The AI leaders among LinkedIn’s 2024 Top Startups list, Nvidia challenger files for IPO and more AI and tech news this week

Welcome back to LinkedIn News Tech Stack, which brings you news, insights and trends involving the founders, investors and companies on the cutting edge of technology, by Tech Editor Tanya Dua. You can check out our previous editions here.

In memoriam: Abhishek Gupta , founder and principal researcher of the Montreal AI Ethics Institute (MAIEI) and director for responsible AI at the 波士顿谘询公司 passed away on September 30, 2024 in India. A widely respected AI ethics leader, one of his most significant accomplishments was bringing together firms including IBM , Meta and ServiceNow as part of the AI Alliance committed to advancing safe and responsible AI rooted in open innovation.

Catch up on the latest edition of my weekly series VC Wednesdays, where Scale Venture Partners ’ Eric Anderson discusses how developer empowerment is driving his investment decisions, why he’s a proponent of open-source projects and why he regrets not backing the cybersecurity company Snyk .

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ICYMI: Last week, we unveiled LinkedIn's annual list of Top Startups, a tally of the 50 emerging U.S. companies you need to know.

The expansive list features startups that aren’t just growing fast and garnering attention from investors and jobseekers alike — but also shaping the future of their industries. (You can see the full list and methodology here).

Unsurprisingly, AI was front and center on this year’s list, with over a fifth of the honorees (20%) harnessing the technology – including the unicorn AI search engine startup Perplexity , which ranked No. 1 and whose founder, Aravind Srinivas , I profiled in last week's edition.

But search is just the beginning. Take a look at the other AI startups that made it to our 2024 list and all the other areas they’re tackling using the technology.?

Cohere Health (#3): The Boston-based company uses AI to streamline and expedite prior authorization for healthcare services, aiming to enhance both patient care and administrative efficiency. The company just landed $50 million in Series B extension funding this February.

Inworld AI (#10): A buzzy gaming startup, Inworld AI uses AI to create virtual characters for video games and digital experiences. Following its latest funding round, which brought its valuation to over $500 million, Inworld became the most-funded AI and gaming startup.?

Glean (#12): Dubbed “Google for Work,” Arvind Jain’s Glean is an AI-powered workplace search tool that helps employees quickly find information across internal apps and documents, enhancing overall worker productivity. The startup raised $260 million in Series E funding just last month, and is another AI unicorn, valued at $4.6 billion.

Cyera (#16): Network security firm Cyera has benefitted from AI becoming more entrenched in our daily lives. The company helps businesses manage and secure their data by providing real-time visibility and control, and recently landed $300 million in funding, which it says it will use to expand its AI-powered cybersecurity platform to protect companies’ information amid the rise of generative AI technologies.

Pinecone (#20): A vector database tool, Pinecone lets businesses store, search, manage and convert their data more easily and efficiently so that it can be used for training generative AI.?

Harvey (#22): A vertical AI application, Harvey is an AI platform that helps lawyers and law firms automate a range of legal tasks — from consolidating research to drafting contracts. The company’s suite of products allows users to more easily develop and interact with legal documents by using natural language instructions.

Typeface (#23): Founded by a former Adobe exec, Typeface leverages generative AI to create automated and custom marketing campaigns tailored to specific audiences for social media campaigns, online merchandising, job postings and more.

Snorkel AI (#27): Snorkel AI is an enterprise-focused AI development platform that enables a range of companies — from BNY to Wayfair — to create, customize and scale generative AI applications using their own proprietary data.?

Figure (#31): Backed by big tech names including Jeff Bezos, AI chipmaker Nvidia and OpenAI, Figure is developing an AI-powered robot that looks and moves like a human, designed for commercial use in fields across manufacturing, shipping and retail.

Character.AI (#32): Founded by former Google engineers, Character.AI is a chatbot that allows you to talk to AI versions of famous people, real and fictional. Its co-founder and CEO Noam Shazeer just returned to Google last week. And this week, the startup came under fire when someone made a chatbot representing Jennifer Ann Crecente, a teenager who was murdered in 2016, on the platform.

