NASA has selected SpaceX to develop a spacecraft that will deorbit the International Space Station in 2030 — a contract valued at as much as $843 million, the agency announced Wednesday. The ISS is nearing the end of its operational life, and as plans for new, commercially-owned space stations heat up, the one that started […]
The Department of Justice has charged a Russian civilian with conspiracy to destroy Ukrainian government computer systems as part of a widespread hacking effort by Russia ahead of its illegal invasion of Ukraine. U.S. prosecutors in Maryland said Wednesday that Amin Stigal, 22, is wanted for helping to set up servers used by Russian government […]
Can chatbots replace human therapists? Some startups — and patients — claim that they can. But it’s not exactly settled science. One study found that 80% of people who’ve used OpenAI’s ChatGPT for mental health advice consider it a good alternative to regular therapy, while a separate report found that chatbots can be effective in […]
Sierra Space’s Dream Chaser spaceplane is off the manifest for United Launch Alliance’s second Vulcan Centaur flight due to scheduling delays, with an “inert payload” taking its place, the rocket company said on Wednesday. Sierra reportedly informed ULA that it had “significant risk” toward making the September launch date and that it would “step aside” […]
Facing new competition from startups like Arc, Google announced on Wednesday that it’s bringing five new features to the Chrome browser on mobile devices, each designed to enhance the search experience. These include new shortcuts for local search results, a refreshed address bar for easier navigation, trending search suggestions, live sports cards for fans, and […]
Jerry Pratt and Figure quietly parted ways last month. The MIT research scientist spent just under two years with the Bay Area-based robotics firm. In 2022, he left Boardwalk Robotics, a humanoid startup he founded and led, and joined Figure’s well-funded ranks as CTO months before it exited stealth. It was only last week, however, […]
Hiya, folks, and welcome to TechCrunch’s regular AI newsletter. This week in AI, music labels accused two startups developing AI-powered song generators, Udio and Suno, of copyright infringement. The RIAA, the trade organization representing the music recording industry in the U.S., announced lawsuits against the companies on Monday, brought by Sony Music Entertainment, Universal Music […]
TikTok earlier this month launched a new social app called Whee, an Instagram-like service for taking photos to share with friends. Like Instagram, Whee also supports the use of photo filters and includes messaging. However, the company’s plans for Whee aren’t clear, as the app has relatively few downloads and has yet to advertise itself […]
You can barely go an hour these days without reading about generative AI. While we are still in the embryonic phase of what some have dubbed the “steam engine” of the fourth industrial revolution, there’s little doubt that “GenAI” is shaping up to transform just about every industry — from finance and health care to […]
The European Union has announced the winners of a “Large AI Grand Challenge” it kicked off earlier this year in a bid to accelerate the pace of homegrown innovation by large-scale AI model makers. Four startups will share €1 million in prize money and — perhaps more importantly — eight million GPU hours to train […]