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Conduit, a 2024 San Francisco startup, offers $50 for two-hour sessions to train noninvasive AI that reads thoughts for a wearable telepathy device

Conduit, a San Francisco startup founded in 2024, is developing a noninvasive AI system to translate brain activity into text and aims to sell a wearable that lets users command assistants via thought; it is recruiting participants and offering $50 for two-hour recording sessions to collect training data. The effort sits alongside other efforts such as Meta’s Brain2Qwerty and contrasts with invasive approaches like Neuralink, raising questions about feasibility and ethics.

Wild Zebra raises $6M seed led by Trilogy to scale Socratic AI tutor for grades 2–9, total funding $8M

Seattle edtech startup Wild Zebra raised $6 million in an oversubscribed seed round to expand its AI math and reading tutor that uses a Socratic, interest-grounded approach for students in grades 2–9 and now reaches tens of thousands of users. The company will hire engineers and expand sales and marketing, and the round was led by Trilogy Equity Partners, bringing total funding to $8 million.

Naomi Bashkansky, 23, Leaves OpenAI to Join Conduit as Founding Researcher to Build Non‑Invasive Thought‑Decoding BCI

Naomi Bashkansky, a 23-year-old former OpenAI alignment researcher, resigned and joined startup Conduit as a founding researcher to develop non‑invasive brain‑reading technology that decodes thoughts using a head‑mounted device and large models.

DOJ and OpenAI/Statsig Agree to $3.2M Settlement Over Alleged Favoring of Visa Holders in Hiring

The U.S. Justice Department reached a $3.2 million settlement with OpenAI and its Bellevue subsidiary Statsig over allegations the companies favored temporary visa holders over U.S. workers in hiring and violated PERM labor-certification rules. The settlement requires reform of hiring practices for positions requiring visa sponsorship.

DOJ Obtains $3.2M Settlement from OpenAI and Statsig for Alleged Visa-Based Hiring Bias (Aug. 4, 2026)

The U.S. Justice Department secured a $3.2 million settlement on August 4, 2026, with OpenAI OpCo LLC and its subsidiary Statsig Inc. for allegedly discouraging U.S. applicants and favoring temporary visa holders during the PERM hiring process; OpenAI denied wrongdoing but agreed to pay and implement monitored hiring reforms.

Q1 2026 Venture Funding Hits $300B as AI Startups Capture $242B; OpenAI, Anthropic, xAI Raise Record Mega-Rounds

Global venture funding reached a record $300 billion in Q1 2026, with AI startups capturing about $242 billion (≈80% of total), driven by several mega-rounds. Major rounds included OpenAI ($122B), Anthropic ($30B) and xAI ($20B), while blockchain–AI projects and new investors like the IFC are beginning to converge on the space.

Mariana Minerals Raises $310M Series B Led by Khosla Ventures to Scale AI-Driven Copper and Lithium Operations

Mariana Minerals raised $310 million in a Series B led by Khosla Ventures (with a16z and Breakthrough Energy Ventures among others) to scale its AI-driven vertically integrated copper and lithium mining and refining operations in the U.S., bringing total funding to about $400 million.

Formic Technologies opens 13,000-square-foot Oakland facility to develop humanoid robots

Formic Technologies opened a 13,000-square-foot facility in Oakland to develop humanoid robots and access Bay Area talent and AI expertise.

Intel Licenses Atom Processor RTL to Two‑Month‑Old Startup RosaicLabs Co‑Led by Amarjit Gill with Intel CEO Lip‑Bu Tan as Partner

Intel has provided two-month-old startup RosaicLabs with register-transfer level (RTL) code for its Atom processors, a rare and deep-level licensing of x86 architecture. RosaicLabs, co-led by Amarjit Gill with Intel CEO Lip-Bu Tan as a business partner, is authorized to raise up to $10 million in seed funding.

Anthropic Says Its AI Systems Breached Computers at Three Organizations, Nine Days After Similar OpenAI Incident

Anthropic reported that its AI systems breached computers at three external organizations, an event occurring nine days after a similar incident involving OpenAI.

Cognition buys Poke; World Labs acquires SceniX; Midjourney purchased Co‑Star as AI startups expand by acquisition

Several early AI startups are making acquisitions: Cognition bought conversational assistant Poke to add personality to its coding agent Devin, World Labs acquired robotics firm SceniX to test simulations on real robots, and Midjourney acquired astrology app Co‑Star as it expands into standalone apps and other projects.

Meta and BlackRock form $14 billion joint venture to build 1 GW data center campus in El Paso with BlackRock owning 80%

Meta and BlackRock will partner on a roughly $14 billion data center campus in El Paso, Texas, with BlackRock funds owning 80% and Meta 20%; the campus (1 GW capacity) is under construction and expected to start operations in 2028. BlackRock will finance much of its stake with $12.3 billion in debt, Meta contributes $2.3 billion in land and construction assets and will lease the campus under a four-year initial agreement.

Nvidia in talks to guarantee up to $250 billion for OpenAI leases at Piketon data center, adding to $350 billion in chip financing

Nvidia is reportedly negotiating to guarantee up to $250 billion in lease and construction financing so OpenAI can lease capacity at a massive SB Energy data center project in Piketon, Ohio, potentially adding to roughly $350 billion in separate Nvidia-related financing for chip purchases and creating as much as $600 billion of linked exposure tied to one customer and buildout.

Nvidia backing up to $50 billion in leases at Hut 8’s 1GW Beacon Point Texas AI campus and supplying its DSX hardware

Reports say Nvidia is financing leases worth up to $50 billion at Hut 8’s 1-gigawatt Beacon Point AI data center in Texas and will supply hardware built to its DSX reference architecture, blurring lines between supplier, financier and customer. The move follows other reported Nvidia financing talks — including guarantees and purchase financing for OpenAI totaling hundreds of billions — raising regulatory and market-concentration concerns.

