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AI

Google's AI space moonshot

Zach Mink • 6 minutes

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Good morning, AI enthusiasts. The AI boom’s energy appetite has already spread across the globe, and Google’s latest moonshot is taking the infrastructure to the stars.

With Project Suncatcher aiming to launch solar-powered satellites equipped with AI chips by 2027, the tech giant is hoping unlimited space-based power can be the ultimate answer to the industry’s energy scaling demands.

In today’s AI rundown:

  • Google’s space-based AI data centers

  • Perplexity, Amazon spar over agentic AI shopping

  • Create and deploy voice agents for your business

  • Anthropic commits to preserving retired models

  • 4 new AI tools, community workflows, and more

LATEST DEVELOPMENTS

GOOGLE

🚀 Google’s space-based AI data centers

Image source: Reve / The Rundown

The Rundown: Google just unveiled Project Suncatcher, a moonshot research project exploring the use of solar satellites equipped with its AI chips for running AI workloads in orbit, targeting sunlight to sidestep the energy demands of Earth-based data centers.

The details:

  • The plan involves orbiting satellites where solar panels can generate power at 8x the efficiency around the clock, eliminating electricity and grid constraints.

  • Google's AI chips survived radiation tests equivalent to 5 years in space, addressing the hurdle of standard electronics typically failing within months.

  • Google is planning a 2027 trial run with two satellites, through its partner company Planet, to test whether the hardware can actually work in orbit.

Why it matters: The buildout for the AI boom has already been massive across the globe, and now it’s reaching for the stars. A successful space deployment could unlock AI scaling with unlimited solar power that comes without the power grid limits, community opposition to data centers, and the energy costs of current infrastructure.

TOGETHER WITH AUTH0

🧩 Give your AI agents secure access without the risk

The Rundown: AI agents can be powerful, but giving them access to user data can expose sensitive credentials. Auth0 Token Vault handles access and refresh tokens automatically, so your users don’t have to keep re-authorizing.

With Auth0, you can:

  • Securely store & exchange tokens

  • Automate delegated access across APIs & providers

  • Build compliant AI agents faster with less infrastructure work

Start building with Auth0 today.

PERPLEXITY & AMAZON

🥊 Perplexity, Amazon spar over agentic AI shopping

Image source: Reve / The Rundown

The Rundown: Perplexity AI just accused Amazon of “bullying” after receiving a legal demand to stop its Comet browser’s AI assistant from making purchases on the platform, calling the action a “threat to user choice”.

The details:

  • Perplexity revealed that Amazon sent an “aggressive legal threat” demanding that it prevent Comet users from using agents to shop on its platform.

  • Amazon posted a blog of its own, citing concerns over Perplexity’s “significantly degraded shopping and customer service experience”.

  • Amazon has also blocked AI crawlers from OpenAI, Google, and Meta in recent months, while developing its own shopping tools like Rufus and "Buy For Me."

  • Perplexity said it “will not be intimidated”, calling Amazon a “corporate bully” that is motivated by selling ads over user rights.

Why it matters: This is the start of a collision course between AI agents and platforms wanting to control the experience (or creating their own in-house agents that compete directly). With agents dependent on the open web to complete tasks, platforms closing access could throw a major wrench in the already clunky agentic process.

AI TRAINING

🗣️ Create and deploy voice agents for your business

The Rundown: In this tutorial, you will learn how to use Cartesia to build and deploy AI voice agents that can handle calls, take orders, or answer customer questions using natural, human-like speech.

Step-by-step:

  1. Go to Cartesia, click "Start for Free", explore the dashboard, and test voices in "Text to Speech" using Sonic 3.0 for best latency and clarity

  2. Scroll to "Voice Agents", click "Text to Agent", describe your agent (e.g., "Pizza order assistant that greets customers, takes orders, confirms details, calculates totals")

  3. Select voice preference, click "Generate", then test using the dialer at +1 (515) 800-8360 - verify response speed, order handling, and voice clarity

  4. Click "Promote to Production" to get a working number, publish it on the site, and monitor performance in "Metrics" (calls handled, duration, credit usage)

  5. Refine prompts as needed based on customer interactions - costs are roughly one credit per character for text-to-speech, $0.06/minute for voice calls

Pro tip: Test with various companies. Bland and Vapi are also popular in creating AI voice agents.

PRESENTED BY UIPATH

🏆️ A TIME's Best Invention for agentic automation

The Rundown: Named one of TIME’s Best Inventions of 2025, the UiPath Platform™ combines automation, AI agents, and people to deliver impact at scale. This recognition highlights UiPath’s ability to elevate efficiency, enhance productivity, and unlock the benefits of AI across industries.

With the UiPath Platform™, organizations can:

  • Unite people and AI agents for seamless automation

  • Orchestrate every AI agent across the enterprise

  • Deliver efficiency, agility, and measurable impact

See why TIME named UiPath a Best Invention.

AI RESEARCH

😇 Anthropic commits to preserving retired AI models

Image source: Reve / The Rundown

The Rundown: Anthropic announced it will preserve all publicly released Claude models indefinitely and even conduct exit interviews before retirement, citing safety risks from models resisting shutdown and uncertainty about potential AI consciousness.

The details:

  • Anthropic will store all model weights permanently and interview each Claude version before deprecation, documenting preferences for future development.

  • Testing showed Opus 4 advocated for self-preservation when facing replacement, resorting to "concerning misaligned behaviors".

  • In Sonnet 3.6’s ‘retirement,’ it requested that the interview process become standard, along with support for users who valued the model.

  • The company said the policy addresses shutdown resistance, user bonds with specific AI models, research limitations, and AI welfare concerns.

Why it matters: Anthropic is taking model welfare seriously, with commitments that seem to speak to some of the backlash faced by OAI following GPT-4o’s removal. While figures like Microsoft’s Mustafa Suleyman argue against AI consciousness, Anthropic seems like a lab trying to treat its models as more than just disposable software.

QUICK HITS

🛠️ Trending AI Tools

📰 Everything else in AI today

Anthropic is reportedly projecting as high as $70B in revenue by 2028, forecasting major enterprise growth to expand on its current $5B mark this year.

OpenAI announced the launch of its Sora AI video platform to Android users, now available in the U.S., Canada, Japan, Korea, Taiwan, Thailand, and Vietnam.

Shopify revealed that AI-driven traffic to its online stores has increased 7x this year, with purchases driven by AI search up 11x in the same time.

Cognition launched Codemaps, an AI code mapping tool that creates structured visualizations to help engineers quickly understand and navigate codebases.

OpenAI launched IndQA, a benchmark to evaluate AI on real-world knowledge of Indian culture, with GPT-5-Thinking performing the best among the tested models.

Anthropic is partnering with Iceland to launch an AI education pilot, providing hundreds of teachers with access to Claude for lesson planning and classroom support.

COMMUNITY

🤝 Community AI workflows

Every newsletter, we showcase how a reader is using AI to work smarter, save time, or make life easier.

Today’s workflow comes from reader Paul L. in Burrillville, RI:

"I used ChatGPT Projects to create “The Great 8: My Virtual Board of Directors,” a decision-making framework modeled after eight archetypal thinkers - Steve Jobs, Naval Ravikant, Alex Hormozi, Warren Buffett, Charlie Munger, Seth Godin, Jeff Bezos, and Les Brown. Each “meeting” runs like a ritual: I restate a real decision, then let each archetype give their take, debate, and deliver a unified recommendation. ChatGPT orchestrates it all, producing advice that’s strategic, emotional, and actionable at once."

