X: @mingchikuo, @andrew_osu, @raywongy, and @mingchikuo. Forums: MacRumors Forums

Tom Warren / The Verge:

Nvidia launches its Nvidia app for Windows, designed to overhaul and replace the GeForce Experience app, after a beta earlier in 2024 — Nvidia is officially launching its Nvidia app on PC today, designed to overhaul and replace the GeForce Experience app.

More: NVIDIA, Tom's Hardware, XDA Developers, VideoCardz.com, PCWorld, Engadget, HotHardware, Club386, Tom's Guide, NVIDIA, MSPoweruser, Guru3D, Rock, Paper, Shotgun, TweakTown, PCGamesN, Digital Trends, Neowin, PC Gamer, and Blue's News

Gian Volpicelli / Bloomberg:

The EU notifies Apple of “potentially prohibited geo-blocking practices” on the App Store and other apps, and says it must align with EU anti-geo-blocking rules — Alexa's New AI Brain Is Stuck in the Lab … Quicktake

More: European Commission, PYMNTS.com, Thurrott, MacRumors, The Verge, AppleInsider, Reuters, 9to5Mac, BNN Bloomberg, Neowin, TechRadar, WinBuzzer, Benzinga, and MacDailyNews

Paresh Dave / Wired:

Rival search engines Ecosia and Qwant debut European Search Perspective, a joint venture to develop a web index for Europe to reduce reliance on Google and Bing — Generative AI and new rules targeting tech giants are giving Ecosia and Qwant fuel to challenge Google and Microsoft and develop a web index for Europe.

More: TechCrunch, Verdict, International Business Times, Library Journal infoDOCKET, Neowin, and CNBC

Forums: Hacker News and Slashdot

Kyle Wiggers / TechCrunch:

Writer, which makes enterprise generative AI tools, raised a $200M Series C led by Premji, Radical Ventures, and Iconiq at a $1.9B valuation, for $326M raised — Writer has raised $200 million at a $1.9 billion valuation to expand its generative AI platform.

More: Writer, San Francisco Business Times, Bloomberg, and Salesforce Ventures. X: @get_writer

Bloomberg:

SoftBank reports Q2 net income of ~$7.7B and a Vision Fund gain of ~$2.42B, driven by strong Indian IPOs and valuation gains in startups like Coupang and Didi — - Tech investor rakes in profit on hot Indian IPO market — Legacy-conscious founder Masayoshi Son is readying next gamble

More: Financial Times, CNBC, Proactive, Moneycontrol, Financial Times, SoftBank Group Corp., Tech Startups, Associated Press, The Economic Times, Tech in Asia, and Reuters

Manish Singh / TechCrunch:

SoftBank says Vision Fund co-CEO Rajeev Misra will step down from his leadership roles; during his 10-year tenure, he led investments in WeWork, Wag, and others

More: globalventuring.com, The Economic Times, Moneycontrol, Bloomberg, YourStory.com, and Tech in Asia

Financial Times:

Amazon's Annapurna Labs plans to unveil Trainium 2 AI chips in December, as part of taking on Nvidia; Anthropic, Databricks, and others are testing Trainium 2 — Big Tech group's Annapurna Labs is spending big to build custom chips that lessen its reliance on market leader

More: Reuters, Benzinga, Wccftech, WinBuzzer, 24/7 Wall St., and CIO.com. Forums: Ars OpenForum

Jay Peters / The Verge:

Signal rolls out new call features, including the ability to share a link to a call, emoji reactions, a “raise hand” button, and a dedicated calls history tab — Signal is making a bunch of improvements to calls so they are more competitive with Zoom and Google Meet, including the ability to share a link to a call.

More: Signal Messenger, 9to5Mac, Engadget, HotHardware, TechCrunch, PCMag, Android Police, TechRadar, PhoneArena, Neowin, RestorePrivacy, MakeUseOf, and Werd I/O

Threads: @quillmatiq. Mastodon: @ilyess@mastodon.online and @Mer__edith@mastodon.world

X: @mer__edith and @_maxgranger. Forums: r/signal

Eleanor Olcott / Financial Times:

Baidu unveils smart glasses, powered by its Ernie LLM, that would “become a private assistant” by tracking calories, playing music, and more, launching in 2025 — Launch comes as Chinese internet groups jostle for dominance in hardware — Baidu has unveiled artificial …

More: Engadget, Reuters, South China Morning Post, WinBuzzer, and Cryptopolitan. Mastodon: @1br0wn@eupolicy.social

Financial Times:

Analysts: Nintendo and Sony are heading into the holiday season with little to offer consumers; the Switch is seven years old and the $700 PS5 Pro is overpriced — Video game industry fears its most important quarter will fall flat with few new mass-market offerings

More: TechRadar

Bloomberg:

Alibaba, JD, and Xiaomi report a plethora of Singles' Day sales statistics to show how 2024's shopping event was one of the biggest yet, as China's economy sags — - Data shows sales surged, but over a much longer period — Analysts warn shoppers still show signs of moderated spending

More: Barron's Online, Associated Press, South China Morning Post, JD Corporate Blog, KrASIA, The Straits Times, and Benzinga

Kyle Wiggers / TechCrunch:

New York-based ScaleOps, which offers cloud spend management tools, raised a $58M Series B led by Lightspeed, taking its total funding to $80M — Thanks to AI, the appetite for cloud services is growing. Cloud expenditures more than doubled between 2019 and 2023, and are expected …

More: SiliconANGLE and Globes Online

Alan Ohnsman / Forbes:

Waymo opens robotaxi rides to anyone in LA within an 80-square-mile area running from downtown LA to Santa Monica and says ~300K users had been on the waitlist — The Alphabet company said about 300,000 people in the second-largest U.S. city have been waiting to use its robotic ridehail service …

More: TechCrunch, NBC News, The Verge, Yahoo Finance, Channel NewsAsia, The Robot Report, Los Angeles Times, and SFist

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