As the Gulf region gains growing strategic importance for the tech war between the U.S. and China, Microsoft makes a big move into one of its richest oil countries. On Monday evening, Microsoft announced a $ 1.5 billion strategic investment in G42, the Abu Dhabi-based company that has become a major force in the United […]
Investors are growing increasingly wary of AI
After years of easy money, the AI industry is facing a reckoning. A new report from Stanford’s Institute for Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence (HAI), which studies AI trends, found that global investment in AI fell for the second year in a row in 2023. Both private investment — that is, investments in startups from VCs — […]
TechCrunch Minute: Why the company behind Trump’s Truth Social joined the growing IPO trend
The Reddit and Astera Labs IPOs last week ate up a lot of media oxygen. And with good reason, the two tech IPOs priced well and traded with even more gusto. After a long dearth for technology offerings, seeing two large, multibillion-dollar offerings in the same week was part of a much-needed win for private-market […]
1991 Ventures in London joins the growing list of VCs aimed at Ukrainian startups
U.K.-based limited partners Venrex and Samos Investments are this week backing the launch of a new VC primarily aimed at investing in startups led by Ukrainians inside and outside the war-torn country. The LPs are better known for being early institutional investors in the successful early stage startup funds Seedcamp and Entrepreneur First. 1991 Ventures is the […]
The DOJ’s case against Apple adds to a growing pile of antitrust problems for Cupertino
On home turf Apple has enjoyed many years of relatively light regulatory scrutiny compared to Big Tech peers. The US Department of Justice (DOJ) opened a monopoly case against Google back in October 2020, for instance. It followed with a second antitrust case at the start of last year, targeting Google’s adtech. While the FTC […]