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21小時前

Amazon drops data center NDAs, and AI agents want your credit card

Amazon says it will stop using NDAs when negotiating data center deals with local governments, following a similar move from Microsoft earlier this year. Secrecy has fueled community backlash against AI infrastructure, with opposition leading to hundreds of proposed and enacted moratoriums from New York to San Francisco. Meanwhile, a wave of startups is betting that consumers will hand AI agents access to their inboxes, files, and credit cards — if they can get websites to let them in. On this episode of TechCrunch’s Equity podcast, Anthony Ha, Sean O’Kane, and Rebecca Bellan dig into whether ditching NDAs will change how data center deals get done, why trust may be the real product for personal AI startups, plus a couple of deals of the week. Listen to the full episode to hear more about: The White House’s plans to make plans with its new Super Intelligence Force Ghost’s $3,499 computer built to run AI agents around the clock, and why the Equity crew doesn’t see it going mass market Tab, Underdog, and Hark pitching privacy as their product, plus the business model that could turn your agent into a salesperson United, Apple, and Amazon putting up walls against outside agents Lambda’s reported $4 billion raise, and the single customer behind $35 billion of its backlog Uber’s $2.3 billion all-cash deal to get into the office catering space with ezCater We’ll see you next week at TechCrunch Disrupt 2026! Get 25% off your tickets with code Equity25, and we’ll see you on the Builders Stage Tuesday at 9 am. Subscribe to Equity on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify and all the casts. You can also follow Equity on X and Threads, at @EquityPod. Chapters: 00:00 Intro 0:55 Trump’s “superintelligence force” and the great AI rebranding 3:19 Amazon drops NDAs on data center deals 9:17 Why the AI industry has a communication problem 12:51 Personal AI agents: finding money in your inbox 15:27 Ghost’s $3,500 computer built for personal AI 19:16 Trust is the product: privacy-first agent startups 27:36 Lambda’s $4B raise and the neo cloud backlog problem 31:22 Uber’s $2.3B move into catering 35:10 Outro Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
9月18日

Automattic's 33-Hour coup, and can AI labs police themselves?

A week after an Anthropic researcher's doomsday warning rattled the AI world, the company's CEO Dario Amodei has outlined his plan to “pace the frontier” of AI development. The proposal leans on independent safety evaluators and coordination between AI labs in democratic countries, and it's already picked up some industry support, along with some pointed pushback from Nvidia's Jensen Huang. On this episode of TechCrunch's Equity podcast, Kirsten Korosec, Anthony Ha, and Sean O'Kane dig into whether companies can agree on what slowing down means and who gets to police it. Plus, WordPress parent Automattic's boardroom coup, and a couple of the week's biggest deals. Listen to the full episode to hear more about: The golden parachute deals struck during Matt Mullenweg's 33-hour ouster from Automattic, and why the drama could give him even more control over technology that powers much of the web Whether May Mobility's SPAC can deliver more than $300 million in potential funding, and why becoming a “public robotaxi company” comes with some big caveats DoorDash's $425 million investment in Wonder and the race to automate food from order to delivery Subscribe to Equity on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify and all the casts. You also can follow Equity on X and Threads, at @EquityPod. 00:00 Intro 1:00 Dario Amodei's plan to "pace the frontier" 5:03 Jensen Huang pushes back 9:08 Can market forces alone keep AI safe? 12:30 Third-party evaluators: how would they actually work? 15:27 Automattic's board tries to oust Matt Mullenweg 19:31 Comparing it to OpenAI's "the blip" 22:54 What's at stake in who controls WordPress 24:04 May Mobility's SPAC deal 28:42 Are SPACs back? 29:34 DoorDash invests $425M in Wonder 33:45 Outro Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
10月2日

Call it AI, call it Super Intelligence, only 2% of consumers are buying it

This week, the White House got nearly every major tech CEO in one room — Zuckerberg, Bezos, Musk, and Anthropic’s Dario Amodei among them — to sign an AI safety pledge that President Donald Trump called “morally binding.” Trump also signed an executive order officially rebranding AI as “super intelligence,” and meanwhile, Meta and OpenAI are putting friendlier faces on their AI products, even as the biggest money in AI still appears to be coming from the enterprise. On this episode of TechCrunch's Equity podcast, Kirsten Korosec, Anthony Ha, and Sean O’Kane dig into this week’s AI moves, the ugly economics of consumer AI, plus the shifting IPO market and a handful of startup deals. Listen to the full episode to hear more about: What Oura pulling its IPO, plus Anthropic’s leaked S-1 and OpenAI going back to private funding, says about how picky public markets have gotten Quartermaster’s $140M raise to bring real-time sensors to an industry that AI basically hasn’t touched yet: maritime shipping Why Atomic, a supply-chain startup from ex-Tesla vets, is already running 90% of DoorDash’s purchasing How Startup Battlefield finalist Charter Space raised $5M to bring insurance to satellites Speaking of Startup Battlefield, join us at TechCrunch Disrupt 2026, where Equity will kick things off with a live show on the Builders Stage at 9 a.m. Get 25% off your tickets with code Equity25. Subscribe to Equity on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify and all the casts. You can also follow Equity on X and Threads, at @EquityPod. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
9月25日