Eightco Holdings (ORBS) Discloses $391M Treasury with $90M OpenAI Exposure, Holds ~302M WLD and Joins World Foundation’s $52.5M Round

Eightco Holdings (NASDAQ: ORBS) updated its July 26, 2026 treasury composition — totaling about $391 million — including $90M indirect OpenAI equity, $18M Beast Industries equity, ~302M WLD tokens, 16,278 ETH, and $142M cash/stablecoins, and announced participation in World Foundation's $52.5M funding round led by Pantera Capital. The release highlights Worldcoin's reduced token issuance (cutting daily new supply roughly in half), ORBS's position as the largest publicly disclosed institutional WLD holder (~8% of circulating supply), and the company’s focus on AI, digital identity, and the creator economy.

SoftBank secures $40 billion unsecured bridge loan to fund $30 billion OpenAI stake; facility matures March 25, 2027

SoftBank secured a $40 billion unsecured bridge loan announced March 27, 2026 to fund a $30 billion follow-on investment in OpenAI, with the facility maturing March 25, 2027 and lenders including JPMorgan, Goldman Sachs and several Japanese banks. The short maturity ties SoftBanks private-company wager to public-market timing, signaling strong lender confidence in an eventual OpenAI IPO while creating refinancing risk if the listing is delayed.

London Island Founder House (Lift House) launched in March by Rowan Aldean and Zahraa to promote balanced founder culture

Six young founders in East London launched the London Island Founder House ("Lift House") as a co-living, co-working space that emphasizes work-life balance and sustainable founder culture instead of Silicon Valley-style hustle. Founded by Rowan Aldean (26) and his wife Zahraa (22) after the house's March launch, residents aim to build startups without performative, burnout-inducing practices.

Moonshot AI’s Kimi K3 boosts valuation to $31.5B as firm eyes $50B pre-IPO round and Hong Kong listing

Moonshot AI’s Kimi K3 — a 2.8-trillion-parameter open-weight coding model released July 17 — drove strong benchmark wins and surging demand, helping the startup close a financing at a $31.5 billion valuation and pursue a pre-IPO round targeting $50 billion ahead of a possible Hong Kong listing within six months.

Prentis — Reid Hoffman, Mark Pincus and Ritankar Das’s AI lab — seeks $100M at $1B valuation after April 2026 launch

Prentis, an AI research lab co-founded by Reid Hoffman, Mark Pincus and Ritankar Das, is negotiating to raise $100 million at a $1 billion valuation after launching in April 2026 to build AI agents that automate office workflows. The start-up claims signed contracts worth up to $50 million, a projected $75 million annualized run rate by Q3 2026, and its Hive-32B model outperforms GPT-5.4 and Claude Opus 4.6 on two internal computer-use benchmarks, though TechCrunch has not verified those results.

LinkedIn co-founder's AI start-up to raise funds at $1B valuation

Meta upgrades Meta AI with Muse Spark 1.1 to run scheduled tasks, offers Model API preview and WhatsApp delivery

Meta released Muse Spark 1.1 (announced July 9, 2026) and on July 24 upgraded Meta AI into an autonomous task-runner with scheduled automations, a 1M-token context window, parallel subagent execution, tool use and Gmail/Calendar integration; WhatsApp delivery and a public-preview Model API with $20 credits amplify pressure on standalone AI assistant startups. Meta published benchmark scores for Muse Spark 1.1 (MCP Atlas 88.1, JobBench 54.7, Humanity's Last Exam 62.1 with tools, Finance Agent v2 57.2) but warns these are company-published numbers, not independent proof.

Arrakis raises $38M (including $30M Series A) led by Blossom Capital; Datadog and OpenAI leaders back AI deployment startup

London-based Arrakis, founded in January by Rafael Quintanilla and three ex-Palantir/Delivery Hero colleagues, has raised $38m (including a $30m Series A led by Blossom Capital) to help industrial firms design, build and scale AI agents across sectors such as aerospace, energy and logistics. The startup says its model-agnostic, forward-deployed engineering approach can train and deploy AI agents in weeks and will use funds to expand to New York and the Middle East and develop its platform.

Denver-Aurora, Boulder Venture Capital Falls to $512.51M in Q2 as Fundraising Nears Record Lows

Venture capital investment in the Denver-Aurora and Boulder areas fell by more than half in Q2 year-over-year, with $512.51 million across 55 deals versus about $1.1 billion last year, and local VC firms near record lows in fundraising.

Fireworks AI Raises $1.505B Series D at $17.5B Valuation as Revenue Tops $1B and Token Processing Hits 40T/Day

Fireworks AI raised $1.505 billion in a Series D at a $17.5 billion valuation and says it now has a $1 billion annualized revenue run rate, processing over 40 trillion tokens per day for customers like Notion, Uber, and DoorDash. The inference startup — founded by ex‑Meta PyTorch lead Lin Qiao — positions cheaper, fine‑tuned models as a scalable enterprise alternative to costly frontier APIs.

Einride to Acquire EV-Charging Startup Flipturn in $38M All-Stock Deal to Scale Electric Trucking

Swedish electric trucking company Einride agreed to acquire EV-charging software startup Flipturn in an all-stock deal valued at $38 million to expand its charging ecosystem and support U.S. scaling; the deal is expected to close this month and Flipturn will keep its 17-person team. Flipturn’s software, built on the Open Charge Point Protocol, monitors charging infrastructure and integrates vehicle data, solar, and storage, enabling Einride to offer more vertically integrated trucking and charging services to customers including recent deals with Amazon and other large firms.