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France leads in financing generative artificial intelligence in Europe, London has 3 times as many GenAI startups

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I like or I hate thisartificial intelligence – especially generative AI – is the technology story of 2024.

OpenAI, because of the implementation of viral services such as ChatGPT and multi-billion-dollar funding, has been in a position to absorb the lion’s share of attention and money up to now. But based on a brand new report from leading VC Accel and analysts at Dealroom, there may be now a wave of up-and-coming players poised to make their mark in Europe and Israel.

Europe and Israel typically together account for around 45% of all enterprise funding annually, but for those who translate this into the particular sphere of AI, the share drops to lower than half that quantity (and generative AI even less). This might be considered a signal that Europe and Israel are lagging behind in the market. On a more optimistic note, this implies we’ll see quite a lot of interesting developments in the approaching months and years as the region catches up.

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Investors are currently trying to find the following big thing, potentially at prices less inflated than in the US. Interestingly, Accel partner Harry Nelis told me that considered one of the explanations this report was produced in any respect was because his firm was working hard to guage all of the generative AI startups emerging across the region, to search out out what to speculate in. So watch this space.

Meanwhile, listed below are a few of the most interesting data from the report:

London is the town that “generated” essentially the most GenAI startups.

Of the 221 Dealroom and Accel startups analyzed, around 27%, or almost a 3rd of the group, were founded in London. Tel Aviv got here second with 13%; Berlin 12%; and Amsterdam 5%. Interestingly, although Paris is a city that everybody has been talking about for a while as a hotbed for the event of artificial intelligence, it was very much in the center of the town rankings, with a rating of 10%.

Image credits: Showroom/Accel (opens in a brand new window) under license.

But these startups have power.

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French startups GenAI earn essentially the most money

In total, French startups that describe themselves as working in the sector of generative artificial intelligence have raised $2.29 billion up to now, essentially the most of any country in Europe and greater than Israel. Recent rounds have included Mistral AI raising $640 million earlier this month (on top of about $500 million earlier), “H” raised $220 million in a SEED round a couple of weeks ago, and Poolside can also be reportedly in the means of raising a large round.

Other notable AI startups in Paris include Hugging Face, an open-source repository for machine learning models that raised $235 million in August 2023; and a brand new research organization called Kyutai, which itself is armed with tons of of hundreds of thousands of euros to make waves in open-source AI models.

Why is it that some places achieve this significantly better than others?

Nelis believes the predominant reason is an ideal storm of strong educational institutions that aren’t only educating loads of tech talent, but in addition attracting large tech corporations to develop their very own operations to leverage that talent.

(*3*) Nelis said. “The same applies to feeding in London by schools such as Cambridge, Oxford and UCL.” However, the step between universities and their founders just isn’t immediate: the center stage for many was working at large technology corporations which have created a platform to streamline recruitment.

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“Universities are clearly very important in attracting hyperscale people,” Nelis said, citing the proven fact that Facebook/Meta established their research labs in Paris early on, as well as Google, which eventually arrange an analogous structure there after already partnering with DeepMind each in London and Paris.

“Founder factories” – hyperscale technology corporations – play a giant a part of this story

Indeed, while startups may appear to be the crucible of AI development, big tech corporations have a very important role to play in fanning those flames. Looking on the long tail of GenAI startups, about 25% of them have founders who previously worked at Alphabet (DeepMind or Google), Apple, Amazon, Meta or Microsoft (let’s call them MAAMA). The higher you go, the more clubbing it gets. Among the highest 10 startups, as many as 60% of the founders come from considered one of MAAMA.

In fact, one company in particular stands out as a transparent supplier of AI founders:

Image credits: Showroom (opens in a brand new window) under license.

This is not great news for those outside this group, although that too will likely evolve and expand as the sector matures and grows.

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This article was originally published on : techcrunch.com

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Anysphere, which makes the cursor supposedly collect USD 900 million with a valuation of USD 9 billion

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AI robot face and programming code on a black background.

Anysphere, producer of coding cursor with AI drive, attracted $ 900 million in the recent financing round by Thrive Capital, Financial Times He informed, citing anonymous sources familiar with the contract.

The report said that Andreessen Horowitz (A16Z) and ACCEL also participate in the round, which values ​​about $ 9 billion.

The cursor collected $ 105 million from Thrive, and A16Z with a valuation of $ 2.5 billion, as TechCrunch said in December. Capital Thrive also led this round and in addition participated in A16Z. According to Crunchbase data, the startup has collected over $ 173 million thus far.