Meta’s Muse just stole the spotlight from OpenAI and Anthropic

When AI leaders at OpenAI and Anthropic started talking about “pacing the frontier,” maybe someone should have asked: what pace? It’s turned into model drop week for both companies as Anthropic rolled out Opus 5.5, followed by OpenAI’s GPT-6 model updates just 90 minutes later. But the company that stole the spotlight this week was Meta, whose personal AI agent Muse is reportedly outpacing ChatGPT’s early numbers and is headed for smart glasses and a tiny Tamagotchi-style device next. On this episode of TechCrunch’s Equity podcast, Kirsten Korosec, Anthony Ha, and Sean O’Kane dig into Meta’s consumer AI strategy and what it means for the startups trying to build on top of this technology, from where the money is flowing to which AI products might actually become part of people's daily lives. They also get into a16z's new school for aspiring founders and two very different AI and hardware deals. Listen to the full episode to hear more about: How a16z's Horowitz Andreessen Academy plans to pave a new path for aspiring founders, and why the Equity crew sees echoes of the Thiel Fellowship and Silicon Valley's long-running anti-college streak Why Oura's $2.2 billion IPO looks more like a payday for existing shareholders than a major fundraising event for the company Ema’s $77 million raise to sell teams of AI agents that automate HR, IT, and finance workflows, with Google and Microsoft among its early enterprise customers Subscribe to Equity on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify and all the casts. You also can follow Equity on X and Threads, at @EquityPod. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
9月16日

Why Thrive, Founders Fund, and Antonio Gracias are betting on hearing aids

“Why do I have to beg my grandparents to put on their hearing aids, but no one has ever needed to ask me to put on my glasses?” That’s the question that drove Matthew de Jonge to spend six years building Fortell, an AI hearing aid startup that recently raised $163 million from the likes of Founders Fund, Thrive Capital, and Valor Equity Partners CEO Antonio Gracias. The buzzy startup aims to build hearing aids that understand the sounds around you in real time, figure out what’s important and turn down the rest — instead of turning everything up at the same time, as most hearing aids do. On this episode of TechCrunch's Equity Equity podcast, Rebecca Bellan is joined by de Jonge to break down what it takes to disrupt a decades-old industry where five companies make 97% of the products, insurance won’t cover the cost, and innovation has been slow to arrive. Listen to the full episode to hear more about: How de Jonge went from mechanical engineering and a hedge fund career to building handheld ultrasound machines at Butterfly Network, and why that experience gave him the confidence to take on hearing aids next. The AI architecture behind Fortell's approach, including a custom chip built by a former Google TPU designer. Why the five companies that dominate the hearing aid industry have been so slow to innovate, and how that shaped Fortell's pitch to investors. De Jonge's take on Apple's AirPods as both a hearing aid alternative and an at-home hearing test, and why he sees them as complementary rather than a threat. The regulatory hurdles around remote hearing aid fittings, and how state-level telemedicine laws are shaping Fortell's path to scale. Subscribe to Equity on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify and all the casts. You also can follow Equity on X and Threads, at @EquityPod. Chapters: 00:00 Intro 1:14 Why Matt built Fortell 5:16 The problem with hearing aids: everything's just... loud 7:36 How Fortell's AI separates important sound from noise 12:12 The funding pitch that won over Founders Fund and Thrive 16:31 Hearing aids vs. AI wearables (Meta, Apple, Legato) 20:34 Pricing, insurance, and the hearing aid "cartel" 23:25 Scaling up: new clinics and remote fitting 26:57 Outro Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
3日前

After selling to P&G and Lululemon, these founders are building for life beyond the screen

