Mindgard, a Lancaster University spinoff specializing in AI security, has raised $8 million in funding led by .406 Ventures to develop its continuous AI security testing solution further. The startup has also appointed two US-based executives as it plans to expand its presence in the US.
Databricks, Decart, Perplexity, and Anysphere all raised new funding; Google gave no breaks to OpenAI and launched a reasoning model and Veo 2; Grammarly acquired Coda; GitHub Copilot introduced a new free tier; Instagram is planning to launch Movie Gen-powered features; and more.
Perplexity AI has secured a $500 million funding round led by IVP that values the AI search company at $9 billion post-money. The current round is the latest of four funding efforts Perplexity AI undertook throughout 2024.
AI-powered video editing features are coming to Instagram. These tools will be based on Meta's recently previewed Movie Gen model suite. According to the announcement, the upcoming features will enable creators to make edits like changing their outfits or modifying the background of the video.
Perplexity has acquired Carbon, a startup specializing in connecting LLMs with external data sources. The deal will allow Perplexity to integrate Carbon's technology into its products, enabling Perplexity to connect to users' apps to deliver a more personalized experience.
In a remarkably short time, Anysphere, the parent company of AI coding assistant Cursor, has managed to raise a $60M Series A led by Andreessen Horowitz and a $100M Series B led by Thrive. The latter round places the startup at an estimated $2.6B valuation.
AI startup Decart has raised $53 million in total funding as it pivots from its profitable AI infrastructure business to developing real-time video generation and world models. Decart recently previewed Oasis, its foundation model capable of generating "playable" Minecraft-like worlds.
GitHub has launched a free version of its AI coding assistant Copilot with limited monthly completions and chat messages, aiming to expand access to AI programming tools as part of its mission to reach one billion developers worldwide.
Grammarly has acquired Coda to create an AI-powered productivity platform that combines Grammarly's writing assistance technology with Coda's document and workflow tools, with Coda's co-founder Shishir Mehrotra taking over as CEO of the combined company.
YouTube has partnered with Creative Artists Agency to develop and test new AI tools that will help celebrities and creators identify and manage AI-generated content featuring their likeness on the platform.
Otterly.AI, the first AI search monitoring platform, has launched from stealth with over 1,000 users, helping brands track and optimize their visibility across major AI search engines like ChatGPT and Google AI Overviews as traditional search traffic faces disruption from AI adoption.
Writer has launched Palmyra Creative, a new AI model designed to produce more creative and engaging outputs. According to Writer, Palmyra Creative can be combined with the company's specialized models to bring creative writing to domains such as finance and healthcare.