Maria Deutscher
Latest from Maria Deutscher
Heavily funded Element AI grows war chest with new $151M round
Element AI Inc., a Montreal-based startup selling artificial intelligence software, today cemented its position as one of the better-funded players in its corner of the market by announcing that it has raised 200 million Canadian dollars (about $151 million) in additional capital. The investment came from a group of public and private sector backers. Canadian pension fund CDPQ led ...
Investors send Cloudflare’s shares soaring 20% after IPO hauls in $525M
Updated: The past few hours have been a lesson in contrasts for Wall Street watchers. Reports emerged this morning that The We Co., parent of unprofitable co-working provider WeWork, will slash its valuation from $47 billion to as little as $10 billion ahead of its initial public offering. Also this morning, Cloudflare Inc., another unprofitable tech firm, ...
House committee probing tech giants asks for internal emails, algorithm details
U.S. lawmakers investigating potential antitrust violations by the tech industry’s largest players want the inside story on their pivotal acquisitions and recent controversies. The House Judiciary Committee today sent request for information letters to Facebook Inc., Amazon.com Inc., Apple Inc. and Google LLC parent Alphabet Inc. as part of a competition probe started this year. The committee ...
Report: Feds looking into potential misconduct at VC firm with ties to Peter Thiel
The U.S. government is probing whether a venture capital firm with ties to high-profile tech investor Peter Thiel has engaged in financial misconduct, Recode reported today. Sources who spoke with the publication on condition of anonymity said that officials hailing among others from the Federal Bureau of Investigation have been interviewing people close to Mithril ...
Shape Security picks up $51M at $1B valuation to combat online fraud and bots
Not all online attacks involve hacking. Cybercriminals also exploit the public-facing features of services such as banking apps to carry out fraudulent transactions and other illicit activities, a threat that Shape Security Inc. is combating. The Mountain View, California-based startup marked a major growth milestone this morning with the announcement that it has raised $51 million ...
Google will pay $1B+ to French authorities to settle tax evasion probe
Google LLC will pay a 500 million euro fine and 465 million euros in back dues to settle allegations that it evaded taxes in France. The penalty, which works out to $1.068 billion at the current exchange rate, brings to an end a four-year investigation by the France’s Office of the Financial Crimes Prosecutor. The ...
With upgraded storage platform, Dell-backed Vast Data targets AI workloads
Vast Data Inc., an infrastructure startup funded by Dell Technologies Inc. and Goldman Sachs Group Inc., today unveiled a new version of its storage platform that promises to enable faster processing speeds for machine learning models. New York-based Vast Data is challenging the conventions of how enterprises manage their information. Normally, a storage system has the dual ...
Google’s VideoBERT algorithm predicts the future one cooking video at a time
Google LLC today debuted VideoBERT, an artificial intelligence that can watch part of a video and extrapolate what will happen in the next few seconds like a human. Equipping a computer with the ability to understand and draw correct conclusions from a visual scene requires an incredibly sophisticated algorithm. For Google’s researchers, however, the challenge ...
California Senate passes bill to classify Uber, Lyft drivers as employees
California state senators today approved a bill that will reclassify Uber Technologies Inc. and Lyft Inc. drivers from independent contractors to employees, potentially raising operating costs significantly for the ride-hailing giants. Assembly Bill 5 passed 29-11 in a development that likely paves the way for it to become law in the foreseeable future. The legislation ...
Q-CTRL nabs $15M round to make quantum computers more reliable
Q-CTRL Pty. Ltd., an Australian startup trying to build the software foundations for large-scale quantum computers, today announced that it has secured a $15 million round of funding. Square Peg Capital led the investment with participation from Sequoia Capital, Main Sequence Ventures and Horizons Ventures. Q-CTRL will use the cash to set up a Los Angeles office in an expansion effort that ...