
As demand for EVs declines, electric automaker Rivian is taking this time to adapt its business and expand its brand. Rivian’s founder and CEO RJ Scaringe joins Rapid Response to explore the company’s recent $5.8 billion partnership with Volkswagen, the ongoing risk assessment for self-driving features, and how Rivian’s AI-enabled ‘technological plumbing’ can accelerate the brand beyond incumbent manufacturers.
This is an abridged transcript of an interview fr

A new startup is leaning on the power of recommendations to spread the word about indie films.
Olyn offers a direct-to-consumer platform for film and video distribution, enabling filmmakers to retain up to 90% of their revenue. Billed as “Shopify for filmmakers,” Olyn removes the platform as a middleman, eliminating ads and algorithm-driven recommendations. This allows movies to shine based on their own merits and be monetized directly through viewer

A new artificial intelligence company from one of the cofounders of OpenAI is quickly becoming one of the most highly valued AI firms in an increasingly crowded marketplace. Ilya Sutskever’s Safe Superintelligence (SSI) is in the process of raising in excess of $1 billion with a valuation topping $30 billion. Bloomberg reports San Francisco-based Greenoak

Since the moment the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) was first proposed, Elon Musk’s critics have warned that the world’s richest man was at risk of making decisions that could be a conflict of interest, given his multiple business operations. With recent cuts at the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), those fears are increasing.
Roughly 20 employees of the FDA’s office of neurological and physical medicine devices were let go over the weekend, part of

U.S. personal injury law firm Morgan & Morgan sent an urgent email this month to its more than 1,000 lawyers: Artificial intelligence can invent fake case law, and using made-up information in a court filing could get you fired.
A federal judge in Wyoming had just threatened to sanction two lawyers at the firm who included fictitious case citations in a lawsuit against Walmart. One of the lawyers admitted in

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Customer experience is at a tipping point. Companies are struggling to see results from AI, digital transformation, and pers

Thinking Machines Lab, an AI startup founded by former OpenAI Chief Technology Officer Mira Murati, has tapped about 30 leading researchers and engineers from competitors such as OpenAI, Meta and Mistral, it said in a blog post on Tuesday.
The team — roughly two-thirds of which comprises former OpenAI employees — includes

Elon Musk’s aggressive push to cut government spending reached new heights on Valentine’s Day, as employees across more than two dozen federal government departments were abruptly fired on Valentine’s Day—with those let go warning it could impact how the government operates.
Jack, who spoke on condition of a pseudonym (as did every ex-federal worker in this story), started working

A lone anglerfish has captured the internet’s heart.
Usually found 6,500 feet under the sea, this black seadevil was filmed by marine researchers in Tenerife swimming towards the water’s surface on January 26. The shark conservation NGO Condrik Tenerife called the black, razor-toothed creature “a legendary fish that few will ever have the privilege of observing alive,” when sharing their footage on Instagram.

A new app makes hiring security as simple as ordering an Uber.
A viral TikTok with 11.2 million views reads, “POV we just ordered bodyguards to pick us up from the airport.” In the video, two influencers summon a pair of Protectors—private security in black SUVs—to Newark Airport after flying in from Los Angeles for New York Fashion Week. Another