OpenAI inflated o3 benchmark claims & Microsoft researchers create super‐efficient AI.

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• We're gonna need a bigger moat by CBInsights.

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• Startup legal document pack – essential legal docs for founders.

• OpenAI’s o3, GPT-4.1, and o4-mini Our take on what’s powerful, what’s practical, and what’s still TBD.

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STARTUPS RAISING MILLIONS

💰 Startup funding updates

Neutrl, a Panama City, Panama-based provider of a DeFi protocol developing a market-neutral synthetic dollar called $NUSD targeting OTC arbitrage strategies, raised USD 5M in Seed funding. The round was led by STIX and Accomplice, with participation from Amber Group, SCB Limited (SIG), Figment Capital, and Nascent, alongside angel investors such as Guy Young and Steven Shi of Ethena, DCF Capital, Flood (Insilico Trading), Huss, Jez (izebel.eth) and Josh Lim (Arbelos Markets).

1Fort, a NYC-based company providing an AI platform for business insurance, raised $7.5M in funding. The round was led by Bonfire Ventures, with participation from Draper Associates, Karim Atiyeh, the founder of Ramp, Village Global, Operator Partners, 8-Bit Capital, Character VC and Company Ventures.

Booked it, a London, UK-based provider of booking, marketing, CRM, and loyalty solutions, raised £2.5M in funding. The round was led by Calculus Capital.

Fotenix, a Salford, UK-based AI-powered crop diagnostics company, rased £2.1M in funding. The round was led by River Capital. The startup received a six-figure investment from EHE Ventures’ AI Growth Fund, unlocking a £1.6 million Innovate UK grant.

Nyobolt, a Cambridge, UK-based developer of charging technologies, raised $30M in funding. The round wad led by Q Capital and Latitude, the sister fund of LocalGlobe, with strategic partners including Scania Invest and Takasago Industry.

Goodfire, a San Francisco, CA-based AI interpretability research company, raised $50M in Series A funding. The round was led by Menlo Ventures with participation from Lightspeed Venture Partners, Anthropic, B Capital, Work-Bench, Wing, South Park Commons, and others.

Revel, a Los Angeles, CA-based provider of a comprehensive hardware control platform, raised $30M across two funding rounds. The Series A round was led by Thrive Capital. The seed round was led by Felicis Ventures and Abstract Ventures with participation from Dylan Field, Earthrise Ventures, and Commodity Capital.

Risa Labs, a Palo Alto, CA-based oncology AI company, raised $3.5M in funding. The round was led by Binny Bansal (Flipkart co-founder) with participation from Oncology Ventures, General Catalyst, z21 Ventures, ODD BIRD VC, and Ashish Gupta.

Cy4Data Labs, a San Jose, Ca-based data protection company, raised $10M in funding. The round was led by Pelion Venture Partners.

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NEW VCs IN THE MARKET

🏦 Venture Capital updates

Founders Fund has closed a $4.6 billion growth fund, up from its previous $3.4B fund in 2022, signaling renewed VC bullishness. The oversubscribed raise drew 270 LPs and included significant GP capital. While active in AI, Founders Fund is also doubling down on defense tech with portfolio companies like Anduril, SpaceX, and Flock Safety.

KEY STORIES IN TECH

📜 Latest in tech

OpenAI faces scrutiny over o3 benchmark results after third-party evaluation:

• OpenAI previously claimed its o3 AI model scored over 25% on the challenging FrontierMath benchmark, but independent tests by Epoch AI found it performed closer to 10%.

• The discrepancy likely stems from differences in compute levels, evaluation subsets, and internal tuning — with OpenAI confirming the public o3 is optimized for real-world use, not aggressive benchmarking.

• While newer models like o3-mini-high and o4-mini now outperform o3, the controversy highlights ongoing transparency challenges around AI model benchmarking.

Microsoft researchers create super‑efficient AI:

• Microsoft researchers introduced BitNet b1.58, a language model engineered specifically to minimize power consumption and memory footprint during operation, making it highly economical for various devices.

• This innovative system uses just 1.58 bits per parameter, drastically reducing computational resource requirements and improving response times, particularly on hardware with limited processing power.

• Despite its compact 0.4 GB size suitable for laptops, benchmark evaluations confirm BitNet performs competitively against significantly larger, less optimized artificial intelligence constructions available today.

Chipmakers fear they are ceding China’s AI market to Huawei:

• New US government limitations block leading American companies like Nvidia from selling their most advanced artificial intelligence processors to the substantial and expanding Chinese market.

• This significant policy change compels American semiconductor firms to revise their plans, fueling concerns that Chinese technology leader Huawei will capture the surrendered AI chip sector.

• Analysts anticipate Huawei could exploit this opening, utilizing boosted domestic sales and collaborations to swiftly improve its processing unit capabilities and compete internationally with established firms.

China pits humanoid robots against humans in half-marathon:

• For the first time, twenty-one humanoid machines joined human athletes in Beijing's Yizhuang half-marathon, competing side-by-side over the full 21-kilometer distance under real race conditions.

• The top-performing automaton, Tiangong Ultra, finished the course in 2 hours 40 minutes using specialized running algorithms, while other mechanical competitors faced difficulties requiring human assistance.

• Chinese firms showcased their bipedal robots in this public spectacle to highlight advancements, though experts debate the demonstration's relevance to practical industrial applications for these devices.

EU puts Apple fine on hold while US trade talks continue:

• The European Commission reportedly postponed announcing regulatory actions against Apple and Meta, coinciding with high-level trade talks between EU officials and the United States government this week.

• This decision to delay the enforcement measures, which stem from the Digital Markets Act, has sparked worries among some Parliament members about political considerations influencing regulators.

• The probes examine Meta's paid ad-free option and Apple's rules preventing developers from directing users to alternative transaction methods outside the official App Store marketplace.

OpenAI’s new reasoning AI models hallucinate more:

• OpenAI’s latest reasoning models, o3 and o4-mini, outperform in coding and math but hallucinate more frequently than older models like o1 and GPT-4o, with o4-mini hallucinating nearly 48% of the time on PersonQA.

• OpenAI admits it doesn’t fully understand why hallucinations are increasing, suggesting the models' tendency to make more claims overall could be driving both more correct and incorrect responses.

• Third-party researchers and users have reported fabricated actions and broken links in o3’s answers, indicating that while reasoning improves capabilities, it may also amplify unreliability.

LAST COFFEE SIP

☕Other news

Meta blocks Apple Intelligence on Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp:

• Meta has opted to disable Apple Intelligence functions, including Writing Tools and Genmoji creation, within its suite of iOS applications like Facebook, Instagram, and WhatsApp.

• Users accessing the social media firm's mobile software will find that integrated features for AI text assistance or customized emoji generation are currently inaccessible on their iPhones.

• Although the technology company did not provide a specific reason, speculation suggests it aims to promote its own Meta AI amid past disagreements with Apple.

HIRING ALERT: STARTUPS & VC ROLES

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