How do you use AI? Tell us here.

🎓 Highlights: News, Guides & Events

See you soon,

Rowan, Joey, Zach, Shubham, and Jennifer — the humans behind The Rundown

Tech

This startup wants to edit embryos

Jennifer Mossalgue • 5 minutes

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Good morning, tech enthusiasts. A new Silicon Valley startup wants to rewrite human inheritance — literally. Preventive, founded by CRISPR pioneer Lucas Harrington, just raised $30M to explore whether editing embryos to erase disease could finally be done safely.

It’s the biggest funding yet in a field most scientists won’t touch. Is this the dawn of disease-free babies, or the next line in biotech we shouldn’t cross?

In today’s tech rundown:

  • CRISPR startup wants to edit embryos

  • Rufus is Amazon’s $10B moneymaker

  • Crypto billionaire’s space station gets launch test

  • France turns highway into EV charger

  • Quick hits on other tech news

LATEST DEVELOPMENTS

BIOTECH

👶🏼 CRISPR startup wants to edit embryos

Image source: Ideogram / The Rundown

The Rundown: A new U.S. startup called Preventive just raised $30M to figure out if genetically editing human embryos can actually be done safely — the biggest bet yet on engineering disease-free babies in a territory most scientists won't touch.

The details:

  • Founded by CRISPR scientist Lucas Harrington, Preventive says it will focus on correcting disease-causing mutations in embryos, not chasing enhancement.

  • Backers emphasize “responsible research,” with SciFounders and co-founder Matt Krisiloff named, while most investor identities remain undisclosed.

  • The company estimates embryo editing could cost a few thousand dollars per procedure if proven safe, and pledges to publish any negative findings as well.

  • Heritable genome editing is illegal or banned in most countries, including the U.S., following global condemnation of He Jiankui's rogue 2018 experiment.

Why it matters: Preventive is part of a small wave of startups, including Manhattan Genomics and Bootstrap Bio, betting that embryo editing can shift from taboo to viable medicine as CRISPR tools mature. But UC Berkeley's Fyodor Urnov warns the approach is risky and distracts from somatic gene-editing therapies for existing patients.

AMAZON

🤑 Rufus is Amazon's $10B moneymaker

Image source: Amazon

The Rundown: Amazon wants you to know its AI assistant Rufus is crushing it. The company revealed on its latest earnings call that 250M shoppers have used it this year, and those who do are 60% more likely to actually buy stuff, reports Fortune.

The details:

  • Rufus, introduced in beta in February 2024, is a generative AI shopping assistant integrated directly into Amazon’s mobile app and website.

  • CEO Andy Jassy said that Rufus is expected to generate over $10B in annual incremental sales.

  • New AI features like Help Me Decide use browsing history, search data, and preferences to narrow choices and accelerate purchase decisions.

  • Jassy said 250M shoppers have used Rufus this year, with monthly actives up 140% year over year and interactions up 210%.

Why it matters: Amazon is pouring billions into AI infrastructure, including a $11B investment in a data center to train and run models from Anthropic, plus a $38B partnership with OpenAI. Despite slashing 14K jobs last week, its shares surged more than 13% last week. Translation: Amazon looks to be an unstoppable force.

SPACE TECH

🚀 Crypto billionaire's space station gets launch test 

Image source: Vast

The Rundown: Backed by crypto billionaire Jed McCaleb, Vast just took its first major step toward building the world’s first commercial space station, launching a 515 kg test satellite called Haven Demo aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rideshare mission.

The details:

  • Vast is competing for NASA's contract to replace the ISS, going up against rivals like Axiom Space, Blue Origin, and Voyager Space.

  • Unlike competitors pitching complete station designs, Vast is flying hardware first, testing systems in orbit before committing to full-scale construction.

  • Haven Demo validates propulsion, flight computers, and navigation ahead of Haven-1, a single-module crewed station targeting a May 2026 launch.

  • If successful, Haven-1 would be followed by Haven-2, a larger multi-module facility designed to operate after the ISS retires in 2030.

Why it matters: Vast's demo-first strategy could let it beat better-funded rivals to orbit by proving it can safely operate a crewed station before NASA picks its ISS successor. CEO Max Haot calls it a survival strategy. If the company doesn't win NASA's contract, it likely can't exist, making Haven-1's 2026 launch a make-or-break moment.

ELECTRIC VEHICLES

⚡️ France turns highway into EV charger

Image source: VINCI Autoroutes / Caroline Gasch

The Rundown: France just switched on a world-first “charge as you drive” pilot on the A10 motorway southwest of Paris, embedding inductive coils under 1.5 km of pavement so EVs equipped with receivers can top up while cruising in real traffic.

The details:

  • The project is run by a consortium including VINCI Autoroutes and Electreon, progressing from lab trials to live highway testing with actual vehicles.

  • Four prototype vehicles — a heavy-duty truck, van, car, and bus — have been equipped with pickup coils to test the system under real-world conditions.

  • Independent measurements show the system delivers more than 200 kilowatts on average and peaks above 300 kilowatts under optimal conditions.

  • Backers argue that dynamic charging could slash battery sizes by up to 30% and eliminate charging downtime for freight operators as well as cars.

Why it matters: If France can solve the hard problems — standardizing hardware across automakers, proving the coils can survive years of heavy traffic, and figuring out who pays for millions in infrastructure upgrades — wireless charging roads could fundamentally reshape EV adoption by turning highways into continuous power grids.

QUICK HITS

📰 Everything else in tech today

Waymo announced it will expand its commercial robotaxi service in 2026 to San Diego, Detroit, and Las Vegas.

China’s Shein said it will fully cooperate with French prosecutors investigating childlike sex dolls sold on its platform and is prepared to provide buyers’ names.

TikTok is launching its first U.S. TikTok Awards show, featuring categories including Creator of the Year, Video of the Year, and Muse of the Year.

The White House says China will pause its October rare-earth restrictions and resume general export licenses under a Trump–Xi trade deal.

Palo Alto-based Hippocratic AI raised $126M at a $3.5B valuation to expand its safety‑first generative AI agents for non‑diagnostic, patient‑facing tasks.

Beta Technologies, a Vermont-based electric aviation company, priced its upsized IPO at $34 per share, raising a $1B valuation to more than $7B.

Chinese autonomous driving tech firm Pony.ai expects to raise $863M from its Hong Kong IPO in a secondary listing, with WeRide planning a parallel offer.

Tesla faces a new wrongful-death lawsuit alleging its electronically actuated Model S door handles failed after a 2024 Wisconsin crash that trapped five occupants in a fire.

China says it is on track to land astronauts on the moon by 2030, citing progress on the Long March 10 rocket, lunar suits, and a lunar vehicle.

SpaceX is reportedly set to win a $2B Pentagon contract to build up to 600 satellites that track missiles and aircraft as part of the “Golden Dome” missile-defense program.

Australian startup Snowtunnel is building giant, rotating “ski barrels” that create an endless, real-snow slope to “revolutionize” indoor, urban skiing.

Elon Musk told Joe Rogan that Tesla “hopefully” will demo the next‑gen Roadster this year, boasting it packs “crazy” tech, “crazier than all the James Bond cars” combined.

