114 stories
Volvo and Nvidia announced an expansion of their nearly decade-long collaboration: Volvo will use the Hyperion hardware-software architecture, the Alpamayo stack and the Halos safety evaluation layer in future vehicles. The system is designed for driverless operation on city streets and highways. The deal value and the first model have not been disclosed.
According to Reuters, SK Hynix's flash memory unit Solidigm is seeking US approval to supply American chipmaking equipment to the plant in Dalian (China) in exchange for continuing construction of a NAND fab in the US. The company is considering upstate New York. SK Hynix says it is not expanding Dalian Mod B capacity and is acting in consultation with US authorities.
Rivian CEO RJ Scaringe said at TechCrunch Disrupt that in the future the company's vehicles will be able to run AI agents from third-party developers such as Anthropic. No timeline was given — details are promised at the 'AI & Autonomy Day' in December. Vehicle control will not be handed over to the agents.
Geely Auto Uzbekistan held an international test called the '3L Challenge': the super-hybrid Geely EX5 EM-i crossover covered 1205 km from Tashkent to Khiva without refueling or recharging. According to the on-board computer, the average fuel consumption was 3.8 l/100 km, and after the fuel was used up, 23% of the battery charge remained.
Google announced the availability of the Universal Cart tool for users in the US. The feature, first shown at Google I/O in May, allows users to collect items from Search and the Gemini app into a single cart, track prices and availability, account for card rewards and promo codes. Checkout is tied to the open Universal Commerce Protocol standard.
YouTube Music is launching a labeling system to indicate the role of AI in music creation: Fully Gen AI, Partly Gen AI, and No Gen AI. The labels will also appear in the main YouTube app. This is part of an industry trend — similar measures are being implemented by Apple Music, Spotify, Deezer, and TIDAL.
Startup Hiyd has developed a thin biometric sensor that attaches to the back of an already-worn watch using micro-suction technology. The device, 2.7 mm thick and weighing 7 g, tracks heart rate, heart rate variability, sleep and other metrics. The company is preparing to present at TechCrunch Disrupt and launch on Kickstarter in November.
Startup Ambrosia Energy, founded by alumni of Swarm (sold to SpaceX), has begun building a 10 GWh battery factory near Austin, Texas. The company is betting on solar power plants with storage to power data centers off-grid at $100 per MWh, and this year it begins its first commercial station in West Texas.
The BMW i3 50L electric sedan covered 1213 km without recharging during road tests in China, arriving at its destination with 1% battery charge remaining. The distance covered amounted to 118% of the claimed range. Average energy consumption was 8.8 kWh per 100 km. Series production and the launch on the Chinese market are scheduled for the fourth quarter of 2026.
TimeTeller, a startup spun out of Berlin's Charité clinic, has developed an at-home saliva test to determine a person's circadian rhythm. Founder Angela Relogio sees the main goal as timing cancer treatment, but stresses that the consumer kit does not determine this. The company has partnered with insurer Techniker Krankenkasse and presented at TechCrunch Disrupt.
The BBC News channel became available as a live stream on YouTube for viewers in the UK and the US. The trial launch began on Thursday, 15 October 2026, and extends a similar practice already running in Australia, Kenya, Nigeria and Poland. It is part of the BBC's strategy to attract young digital audiences amid audience fragmentation and a debate about the corporation's future funding after 2027.
At the Disrupt 2026 conference in San Francisco, Flock head Garrett Langley said the company has never once 'fired' police department clients, despite reports of abuse of access to the license plate database. During his talk, a protest against mass surveillance was held outside the venue.
Colossal Biosciences has announced the AI platform GenoMorph, which helps identify genes for editing in de-extinction projects with limited genetic data. The platform is being applied to the dodo project, for which only one genome is available. The company also reported that its Nicobar pigeon colony has grown to 36 birds and that it has created cells that give rise to eggs and sperm.
At TechCrunch Disrupt, Flock head Garret Langley claimed that the Gunshot Detection system's microphones only pick up gunshots. However, materials on the company's website mention detection of fireworks, street takeovers, and crashes. A Flock representative confirmed the contradiction, and criticism of the product is intensifying amid growing distrust of mass surveillance.
Google announced broad access to the Gemini 4 Argon model, first introduced in late September. From October 13, the model is available to Google AI Pro and Ultra subscribers, via API and in AI Studio. The current API price is $2 per million input and $10 per million output tokens; from December 1 it will rise to $4 and $20.
Denver startup Intero Biosystems, spun out of the University of Michigan, grows human gut organoids and sells them to pharma, biotech, food and chemical companies for testing compounds. The flagship product GastroScreen — organoids about 1 mm in size, shipped roughly 100 per tube. The company was founded in 2024, raised $2.3 million pre-seed and generated more than $400 thousand in revenue from the fourth quarter of last year through the third quarter of this year.
Munich-based startup CedarDB, founded by alumni of the Technical University of Munich, announced limited access to the cloud version of its database that combines operational and analytical workloads. The company links demand for this approach to the rise of agentic AI and is competing at TechCrunch Disrupt's Startup Battlefield.
Gudea, a startup presented at TechCrunch Disrupt 2026, tracks the spread of stories and rumors across more than 500 platforms and helps organizations respond before escalation. The company raised $7 million in seed funding, bringing total funding to approximately $15 million.
