Skild AI hits $14B valuation with $1.4B raise

🤖 Skild AI Raises $1.4B, Robots Now Worth More Than Countries

• Skild AI just raised $1.4 BILLION from SoftBank, tripling its valuation to $14B in 7 months. Their robots learn by watching humans like creepy metal toddlers.

• We're speedrunning to robots that don't need training manuals - they just watch you make coffee once and suddenly they're baristas. Not terrifying at all!! (source)

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🌍 Meta Drops $2B on Chinese AI Startup, Geopolitics in Shambles

• Zuck just bought Manus for $2 BILLION - a Chinese-founded startup that went from $0 to $100M revenue in months. Benchmark got a 4x return in under a year (must be nice).

• Turns out AI talent doesn't care about your trade war - 50% of AI researchers are Chinese and money speaks all languages. The decoupling narrative just got REKT. (source)

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💊 AstraZeneca Buys Its First AI Company, Cancer Research Goes Brrr

• Big Pharma FINALLY joined the party - AstraZeneca acquired Modella AI to turbocharge cancer drug discovery with foundation models and AI agents.

• AI might actually cure cancer before it destroys humanity. Plot twist nobody saw coming?? (source)

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🏗️ Meta Launches "Meta Compute" to Build TENS OF GIGAWATTS of Infrastructure

• Meta's new initiative plans to build tens of gigawatts of AI infrastructure this decade (potentially hundreds more). They hired a former Trump advisor to sweet-talk governments into financing it.

• Zuck's not playing around - he wants to deliver "personal superintelligence to billions" which sounds totally normal and not dystopian AT ALL. (source)

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🛡️ Depthfirst Raises $40M Because AI Hackers Are Coming for Your Code

• New security startup Depthfirst got $40M from Accel to fight AI-powered cyberattacks. It's literally an AI arms race in cybersecurity now.

• Hackers are using AI to find vulnerabilities faster than you can say "zero-day exploit." We're all doomed :) (source)

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🧠 Google's Gemini Can Now Stalk Your Entire Digital Life (Helpfully!)

• Gemini's new "Personal Intelligence" connects across Gmail, Photos, Search, and YouTube to reason across your data. It knows your license plate from that one photo you forgot about.

• AI is getting uncomfortably personal - but hey, at least it can plan your vacation while analyzing your psychological profile!! (source)

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🏥 ChatGPT Health Launches, Doctors Hate This One Trick

• OpenAI dropped ChatGPT Health with HIPAA protections after 230 MILLION people were already using regular ChatGPT for medical advice weekly (yikes).

• With 6-month waits for primary care, people are trusting hallucinating chatbots with their health. What could go wrong?? (source)

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🧬 Anthropic Launches Claude for Healthcare, Mike Krieger Joins the Lab

• Instagram co-founder Mike Krieger joined Anthropic's Labs team while they launch HIPAA-ready Claude for healthcare.

• The race to put AI in hospitals is ON - now taking bets on which chatbot prescribes the first completely made-up medication. (source)

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🎬 Google's Veo 3.1 Makes Vertical Videos, TikTokers in Shambles

• Veo now generates native 9:16 vertical videos with 4K upscaling. Your favorite influencer might already be AI-generated (honestly would explain a lot).

• AI slop is going mainstream on social media - soon you won't know if that dance trend is human or hallucinated. (source)

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🤖 1X's Neo Robots Learn from YouTube, Humanity's Days Numbered

• 1X's World Model lets Neo humanoids learn tasks from videos. They opened preorders but won't say how many (translation: not many).

• Robots that learn by watching YouTube tutorials?? Great, now they'll know how to fix everything AND do terrible life hacks. (source)

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💾 Memory Chip Stocks Go Parabolic, Retail Traders YOLO Everything

• SanDisk saw $7.1M in retail inflows in ONE DAY as Samsung's co-CEO called the shortage "unprecedented" - could last years.

• Memory chips are the new oil and everyone's trying to strike it rich. The AI boom created a supply chain nightmare that makes GPU shortages look cute. (source)

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🏛️ UAE Joins US "Pax Silica" Alliance, Picking Sides in AI Cold War

• The UAE joined America's semiconductor alliance alongside Japan, Israel, and others to secure AI supply chains. It's literally called "Pax Silica" (Silicon Peace) which is... a choice.

• Countries are choosing teams in the AI race - it's NATO but for GPUs. Not ominous at all!! (source)

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🌿 AI Cuts Environmental Assessments from 40 Hours to 1 Hour

• NEC's agentic AI reduced impact assessments from 40 hours to under 1 hour, saving 80,000 hours of labor. Nature monitoring just got automated.

• FINALLY, AI doing something useful - helping companies track environmental damage at scale. (Now they can destroy nature efficiently!) (source)

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🛒 Google Swears AI Shopping Agents Won't Price-Gouge You (Sure Jan)

• Consumer groups warned Google's Universal Commerce Protocol could enable "surveillance pricing" - Google pinky-promises they "strictly prohibit" it.

• Your AI shopping assistant might be working for the merchants, not you. But hey, at least it'll suggest the premium option while it empties your wallet!! (source)

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⚡ Microsoft Promises Data Centers Won't Raise Your Power Bill (X to Doubt)

• Microsoft faces 142 activist groups across 24 states opposing data centers. They promise a "community-first" approach (after already abandoning one Wisconsin project lol).

• The AI infrastructure boom is becoming a political nightmare - turns out people don't want their power bills funding Skynet. (source)

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🎨 UK Government Admits Copyright Proposal Was Trash, Tries Again

• British officials admitted their "opt-out" copyright plan was a mistake after creators revolted. "Genuine reset" coming in March (we'll see).

• This could set global precedent for AI training rights - creators might actually get paid instead of just getting their art stolen. Revolutionary concept!! (source)

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🚫 Teachers Union Rage-Quits X Over AI-Generated Kid Images

• The American Federation of Teachers (1.8M members) is leaving X because Grok is generating "sickening" AI images of children. The "last straw" apparently.

• Major organizations are drawing ethical lines about AI image generation - turns out there ARE things we shouldn't let chatbots create. Who knew?? (source)

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