Jio Financial’s lending, insurance offering puts another feather in Mukesh Ambani’s cap

Tuesday, October 17, 2023

Today’s top story is proof that billionaire Mukesh Ambani wants to touch more lives. His financial services firm Jio Financial has started to offer personal loans to salaried and self-employed individuals and offers a number of insurance coverage options. Get the scoop.

Meanwhile, Ray-Ban’s new Meta sunglasses have “influencer” written all over them, according to my colleague Brian Heater, who tested them out. Here’s why they are so cool.

And Microsoft shows us what happens when GPT-4 takes itself too seriously. There are some flaws.

Image Credits: Dhiraj Singh / Bloomberg / Getty Images

More top reads

Manifesto makes us scratch our heads: Famed venture capitalist Marc Andreessen blew up social media this week when he crafted a 5,000-word blog post that has him opining on everything from colonizing outer space to bringing back Reaganomics. This left some of my colleagues perplexed and wondering why the billionaire is so bullish that technology will save us. Read for yourself.

There’s always a catch: Amazon quietly rolls out support for passkeys but says keep that password handy just in case. Speaking of passkeys, WhatsApp is launching its own passkey support on Android.

Baby robot steps: Figure got its humanoid robot to walk for the camera. Check it out.

We’ve got the beat: AI-generating music app Riffusion turns viral success into $4 million in funding. Listen up.

More layoffs: The developer community site Stack Overflow cut 28% of its staff. This is why.

Is that a vape or a remote control?: Storz & Bickel announce the $448 Venty, its first new dry herb vaporizer in nearly 10 years. It’s big.

Here’s to the horn: Prove Identity is in unicorn territory after grabbing $40 million in new capital to expand in mobile-based authentication tech. Go ahead, verify it.

Link to your heart’s content: Snapchat is now allowing websites to embed content. Here’s how.

Fewer features: That’s what the new Apple Pencil has. Granted, it costs less than previous models. Write that down.

Users go bye-bye: We have a pair of X stories for you today. In the first one, a new report claims that one year post-acquisition, the former Twitter’s traffic and monthly active users are in decline. X’s new plan to lure subscribers? Partnering with Paris Hilton on a custom icon. That’s hot.

What once was lost, now is found: Invesco raises Swiggy’s valuation to nearly $8 billion after it was slashed earlier this year. See how it grew.

Connecting the world one dollar at a time: Nova Credit lands $45 million to grow its cross-border and alternative data credit products. Here’s how it moves money.

Into orbit: K2 Space is building a power-rich future for space exploration based on the premise that bigger is better. Read more.

Even more for your Tuesday:

Capella Space to replace founder and CEO Payam Banazadeh

Give biotech a chance for the planet’s sake, EU lawmakers urged

Trust & Safety Tycoon lets you simulate the most agonizing job in tech

Luxury EV maker Lucid misses the mark on deliveries

LeapFrog’s new fund to double down on financial and healthcare sectors in Africa and Asia

Image Credits: Steve Jennings / Stringer

Incorporate Foursquare Places data into your App and drive user engagement

On the pods

This week on Found, we’re bringing you a conversation with Hilary Mason from Hidden Door, an AI-driven narrative game engine. In this mini-episode, recorded in person at TechCrunch Disrupt, Dominic-Madori and Hilary get into how generative AI is changing online gaming, building a team of creatives, and fundraising in the gaming space. Listen here.