The business of tech stories our desk judged worth your time, written so anyone can follow them.
Beeline Russia now pays back up to 500,000 rubles a month if a scammer tricks a prepaid customer, at no extra cost. Here is why that matters.
Read more: Russian phone company Beeline now insures customers against scam callsSouth African insurer Naked now covers cats and dogs, and says early claims were often paid within two days, the fastest in 12 minutes.
Read more: South African insurer Naked now offers pet insurance with fast claimsKPN, the Netherlands' largest phone company, now sells an AI call assistant to small businesses, aiming to cut missed calls without stopping the work.
Read more: Dutch phone company adds an AI assistant to answer small business callsLarridin raised $30 million to help companies check whether their AI tools save time or money. Its pitch matters to any business watching its AI bills grow.
Read more: Startup raises $30M to show companies if their AI spending pays offSaaStr warns that software firms raising prices and locking in contracts as sales slow may push customers to cheaper, AI-built alternatives.
Read more: When sales slow, software firms squeeze loyal customers. It backfires.Omen AI is buying Aquatic Labs for $16 million to build one sensor that checks data center cooling water in real time, which could mean less wasted water.
Read more: Two startups merge to keep AI data centers from wasting waterPolygraf AI's tools, which screen what staff type into AI chatbots, can now be bought by public agencies through Carahsoft and existing government contracts.
Read more: Government agencies get a new way to buy AI safety toolsA software rep's pitch cited 'end of 2024 goals' in 2026. SaaStr says it shows why outbound email needs a check, and why buyers' AI may screen sloppy pitches.
Read more: A sales email with the wrong year shows why companies are turning to AI agentsWeil Gotshal, a 95-year-old law firm, plans to wind down after top partners left. Lawyers say AI could help firms keep what their stars know, or help stars leave.
Read more: Weil Gotshal is closing after 95 years, and AI wasn't the causeAnthropic bought Mithril Medicine, a one-employee drug startup that used Claude to run its lab work. It hints at how small teams may work with AI.
Read more: Anthropic buys a one-person drug startup run with its AI, ClaudeY Combinator CEO Garry Tan says AI agents cost him $100,000 to $200,000 a year, and his agent has read his email, files and 20 years of therapy notes.
Read more: Y Combinator's boss spends up to $200,000 a year on AI agentsWhatsApp is reportedly testing its own cloud for chat backups, with 2GB free and mandatory encryption, which could mean less reliance on Google or Apple.
Read more: WhatsApp Tests Its Own Cloud Storage for Chat BackupsDisney is reportedly planning thousands of job cuts, and some managers have been told to aim for 20% in yearly savings. Here is what is known so far.
Read more: Disney is moving toward thousands of layoffsApple says memory costs will keep climbing and would not say whether it will raise prices again, which could matter if you plan to buy a Mac, iPad or iPhone.
Read more: Apple says memory costs will keep rising and won't rule out new price hikesHinge is testing a cheaper paid plan with extra filters and location limits, but its parent company has not said what it will cost.
Read more: Hinge is testing a cheaper paid plan as dating app fatigue growsMastercard signed an AI shopping deal with OpenAI and a preliminary one with Tencent's TenPay Global. Soon an AI helper may pay with your card.
Read more: Mastercard teams up with OpenAI and Tencent so AI can shop for youMastercard signed a small business deal with HDFC Bank, India's largest private bank, which could put three million more of its cards in circulation.
Read more: Mastercard deepens its bet on India with the country's biggest private bankThe Brand Constructors launched a service to help contractors appear in AI chatbot answers, as buyers start comparing builders on ChatGPT, Google AI and Gemini.
Read more: Marketing firm helps contractors show up in AI chatbot answersAnthropic, maker of the Claude AI assistant, says it has committed to $900 billion in computing costs, as it prepares to sell shares to the public.
Read more: Anthropic says it has promised to spend $900 billion on AI computingTrajectory, a one-year-old startup, raised $45 million to let lawyers, doctors and other specialists improve AI models themselves, without a research team.
Read more: Startup raises $45M to let nonexperts teach AI their jobsA Colorado startup that grew food in shipping containers filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy, even after reporting its best sales year. Here is what that means for buyers.
Read more: Container farm startup shown on national TV files for bankruptcyBig investors reportedly told Anthropic its IPO should be valued near $1.5 trillion to $1.6 trillion, below earlier talk of $2 trillion, after tech stocks fell.
Read more: Investors Say Anthropic Is Worth Less Than Hoped Ahead of IPOMomentic, a Y Combinator startup, built AI agents that click through web and mobile apps to find bugs, which could save small teams hours of manual checking.
Read more: Momentic launches AI testers that click through your app to find bugsA startup called 42AI says its AI can predict what people will decide, and ten big brokerages already use it on their customers' calls and account activity.
Read more: Startup says its AI can predict what you will do before you do
