Post-IPO blahs, OpenAI gives ChatGPT a voice, and Michael Saylor's MicroStrategy is on a new Bitcoin-buying binge

Amazon is backing AI startup Anthropic to the tune of $1.25 billion with an option to increase its stake to $4 billion. As part of the deal, Anthropic has agreed to use Amazon's AWS cloud services. Although Anthropic didn't disclose how much Amazon's investment was worth to the company, it raised $450 million in May at a $5 billion valuation.

ChatGPT can now speak. It's not just another Siri or Alexa, OpenAI claims. “You can now have two-way conversations,” Joanne Jang, a product lead, told the WSJ.

Costco will shortly offer virtual care visits to its members for $29 thanks to a partnership with Sesame, a health marketplace backed by Google.

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Lepaya, a five-year-old Amsterdam startup whose platform that helps clients such as ING, Dell, and Maersk teach their workers new skills, raised a $38 million round led by Endeit Capital, with Educapital, Mars Growth Capital, Liquidity Capital, and previous investors Target Global and Mediahuis Ventures also taking part. The company has raised a total of $80 million. EU-Startups has more here.

Nx, a seven-year-old startup based in Gilbert, Az., that is developing tooling to make it simpler for software dev teams to work within a single code repository, raised a $16 million Series A round from Nexus Venture Partners and Andreessen Horowitz. TechCrunch has more here.

Traceless Materials, a three-year-old Hamburg startup that has created a substitute for plastic that it claims is bio-based and home-compostable, raised a $38.8 million Series A round co-led by United Bankers and Swen Capital Partners, with GLS Bank and Hamburger Sparkasse as well as previous investors Planet A Ventures, High-Tech Gründerfonds, and b.value also contributing. Silicon Canals has more here.

Vegrow, an Indian startup that runs a business-to-business marketplace for fruits, is reportedly in talks with GIC (the Singapore sovereign fund), about leading a $40 million Series C round. Prosus Ventures led the company's Series B round last year. TechCrunch has more here.

Continuum Industries, a five-year-old Edinburgh startup that uses AI to enable utilities to plan the routing of power lines, onshore and offshore cables, and pipelines for hydrogen, water, and CO2, raised a $10 million Series A round led by Singular, with additional participation from previous investors Credo, Playfair, and Techstart Ventures. The company has raised a total of $15.5 million. EU-Startups has more here.

Peregrine Hydrogen, a startup based in Santa Cruz, Ca., that is focused on creating climate-friendly hydrogen that is cost-competitive with dirtier fuel made from methane, spun out of Orca Sciences and raised a $7.8 million seed round led by Bidra, with additional funds provided by Gates Frontier, Builders, Presidio Ventures, RiSC Capital, and Schox. GeekWire has more here.

Correcto, a two-year-old Madrid startup that is building a "Grammarly for Spanish," raised a $7 million seed round. Investors included Octopus Ventures, Carya Venture Partners, and River Park Ventures. The company has raised a total of $8 million. TechCrunch has more here.

Mintago, a four-year-old UK startup that allows companies to provide their employees with pension help, financial advice, and savings options, raised a $4.75 million round led by BlackLion Ventures, with Love Ventures and Cur8 Capital also joining in. The company has raised a total of $5.2 million. Tech.eu has more here.

Gizmo, a two-year-old London startup that uses generative AI to devise gamified quizzes to engage learners, raised a $3.5 million seed round from NFX, Ada Ventures, and Capital T. TechCrunch has more here.

TeachMe.To, a two-year-old startup that operates a sports coaching platform for beginner athletes in sports like pickleball, tennis, golf, surfing, and boxing, raised a $2 million seed round led by 1984 Ventures, with participation from Common Metal and Alumni Ventures as well as angel investors such as  OpenAI CEO Sam Altman. TechCrunch has more here. 

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Dawn Capital, one of Europe’s biggest backers of business software companies, raised $700 million in capital commitments across two new funds: a $620 million early-stage fund and an $80 million “opportunities” fund for growth-stage firms in Dawn Capital’s existing portfolio. CNBC has more here.

Fuse, a three-year-old VC firm based in Seattle that focuses on early-stage enterprise software startups in the Pacific Northwest, raised a $250 million second fund. TechCrunch has more here.

Billionaire Xavier Niel is investing €200 million ($212 million) in AI, split between a future research lab to be located in Paris, cloud supercomputing capabilities powered by Nvidia hardware, and funding for startups. The effort aims to lure top French AI engineers — who left to work for big tech firms — back to their home country, where they can build AI products to rival the likes of OpenAI, Niel said in an interview with Bloomberg.

Arm, Instacart, and Klaviyo are all trading at or below their initial IPO price. 

According to Puck, Donald Trump had a heated call earlier this year with Peter Thiel about Thiel's decision to forego funding Trump's third presidential run.

Blue Origin is replacing retiring CEO Bob Smith with outgoing Amazon exec Dave Limp, who worked closely with Amazon founder and CEO Jeff Bezos as well as Bezos's successor, Andy Jassy.

The Silicon Valley movers and shakers (Marc Andreessen, Michael Moritz, Reed Hoffman, Laurene Powell Jobs, et. al.) who were revealed this past August to have purchased over 50,000 acres of Solano County farmland, reportedly want to build a "city of yesterday."

MicroStrategy, the company best known as the largest publicly traded holder of Bitcoin, added to its hoard of the world’s largest cryptocurrency in the past two months, using stock sales to help fund the almost $150 million worth of purchases.

ChatGPT has succeeded where other LLMs have failed by placing a human thumb on the scale.

A Harvard Business School study found that ChatGPT-4 improved the quality of work of Boston Consulting Group consultants by 40%.

Getty made an AI generator that only trained on its licensed images

Is the iPhone 15 just too hot to handle?

The NYPD is deploying a 420-pound security robot at the Times Square subway station. 

Flesh-eating bacteria cases are on the rise.

Jellyfish have advanced learning skills similar to humans.  

My Saturday self versus my Sunday self.

Here's where you can buy the Travis Kelce ensemble that broke the Internet this weekend. (Hey, it apparently works for Taylor Swift.)

Airless bicycle tires. 

An amphibious cooler.

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