Scribe (#36): Scribe is an AI-powered tool that helps users instantly create step-by-step guides of anything they’re working on, turning clicks and keystrokes into written instructions and screenshots for others to follow.

Transcarent (#40): Transcarent is a health tech company that aims to help employers save money on healthcare benefits. Transcarent’s digital platform connects users with telehealth services and answers questions about insurance coverage using generative AI.

Gretel (#43): A synthetic data startup, Gretel creates large, artificial datasets that can be fed to AI models to help organizations train and refine the models while protecting sensitive information — allowing engineers and businesses to preserve privacy and comply with data protection regulations.

Spotter (#45): A creator-focused startup, Spotter helps YouTube creators accelerate growth through its unique revenue-sharing model and various digital tools including Spotter Studio, which uses generative AI to review existing content and recommend new ideas.

Here’s where we bring you up to speed with the latest advancements from the world of AI.

• OpenAI valuation reaches $157 billion. The ChatGPT maker has raised $6.6 billion in its latest funding round, in what is the largest venture capital deal of all time. The newly completed round, led by Thrive Capital , pushes the company's valuation to $157 billion — nearly double what it was just eight months ago — and vaults OpenAI alongside leading venture-backed startups SpaceX and TikTok . The company has also revealed that it has secured a $4 billion revolving credit facility from major banks. The access to over $10 billion is sorely needed as the AI startup burns through cash seeking "to meet growing demand." Investors were urged not to buy into competitors including Anthropic , Elon Musk's xAI and the company recently founded by OpenAI co-founder Ilya Sutskever, according to Reuters, which cites anonymous sources. Meanwhile, Axios reports that investors can request their money back if OpenAI doesn't restructure as a for-profit benefit corporation within two years. The company also hosted an event for developers this week, with a slew of products tailored for the crowd — see the highlights in this LinkedIn post from customer success executive Vanessa Gatihi . It also rolled out Canvas, a new product that helps to collaborate on writing and coding, currently only available in beta for ChatGPT Plus users.
• Google search gets AI overhaul. 谷歌 has announced "dramatic" impending changes to its search pages, as it looks to further integrate its Gemini AI platform into a cornerstone of its business. Starting on mobile, Google will present search results for "open-ended" queries with summaries organized by AI into different categories, with video and forum links at the top of the page. The company says it also will begin showing ads and links within its machine-generated AI Overview summaries. Google also announced upgrades to its Lens image recognition platform, which will allow users to pose queries about photos and videos.
• 英伟达 challenger files for IPO. Cerebras Systems , a developer of microprocessors for AI systems, filed for an initial public offering as it looks to raise capital and strengthen its competitive standing in the sector dominated by Nvidia. The startup is seeking to raise as much as $1 billion in the IPO, Bloomberg reported last week, citing anonymous sources. In addition to Nvidia, Cerebras faces competition from the likes of 谷歌 and 亚马逊 , which have developed their own AI chips. IPOs in the tech sector have been sporadic this year, with Reddit, Inc. and Rubrik going public this spring. In more Nvidia news, the chip maker is partnering with consulting giant 埃森哲 in a bid to drive mass adoption of AI more quickly and boost its own orders. Most orders for Nvidia’s AI chips have come from tech giants that own large data centers, including Alphabet’s Google and Microsoft (LinkedIn's parent company). Accenture has trained 30,000 experts to assist others in building their own large language models to power AI. CEO Jensen Huang called the consultancy the “connecting fabric” between its technology and new customers. See this LinkedIn post from Accenture’s chief AI officer Lan Guan for more.
• California AI safety bill vetoed. California Gov. Gavin Newsom has vetoed a controversial AI safety bill that, according to The Wall Street Journal, would have "laid the groundwork for how AI is regulated across the U.S." In a statement, he said SB 1047 is "well-intentioned" but doesn't consider whether AI is deployed in high- or low-risk situations, and would have applied to only the largest and most costly models. It faced opposition from tech companies large and small, who warned that it would strangle innovation. Newsom said he's now collaborating with researchers including the ‘godmother of AI’ Fei-Fei Li to create more effective legislation.
• Chip market feels Helene's impact. As authorities assess the deadly aftermath of Hurricane Helene, two mining companies operating in North Carolina that produce a key component for powering semiconductor chips say they’re prioritizing the safety of their workers. Sibelco Group and The Quartz Corp , which both halted production in the small town of Spruce Pine, mine more than 80% of the world’s high-purity quartz, Bloomberg reported. While a temporary shutdown may not have ripple effects, experts say long-term disruption could impact global supply chains and prompt the semiconductor industry to seek alternatives.
• Tech giants test humanoid robots. For most people, humanoid robots exist only in science fiction. But for some tech giants, they are becoming a reality, fueling what Fortune calls the “robot revolution.” Amazon has invested in Agility Robotics, testing the startup's droids in warehouses. BMW is experimenting with a robot made by Figure , a startup backed by OpenAI, in its factory in South Carolina. And Elon Musk expects Tesla's Optimus robots to go on the market next year. But some experts point to limitations, including short battery spans, and many question whether the human body is the best model for robot design.
• ICYMI: AI demand lifted revenue projections for memory chip manufacturer 美光科技 . The company now expects fiscal-first-quarter revenue of $8.5 billion to $8.9 billion, up from analyst predictions of $8.32 billion. Micron's fourth-quarter revenue also surpassed previous estimates, increasing 93% year-over-year to $7.75 billion. The stock surged almost 15% on Thursday, marking its biggest daily jump in years. The key to Micron's upswing: its high-bandwidth memory products, an essential component in AI computing. The company says it has already sold out its high-bandwidth memory inventory for 2024 and 2025..