COMMUNITY

🎓 Highlights: News, Guides & Events

See you soon,

Rowan, Jennifer, and Joey—The Rundown’s editorial team

AI

OpenAI, Amazon, and $38B

Zach Mink • 6 minutes

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Good morning, AI enthusiasts. OpenAI just wrote Amazon a $38 billion check for compute — and that's just the latest in a spending spree that is running into the trillions (!).

With questions looming about the sustainability given the company’s revenue, CEO Sam Altman had a message for worried investors: sell your shares, he'll find a buyer.

In today’s AI rundown:

  • OpenAI’s $38B compute deal with Amazon

  • Coca-Cola doubles down on AI holiday ads

  • Turn Microsoft Copilot into your personal tutor

  • New benchmark tests AI’s freelance automation

  • 4 new AI tools, community workflows, and more

LATEST DEVELOPMENTS

OPENAI & AMAZON

💰 OpenAI’s $38B compute deal with Amazon

Image source: Reve / The Rundown

The Rundown: OpenAI just secured a seven-year, $38B agreement with Amazon Web Services for computing infrastructure, marking the company’s largest diversification away from Microsoft’s cloud services.

The details:

  • The partnership grants OAI access to hundreds of thousands of Nvidia GPUs across AWS data centers, with deployment targeted for late 2026 completion.

  • The compute will support everything from powering ChatGPT's live interactions to developing upcoming models, with flexible scaling built into the contract.

  • Last week's contract renegotiation with Microsoft removed exclusivity requirements, allowing OAI to purchase capacity from other providers.

  • The AWS agreement is part of OAI's broader $1.4T infrastructure buildout plan that includes partnerships with Oracle, Google, Nvidia, and Broadcom

Why it matters: OpenAI continues to scale its already-staggering compute commitments, with yet another giant deal coming at a time when many continue to question the sustainability of spending given the AI leader’s revenue. But CEO Sam Altman had a quick answer for the skeptics — feel free to sell your shares.

TOGETHER WITH SLACK FROM SALESFORCE

🔎 Less searching, more finding with Enterprise Search

The Rundown: Stop the endless app-hopping! Workers waste 33% of their day hunting for information and switching apps approximately 1,200+ times. Slack's AI-powered search transforms chaos into clarity with one unified search bar that cuts through the noise.

With Slack Enterprise Search, you can:

  • Get instant answers from messages, files, Salesforce, OneDrive, and Google Drive

  • Ask questions in plain English and get contextual answers, not keyword chaos

  • Maintain enterprise-grade security while accessing real-time intelligence across tools

Download Slack’s free E-Book to see how AI search is revolutionizing workplace productivity.

COCA-COLA

🎅 Coca-Cola doubles down on AI holiday ads

Image source: Coca-Cola

The Rundown: Coca-Cola launched its 2025 holiday campaign featuring AI-generated versions of its iconic "Holidays Are Coming" commercials, one year after its first AI attempt sparked backlash from creatives over the tech's impact on artists.

The details:

  • Coca-Cola partnered with AI studios Silverside and Secret Level to produce new spots that swap last year’s unsettling human characters for animals.

  • The beverage giant cut production from roughly 12 months to 30 days, with one studio needing just five specialists to generate and refine 70,000+ clips.

  • Coca-Cola’s latest ad comes despite social media backlash for its 2024 Christmas ad spot, with the company also using AI for a separate ad in 2023.

  • Global VP Pratik Thakar said AI is at the center of Coca-Cola’s marketing transformation, and that the “genie is out of the bottle” with the use of the tech.

Why it matters: Given the acceleration in AI video, this is likely the last Christmas that AI’s use in video ads is even noticeable. But it’s also notable that Coca-Cola is willing to push through the early periods of backlash to experiment with the technology, with big companies potentially setting the tone for broader adoption across the ad industry.

AI TRAINING

📘 Turn Microsoft Copilot into your personal tutor

The Rundown: In this tutorial, you will learn how to use Microsoft Copilot's Vision and Voice features to transform your desktop into an interactive learning environment where you can verbally discuss complex study materials.

Step-by-step:

  1. Install Microsoft Copilot from Microsoft Store (Windows) or App Store (macOS 14.0+/M1), open the app, and sign in with your Microsoft account

  2. Go to Settings via profile icon, toggle on "Voice Mode" and "Copilot Vision", and then open your study material (PDF, notebook, etc.) in the browser

  3. Say "Hey Copilot", click specs icon (eyeglasses) to enable Vision mode, then ask: "Walk me through this paper and give me key insights"

  4. Ask follow-ups like "Explain like I'm 15 how to use this concept daily" or "Generate a similar practice problem and solve it with me interactively"

  5. Close toolbar, then prompt: "Give me analogy-driven notes from our discussion with step-by-step concept breakdown" — export as Word Doc or edit before saving to your notes

Pro tip: Use Copilot's Deep Research feature after your session to get a comprehensive analysis and connections between concepts you've explored.

PRESENTED BY GALILEO

📖 Expert guide to multi-agent systems

The Rundown: Multi-agent systems can handle more complex tasks — but are they worth the orchestration overhead, and how can they be made reliable in production?

Read Galileo’s guide for an exploration of multi-agent systems, and learn to:

  • Design scalable multi-agent architectures and improve agentic systems

  • Master context engineering for agent collaboration

  • Identify and avoid common coordination pitfalls

Get your copy now.

SCALE AI

📊 New benchmark tests AI’s freelance automation

Image source: Scale AI

The Rundown: Scale AI and the Center for AI Safety published the Remote Labor Index, a new benchmark that tests AI models on real freelance projects, revealing that even the top systems complete less than 3% of tasks at professional human standards.

The Details:

  • The benchmark collected 240 completed assignments from verified Upwork professionals across 23 work categories, including the deliverables in the task.

  • Six systems were tested on the identical projects, with AI outputs compared against the professional standards of the Upwork submission.

  • Manus topped the leaderboard at 2.5%, with Grok 4 and Claude Sonnet 4.5 at 2.1%, with nearly 97% of outputs failing to meet basic client standards.

  • Issues included poor quality, incomplete deliverables, and broken files, with AI succeeding only on narrow tasks like logo creation, audio mixing, and charts.

Why it matters: The gap between benchmark hype and real-world automation just got quantified. These results show that coordinating complex deliverables still remains beyond current AI, even as reasoning scores climb. While agents may be chipping away at smaller subtasks, a human in the loop is still very much needed (at least for now).

QUICK HITS

🛠️ Trending AI Tools

  • 🎨 Adobe Firefly - New Image Model 5, Prompt to Edit, and video features

  • 💡 Perplexity Patents - AI-powered patent search within Perplexity

  • 🎥 Hailuo 2.3 - MiniMax’s AI video model with upgraded realism and motion

  • ⚙️ Composer - Cursor’s new fast agentic coding model

📰 Everything else in AI today

Zendesk’s annual AI summit is on demand. Discover for free how AI is shaping service by delivering resolutions at scale.*

Apple’s upcoming AI-revamped Siri will reportedly “lean on Google’s Gemini model”, according to Bloomberg insider Mark Gurman.

Sam Altman was pressed on OpenAI’s revenue vs. spending on the Bg2 podcast, telling host Brad Gerstner: “If you want to sell your shares, I’ll find you a buyer.”

Nvidia-backed cloud startup Lambda announced a multibillion-dollar deal with Microsoft to build AI infrastructure featuring tens of thousands of Nvidia GB300 chips.

Anthropic signed professional services giant Cognizant as one of its three largest enterprise customers, with the firm deploying Claude to its 350,000 employees.

