Wednesday, May 8, 2024

Good afternoon, and welcome to your Hump Day TechCrunch PM. I have a fun one for you that includes much ado about mushrooms, as well as a look at Google DeepMind’s new AlphaFold, cleaning robots, and a way to talk to people thousands of miles away from a New York park. Get ready to dig in!

TechCrunch Top 3

Image Credits: Google DeepMind

Meet AlphaFold 3: The third time just might be the charm for Google DeepMind, which showed off the newest version of its transformative machine learning model that predicts the shape and behavior of proteins. AlphaFold 3 is not only more accurate, but it also predicts interactions with other biomolecules, making it a far more versatile research tool. Read More

Atlan secures $105 million: The data governance startup developed a tool for controlling and collaborating around data, pulling together the myriad data sources and bringing some control to the data chaos inside large organizations. Read More

A Portal to Dublin: Sounds like a story title, right? Video Window put up a Portal in New York City that combines technology, sociology, anthropology and art to let people interact with one another in real time between two cities. This one is a portal to Dublin. Read More

Afternoon must-reads

Image Credits: Google

Circle to Search: Now iPhone users can join in on the fun of Google’s “Circle to Search” gesture. To do this, Google is now using Apple’s Action Button on iPhone 15 Pro devices to enable a quick way to visually search anything on your screen with just a press of a button. Read More

Match’s future may Hinge on which app daters like the most: Match Group’s first-quarter earnings show people are more willing to pay for the Hinge app, while Tinder’s subscriber base declined for the sixth quarter in a row. Read More

Is AI the secret to a successful fundraise?: Intently puts it to the test. Its new service, Founder AI, will go through your personal data, understand who you know, sort those connections based on their own background in terms of what they have built, and then craft a few recommended paths to warm investor intros from your existing founder network. Read More

Uber exclusives: The ride-hailing behemoth plans to deliver more perks to Uber One members, including member-exclusive events. This is all in a bid to gain more revenue through subscriptions. Read More

Mixing mushrooms with tires: Myocycle is making old new again with help from fungi. The startup creates plastic-like polymers from trash by turning it into treasure that doesn’t deplete the environment the way oil and gas-made plastics do. Read More

Positive social media: Gratitude Plus is a startup that encourages users to establish healthier relationships and better mental wellness habits by offering a space for journaling, mood tracking, and staying in touch with family and friends through small, private “circles” within its app. Read More

Money, money, money

Bye-bye, bots: Altera’s game-playing AI agents get backing from Eric Schmidt. Read More

Meati Foods bites into another $100 million amid growth to 7,000 retail locations. Read More

Controversial drone company Xtend leans into defense with a new $40 million round. Read More

Xona Space Systems closes a $19 million Series A to build out ultra-accurate GPS alternative. Read More

Israeli startup Panax raises a $10 million Series A for its AI-driven cash-flow management platform. Read More

Around the web

Image Credits: Getty Images/Patra Kongsirimongkolchai / EyeEm

AstraZeneca pulls COVID vaccine from market in Europe: The Associated Press reports that while the vaccine was approved back in 2021, European Medicines Agency made the decision to pull it after blood clots were detected in a small number of immunized people. However, regulators concluded the vaccine did not raise the risk for blood clots. Read More

Tesla under investigation: Elon Musk’s comments about Tesla’s self-driving technology have landed him in a U.S. Department of Justice probe again, Quartz reports. Read More

Looking for a new watch?: ZDNet has a look at Mobvoi's TicWatch Pro 5 Enduro. Read More

TechCrunch Minute

When did iPads get as expensive as MacBooks?: Apple’s iPad event this week had a lot to like. New iPads with new chips and new sizes, a new Apple Pencil, and even some software updates. If you are a big fan of Apple hardware, well, it was probably a good day. Now you can get an updated and thinner iPad Pro, if that’s your jam. But while watching the event and parsing its news in the immediate aftermath, Alex Wilhelm ran into a personal sticking point. While it’s welcome that iPads are getting more and more powerful, their price point is challenging and even surpassing those of many computers. Which seems a little bit backward. Hit play and let’s chat!