Here’s a list of other notable AI developments from this week:

• Mozilla on Monday unveiled its vision for Public AI — an open-source approach to AI technology and infrastructure designed with society's broader interests in mind. See Mozilla president Mark Surman’s LinkedIn post for more.?
• LinkedIn parent Microsoft announced major updates to its Copilot AI platform for Windows, including a number of new features such as the ability to speak directly to the AI helper, at a press event at its Microsoft Experience Center in New York on Tuesday. Catch up here.
• Pinterest has unveiled a suite of new AI and automation tools that helps advertisers increase campaign performance, while making it easier for them to create campaigns. See CEO Bill Ready’s LinkedIn post for more.
• Liquid AI , a new startup from a group of researchers from 美国麻省理工学院 ’s Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory (CSAIL) has developed a series of new models different from most other generative AI models that are based on the transformer architecture from the seminal 2017 paper “Attention Is All You Need.” The company says its models are built from “first principles…the same way engineers built engines, cars, and airplanes,” and claims that its LFM 1.3B model outperforms Meta’s new Llama 3.2-1.2B and Microsoft’s Phi-1.5 on many leading third-party benchmarks including science, tech, engineering and math problems.?
• A new startup called Resolve AI has raised $35 million in seed funding to build AI agents, with its first product being an AI Production Engineer that autonomously resolves incidents and handles operational tasks, freeing up engineers to focus on building. See co-founder and CEO Spiros Xanthos ’s LinkedIn post for more.
• A new generative AI-powered search engine startup called iAsk.Ai has raised $4.2 million in seed funding. See CEO and co-founder Dominik Mazur ’s LinkedIn post for more.??

Catch up on the tech headlines you may have missed this week and what our members are saying about them on LinkedIn.

