February 6, 2025

What a return to supersonic flight could mean for climate change

This article is from The Spark, MIT Technology Review’s weekly climate newsletter. To receive it in your inbox every Wednesday, sign up here. As I’ve admitted in this newsletter before, I love few things more than getting on an airplane. I know, it’s a bold statement from a climate reporter because of all the associated…

Blue Origin successfully launches New Glenn rocket into space

January 16, 2025

Jeff Bezos’ spaceflight company Blue Origin launched its new mega-rocket, called New Glenn, into orbit for the first time. The rocket lifted off at 2:03AM ET on January 16 from Cape Canaveral, Florida, and crossed the official boundary into space a few minutes later. Shortly after, a second-stage burn placed the rocket’s upper section into […]

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Interest in nuclear power is surging. Is it enough to build new reactors?

January 16, 2025
This article is from The Spark, MIT Technology Review’s weekly climate newsletter. To receive it in your inbox every Wednesday, sign up here. Lately, the vibes have been good for nuclear power. Public support is building, and public and private funding have made the technology more economical in key markets. There’s also a swell of…

What to expect from Neuralink in 2025

January 16, 2025
In November, a young man named Noland Arbaugh announced he’d be livestreaming from his home for three days straight. His broadcast was in some ways typical fare: a backyard tour, video games, meet mom. The difference is that Arbaugh, who is paralyzed, has thin electrode-studded wires installed in his brain, which he used to move…

Mistral signs deal with AFP to offer up-to-date answers in Le Chat

January 16, 2025

Just a day after Google inked a deal with The Associated Press, Mistral is also announcing a content deal with the Agence France-Presse (AFP) to improve the accuracy of answers in Le Chat, Mistral’s chatbot product. This is the first deal of this kind for the Paris-based artificial intelligence company. And it indicates that Mistral […]

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Prepaid payments platform Recharge raises €45M to go on M&A spree

January 16, 2025

With inflation still stubbornly high in comparison to previous years, and the siren voices of subscription services like Netflix and Spotify continuing to lure, consumers have understandably turned to alternative forms of payment to manage their household bills. As a result, online prepaid payment platforms have benefited.  That’s the bet being laid today by Recharge, […]

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Hyperline secures $10 million for its automated billing platform

January 16, 2025

French startup Hyperline wants to build the next-generation Chargebee. Over the past two years, the startup has built a new billing platform that can be used for recurring subscriptions, one-off purchases, usage-based billing and more. Hyperline raised an initial €4 million funding round from Index Ventures back in 2023 ($4.1 million at today’s exchange rate). […]

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Amazon to acquire Indian fintech Axio in credit push

January 16, 2025

Amazon has agreed to acquire Indian buy now pay later startup Axio, deepening its push into financial services in one of its fastest-growing markets as it seeks to expand credit access to millions of underserved customers. The US technology group, which has held an equity stake in Axio for six years, signed the acquisition agreement […]

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In AI copyright case, Zuckerberg turns to YouTube for his defense

January 16, 2025

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg appears to have used YouTube and its battle to take down pirated content to defend his own company’s use of a data set containing copyrighted e-books to train AI models, newly released snippets of his deposition reveals.  The deposition, which was part of a complaint submitted to the court by plaintiffs’ […]

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Chinese AI company MiniMax releases new models it claims are competitive with the industry’s best

January 16, 2025

Chinese firms continue to release AI models that rival the capabilities of systems developed by OpenAI and other U.S.-based AI companies. This week, MiniMax, an Alibaba- and Tencent-backed startup that has raised around $850 million in venture capital and is valued at more than $2.5 billion, debuted three new models: MiniMax-Text-01, MiniMax-VL-01, and T2A-01-HD. MiniMax-Text-01 […]

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