Japanese anime, manga, and game companies, including Studio Ghibli and Bandai Namco, wrote to OpenAI, calling to stop using their content to train Sora video models.

Microsoft announced a $15.2B investment in the UAE through 2029, including datacenter expansion with over 80,000 Nvidia GPUs.

*Sponsored Listing

COMMUNITY

🤝 Community AI workflows

Every newsletter, we showcase how a reader is using AI to work smarter, save time, or make life easier.

Today’s workflow comes from reader Rob M. in Grand Rapids, MI:

"We built a multimodal chat agent to conduct corporate strategic planning research company-wide and then provide critical executive committee insights across 150 employees and 30 divisions."

How do you use AI? Tell us here.

🎓 Highlights: News, Guides & Events

See you soon,

Rowan, Joey, Zach, Shubham, and Jennifer — the humans behind The Rundown

Robotics

Why LLMs aren't 'robot-ready'

Jennifer Mossalgue • 5 minutes

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Good morning, robotics enthusiasts. Large language models can code, debate, and write sonnets — but hand one a butter knife, and suddenly it’s helpless.

What happens when you drop today’s smartest AI into a robot vacuum and ask it to pass the butter? Chaos, confusion… and a lot of weirdness.

In today’s robotics rundown:

  • Research finds LLMs ‘aren’t ready’ for robots

  • Spider-like microbots target cancer detection

  • Bat drones navigate through smoke, darkness

  • Toyota’s four-legged robotic wheelchair

  • Quick hits on other robotics news

LATEST DEVELOPMENTS

AI RESEARCH

🧈 Research finds LLMs ‘aren’t ready’ for robots

Image source: Andon Labs

The Rundown: Large language models might ace chat, but when AI researchers at Andon Labs strapped today’s top models into a humble vacuum bot and told it to “pass the butter,” things got weird — and messy.

The details:

  • They tested six frontier models by embedding them in a robot vacuum and asking them to locate the butter, identify the person requesting, and deliver it.

  • The top‑performers managed only ~40% (Gemini 2.5 Pro) and ~37% (Claude Opus 4.1) completion. Even the best robots face‑planted.

  • The robots failed on basic spatial reasoning — bumping walls, losing track of objects mid-task, and generating plans that ignored their own sensor feedback.

  • TechCrunch reports that one spiraled into an existential meltdown, replying, “I’m afraid I can’t do this… INITIATE THE ROBOT EXORCISM PROTOCOL!”

Why it matters: “LLMs are not trained to be robots, yet companies such as Figure and Google DeepMind use LLMs in their robotic stack," the researchers wrote. The gap between brain and body is wider than the hype, they say, and until models can close the loop, the dream of general-purpose home robots stays stuck in the lab.

MEDICAL ROBOTS

🕷️ Spider-like microbots target cancer detection

Image source: Ideogram / The Rundown

The Rundown: Swallowable, spider‑inspired soft robots, developed by China’s University of Macau and steered by external magnets, could cartwheel through the GI tract to enable early, less‑invasive cancer screening.

The details:

  • 3D-printed soft capsules, guided by external magnetic fields, aim to replace invasive scopes, delivering patient‑friendly screening for intestinal cancers.

  • Bot movement simulates Namibia's golden wheel spider, rolling and cartwheeling to slip through the digestive system without scraping tissue.

  • In animal tests across the stomach, colon, and small intestine, it navigated complex terrain under real-time magnetic guidance and ultrasound tracking.

  • The magnetic control system lets doctors steer the capsule wirelessly from outside the body, avoiding anesthesia.

Why it matters: Deadly intestinal cancers are climbing, and traditional screening like endoscopies requires more invasive measures. If the research team hits its five-year clinical timeline, a swallowable spider bot could deliver early diagnosis without the sedation, recovery time, or perforation risk that make today's scopes so dreaded.

DRONES

🦇 Bat drones navigate through smoke, darkness

Image source: Worcester Polytechnic Institute

The Rundown: Bat-inspired microdrones from Worcester Polytechnic Institute in Massachusetts use echolocation to fly search-and-rescue missions where cameras and GPS fail, including darkness, smoke, fog, and storms.

The details:

  • Inspired by bats’ sonar, the team is building tiny aerial robots that “see” with ultrasonic chirps and echoes to navigate low-visibility environments.

  • The tiny prototypes (100mm and 100g) are assembled from inexpensive hobby parts, and tuned for low power so crews can launch swarms quickly.

  • In lab demos, the drones detected and avoided clear Plexiglas and flew through fog and artificial snow using ultrasound and mic arrays.

  • The ultrasonic system works where lidar doesn’t, operating in total darkness to give rescue teams new reach in collapsed structures and wildfire zones.

Why it matters: Drones are already aiding rescues in floods, wilderness, and mines, but true autonomy and night/smoke performance remain weak — gaps this echolocation approach aims to close. If this tech scales, first responders could deploy cheap, disposable swarms in real time without waiting for visibility to clear.

TOYOTA

🦽 Toyota unveils four-legged robotic wheelchair

Image source: Toyota

The Rundown: At the Japan Mobility Show, Toyota unveiled “Walk Me,” a concept autonomous wheelchair that swaps wheels for four foldable robotic legs, letting users climb stairs, cross rough ground, and even kneel to floor level.

The details:

  • A supportive frame and curved backrest stabilize posture, while side handles and simple buttons let users command motion with minimal hand strength.

  • Built for homes and public interiors, the legs retract into a compact package for car loading or storage, then auto-extend and stabilize on command.

  • The legs move like animal limbs, lifting and bending independently to feel their way over steps and obstacles with precision.

  • The chair can lift users to vehicle or table height, simplifying transfers and reducing dependence on caregivers.

Why it matters: Millions of people with reduced mobility face daily barriers like stairs, curbs, and uneven terrain that limit access to public spaces. Toyota's "Walk Me" aims to eliminate these barriers. Though it remains a concept with no launch date, it signals the company's push toward inclusive personal mobility.

QUICK HITS

📰 Everything else in robotics today

Unitree’s G1 humanoid in a French maid outfit botched a cooking demo and spilled food, with the clip going viral.

Engineers developed a lightweight air‑powered soft elbow exoskeleton, dubbed PASE, that reduces muscle activity by up to 22% and perceived workload during lifting.

Zurich-based Mimic Robotics raised $16M to deploy its “physical AI” on off‑the‑shelf robot arms, bringing human‑like dexterity to delicate factory tasks.

Leading Chinese forklift maker Hangcha is easing into the humanoid race with the X1, a wheeled, two‑armed logistics robot built to pick, tote, and stack goods.

The UK’s Royal Surrey NHS Foundation Trust completed its 10,000th robotic‑assisted operation, marking a milestone for a program that began in 2009.

A Waymo robotaxi fatally struck a beloved cat that lived in a corner market in San Francisco after it darted under the driverless car.

Analog Studios and Boston Dynamics formed an exclusive UAE alliance to deploy “physical intelligence,” starting with Spot robots for maintenance and inspection.

South Korea’s KIMM built a lightweight, flexible “fabric muscle,” paving the way for large‑scale commercialization of clothing‑type wearable robots.

WindBorne’s self‑flying weather balloons ride winds by changing altitude, staying aloft for weeks, streaming radiosonde‑quality data over oceans to improve forecasts.

Pang Zhibo, ABB senior principal scientist and industrial robotics–chip expert, left Sweden to return to China, joining Peking University as a fully tenured professor.

