TechCrunch
January 2026
HomeBoost’s app will show you where to save on your utility bills
Given my love of surveys, I surveyed a ton — a ton — of customers,
We talked to a bunch of consumers who’d gotten home energy assessments done, and there this feeling that was like ‘all they did was try to sell me up an upgraded HVAC,’
It’s a very unique situation where everybody’s aligned to actually lower the utility bill, which in the net result is improvement on the climate,
When we talked to consumers, we heard the same thing over and over again: They get that email that says, ‘Hey, you spend more money than your neighbors,’
Nvidia CEO pushes back against report that his company’s $100B OpenAI investment has stalled
We will invest a great deal of money,
Let [OpenAI CEO Sam Altman] announce how much he’s going to raise — it’s for him to decide.”
SpaceX seeks federal approval to launch 1 million solar-powered satellite data centers
The company’s filing lays out a grandiose vision, not just describing these planned satellites as “the most efficient way to meet the accelerating demand for AI computing power” but also framing them as “a first step towards becoming a Kardashev II-level civilization — one that can harness the Sun’s full power” while also “ensuring humanity’s multi-planetary future amongst the stars.”
Waymo reportedly raising a $16B funding round
More than three-fourths of that funding will reportedly come from a source close to home — Alphabet, where Waymo is a subsidiary
While we don’t comment on private financial matters, our trajectory is clear: with over 20 million trips completed, we are focused on the safety-led operational excellence and technological leadership required to meet the vast demand for autonomous mobility.”
Uber is literally in the driver’s seat when it comes to AV bets
Uber puts another chip on the self-driving roulette table
Reid Hoffman urges Silicon Valley leaders to stop bending the knee to President Trump
We in Silicon Valley can’t bend the knee to Trump. We can’t shrink away and hope the crisis fades. Hope without action is not a strategy –– it’s an invitation for Trump to trample whatever he can see, including our own business and security interests.”
Russian hackers breached Polish power grid thanks to bad security, report says
On Friday, Poland’s Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT), which is part of the Ministry of Digital Affairs, released a technical report about an incident at the end of last year, where suspected Russian government hackers hacked wind and solar farms and a heat-and-power plant
All of the attacks were purely destructive in nature — by analogy to the physical world, they can be compared to deliberate acts of arson,
Blue Origin pauses space tourism flights to focus on the moon
The decision puts a temporary halt on a program that Blue Origin has been using to fly humans past the Kármán line, the recognized boundary of space, for the last five years
The decision reflects Blue Origin’s commitment to the nation’s goal of returning to the Moon and establishing a permanent, sustained lunar presence,
Informant told FBI that Jeffrey Epstein had a ‘personal hacker’
The hacker allegedly developed zero-day exploits and offensive cyber tools and sold them to several countries, including an unnamed central African government, the U.K., and the United States
OnlyFans considering selling majority stake to Architect Capital
The deal would value the platform at $5.5 billion
OpenClaw’s AI assistants are now building their own social network
The lobster has molted into its final form.”
I added quite a few people from the open source community to the list of maintainers this week,
I got someone to help with researching trademarks for OpenClaw and also asked OpenAI for permission just to be sure,
We need to back people like Peter who are building open source tools anyone can pick up and use,
Remember that prompt injection is still an industry-wide unsolved problem,
This project has grown far beyond what I could maintain alone,
Deezer makes it easier for rival platforms to take a stance against AI-generated music
Last year, Deezer introduced an AI detection tool that automatically tags fully AI-generated music for listeners and removes it from algorithmic and editorial recommendations
Waymo robotaxi hits a child near an elementary school in Santa Monica
Following contact, the pedestrian stood up immediately, walked to the sidewalk, and we called 911. The vehicle remained stopped, moved to the side of the road, and stayed there until law enforcement cleared the vehicle to leave the scene,
Google Maps now lets you access Gemini while walking and cycling
The update comes a few months after Google Maps rolled out its Gemini-powered hands-free, conversational driving experience
Tesla’s energy storage business is growing faster than any other part of the company
Despite these challenges, as AI infrastructure drives rapid load growth, we see opportunities for our energy storage products to stabilize the grid, shift energy when it is needed most and provide additional power capacity,
Flapping Airplanes and the promise of research-driven AI
Music publishers sue Anthropic for $3B over ‘flagrant piracy’ of 20,000 works
This lawsuit was filed by the same legal team from the Bartz v. Anthropic case, in which a group of fiction and nonfiction authors similarly accused the AI company of using their copyrighted works to train products like Claude
While Anthropic misleadingly claims to be an AI ‘safety and research’ company, its record of illegal torrenting of copyrighted works makes clear that its multibillion-dollar business empire has in fact been built on piracy,
I built marshmallow castles in Google’s new AI-world generator
Google DeepMind is opening up access to Project Genie, its AI tool for creating interactive game worlds from text prompts or images
The reason we limit it to 60 seconds is because we wanted to bring it to more users,
I think it’s exciting to be in a place where we can have more people access it and give us feedback,
We don’t think about [Project Genie] as an end-to-end product that people can go back to everyday, but we think there is already a glimpse of something that’s interesting and unique and can’t be done in another way,
Waymo robotaxis are now giving rides to and from San Francisco International Airport
After years of negotiations and false starts, Waymo is now allowed to operate a robotaxi service to and from the San Francisco International Airport (SFO)
Serving rides to and from San Francisco International Airport delivers one of the most requested features for our riders and further deepens our relationship with the city,
Apple buys Israeli startup Q.ai as the AI race heats up
As first reported by Reuters, Apple has acquired Q.ai, an Israeli startup specializing in imaging and machine learning, particularly technologies that enable devices to interpret whispered speech and enhance audio in noisy environments
Satya Nadella insists people are using Microsoft’s Copilot AI a lot
The fact that BOTH Azure and the M365 segments fell a bit short is the key negative we’re hearing,
Microsoft won’t stop buying AI chips from Nvidia, AMD, even after launching its own, Nadella says
We have a great partnership with Nvidia, with AMD. They are innovating. We are innovating,
Because we can vertically integrate doesn’t mean we just only vertically integrate,
Amazon is reportedly in talks to invest $50B in OpenAI
OpenAI, a company already valued at $500 billion, has made it known that it’s on the hunt for another $100 billion in investment
The iPhone just had its best quarter ever
It was driven by iPhone, where we set an all-time revenue record,
We did set a quarterly revenue record during the December quarter,
IPhone had its best-ever quarter driven by unprecedented demand, with all-time records across every geographic segment,
I would tell you that during the quarter, traffic in our stores in China grew by strong double digits year over year,