Techmeme: New York-based ScaleOps, which offers cloud spend management tools, raised a $58M Series B led by Lightspeed, taking its total funding to $80M (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, PYMNTS.com, TechCrunch, Associated Press, Reuters, noyb, Bloomberg, RTÉ, WinBuzzer, Axios, Irish Independent, and The Verge

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

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

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, Thurrott, MacRumors, The Verge, AppleInsider, 9to5Mac, Reuters, BNN Bloomberg, Neowin, TechRadar, WinBuzzer, Benzinga, and MacDailyNews

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

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

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

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 and Bloomberg

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

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, Tech Startups, Associated Press, Proactive, Moneycontrol, Financial Times, SoftBank Group Corp., 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, Moneycontrol, The Economic Times, Bloomberg, YourStory.com, and Tech in Asia

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

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

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

Reuters:

Ilya Sutskever says “we're back in the age of wonder and discovery” as AI companies focus on pre-training, inference improvements, and finding the “next thing” — Artificial intelligence companies like OpenAI are seeking to overcome unexpected delays and challenges …

More: PC Gamer, The Decoder, WinBuzzer, Hindustan Times, Decrypt, Business Insider, Android Headlines, Shelly Palmer, Sherwood News, and Analytics India Magazine

Bluesky: @jeczjan.bsky.social. X: @modestproposal1, @modestproposal1, and @readkrystalhu

Forums: r/aiwars, r/mlscaling, and Slashdot

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