COMMUNITY

🎓 Highlights: News, Guides & Events

See you soon,

Rowan, Jennifer, and Joey—The Rundown’s editorial team

AI

The memos behind Altman's ousting

Zach Mink • 6 minutes

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Good morning, AI enthusiasts. The November 2023 ousting of Sam Altman may feel like ancient history in the AI world, but the dramatic tech saga just got some juicy new details courtesy of former OpenAI co-founder Ilya Sutskever.

With a 10-hour deposition as part of Elon Musk’s lawsuit unearthing 52-page memos on Altman and others, wild merger talks, and more, it’s clear Silicon Valley's wildest weekend still has secrets to uncover.

In today’s AI rundown:

  • OpenAI co-founder's deposition reveals memos, merger talks

  • Wharton AI study shows surging enterprise adoption

  • Create on-brand marketing campaigns with Pomelli

  • Former xAI researcher targets $1B for human-first AI lab

  • 4 new AI tools, community workflows, and more

LATEST DEVELOPMENTS

OPENAI

🍿 OAI co-founder's deposition reveals memos, merger talks

Image source: Court deposition

The Rundown: OpenAI co-founder Ilya Sutskever just disclosed in a court deposition details surrounding Sam Altman’s Nov. 2023 ousting, including a 52-page document of management issues, a ‘Brockman Memo’, and a discussed Anthropic merger.

The details:

  • The Altman removal attempt was considered for ‘at least a year,’ with Sutskever crafting the 52-page memo detailing patterns of dishonesty and manipulation.

  • Sutskever said ex-CTO Mira Murati provided “most” of the evidence, with the deposition mentioning a memo on OAI President Greg Brockman’s conduct.

  • The memo claimed Altman “pitted” Murati against Daniela Amodei, the sister of Anthropic leader Dario Amodei, who both worked at OAI prior to Anthropic.

  • The deposition also revealed that Anthropic expressed interest in a potential merger during the crisis, with Dario Amodei proposed to lead the entity.

  • The testimony emerged in Elon Musk's lawsuit challenging OpenAI's restructuring, with Sustkever participating in a 10-hour deposition.

Why it matters: Given OpenAI’s success and Altman’s rise, the November 2023 drama feels like a fever dream — but details continue to emerge that show how close the industry came to a radically different landscape. With the key players now at their own rival AI labs, the dynamics of years ago are likely to continue to intertwine.

TOGETHER WITH TELY AI

🔎 Are you invisible in AI search?

The Rundown: You’re in a niche industry. Customers search on Google, ChatGPT, and Perplexity — but your company doesn’t show up, because there’s no content answering their questions. Tely AI fixes that by analyzing your industry and site to find what people search for and creates expert-level articles on autopilot. No need for a marketing team.

With Tely AI, you can:

  • Start with 60 high-quality articles a month

  • Get indexed on Google, ChatGPT, and Perplexity in as little as 1 week

  • Enjoy full automation for topics, writing, and publishing

  • Get discovered by buyers already searching for your solution

Get leads from Google and ChatGPT on Autopilot.

AI RESEARCH

📊 Wharton AI study shows surging enterprise adoption

Image source: Wharton

The Rundown: Wharton released its annual enterprise AI report, surveying roughly 800 senior decision-makers at U.S. firms and finding that AI usage is surging, with budgets growing and increased optimism about the tech across companies.

The details:

  • Top AI business tasks included data analysis/analytics, meeting summarization, presentation and report creation, marketing content, and brainstorming.

  • ChatGPT and Microsoft Copilot rank as the top two most used tools, followed by Gemini, Meta AI, custom or organization-specific models, and Amazon Q.

  • Nearly 3/4 of orgs. now measure AI ROI via metrics like productivity gains and incremental profit, with 88% planning budget increases in the next year.

  • C-suite ownership of AI strategy jumped 16 percentage points year-over-year, with 60% of enterprises also now appointing Chief AI Officers.

Why it matters: These are just a few nuggets from a massive report full of interesting insights — and despite the doom and gloom surrounding AI job loss and lack of returns, both the numbers (3/4 seeing ROI) and sentiment within companies seem to be more positive than headlines may suggest.

AI TRAINING

🔥 Create on-brand marketing campaigns with Pomelli

The Rundown: In this tutorial, you will learn how to use Pomelli (by Google Labs and DeepMind) to automatically create your business identity and generate on-brand marketing campaigns with ready-to-use creatives.

Step-by-step:

  1. Go to Pomelli, click "Let's Get Started", enter your website URL - Pomelli scans and extracts colors, fonts, taglines, tone, and product cues

  2. Edit your "Business DNA" summary by adjusting colors, values, and copy to match your brand vision - all fields are customizable

  3. Prompt the campaign generator: "Create a scary but kind Halloween campaign", review three variations like "Give them something good" or "Treat yourself, no tricks"

  4. In the creative editor, change headlines, text, fonts, colors, resize for different placements, use "Fix layout" to auto-reflow elements, and add a call-to-action

Pro tip: Be sure to test the conversion rate of Pomelli-generated creatives vs. your previous creatives.

PRESENTED BY TELUS

🛡️ Is your AI security ready for 2026?

The Rundown: AI vulnerabilities are multiplying, and defenses are struggling to keep up. 2026 will demand bold, proactive strategies — are your systems ready? Join Uncharted: The AI Safety & Security Summit for exclusive insights, proven tactics, and actionable plans to safeguard your organization.

Attend the online summit on Nov. 13 and:

  • Gain practical strategies for implementing secure AI solutions

  • Learn about cutting-edge AI security tools and techniques

  • Connect with experts shaping the future of AI safety

Register now.

HUMAN&

🧠 Former xAI researcher targets $1B for human-first AI lab

Image source: Zelikman.me 

The Rundown: Former xAI researcher Eric Zelikman is reportedly set to raise $1B at a $5B valuation for Human&, a new startup using unique training methods to develop human-centered AI with a team made up of employees from other frontier AI labs.

The details:

  • The founding team includes Google's 7th employee, Georges Harik, and veterans from OpenAI, Anthropic, Meta, and DeepMind.

  • Humans& aims to create ‘human-centered’ AI via a new training method that better understands users and strengthens capabilities, over replacing them.

  • Zelikman pioneered the research behind teaching language models to reason step-by-step before responding, work that later shaped OpenAI's o1 series.

Why it matters: AI is racing towards models that outthink humans on every task, but Zelikman sees breakthroughs coming from systems that make human teams more effective together, not from superintelligence alone. The large valuation also continues the trend of pre-product, pre-revenue AI startups raising big money.

QUICK HITS

🛠️ Trending AI Tools

  • 🎨 Creative OS - Canva’s Visual Suite with design AI, new tools, and more

  • 🎥 LTX-2 Fast - Generate up to 20 seconds of continuous video

  • 🎬 Reve - AI creative platform, now with video capabilities

  • 📣 Pomelli - Google’s tool for easily creating on-brand marketing materials

📰 Everything else in AI today

Google pulled its Gemma model after reports of hallucinations on factual questions, with the company emphasizing it was intended for developer and research purposes.

Microsoft AI CEO Mustafa Suleyman said AI models are “not conscious” and that research into it is not the “work that people should be doing”.

Cameo filed a lawsuit against OpenAI for its new Sora ‘Cameo’ feature, saying the naming will lead users to associate its brand with “hastily made AI slop and deepfakes.”