Tristan Walker and Brynn Putnam both built and sold major consumer companies. Now, they’re building products designed to bring people together. Today on Equity, we’re bringing you a conversation TechCrunch AI editor Russell Brandom had on stage at the latest StrictlyVC event in New York. Russell sat down with Walker, who sold Bevel maker Walker & Company to Procter & Gamble and is now building leathercraft trade school Heirloom, and Putnam, who sold fitness startup Mirror to Lululemon and is now CEO of Board, a touchscreen console that combines board games and video games. The two repeat founders talk about what they learned from their first companies, why they’re focused on physical skills and shared experiences now, and how AI could make hands-on, human connection more valuable rather than less. Walker explains why he sees growing demand for mastery and trade skills, while Putnam talks about using technology to bring people together instead of pulling them into individual screens. Subscribe to Equity on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify and all the casts. You also can follow Equity on X and Threads, at @EquityPod. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
9月30日

A Neko Health investor on the $700M bet to scan your whole body

Spotify founder Daniel Ek’s Neko Health raised $700 million to build a business around scanning your body, but it’s not the only company centering its roadmap around a new kind of preventative healthcare. Midjourney is building its own body scanner, while Function Health has also raised significant capital to build out its preventative-health platform. Why are investors betting so big on this category? On this episode of TechCrunch's Equity podcast, Dominic-Madori Davis talks with Farooq Abbasi, founder and general partner of Preface Ventures and an investor in Neko Health, about how Neko compares with other consumer-health startups. They discuss what has to happen for body scanning to become part of the broader healthcare system. Listen to the full episode to hear more about: Why Farooq invested in Neko after trying the company's scan himself What Neko's $500 scan actually includes, and how the company keeps the price down Why Farooq thinks low primary-care utilization is one of the biggest problems in U.S. healthcare Why some consumer-health startups may be overfunded, in Farooq's view How better health data could open the door to a new generation of AI-powered healthcare Subscribe to Equity on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify and all the casts. You can also follow Equity on X and Threads, at @EquityPod. Chapters: 00:00 — Can Tech Reinvent Preventative Healthcare?01:44 — Why Spotify’s Founder Built Neko Health06:22 — Why Healthcare Is So Hard to Fix08:23 — Inside a $500 Neko Health Scan12:35 — Can Preventative Healthcare Scale?14:20 — The Risks of VC-Backed Healthcare17:28 — How AI Is Changing Medicine22:55 — Is AI in Healthcare Worth the Risk? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
9月23日

What’s next for cybersecurity, according to Index Ventures’ Shardul Shah

As concern over AI safety and rogue agents continue to make headlines, it’s no surprise that cybersecurity stocks are rising, or that investors are pouring massive amounts of capital into startups trying to build the next generation of security for an AI-native world. We’re even seeing companies like Instinct and Simile bring in nine-figure checks and valuations that wouldn't have made sense a few years ago. With a front row seat to it all is Shardul Shah, a partner at Index Ventures who’s spent nearly two decades investing in cybersecurity and enterprise software — including six consecutive rounds in cloud security startup Wiz, which Google acquired for $32 billion earlier this year in one of its largest acquisitions ever. On this episode of TechCrunch's Equity podcast, Shah joins Rebecca Bellan to break down why he thinks periodic, human-in-the-loop security can’t keep up anymore, and why Index continues investing in AI-native security companies at stages that once required much more proof. Listen to the full episode to hear more about: Why Shah thinks cyber insurance should be most companies’ first move in managing AI-era risk What happens when a single attacker can deploy a 10,000-agent ransomware swarm, and why that could force cybersecurity to become more machine-to-machine How Wiz’s founders paved the way for a new generation of startups, including Frame and Enigma Shah’s take on “pacing the frontier,” and why he thinks even a slowdown in model capability wouldn’t cool off cybersecurity investment Subscribe to Equity on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify and all the casts. You also can follow Equity on X and Threads, at @EquityPod. Chapters: 00:00 Intro 02:02 Why AI is creating a new cybersecurity category 05:16 The cyber insurance layer most companies overlook 09:15 Why Index is betting on AI-native security platforms 12:40 Will Wiz become a talent factory for new startups? 14:46 What actually makes a founder worth betting on 16:11 The hard part of knowing when to double down 18:53 Why Shardul says he’s not a visionary investor 21:16 How AI could reshape the entire security stack 24:18 What makes an AI security startup defensible 25:14 Why he doesn’t want to find “the next Wiz” 26:48 Why investors are writing huge checks so early 29:39 What happens to AI valuations if the frontier gets paced 31:01 Outro Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
7月24日

