​Airbnb started rolling out an AI-powered customer service bot in the U.S. last month, CEO Brian Chesky said during the firm’s first-quarter conference call on Thursday. Chesky said 50% of Airbnb’s U.S. users are already using the AI bot for customer service, adding that the company plans to roll out the feature to all its […]  

​Amazon’s upgraded digital assistant powered by generative AI, Alexa+, has rolled out to over 100,000 users, CEO Andy Jassy said on the company’s earnings call Thursday. While that’s a far cry from the 600 million Alexa devices out there, the company is making some progress on the rollout of Alexa+, which was first unveiled in […]  

​Apple CEO Tim Cook commented on the impact of President Trump’s tariffs during Thursday’s second-quarter earnings call with investors. While the iPhone maker saw only “limited impact” from tariffs in the March quarter, Cook said Apple couldn’t forecast what that would mean for the coming quarter. However, if things remained the same, the company estimates […]  

​Three years ago, a group of TikTokers joined NBCUniversal’s new initiative aimed at transforming social media influencers into the next generation of TV show creators.  Now, four of these creators are set to launch their original series on Peacock.  According to The Hollywood Reporter, the shows set to premiere are “The Warehouse Phase,” developed by […]  

​Mach Industries, the defense tech founded by 21-year-old Ethan Thornton, is about to close a fresh $100 million in financing co-led by new investor Khosla and existing investor Bedrock Capital, a source familiar with the deal tells TechCrunch. The new round will value the company at around $470 million, according to the source. However, the […]  

​Payments processing software provider Stripe is ready to help iOS app developers bypass Apple’s cut of App Store transactions. Following yesterday’s ruling in the Apple-Epic antitrust trial, where Judge Yvonne Gonzalez Rogers outright shamed Apple for not permitting external payment links in apps as she had previously ruled, Stripe shared documentation that shows iOS developers […]  

​Dub, the copy-trading platform that says it’s transforming how Gen Z invests, has secured a $30 million Series A funding round, bringing its total raised to $47 million. The deal, which founder Steven Wang had previously hinted to TechCrunch was in the works, comes a year after its official launch. The 23-year-old’s Harvard dropout’s platform […]