Tuesday, April 2, 2024

Welcome to TechCrunch AM! This morning, we have the latest on OpenAI, notes on a fascinating new venture fund, and why Truth Social isn't a startup. There's also two very different perspectives on the future of AI in music, and a look at the tribulations of space companies. Talk about a busy morning! — Alex

TechCrunch Top 3

1. Sam Altman lets go of the reins of OpenAI’s venture fund: Following OpenAI’s leadership crisis last year, Altman’s control of OpenAI’s venture arm looked both odd and risky given that he was briefly fired from the company. Altman is now back atop OpenAI, of course, but formal control of the nine-figure venture fund has been transferred to Ian Hathaway, who joined OpenAI in 2021 and played a key role managing the Startup Fund... Read More

2. Margins or private jets? Building an EV company is incredibly expensive and hard. So is taking commercial flights, apparently. Canoo, which is losing hundreds of millions of dollars per year against revenue below a million dollars, has been spending about $1 million to $2 million per year to pay for its CEO’s private jet usage. Seems a little expensive, no? Read More

3. Don’t expect Slack to benefit from Microsoft unbundling Teams: Years after Slack filed a complaint about Microsoft bundling Teams with Office, Microsoft has now decided to unbundle the corporate chat service. However, as TechCrunch’s Ron Miller notes, Teams has already grown to a large multiple of Slack’s size. The win may have come too late... Read More

Morning Must Reads

Autism Impact Fund closes $60M first fund, plans another: A venture capital firm with a goal to become the “investment and innovation arm of the autism community,” Autism Impact Fund has closed $10 million more for its first fund than it targeted. The firm has 12 portfolio companies, and TechCrunch reports that it will start raising its second fund in less than a year... Read More

Truth Social is no startup: Despite being valued extremely highly, having a nascent product that has yet to reach any kind of scale, and large incumbent competitors, Truth Social’s parent company Trump Media and Technology Group is no startup. Devin Coldevey argues that there are three main reasons why: TMTG isn’t growing; it doesn’t have any VC runway; and as a public company, it is now accountable to its shareholders... Read More

Beyoncé criticizes AI music: With her latest album breaking streaming records, Beyoncé says she “wanted to go back to real instruments” in this era of increased dependence on AI and programming to compose music. Given her cultural influence, Beyoncé’s comments could steer public opinion on how music is made and the best way to go about it... Read More

TikTok to bring its STEM feed to Europe: As it faces regulatory scrutiny and some consumer concern around the world, TikTok is working to expand its content mix in key markets. The short-form video app launched a dedicated science, technology, engineering, and mathematics feed inside its service in the United States last year, and is now bringing that feed to Europe... Read More

Fake eggs are making real progress: Egg prices were the topic of much humor and memes when they exited orbit in 2023, but they’ve come down back to Earth since then. Still, that hasn’t stopped startups from working on alternatives to the humble egg. Onego Bio, for example, is working on a “animal-free egg white alternative called Bioalbumen,” Christine Hall reports. Given the impact of poultry farming on our climate, such alternatives could become pretty important in the coming years... Read More

Indeed is bringing AI to its recruiting service: In the wake of LinkedIn’s own AI push, recruiting platform Indeed has AI plans, too. These include allowing users to employ AI to craft their personal documents, like resumes, as well as AI-powered tools recruiters can use to better filter candidates. AI on both sides of the proverbial table? I expect to see more of this... Read More

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Around the Web

1. Apple didn’t want Jon Stewart to talk to Lina Khan: If you want to do impactful journalism, don’t try to do it with a major tech company. Axios reports that former Apple TV+ host Jon Stewart told the FTC’s Lina Khan that his former employer didn’t want him to speak with her, and was too conservative with its content strategy in other ways... Read More

2. More on AI in music: Sony Music’s Bob Stringer tells the FT that the best AI-powered music won’t be mashups of existing or former artists, but new creativity unlocked by fresh artists. Let’s hope that rosy picture is in our future and not poorly composed derivatives of whatever’s hot at the moment... Read More

3. U.S. ratchets up chip pressure on China: Bloomberg reports that the United States government is not done putting pressure on China’s chip industry. Now, Washington is leaning on South Korea to reduce its chip-related exports to China... Read More

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Before You Go

Sometimes rockets go boom: The commercial space launch industry has never been more impressive in terms of its ability to get lots of rockets into space, but that progress has been hard won. For example, back in 2020, Astra’s Rocket 3.0 went boom. SpaceX once made light of its own trials and errors in getting returned boosters to land on drone ships. The clip is evidence of the heartbreak that rocket companies have to power through to get to where they want to be, even if Astra wound up struggling to commercialize its work... Read More