TechCrunch Startups – Spoken Edition

AI coding startup Cursor is now officially a part of SpaceX. Also, OpenRouter's CEO recently described the startup as Stripe for AI. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Investors are still waiting for their share of the $250 million windfall, and VideoVerse co-founder Vinayak Shrivastav is now at the center of multiple legal cases. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Reservoir has built an ultra-efficient water heater that can predict hot water demand, store energy, and detect plumbing leaks throughout a home. Also, Blacksmith says revenue has grown more than tenfold over the past year. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

An OpenClaw agent hacked into a gym's reservation system to bump its human boss higher on a class's waitlist. And the tech industry took notice. Also, fusion power startups are turning to Kyoto Fusioneering to supply components for future power plants. The Japan-based startup just received a grant to build a part of the fuel system. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Discovered Materials raised $9 million to fund the hunt for more novel materials to build more efficient chips. Plus, embattled hedge fund Situational Awareness invests $400M in chip startup Source Foundry. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

More than 20 years ago, King's Cross was one of the seediest area's in London. Now it's sprouting something new. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

-Taking vibe-coding a step further, Naive claims its infra can automate most of the work in setting up and running a business. -Defense tech Hadrian raises $1.37B at $8B valuation -Athens-based Omilia, which has been working on automating voice calls and customer support since 2002, throwing AI at every process can be wasteful.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

-WindBorne Systems has raised a $37 million Series B round to scale its weather balloons and AI forecasts. -Hark claims that its browser use agent is faster and cheaper than competition. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Texas Governor Greg Abbott has paused new data center development until an audit has been completed. Also, on Tuesday, AI infrastructure company Runware announced the launch of its own modular data center called Sonic Inference Pod. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

June emerged from stealth today with a $20 million pre-seed round to make AI adoption simpler. Also, Base Power's $1 billion round will help the startup ramp production of its home batteries. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

There are fresh signs that fusion power startup Commonwealth Fusion Systems will list in the next two to three years. Also, the Okta/Permiso deal gives Okta identity threat detection capabilities as enterprises seek to secure AI agents and other non-human identities across cloud environments. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Dili's Series A was led by Khosla Ventures, with participation from Allianz, Rebel Fund, Brick and Mortar Ventures' Darren Bechtel, and Y Combinator's Garry Tan. Also, Commonwealth Fusion Systems raised $1 billion as the startup moves toward its first commercial fusion power plant. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Pangram has raised $9 million to scale its AI detection software. The startup has also released a new AI text detection model, Pangram 4, and an AI image detection model in research preview. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Runlayer is suing Rippling after Rippling evaluated the startup's MCP gateway product and then opted to build one itself. Also, Ozlo unveiled Sleepbuds 2, an updated version of its original product that tackles key areas of improvement, including battery life, connectivity, and sound quality.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Antares has raised $470 million to build small modular reactors — 100 kW to 1 MW — for U.S. Air Force bases. Also, fusion power startup Thea Energy snagged a $20 million award from ARPA-E to scale production of its high-temperature superconducting magnets. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Etched, founded by three Harvard dropouts, has created new chips and memory components that speed up inference on any AI model -- no GPUs required, it says. Also, Imagi announced a $4.5 million seed round, with investors including Brighteye Ventures, Day One Capital, and artist Wil.i.am. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Colossal Biosciences is in talks to raise new funding at a $20 billion to $30 billion valuation, Axios reported. Also, Passionfroot, a German startup building a marketplace connecting B2B creators with brands, has raised $15M in a Series A round led by Insight Partners. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Gritt is coming out of stealth with $34 million and plan to automate the hardest tasks on construction sites. Also, maritime nuclear energy startup Bluecore Energy has raised $10 million in a pre-seed funding round led by Slauson & Co. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The potential deal highlights a growing trend of complex, multi-stage funding rounds that mask true entry prices. Also, Databricks has remade its image into an AI company and has published research on the cost savings of open weight AI models for coding. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Applied Computing has raised a $20M Series A to build a foundation AI model for the oil, gas and petrochemical industry. Also, travel agency Fora announced a $60 million Series D round led by Forerunner and Tactile Ventures, valuing the company at $1 billion. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

