Author: GT

TechCrunch All Stage, our big event for founders of startups at all stages of funding (see what we did there?), is coming up July 15 at Boston’s SoWa Power Station. And it’s our pleasure to announce that Underscore VC’s investing partner Chris Gardner will join a loaded lineup of speakers by leading a breakout session titled “MVP in the Age of AI: When to Bot and When to Not.” Spoiler: Expect to learn a lot about using AI for minimum viable products. Our limited-time discounts on Investor and Founder Passes are ending soon, with each discounted by at least $200…

NEW YORK (AP) — It took only seconds for the judges on a New York appeals court to realize that the man addressing them from a video screen — a person about to present an argument in a lawsuit — not only had no law degree, but didn’t exist at all.The latest bizarre chapter in the awkward arrival of artificial intelligence in the legal world unfolded March 26 under the stained-glass dome of New York State Supreme Court Appellate Division’s First Judicial Department, where a panel of judges was set to hear from Jerome Dewald, a plaintiff in an employment…

After effectively canceling the consumer launch of its o3 reasoning model in February, OpenAI now says it aims to release both o3 and a next-gen successor, o4-mini, in “a couple of weeks.” In a post on X on Friday, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said the reversal in course is related to OpenAI’s upcoming GPT-5, which the company has previously said will be a unified model incorporating reasoning capabilities. “[W]e are going to be able to make GPT-5 much better than we originally thought,” Altman wrote. “[W]e also found it harder than we thought it was going to be to smoothly…

WEST PALM BEACH, Fla. (AP) — President Donald Trump on Friday said he is signing an executive order to keep TikTok running in the U.S. for another 75 days to give his administration more time to broker a deal to bring the social media platform under American ownership.Congress had mandated that the platform be divested from China by Jan. 19 or barred in the U.S. on national security grounds, but Trump moved unilaterally to extend the deadline to this weekend, as he sought to negotiate an agreement to keep it running. Trump has recently entertained an array of offers from…

By Omkar Godbole (All times ET unless indicated otherwise) Major coins reversed early gains after Beijing stepped up trade tensions by announcing retaliatory tariffs following President Donald Trump’s Wednesday decision to impose additional levies on China and other nations. Bitcoin dropped to $83,000 from $84,600, though the downside appeared limited, probably because the market’s worst fears have finally come true. Markets dislike uncertainty, and the anticipation of a looming threat often creates more anxiety and fear than the actual realization of that threat. Since Trump took office on Jan. 20, markets have been wrestling with the threat of tariffs and…

Igor Golovniov | SOPA Images | Lightrocket | Getty ImagesAffirm shares have plunged nearly 30% in the past two trading days and are on track to close out their second-worst week on record, following President Donald Trump’s sweeping tariff announcement on Wednesday.Widespread tariffs could represent a particular problem for Affirm, because the provider of buy now, pay later loans is reliant on consumer spending, and economists expect prices to rise on all sorts of goods. The news got worse on Friday when Affirm rival Klarna delayed its long-anticipated IPO due to market volatility.Klarna had planned to debut on the New…

Muhammed Selim Korkutata | Anadolu | Getty ImagesPresident Donald Trump on Friday extended a deadline requiring China-based ByteDance to sell the U.S. operations of TikTok or face an effective ban in the country, marking the second time he has taken such action.Trump announced the extension on his Truth Social platform, saying the TikTok deal “requires more work to ensure all necessary approvals are signed.” The extension will “keep TikTok up and running for an additional 75 days,” he said. The new extension kicks TikTok’s deadline to mid-June.”We hope to continue working in Good Faith with China, who I understand are…

Nintendo is delaying preorders for the newly announced Switch 2 in the U.S. due to concerns around President Donald Trump’s tariffs. Preorders will no longer begin on April 9. “Preorders for Nintendo Switch 2 in the U.S. will not start April 9, 2025, in order to assess the potential impact of tariffs and evolving market conditions,” a spokesperson for the company said in a statement to TechCrunch. “Nintendo will update timing at a later date. The launch date of June 5, 2025, is unchanged.” Nintendo still plans to release the console on June 5 for $450. The company unveiled the…

OSL Group has launched a new wealth management service for professional investors seeking to manage digital assets. The service, branded as OSL Wealth, is now operational in Hong Kong and aims to provide institutional and high-net-worth investors with access to a range of crypto-focused investment products. OSL Wealth provides regulated wealth management services, focusing on digital asset investment opportunities. The platform integrates the group’s existing services, including over-the-counter trading, crypto exchange operations, custody solutions and prime brokerage, to deliver a single offering tailored to investors managing digital asset portfolios. Features of the service include tokenised treasury instruments, real-world asset (RWA)…

The tech layoff wave is still kicking in 2025. Last year saw more than 150,000 job cuts across 549 companies, according to independent layoffs tracker Layoffs.fyi. So far this year, more than 22,000 workers have been the victim of reductions across the tech industry, with a staggering 16,084 cuts taking place in February alone. We’re tracking layoffs in the tech industry in 2025 so you can see the trajectory of the cutbacks and understand the impact on innovation across all types of companies. As businesses continue to embrace AI and automation, this tracker serves as a reminder of the human…