Donât miss these Chips are green because of all the money involved: The ability to manufacture lots of semiconductors is considered a national security issue today. That means that the amount of investment that the sector will receive globally will likely outstrip natural demand. On the other hand, computing power is more in demand than ever to power the ongoing AI boom. So itâs not too surprising that Rebellions, a South Korean fabless AI chip startup, just landed $124 million in a massive Series B, partially predicated on work it announced recently to build an AI chip with Samsung. But thatâs not all. Semron, a German startup, wants to build â3D-scaledâ chips that will allow companies and people to run AI models locally. AI in the enterprise! AI at home! AI on your device if itâs a TV or a phone! Welcome to our new future. p0 wants to use AI to catch code flaws: No one wants to push an update to production that kills the service. Thatâs what p0 wants to prevent. The company is using large language models to analyze code and help developers catch serious issues in code before it is shipped. I wonder how long itâll be until AI writes the code, more AI verifies that itâs good to go, and then even more AI deploys it? Heck, AI could even be dogfooding at that point, right? Maybe developers will code up a solution to the ever-present shortage of high-powered code slingers. The latest in climate tech: Thankfully, not everything in the world (and this newsletter) is about AI. Some companies are still building vertical SaaS. BlueLayer is one such firm, and it is working on software that is specifically designed for carbon project developers, which I thought was pretty neat. It helps companies track carbon credits and provide reporting tools for other stakeholders. The company has raised $10 million to date. Also: Haven Energy has closed a Series A less than a year after it raised a seed round. Investors are seemingly impressed by the company, which connects consumer solar power generators to battery techs who can up their in-house storage capacity. Why is that big business? A regulatory change in California is a key driver, Tim De Chant reports. PG-13 OpenAI: On the heels of a global conversation about the use of modern AI tools for creating unsavory images, OpenAI has teamed up with Common Sense Media to offer family-friendly âchatbot apps powered by OpenAIâs GenAI models,â Kyle Wiggers reports. Given the appetite for AI regulation around the world, we think itâs a good idea to keep tabs on how major AI model companies are working to get ahead of legal strictures by cosplaying as moral leaders. Plex raises $40M as it hunts for profitability: The streaming media economy is so large now that I have to admit I donât know all the companies in the space. Tubi, for example. Itâs on my Roku. What is it? Iâll never know. Another streaming company that I should pay more attention to is Plex. The company started off as a media server tool, but then started offering a free streaming service, monetized via advertisements. Plex also offers a paid version of its service that offers content downloads. Regardless, TechCrunch reports that the company could reach profitability late this year or early next year, so while streaming has not yet proven to be a profitable avenue for many companies, Plex appears to have found a way forward that is resonating with consumers. | 