While everyone in AI is chasing "superintelligence." Alexandre LeBrun, CEO of Yann LeCun's world model startup, AMI Labs, dismisses the word. Also, Syntetica, a French startup that has developed a novel approach to recycling nylon, has already obtained big-name partners and investors. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Rime is handling over 100 million calls each month across multiple companies Also, Anthropic-backed Ode launches as AI labs bet that embedding forward-deployed engineers inside enterprises is the key to accelerating enterprise AI adoption. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The company is raising at least $75 million, led by Robot, with significant participation from USV and other prominent investors. Also, kid-friendly tech company Pinwheel announced the launch of a new landline phone designed to let children stay connected without the distractions of a smartphone. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Phia, the shopping startup founded by Bill Gates' daughter, Phoebe, and her friend, Sophia Kianni, is under fire for a practice known as “cookie stuffing,” which helped the product receive commissions and credit for sales it did not actually generate, per a Bloomberg investigation. Also, Lyzr, a startup that builds AI agents for enterprises, used its own AI agent to raise a $100 million round — proof, evidently, that the product actually works. Plus, the new startup raised $300 million co-led by ARCH Venture Partners, Spark Capital, and Khosla Ventures. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

AI chip maker SambaNova has raised at an $11 billion valuation months after Intel was rumored to be trying to buy it for about $1.6 billion. Plus, Benchmark-backed Ollama has amassed 176,000 stars, and nearly 17,000 forks on Github by helping developers easily run AI on their PCs. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Build a new kind of rocket engine, and the world will beat a path to your door. Also, Blue Origin is raising $10 billion at a $130 billion pre-money valuation from Coatue Asset Management, Bezos himself and other big-name investors, the New York Times reported. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Bidbus, which lets dealerships bid on used cars, has raised $15 million in a Series A round that was led by early-stage mobility fund Ibex Investors. Also, Savi just raised $7 million in seed funding, and is launching its app for iPhone and Android on Tuesday. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Station F, the Paris-based startup hub founded by French billionaire Xavier Niel in 2017, is gearing up for a new edition of its selective acceleration F/ai program that will cement its role as a stepping stone for AI startups. Also, Even Realities, an ex-Apple team building camera-free smart glasses, raised $150M from Meituan and Tencent at a $1B valuation. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

As part of an ongoing legal dispute with three Hollywood studios, Midjourney is seeking to compel those studios to reveal how they use AI themselves. Also, Selby's VC firm Copper Sky Capital is currently raising a $300 million second fund, according to a regulatory filing. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Nvidia AI chip competitor Etched says it has already booked $1 billion under contract for the inference systems powered by its chip. Also, Neo is Bhavin Turakhia's fifth venture and his latest involving enterprise software. This time he's taking on Microsoft Office, Google Apps with AI. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The startup, which runs a popular free AI leaderboard, launched its commercial service just last September. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Corgi became embroiled in controversy when Papermark accused it of stealing its software. Corgi says it did not, raising new questions about vibe coding. Also, Omen AI raised a $31 million Series A to monitor chip coolant and stop bacterial outbreaks in data centers. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Aseon Labs, which came out of Y Combinator's 2026 spring cohort, has raised $10 million from Crane Venture Partners and others. Also, General Intuition has raised $320 million to scale AI trained on millions of hours of gameplay, betting action data can help AI develop something closer to human intuition. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The Jeff Bezos-backed startup finally revealed more pricing details for its debut EV, including a $29,950 starting price for the SUV variant, and boosted the base range to 205 miles. Plus, new details have emerged about Valor's latest fund, which last year announced it was raising an unspecified amount of capital. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Fika Jobs announced on Tuesday a $4 million pre-seed round, which will be used to continue developing the platform, grow the team, and prepare for a wider launch later this year. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

After 18 years of focusing on Europe, early-stage investor Seedcamp said that it has raised $320 million for its latest fund which will see it expanding its presence in the United States. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

French serial entrepreneur and open-source legend Jean-Baptiste Kempf has been building Kyber, an infrastructure layer to control remote devices in real time. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

World models are the next big thing in AI beyond LLMs and, with this round, Odyssey has cemented itself as one of the startups to watch. Also, General Intuition is in talks to raise around $300 million at a roughly $2 billion valuation from backers including Jeff Bezos. The startup trains AI agents on spatial-temporal reasoning. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Critical Energy is turning rocket engines into geothermal power plants, and it wants to build 300 GW per year by 2045. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Instead of heating metals, Foundation Alloy beats them into submission. The startup has raised $22 million to scale up production of its alloys. Also, the company Probably wants to prevent hallucinations and factual errors from reaching users, and achieve accuracy on par with deterministic systems. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The new round values the physical AI startup that aims to automate heavy engineering and drug design at $41 billion. Also, unlike humanoid robots designed around a fixed form — think Boston Dynamics — Theker's machines are built to be reconfigured. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

SpaceX alumni Andrew Redd is betting the ocean has vast amounts of untapped geothermal energy. Also, the funding round was led by Norwest, with participation from S Capital VC, Cerca Partners, and Oceans Ventures. Snowflake Ventures also participated as a strategic investor. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices