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TikTok Users’ Move to Chinese App RedNote Alarms Beijing’s Censors

By Qianer Liu and Juro Osawa · Jan 16, 2025 5:51am PST · 4 comments

A pending ban of TikTok in the U.S. is prompting a flood of TikTok users to try out Chinese social media app RedNote. Chinese regulators aren’t happy. The Cyberspace Administration of China, the country’s Internet watchdog, is concerned that English-language content showing up on RedNote may contain politically sensitive posts that... A pending ban of TikTok in the U.S. is prompting a flood of TikTok users to try out Chinese...

Anduril CEO Palmer Luckey. Photo by Getty

Anduril Doubles Revenue and Plans $100 Million Employee Tender

By Cory Weinberg · Jan 15, 2025 2:37pm PST

Business has been booming for Anduril. The venture-backed weapons maker doubled revenue to about $1 billion in 2024, say people close to the company, and could get another sales lift from a change in Defense Department leadership under incoming President Donald Trump. The opportunity for growth could position Anduril for an initial public... Business has been booming for Anduril. The venture-backed weapons maker doubled revenue to about...

TikTok Prepares for Immediate Shut-Off in the U.S. on Sunday

By Sylvia Varnham O'Regan and Kaya Yurieff · Jan 14, 2025 8:03pm PST

TikTok plans to shut off its app for U.S. users on Sunday, the day a federal law will ban the app, unless the Supreme Court intervenes to block the ban, according to two people familiar with TikTok’s plans. Abruptly switching off the app, rather than allowing people who have already downloaded it to continue using it, will bring home the... TikTok plans to shut off its app for U.S. users on Sunday, the day a federal law will ban the...

Art by Mike Sullivan.

Temu Pilots Amazon-Like Search Ad Business, Plans App Store

By Jing Yang, Qianer Liu and Theo Wayt · Jan 14, 2025 6:00am PST · 1 comment

Art by Mike Sullivan.

Temu Pilots Amazon-Like Search Ad Business, Plans App Store

By Jing Yang, Qianer Liu and Theo Wayt · Jan 14, 2025 6:00am PST · 1 comment

Chinese-owned bargain seller Temu has spooked Amazon by selling ultracheap household gadgets, electronics and more, oftentimes undercutting the e-commerce giant on price. Now Temu is looking to capitalize on its popularity by going head to head with Amazon in another business: advertising. Temu has started testing selling ad space to merchants... Chinese-owned bargain seller Temu has spooked Amazon by selling ultracheap household gadgets,...

Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang holds a Thor Blackwell robotics processor. Photo by Getty.

Nvidia’s Top Customers Face Delays From Glitchy AI Chip Racks

By Qianer Liu and Anissa Gardizy · Jan 13, 2025 6:00am PST · 5 comments

Some of Nvidia’s biggest customers are facing new delays in getting its most advanced artificial intelligence chips up and running in data centers. The first shipments of racks equipped with Nvidia’s newest chips, Blackwell, have been plagued by overheating as well as glitches involving the way the chips connect to one another,... Some of Nvidia’s biggest customers are facing new delays in getting its most advanced...

Photos via Getty and Meta. Art by Shane Burke.

Amazon Downplays DEI, Meta Plays Up Free Speech as Tech Tilts Right

By Theo Wayt, Sylvia Varnham O'Regan and Nick Wingfield · Jan 10, 2025 6:00am PST · 4 comments

Like most big technology companies, Amazon began publishing pages and blog posts on its corporate website in recent years declaring its commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion along with other issues. Over the past few weeks, though, some of those webpages have been undergoing curious makeovers—or disappearing altogether. For... Like most big technology companies, Amazon began publishing pages and blog posts on its corporate...

Deel co-founder and CEO Alex Bouaziz. Photo via Getty.

Deel Accused of Money Laundering, Sanctions Failures in Lawsuit

By Michael Roddan · Jan 9, 2025 1:07pm PST · 1 comment

Fast-growing human resources and payroll startup Deel has been dragged into a dispute involving a Florida Ponzi scheme, in the latest legal action connecting the firm to fraudulent or illegal movement of money. In a lawsuit filed in federal court in Florida last week, Deel was accused of transferring money for a Ponzi operation the Securities... Fast-growing human resources and payroll startup Deel has been dragged into a dispute involving a...

Photos of Zhang Yiming by Getty. Art by Mike Sullivan

TikTok’s Fate Rests With ByteDance’s Elusive Founder

By Juro Osawa, Jing Yang and Qianer Liu · Jan 9, 2025 6:18am PST · 3 comments

Photos of Zhang Yiming by Getty. Art by Mike Sullivan

TikTok’s Fate Rests With ByteDance’s Elusive Founder

By Juro Osawa, Jing Yang and Qianer Liu · Jan 9, 2025 6:18am PST · 3 comments

The business world is watching to see whether the Supreme Court—or possibly Donald Trump—saves TikTok. But another man may be more important to the app’s fate: Zhang Yiming, the elusive founder of TikTok’s parent company, ByteDance. Zhang holds supervoting shares that give him effective control over ByteDance and its... The business world is watching to see whether the Supreme Court—or possibly Donald...

Michael Grimes, head of global technology investment banking at Morgan Stanley. Photo via Getty.

Silicon Valley’s Top IPO Salesman Wants a New Sales Training Ground

By Cory Weinberg · Jan 7, 2025 6:00am PST · 8 comments

Michael Grimes, Morgan Stanley’s investment banker to the stars of Silicon Valley, has earned the trust of tech-industry luminaries from Elon Musk to Brian Chesky, thanks to his ability to orchestrate multibillion-dollar mergers and initial public offerings. He offers prospective job candidates visiting his Menlo Park, Calif., office a... Michael Grimes, Morgan Stanley’s investment banker to the stars of Silicon Valley, has...

Art by Clark Miller

Employer.com Offers to Buy Shuttered Startup Level

By Natasha Mascarenhas · Jan 6, 2025 9:08pm PST

Employer.com, part of a San Francisco–based company pursuing buyouts of human resources companies, recently offered to acquire troubled benefits startup Level, according to a person with direct knowledge of the deal. The talks, which are ongoing, come just days after Level said it was shutting down because a different acquisition fell... Employer.com, part of a San Francisco–based company pursuing buyouts of human resources...

Photo via Getty

Google Plays Catch-Up in Video Ad Tech as Streaming Ads Take Off

By Catherine Perloff · Jan 6, 2025 6:00am PST · 3 comments

Google is good at operating the technology independent websites use to sell their ads—so good that the U.S. says it has a monopoly in that area. But it has been surprisingly poor at developing streaming TV ad technology—advertisers, TV ad sellers and former Google employees say its technology lag those of rivals. Buyers say... Google is good at operating the technology independent websites use to sell their ads—so...

Art by Clark Miller. Ma screenshot via YouTube.

Databricks, Snowflake Discussed Buying Same AI Search Startup

By Kevin McLaughlin, Natasha Mascarenhas and Stephanie Palazzolo · Jan 3, 2025 8:33am PST

Art by Clark Miller. Ma screenshot via YouTube.

Databricks, Snowflake Discussed Buying Same AI Search Startup

By Kevin McLaughlin, Natasha Mascarenhas and Stephanie Palazzolo · Jan 3, 2025 8:33am PST

Databricks and Snowflake, already embroiled in a fierce rivalry over software that manages companies’ data, are now jockeying for position in generative artificial intelligence—particularly AI that helps businesses search their own data. Those goals have led both companies to consider buying the same startups. In recent weeks,... Databricks and Snowflake, already embroiled in a fierce rivalry over software that manages...

Art by Clark Miller.

Fintech Startup Level Abruptly Shuts Down

By Cory Weinberg and Michael Roddan · Jan 2, 2025 11:46am PST · 3 comments

Benefits startup Level has told its clients that it is shutting down after an effort to sell the company fell through, marking another abrupt closure of a fintech that has left users in the lurch. Level, which was founded in 2018 and raised a $27 million Series A round in 2021 led by Khosla Ventures and Lightspeed Venture Partners, told the... Benefits startup Level has told its clients that it is shutting down after an effort to sell the...

Photo by AP.

TikTok Promises Ban Refunds to Keep Advertisers Spending

By Sylvia Varnham O'Regan, Sahil Patel and Catherine Perloff · Jan 2, 2025 9:22am PST

As some advertisers start to pull back from buying ad space on TikTok, the Chinese-owned app is telling big ad buying firms how they could get out of ad agreements if the app is banned in the U.S. in January. TikTok said in an email to big ad buying firms that it would return any principal payments—down payments on agencies’ spending... As some advertisers start to pull back from buying ad space on TikTok, the Chinese-owned app is...

Photo via Getty.

Morgan Stanley’s E-Trade Explores Offering Crypto Trading

By Yueqi Yang · Jan 2, 2025 6:00am PST

Morgan Stanley’s online stock-trading arm, E-Trade, is exploring adding crypto trading in anticipation of a more favorable crypto regulatory environment under the incoming Donald Trump administration, according to two people familiar with the firm’s plans. If Morgan Stanley goes ahead with the launch, E-Trade would become one of the... Morgan Stanley’s online stock-trading arm, E-Trade, is exploring adding crypto trading in...

Jack Hidary, left, and Eric Schmidt. Art by Mike Sullivan

An Eric Schmidt–Chaired Quantum AI Moon Shot Has a Rocky Launch

By Michael Roddan and Cory Weinberg · Dec 31, 2024 8:00am PST · 3 comments

Jack Hidary, left, and Eric Schmidt. Art by Mike Sullivan

An Eric Schmidt–Chaired Quantum AI Moon Shot Has a Rocky Launch

By Michael Roddan and Cory Weinberg · Dec 31, 2024 8:00am PST · 3 comments

In October, on a panel at an investor conference in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, futurist Peter Diamandis congratulated a technology entrepreneur sitting next to him, Jack Hidary, on the success of his startup, SandboxAQ. “I’ve never seen a company scale revenues as quickly as you have,” said Diamandis, founder of the nonprofit XPrize... In October, on a panel at an investor conference in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, futurist Peter...

Art by Clark Miller

Accounting Startup’s Sudden Shutdown Adds to Fintech Woes

By Natasha Mascarenhas · Dec 30, 2024 6:28pm PST · 4 comments

Elizabeth MacBride, an author and the owner of a small publishing company, was celebrating a belated Christmas with her daughters on Friday morning when she glanced at her phone and saw an e-mail from her accounting firm, Bench. The Vancouver, British Columbia–based startup said it was shutting down services for customers, effective... Elizabeth MacBride, an author and the owner of a small publishing company, was celebrating a...

Photos via Getty

ByteDance Planned to Spend $7 Billion on Nvidia Chips Next Year

By Qianer Liu and Juro Osawa · Dec 30, 2024 6:00am PST

ByteDance continues to use Nvidia’s most advanced artificial intelligence chips despite U.S. efforts to block Chinese companies from using them. The Chinese owner of TikTok recently told suppliers it planned to spend up to $7 billion to access Nvidia chips outside China in 2025, according to a person who has been involved in the plan.... ByteDance continues to use Nvidia’s most advanced artificial intelligence chips despite...

Sam Altman and Satya Nadella. Photos via Getty.

Microsoft and OpenAI Wrangle Over Terms of Their Blockbuster Partnership

By Amir Efrati and Stephanie Palazzolo · Dec 26, 2024 7:00am PST · 3 comments

OpenAI CEO Sam Altman wants to convert the artificial intelligence developer, which is governed by a nonprofit, into a for-profit corporation. His biggest hurdle is Microsoft, which has outsize influence on the process after having committed more than $13 billion to OpenAI. The companies have been negotiating potential changes in OpenAI’s... OpenAI CEO Sam Altman wants to convert the artificial intelligence developer, which is governed...

Amazon CEO Andy Jassy. Photos via Amazon/Adobe Stock.

Amazon Wants Merchants to Sell Everywhere—Except Temu

By Jing Yang, Qianer Liu and Theo Wayt · Dec 24, 2024 10:52am PST · 1 comment

Amazon CEO Andy Jassy. Photos via Amazon/Adobe Stock.

Amazon Wants Merchants to Sell Everywhere—Except Temu

By Jing Yang, Qianer Liu and Theo Wayt · Dec 24, 2024 10:52am PST · 1 comment

For popular China-based Amazon merchants, bargain site Temu has been an attractive new place to sell their wares. And Amazon hadn’t been doing much to stop them from branching out. That’s all changed in recent weeks, several major Amazon merchants said. Amazon representatives have been offering incentives such as free advertising and... For popular China-based Amazon merchants, bargain site Temu has been an attractive new place to...