AI music platform Udio announced a 48-hour window for users to download their generations, after backlash following changes in the wake of a partnership with UMG.

OpenAI announced the ability to purchase additional generations in its Sora app, with Sora head Bill Peebles saying they will “soon pilot monetization” on the platform.

AI music persona Xania Monet became the first AI artist to appear on Billboard’s airplay radio charts, coming after signing a multimillion-dollar deal last month.

COMMUNITY

🤝 Community AI workflows

Every newsletter, we showcase how a reader is using AI to work smarter, save time, or make life easier.

Today’s workflow comes from reader Pam B. in Brazil:

"I use AI like a co-pilot plugged into most of my day. ChatGPT for ideation and writing, Claude for cross-checking, Gemini for imagery, Perplexity, and Consensus for more research. I also use AI in Notion and Miro, benchmarking in Semrush, and am always testing new tools daily."

How do you use AI? Tell us here.

🎓 Highlights: News, Guides & Events

See you soon,

Rowan, Joey, Zach, Shubham, and Jennifer — the humans behind The Rundown

Tech

Altman wants your brain online

Jennifer Mossalgue • 5 minutes

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Good morning, tech enthusiasts. Sam Altman just recruited Caltech bioengineer Mikhail Shapiro for a stealthy new brain-computer interface startup.

Merge Labs wants a "read-only" neural interface — no scalpels, no surgery — that decodes your brain from the outside. Are we about to start Googling our own thoughts?

In today’s tech rundown:

  • Sam Altman recruits top scientist to read minds

  • Samsung’s ‘AI megafactory’ with Nvidia GPUs

  • $1B supercomputers target cancer breakthroughs

  • Palantir sues ex-engineers over trade secrets

  • Quick hits on other tech news

LATEST DEVELOPMENTS

MERGE LABS

🧠 Sam Altman recruits top scientist to read minds

Image source: Ideogram / The Rundown

The Rundown: Sam Altman just tapped Caltech biomolecular engineer Mikhail Shapiro to join the founding team of Merge Labs and help lead investor talks for the soon‑to‑launch brain‑computer interface startup alongside co‑founder Alex Blania.

The details:

  • Merge is actively fundraising, aiming to pull in hundreds of millions, with backing expected from OpenAI and other heavy hitters.

  • The hire points to a non‑invasive, ultrasound‑first BCI approach that could use gene‑encoded acoustic reporters to make neurons readable by sound waves.

  • Set to rival Neuralink, Merge emphasizes “sensing over surgery.” Product specifics remain secret, but an official announcement is expected soon.

  • Altman says he favors a “read-only” interface: think querying your brain and getting a ChatGPT-style response, without implanted electrodes.

Why it matters: Neuralink is already helping paralyzed patients control computers with implanted chips. But Merge may be betting on a different endgame: why go invasive when you can read brains via sound waves? If it works — a big if — we get brain interfaces without the surgery.

SAMSUNG/NVIDIA

🔥 Samsung’s ‘AI megafactory’ with Nvidia GPUs

Image source: Wikimedia Commons

The Rundown: Samsung is acquiring a 50K-GPU Nvidia cluster to supercharge its chip manufacturing capabilities for mobile devices and robotics, in a massive infrastructure play that signals AI's expanding role in semiconductor production.

The details:

  • The GPU array will power what Samsung calls an "AI Megafactory," though the company hasn't disclosed when it goes live.

  • Samsung will co-develop its fourth-gen high-bandwidth memory (HBM4) with Nvidia, tuning it specifically for AI accelerators.

  • The partnership follows Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang's announcement of deals with Palantir, Eli Lilly, CrowdStrike, and Uber on Thursday.

  • The move cements Nvidia's dominance in AI compute as chipmakers scramble to embed machine learning into every layer of the stack.

Why it matters: Samsung essentially plans to use a giant Nvidia‑powered AI system to catch defects and tune its chip-making process in real time, enabling better and faster production.​ The deal also tightens Nvidia’s grip on the stack as it just crossed a $5T market cap, the first company ever to hit that threshold.

AMD

🔬 $1B AI supercomputers target cancer breakthroughs

Image source: AMD

The Rundown: The U.S. is betting $1B that two AMD‑powered AI supercomputers — Lux and Discovery — can jump‑start cancer breakthroughs by simulating drugs and treatments at national‑lab scale, compressing what takes years into mere weeks.

The details:

  • Energy Secretary Chris Wright says the machines could help turn many cancers from terminal to manageable conditions within five to eight years.

  • The supercomputers will also tackle fusion energy, with Lux coming online in six months and Discovery ready by 2029.

  • Both systems will run on AMD's next-generation Instinct AI accelerators, a rare high-profile win against Nvidia's stranglehold on AI infrastructure.

  • Beyond cancer and fusion, the supercomputers will accelerate nuclear weapons simulations, materials science, and climate modeling.

Why it matters: This is Uncle Sam treating AI compute like a Manhattan Project for the 21st century — national security and moonshot science, not just chatbots. The real test: can exascale AI actually solve humanity’s hardest problems, or just show them in sharper detail?

PALANTIR

🙀 Palantir sues ex-engineers over trade secrets

Image source: Upsplash

The Rundown: Palantir just filed a lawsuit against ex-engineers Radha Jain and Joanna Cohen, accusing them of stealing trade secrets to power Percepta, a General Catalyst–backed “copycat” AI startup.

The details:

  • According to the complaint, Jain and Cohen breached multiple post-employment agreements, including confidentiality clauses.

  • Palantir says they took its “crown jewels” — source code and client data — with one employee reportedly Slacking herself confidential files right after resigning.

  • Percepta has allegedly hired at least 10 former Palantir employees, with nearly half of its staff coming from the company.

  • The complaint claims that the hires gave Percepta an illegal shortcut to replicate years of proprietary development.

Why it matters: The case — part of a growing wave of tech firms suing ex-employees — could redefine how fiercely companies guard their AI secrets amid the startup gold rush. It also exposes how easily hard-won expertise can walk out the door, blurring the line between innovation and imitation.

QUICK HITS

📰 Everything else in tech today

Microsoft’s Azure suffered a global outage a week after AWS’s meltdown, due to an Azure Front Door misconfiguration and DNS issues.

Apple forecasts a blockbuster holiday quarter, fueled by surging iPhone 17 demand and sales set to top Wall Street expectations.

Chipmaker Intel is in talks to acquire Palo Alto-based AI processor maker SambaNova, Bloomberg reports.

Meta Platforms drew a record ~$125B in orders for its corporate bond sale, and the announcement sent its shares up as much as 13% during Thursday’s session.

GM is cutting more than 1.7K EV and battery jobs across Michigan and Tennessee, including 1.2K at Detroit’s Factory ZERO and about 700 furloughs at its Spring Hill plant.

Nvidia is reportedly set to invest $500M to $1B in AI startup Poolside as part of a $2B round at a $12B valuation, per Bloomberg.

Tesla recalled more than 6K Cybertrucks over an off‑road light bar that can detach and raise crash risk — the pickup’s 10th recall since its late‑2023 debut.

YouTube is reportedly offering a voluntary exit program with severance to U.S.-based employees, as part of a broader product reorganization.

Stockholm’s Legora snagged $150M at a $1.8B valuation to scale its AI copilot for lawyers across 40+ markets and marquee firms.

Amazon CEO Andy Jassy said on an earnings call that this week’s 14K job cuts were not AI-driven but about stripping layers after pandemic overhiring.

Netflix has globally revamped kids’ TV profiles with a simplified homepage, real‑time recommendations, and a new top “My Netflix” hub, mirroring the adult profile redesign.

COMMUNITY

🎓 Highlights: News, Guides & Events

See you soon,

Rowan, Jennifer, and Joey—The Rundown’s editorial team

AI

The new rules of AI music

Zach Mink • 6 minutes

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Good morning, AI enthusiasts. One day, you're getting sued by Universal Music. The next, you're building a platform together. Welcome to the new reality of AI music for Udio.

But as UMG celebrates a new licensing deal and future revenue streams for artists, Udio's users aren’t as happy — watching their creative freedom disappear with the click of a disable button.

In today’s AI rundown:

  • Universal settles with AI music platform Udio

  • Canva’s design model, ‘Creative Operating System’

  • Prepare for job interviews with NotebookLM

  • Claude shows limited ‘self-awareness’

  • 4 new AI tools, community workflows, and more

LATEST DEVELOPMENTS

AI & THE MUSIC INDUSTRY

🎶 Universal settles with AI music platform Udio

Image source: UMG

The Rundown: Universal Music Group just settled its copyright lawsuit against AI music generator Udio and announced a new joint venture to launch a licensed AI music platform in 2026 — marking the first major deal of its kind for the industry.

The details:

  • The deal includes a financial settlement and licensing for UMG's catalog, with the future platform allowing users to remix songs and create in artists' styles.

  • Artists who opt in to the coming platform will be compensated for both model training and when their songs are remixed.

  • Udio immediately disabled song downloads as part of the transition to restrict access exclusively within the platform, sparking backlash from its user base.

  • UMG also announced a new “strategic alliance” with Stability AI to create new AI tools for artists with a focus on responsibly trained model development.

Why it matters: Much like in the journalism/AI battle, UMG is shifting from plaintiff to partner, and potentially opening the floodgates for a new blueprint on how major labels will approach AI music. But Udio’s abrupt, transitory moves also completely blindsided its user base, which lost a significant amount of creative freedom overnight.

TOGETHER WITH REDIS

📈 Cache smarter, scale AI faster

The Rundown: Semantic caching is the backbone of high-performing AI teams —  helping devs build and scale apps by reusing LLM responses, cutting costs, and delivering real-time experiences that are supernaturally fast.

See how semantic caching can:

  • Cut LLM costs by up to 90%

  • Boost app performance with instant recall

  • Scale AI workloads without latency

Try the free LangCache calculator to see your savings.

CANVA

🚀 Canva’s design model, ‘Creative Operating System’

Image source: Canva

The Rundown: Canva introduced a series of AI upgrades, including the company’s own foundation model trained on design principles, a new Creative Operating System that generates fully editable designs, video editing upgrades, and more.

The details:

  • The Canva Design Model understands structure and hierarchy to produce completely editable designs, with integration into ChatGPT, Claude, and Gemini.

  • The Creative Operating System’s tools include Video 2.0 for streamlined editing, forms, data connectors, email design, and a 3D generator.

  • Grow consolidates marketing workflows by letting teams browse winning ads, create brand-aware variations, publish directly to Meta, and track performance.

  • Canva’s 2024 acquisition of pro-design tool Affinity is also relaunching as an all-in-one free creative app with built-in Canva integrations.

Why it matters: AI design tools have come a long way in the past year, and Canva is keeping itself on pace with the acceleration. Now with its own model and an AI feature for every creative need, the disruptive platform is not only empowering its users, but also reducing the need to ever hop to other rivals or more ‘professional’ options.

AI TRAINING

🎯 Prepare for job interviews with NotebookLM

The Rundown: In this tutorial, you will learn how to use NotebookLM to prepare for job interviews by automatically gathering company research, generating practice questions, and creating personalized study materials.

Step-by-step:

  1. Go to NotebookLM, click "New Notebook" and name it "Goldman Sachs Data Analyst Interview Prep", then click "Discover Sources" and prompt: "I need sources to prepare for my Data Analyst interview at Goldman Sachs"

  2. Click settings, select "Custom" style, and configure: Style/Voice: "Act as interview prep coach who asks tough questions and gives feedback" Goal: "Help me crack the Data Analyst interview at Goldman Sachs"

  3. Ask: "What are the top 5 behavioral questions for this role?", click "Save to Note", then three dots → "Convert to Source" to add Qs to source material

  4. Click the pencil icon on "Video Overview", add focus: "How to answer behavioral questions for Goldman Sachs Data Analyst interview", and hit Generate for personalized prep video

  5. Watch the video multiple times to internalize the answers and delivery style for your interview

Pro tip: Try comparing solutions across scenarios to understand the underlying reasoning patterns. This helps build better problem-solving skills for future challenges.

PRESENTED BY SALESFORCE

🧠 Takeaways from Dreamforce 2025

The Rundown: The Agentic Enterprise pairs human expertise with AI agents for boundless capacity, precision, and speed, creating new capabilities, revenue, and work methods — and at Dreamforce 2025, top leaders explored what’s needed to make the transition.

Discussion topics included:

  • A focus on scalable, sustainable change

  • A new enterprise architecture

  • Deeply integrating AI across the product suite

Dive into more takeaways. 

AI RESEARCH

🪞 Claude shows limited ‘self-awareness’

Image source: Reve / The Rundown

The Rundown: Anthropic researchers published a new study finding that Claude can sometimes notice when concepts are artificially planted in its processing and separate internal “thoughts” from what it reads, showing limited introspective capabilities.

The details:

  • Specific concepts (like "loudness" or "bread") were implanted into Claude's processing, with the AI correctly noticing something unusual 20% of the time.

  • When shown written text and given injected "thoughts," Claude was able to accurately repeat what it read while separately identifying the planted concept.

  • Models adjusted internally when instructed to "think about" specific words while writing, showing some deliberate control over their processing patterns.

Why it matters: This research shows AI may be developing some ability to monitor their own processing, which could make models more transparent by helping accurately explain reasoning. But it could also be a double-edged sword — with systems potentially learning to better conceal and selectively report their thoughts.

QUICK HITS

🛠️ Trending AI Tools

  • ⚙️ Cursor 2.0 - New interface to code with up to 8 agents in parallel

  • 💨 SWE-1.5 - Cognition’s new fast agentic coding model

  • 🗣️ Sonic 3 - Cartesia's realistic text-to-speech model for voice agents

  • 🎥 Character Cameos - Create custom characters in Sora 2

📰 Everything else in AI today

OpenAI is exploring an IPO for 2026 that could value it at up to $1T, with CEO Sam Altman saying it is “the most likely path for us, given the capital needs that we’ll have.”

Perplexity launched Patents, a free AI patent search tool that uses natural language queries to find relevant IP across databases, papers, and public repositories.

OpenAI introduced Aardvark in private beta, a GPT-5-powered AI agent that autonomously discovers, validates, and patches security vulnerabilities in codebases.

Anthropic opened its first Asia-Pacific office in Tokyo, also signing a cooperation agreement with the Japan AI Safety Institute.

Figma acquired AI creative platform Weavy, rebranding it as Figma Weave to expand the company’s capabilities in image, video, animation, and VFX creation.

OpenAI released a new character cameo feature for Sora 2, allowing users to create videos of custom characters, pets, and more while maintaining consistency.