• 亚马逊 scores partial antitrust win. A portion of the Federal Trade Commission’s antitrust lawsuit against Amazon has been dismissed by a federal court in Seattle. However, it was “not immediately clear” which parts of the case were thrown out, reports Reuters, as U.S. District Judge John Chun issued a sealed ruling on the case. Amazon had petitioned the court to dismiss the FTC’s lawsuit in December, arguing that there was no evidence consumers had been harmed. The FTC can still move forward on any claims that were not permanently tossed. Separately, U.K. regulators recently closed an antitrust investigation into Amazon’s partnership with Anthropic.?
• X's value has dropped 75% since Musk’s takeover. When Elon Musk bought Twitter in 2022 he paid $44 billion for the company. The business, which he renamed to X, is now worth more than 75% less, according to a disclosure from an investment firm with equity in the social media platform. 富达 's Blue Chip Growth Fund says its stake has fallen from $19.6 million at the time of the takeover to $5.5 million in July this year, meaning X's total valuation stands at around $9.4 billion. That's less than a quarter of what Musk paid for it in October 2022. The share price has fallen following a number of controversial decisions by Musk including the name change and the new verification system. Several advertisers have also allegedly boycotted the platform over concerns about content moderation.
• Epic Games takes on 三星电子 and 谷歌 . The maker of the Fortnite video game has expanded its fight for the right to compete, suing Google and Samsung for a mobile security feature it says was designed to deter users from downloading app stores other than Play. Samsung said the feature — which requires dozens of steps to disable — gives users added security. Epic earlier won a case against Google over making third-party app stores such as its own more readily available. It said Samsung's new feature was designed to nullify that success.
• Adam Neumann’s new project: The ex- WeWork boss is now setting up its competitor, WorkFlow. Neumann’s new project is "a more adult version of his former brainchild," reports Bloomberg. Rather than "twentysomethings running amok," the new firm is aimed at a more mature crowd and will offer co-working spaces for residents and private offices to rent in buildings under Neumann's real estate company, Flow. Neumann's Miami-based startup was recently valued at more than $1 billion, while WeWork recently exited chapter 11 bankruptcy.
• Data breaches cost T-Mobile $31.5 million. The carrier has reached a settlement with the Federal Communications Commission, agreeing to pay $31.5 million for data breaches over the past three years. According to the FCC, a series of T-Mobile breaches starting in 2021 affected millions of consumers. T-Mobile will pay half of the total fee as a civil penalty, while the other half will be earmarked for tighter cybersecurity measures. "We will continue to send a strong message to providers ... that they need to beef up their systems or there will be consequences," said FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel.
• 苹果 plans new iPhone SE in 2025. Say goodbye to the home button. Apple is preparing to launch the latest version of its entry-level iPhone SE early next year, Bloomberg reports, citing anonymous sources. The new SE will feature an edge-to-edge screen, like more expensive iPhone models; Apple hopes it will lure "budget-minded shoppers," particularly in China, where the company has lost ground to homegrown brands such as Huawei. The phone is also expected to support Apple Intelligence. Shoppers can expect an updated iPad Air, too, to be released around the same time.

Here’s keeping tabs on key executives on the move and other big pivots in the tech industry. Please send me personnel moves within emerging tech.

• Anthropic has hired Durk Kingma , one of the co-founders of OpenAI and also a former employee of Google DeepMind in its machine learning research team. See Kingma’s LinkedIn post for more.
• 英伟达 has hired former 思科 AI executive JP Vasseur, PhD as a senior distinguished engineer and its chief architect of AI and Networking, he shared on LinkedIn.?
• OpenAI has hired Coursera ’s chief revenue officer Leah Belsky as its VP and general manager of education, she shared on LinkedIn.?
• Cloud security firm Zscaler has hired former Exabeam and Palo Alto Networks executive Adam Geller as its new chief product officer. See CEO Jay Chaudhry ’s LinkedIn post here.?
• Speaking of Palo Alto Networks, the company has hired former 谷歌 , Stripe and Cardlytics executive Karim Temsamani as the president of its Next Generation Security business. See the company president BJ Jenkins ’ LinkedIn post for more.
• Cybersecurity firm Expel has added Mandiant (part of Google Cloud) founder Kevin Mandia to its board of directors.

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