A researcher at Slovenia's InnoRenew Centre of Excellence describes winning a nearly €2 million European Research Council grant to develop self-repairing, UV-protective fungal-biofilm coatings for buildings. The five-year award, secured after a lengthy application and resubmission process, immediately reshaped the scope of her research group's work and her own daily responsibilities, shifting her focus from hands-on experiments toward managing people and projects.
nature.com
· 2026-09-18
Crusoe, the data center developer behind OpenAI's Abilene, Texas site, closed a $3.9 billion Series F funding round led by Atreides Management, Mubadala Capital, and Valor Equity Partners, valuing the company at $30.9 billion. The funds will support both large-scale data center builds and Crusoe's new modular 'Spark' AI factories, which can be manufactured off-site and deployed quickly. The company also added three board members, including Redwood Materials CEO JB Straubel and Cloudflare CFO Thomas Seifert.
techcrunch.com
· 2026-09-17
Comp AI, a startup building AI agents to automate security and compliance tasks like drafting policies and gathering audit evidence, announced a $34 million Series A led by Roo Capital and Grand Ventures. The company was founded by Lewis Carhart, Claudio Fuentes, and Mariano Fuentes, who previously ran a workflow startup called LeapAI that they shut down after failing to find a sticky use case. Their frustration with the tedious SOC 2 compliance process while scaling LeapAI directly inspired Comp AI's product.
techcrunch.com
· 2026-09-17
A user examining Neovim's public donation footer discovered a Bitcoin address that received a 10 BTC donation in 2023, now worth roughly $800,000. Blockchain records show the project last moved funds from that address in 2019, suggesting the large donation has gone unnoticed or unused for years.
news.ycombinator.com
· 2026-09-17
Noise, a marketing platform that lets anyone with a smartphone create sponsored content for brands and get paid per view, has raised a $5.5 million seed round led by Capital Midwest, M25, and Grishin Robotics, bringing total funding to $7.2 million. The app connects brands seeking scalable content campaigns with a pool of over 1.5 million creators across TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, and YouTube, handling briefs, payments, and sourcing automatically. Founded in 2025 by Diego Kafie, Stu Feldt, and Nic Weber, the company says its top creators earn six figures annually.
techcrunch.com
· 2026-09-16
Reps. Raja Krishnamoorthi and Michael Cloud introduced the No FLOCK Act, which would cut 10 percent of a state's federal highway funding unless it restricts automated license plate readers like Flock to five specific uses, such as tracking stolen vehicles or felony suspects. The bill excludes broader applications like traffic studies or minor drug enforcement, but does not ban the technology outright or restrict sharing plate data with agencies including immigration enforcement.
arstechnica.com
· 2026-09-16
Investors have approached OpenAI proposing a fresh funding round that could value the company at $1.2 trillion, though no formal talks have begun, according to people familiar with the matter. Some backers see the round partly as a mechanism for employees to sell shares, similar to the roughly $7 billion secondary sale OpenAI completed in August following its $122 billion raise at an $852 billion valuation in March.
cnbc.com
· 2026-09-16
Hang Ten Systems, the AI startup started by former Infosys CEO Vishal Sikka just four months ago, has raised an additional $53 million just five weeks after closing its $32 million seed round. The new round was led by Temasek's Xora, with participation from Mayfield, Aramco Ventures, and individual backers including Intel's Lip-Bu Tan, Micron's Sanjay Mehrotra, and Yahoo co-founder Jerry Yang, pushing total funding to $85 million.
techcrunch.com
· 2026-09-16
OpenAI has held early talks with investors about raising fresh capital at a valuation exceeding $1.2 trillion, according to reports. The round would come as the company prepares for a widely expected public listing next year.
wsj.com
· 2026-09-16
Health benefits startup Thatch has raised $108 million in new funding at a $1 billion valuation, backed by existing investors including Andreessen Horowitz, General Catalyst, Index Ventures, and The General Partnership. The round comes just 17 months after Thatch was valued at $410 million, with CEO Chris Ellis saying annual recurring revenue grew roughly sevenfold in that span.
techcrunch.com
· 2026-09-15
The US National Science Foundation will issue its fewest new grants in four decades after withholding roughly $1 billion for the White House's Grand Research Challenges initiative and pulling back recommendations for over 150 peer-reviewed proposals. Meanwhile, the National Natural Science Foundation of China is increasing its prestigious early-career grants by 50% this year, moving in the opposite direction as Washington retreats from research investment.
nature.com
· 2026-09-15
Xcimer, a laser-based fusion startup, has struck a partnership and investment deal with RTX, the conglomerate that owns Raytheon. The move reflects a broader trend of fusion companies seeking defense industry backing as climate tech venture funding tightens, reviving fusion's historical ties to national security research.
techcrunch.com
· 2026-09-13
GoKawiil