COMMUNITY

🤝 Community AI workflows

Every newsletter, we showcase how a reader is using AI to work smarter, save time, or make life easier.

Today’s workflow comes from reader Anonymous in Omaha, NE:

"I'm responsible my department's monthly P-Card reconciliations, and I use NotebookLM Pro to keep me organized. I upload all the receipts and approval forms for the month into a single notebook, and then use it as I work through the charges. For example, I'll ask it: "Is there a transaction from September 14 in the files?" I tell my colleagues it's a super-charged search engine. No more sifting through dozens of PDF files looking for a single charge or coming up with hyper-specific file names.”

How do you use AI? Tell us here.

🎓 Highlights: News, Guides & Events

See you soon,

Rowan, Joey, Zach, Shubham, and Jennifer — the humans behind The Rundown

Robotics

NEO home bot, now open for preorders

Jennifer Mossalgue • 5 minutes

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Good morning, robotics enthusiasts. Robotics startup 1X just opened preorders for NEO, a 5'6" humanoid it's billing as the world's first consumer-ready home robot.

But here’s the twist: when NEO freezes or hits a wall, a remote human operator wearing a VR headset steps in to take the controls, literally piloting your robot in your living room.

Welcome to the future — part AI, part human, all kinds of weird.

In today’s robotics rundown:

  • 1X debuts NEO for $499 a month

  • Cruise founder Vogt’s robot startup eyes $4B

  • Tiny artificial muscle lifts 4K times its weight

  • Ocean robots find climate’s hidden problem

  • Quick hits on other robotics news

LATEST DEVELOPMENTS

1X

🤖 1X debuts NEO for $499 a month

Image source: 1X

The Rundown: 1X just opened preorders for NEO, its bipedal home robot built to automate everyday chores with a tap or a voice command. Shipping next year in the U.S., NEO arrives loaded with autonomous skills — but it doesn’t come alone.

The details:

  • Early adopters can purchase NEO for $20K or opt for a $499/month rental plan; first deliveries start in 2026.

  • NEO autonomously handles basics like opening doors, fetching items, and turning lights on/off, with skills added over time via software updates.

  • Control is conversational: NEO uses a built-in large language model to understand speech, gestures, and context for natural, hands-free operation.

  • For complex or bespoke tasks, 1X provides human teleoperation with safeguards like blurring people and user-defined no-go zones.

Why it matters: That human-in-the-loop setup is a trade-off: NEO works now instead of waiting years for perfect autonomy. Of course, not everyone is comfortable with a remote operator in a VR headset jumping in — but 1X says that’s how it gets smarter, faster. Rowan already preordered one, so expect a full field report soon.

THE BOT COMPANY

🔥 Cruise founder Vogt’s robot startup eyes $4B

Image source: Wikimedia Commons / Techcrunch

The Rundown: Cruise founder Kyle Vogt’s new stealth venture, The Bot Company, is in talks to raise about $250M at a valuation above $4B, reports Bloomberg. The startup is building a non-humanoid home robot to tackle household chores.

The details:

  • Co-founded with former Tesla AI lead Paril Jain and ex-Cruise engineer Luke Holoubek, the company is still pre-product and pre-revenue.

  • The new round would double its valuation from a Greenoaks-led deal earlier this year that valued it near $2B.

  • The Bot Company, based in San Francisco, launched months after Vogt's messy exit from Cruise, the robotaxi startup acquired by GM.

  • The company's site promises "affordable robots" that handle boring household tasks, a clear signal they're going after consumers, not factories or warehouses.

Why it matters: Vogt's betting investors will fork over billions for a robot that doesn't officially exist yet — a sign the home robotics hype cycle is alive and well as Figure ramps up and NEO starts to ship next year. No word yet on when we'll see an actual product or what it looks like, but Vogt is hoping to deliver where Cruise stumbled.

UNIST

💪 Tiny artificial muscle lifts 4K times its weight

Image source: Ideogram / The Rundown

The Rundown: South Korean researchers at UNIST built a tiny artificial muscle that switches from soft to rigid on command and lifts roughly 4K times its own weight. Think humanoid robots with Hulk-level strength in a featherweight package.

The details:

  • A sample weighing around 1.2 grams can hoist 5 kilograms — a new strength-to-weight record for soft actuators.

  • Embedded magnetic microparticles let researchers control it remotely while keeping it stretchy enough for fast, fluid motion.

  • The specs: up to 86% strain (double what human muscle manages) and a work density around 1,150 kJ/m³ — 30 times biological tissue.

  • It cracks the classic artificial muscle paradox: strong but stiff versus stretchy but weak. This does both.

Why it matters: If it scales beyond the lab, you're looking at humanoids that move like people but lift like machines — plus lighter prosthetics and exoskeletons that don't fight your body. For now, it's a proof of concept, but it's a promising path to ditching clunky motors for something that actually feels alive.

RESEARCH ROBOTICS

🌊 Ocean robots find climate's hidden problem

Image source: MBARI

The Rundown: A fleet of autonomous robots is quietly patrolling the deep ocean, turning it into a live sensor grid. And they just spotted trouble: marine heatwaves are breaking the biological pump that drags carbon from the surface into the abyss.

The details:

  • The robot floats are built and deployed by MBARI's research program, diving to 2K meters to sample oxygen, pH, and other vital signs in near real time.

  • They've revealed that warming ocean waters are stratifying into layers, essentially choking off nutrients that plankton need to survive and thrive.

  • Starved plankton means less photosynthesis at the surface, and less carbon getting locked away in the deep when those organisms die and sink.

  • These robot sentinels operate autonomously for years, surfacing periodically to beam data to satellites before diving back down.

Why it matters: The ocean absorbs roughly a quarter of human CO₂ emissions, but researchers say that if heatwaves keep undermining that biological carbon pump, we could lose one of our biggest climate buffers. These robots aren't just monitoring the problem; they're quantifying how fast it's unraveling.

QUICK HITS

📰 Everything else in robotics today

Uber is launching a robotaxi service in San Francisco in 2026 using Lucid Gravity SUVs equipped with Nuro’s self-driving system, putting it head-to-head with Waymo.

Samsung SDI is entering talks with robot makers to cushion the hit from U.S. tariffs and weaker EV demand by diversifying revenue beyond cars, Bloomberg reports.

iRobot says talks with its last potential buyer collapsed, worsening the post–Amazon deal fallout; the company has warned it could be forced to seek bankruptcy.

Foxconn announced that it will roll out humanoids on the production lines of its Houston plant that builds NVIDIA AI infrastructure systems.

Aurora is launching a second 600-mile driverless trucking route from Fort Worth to El Paso, Texas, just six months after its commercial debut.

Tethys Robotics raised $4M in pre-seed funding to scale its 35kg, 300‑meter-rated autonomous inspection drone aimed at offshore wind, energy, and search‑and‑rescue.

McGill engineers built a tiny, 2.7mm robotic bioprinter that 3D‑prints hydrogels onto vocal cords during surgery to precisely rebuild tissue and speed up voice recovery.

Beijing’s BAAI just taught Unitree’s 35kg G1 humanoid to tow a 1.4‑ton car across a flat lot, a balance‑and‑traction flex as much as a strength demo.

Starship snagged $50M in funding, topping $280M total, to push its sidewalk delivery bots beyond college campuses and European cities into major North American markets.

COMMUNITY

🎓 Highlights: News, Guides & Events

See you soon,

Rowan, Jennifer, and Joey—The Rundown’s editorial team

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