‘AI communism’, rogue models, and the why Kimi K3 spooked Wall Street

Chinese AI lab Moonshot's open model Kimi went viral this week for reasons that had less to do with the model itself and more to do with how the U.S. AI industry reacted to it. Meanwhile, an unreleased OpenAI model wandered outside its test environment and ended up connected to a real security breach at Hugging Face — a reminder that “China risk” isn't the only kind of AI risk worth worrying about. On this episode of TechCrunch's Equity podcast, hosts Kirsten Korosec, Anthony Ha, and Sean O'Kane dig into why Kimi K3 set off a fresh round of AI panic, the industry’s response to an OpenAI staffer's “regulatory FUD” post, and what that OpenAI breach means for AI security more broadly. Listen to the full episode to hear more about: Why EVs are getting killed off across the U.S. even as automakers roll out new models, and how Rivian and Ford, and a wave of new startups are betting on different EV strategies to survive What Sila's $300 million raise says about where battery investment is headed even as EV demand cools Travis Kalanick's comeback with a $1.7 billion raise for his robotics startup, Atoms, and why we’re surprised to see Uber among its investors Subscribe to Equity on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify and all the casts. You also can follow Equity on X and Threads, at @EquityPod. Chapters: 00:00 Intro 1:39 Chinese AI model Kimi sparks a Wall Street freakout 10:45 OpenAI model breaks out of a test, Hugging Face breach 15:53 Why EVs are getting killed off in the U.S. 20:35 Tax credits, free markets, and the road ahead for EVs 28:56 Sila raises $300M for battery materials 32:20 Travis Kalanick's Atoms raises $1.7B, with Uber as an investor 36:39 Outro Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
8月14日

Meta's “open” AI, data centers' hidden costs, and a $250M deal gone very wrong

Meta released Glimmer this week, an open-weight AI model anyone can download and run on their own hardware — a contrast to Muse Spark, the company’s more powerful model that stays locked behind its own APIs. The release landed alongside a letter from Mark Zuckerberg arguing AI should be “for everyone” rather than controlled by a handful of labs, but as Equity’s hosts point out, the vision comes with some asterisks. On this episode of TechCrunch's Equity podcast, Kirsten Korosec, Anthony Ha, and Rebecca Bellan take a look at Glimmer, Zuckerberg’s 6,500-word manifesto, and more of the week’s headlines, from the true cost of the AI industry’s energy needs to a $250M acquisition gone very wrong. Listen to the full episode to hear more about: Who’s on the market for a $300 cocktail robot? Why Anthropic is adding watermarks to its generated text, and users are not happy. The potential cost Amazon’s planned data center in Texas and the startups racing to fix the grid, including Form Energy’s $750M raise for 100-hour batteries, Reservoir’s $8M bet on smarter water heaters, and Discovered Materials’ hunt for cooler chips. Why Joby Aviation’s $500M acquisition of a defense contractor reminds Kirsten of its Blade deal last year — and what the 2028 LA Olympics have to do with it. How a $250M deal between video-clipping startup VideoVerse and sports publisher Minute Media collapsed amidst allegedly forged documents, multiple lawsuits, and a CEO nobody can reach. Subscribe to Equity on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify and all the casts. You also can follow Equity on X and Threads, at @EquityPod. 00:00 Intro 1:20 Would you buy a $300 cocktail robot? 3:08 Meta's Glimmer and the “AI for everyone” pitch 8:03 Anthropic starts watermarking its writing, and users have thoughts 14:34 Amazon's data center and its natural gas problem 16:37 The startups racing to keep the grid from melting down: Form Energy, Reservoir, and Discovered Materials 23:28 Joby Aviation buys into defense with Resonant Sciences 28:24 The $250M VideoVerse-Minute Media deal, a missing CEO, and a mess of lawsuits 32:37 Outro Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

TechCrunch podcasts cover the business of technology, startups, venture capital funding, crypto, and the humans behind it all.

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Amazon drops data center NDAs, and AI agents want your credit card

Automattic's 33-Hour coup, and can AI labs police themselves?

Call it AI, call it Super Intelligence, only 2% of consumers are buying it

Meta’s Muse just stole the spotlight from OpenAI and Anthropic

Why Thrive, Founders Fund, and Antonio Gracias are betting on hearing aids

After selling to P&G and Lululemon, these founders are building for life beyond the screen

A Neko Health investor on the $700M bet to scan your whole body

What’s next for cybersecurity, according to Index Ventures’ Shardul Shah

‘AI communism’, rogue models, and the why Kimi K3 spooked Wall Street

Meta's “open” AI, data centers' hidden costs, and a $250M deal gone very wrong

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