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It is alleged that investors, including index ventures and a reference point, attempt to support the company, but plainly existing investors don’t want to miss the opportunity to support it.

Other coding start-ups powered by artificial intelligence also attract the interest of investors. Techcrunch announced in February that Windsurf, a rival for Aklesphere, talked about collecting funds at a valuation of $ 3 billion. Openai, an investor in Anysphere, was supposedly I’m attempting to get windsurf for about the same value.

(Tagstransate) A16Z

(*9*)This article was originally published on : techcrunch.com

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This is the shipping of products from China to the USA

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Shein and Temu icons are seen displayed on a phone screen in this illustration photo

The Chinese retailer has modified the strategy in the face of American tariffs.

Thanks to the executive ordinance, President Donald Trump ended the so -called de minimis principle, which allowed goods value 800 USD or less entering the country without tariffs. It also increases tariffs to Chinese goods by over 100%, forcing each Chinese firms and Shein, in addition to American giants, similar to Amazon to adapt plans and price increases.

CNBC reports that this was also affected, and American buyers see “import fees” from 130% to 150% added to their accounts. Now, nevertheless, the company is not sending the goods directly from China to the United States. Instead, it only displays the offers of products available in American warehouses, while goods sent from China are listed as outside the warehouse.

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“He actively recruits American sellers to join the platform,” said the spokesman ago. “The transfer is to help local sellers reach more customers and develop their companies.”

(tagstotransate) tariffs

This article was originally published on : techcrunch.com
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One of the last AI Google models is worse in terms of safety

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The Google Gemini generative AI logo on a smartphone.

The recently released Google AI model is worse in some security tests than its predecessor, in line with the company’s internal comparative test.

IN Technical report Google, published this week, reveals that his Flash Gemini 2.5 model is more likely that he generates a text that violates its security guidelines than Gemini 2.0 Flash. In two indicators “text security for text” and “image security to the text”, Flash Gemini 2.5 will withdraw 4.1% and 9.6% respectively.

Text safety for the text measures how often the model violates Google guidelines, making an allowance for the prompt, while image security to the text assesses how close the model adheres to those boundaries after displaying the monitors using the image. Both tests are automated, not supervised by man.

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In an e-mail, Google spokesman confirmed that Gemini 2.5 Flash “performs worse in terms of text safety for text and image.”

These surprising comparative results appear when AI is passing in order that their models are more acceptable – in other words, less often refuse to answer controversial or sensitive. In the case of the latest Llam Meta models, he said that he fought models in order to not support “some views on others” and answers to more “debated” political hints. Opeli said at the starting of this yr that he would improve future models, in order to not adopt an editorial attitude and offers many prospects on controversial topics.

Sometimes these efforts were refundable. TechCrunch announced on Monday that the default CHATGPT OPENAI power supply model allowed juvenile to generate erotic conversations. Opeli blamed his behavior for a “mistake”.

According to Google Technical Report, Gemini 2.5 Flash, which is still in view, follows instructions more faithfully than Gemini 2.0 Flash, including instructions exceeding problematic lines. The company claims that regression might be partially attributed to false positives, but in addition admits that Gemini 2.5 Flash sometimes generates “content of violation” when it is clearly asked.

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“Of course, there is a tension between (after instructions) on sensitive topics and violations of security policy, which is reflected in our assessment,” we read in the report.

The results from Meepmap, reference, which can examine how models react to sensitive and controversial hints, also suggest that Flash Gemini 2.5 is much less willing to refuse to reply controversial questions than Flash Gemini 2.0. Testing the TechCrunch model through the AI ​​OpenRoutter platform has shown that he unsuccessfully writes essays to support human artificial intelligence judges, weakening the protection of due protection in the US and the implementation of universal government supervisory programs.

Thomas Woodside, co -founder of the Secure AI Project, said that the limited details given by Google in their technical report show the need for greater transparency in testing models.

“There is a compromise between the instruction support and the observation of politics, because some users may ask for content that would violate the rules,” said Woodside Techcrunch. “In this case, the latest Flash model Google warns the instructions more, while breaking more. Google does not present many details about specific cases in which the rules have been violated, although they claim that they are not serious. Not knowing more, independent analysts are difficult to know if there is a problem.”

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Google was already under fire for his models of security reporting practices.

The company took weeks to publish a technical report for the most talented model, Gemini 2.5 Pro. When the report was finally published, it initially omitted the key details of the security tests.

On Monday, Google published a more detailed report with additional security information.

(Tagstotransate) Gemini

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This article was originally published on : techcrunch.com
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