Posts by Liam Redmond
Trump reacts to ‘true warrior’ Maria Bartiromo leaving Fox News
President Trump praised Maria Bartiromo as a “true warrior” and predicted that fans of the longtime Fox News host “will not be happy” after she was abruptly axed from the cable giant. Bartiromo’s sudden exit after a 12-year run at the network with no explanation left the president shocked Thursday night. “I can’t believe Maria Bartiromo…
Read MoreTrump reacts to ‘true warrior’ Maria Bartiromo leaving Fox News
President Trump praised Maria Bartiromo as a “true warrior” and predicted that fans of the longtime Fox News host “will not be happy” after she was abruptly axed from the cable giant. Bartiromo’s sudden exit after a 12-year run at the network with no explanation left the president shocked Thursday night. “I can’t believe Maria Bartiromo…
Read MoreFraud Prevention Draws $156M as Socure Buys Fravity
A quiet corner of financial infrastructure just repriced, because Socure raised $156 million at a $5.2 billion valuation and acquired an AI startup on the same day. Summit Partners led the round, with Goldman Sachs Alternatives, Wells Fargo and Docusign participating. Numbers this large can feel remote from a ten-person company. The mechanics underneath are…
Read MoreAgentic Commerce: 5 Ways to Get Picked by AI Agents
Shopping agents stopped being a demo this year, and Google now completes checkout on merchant sites for shoppers through Search, AI Mode and Gemini. A buyer sets size, color and a price ceiling, then confirms once, and Google fills the cart and pays. Agentic commerce changes who you are selling to. Your next customer may…
Read MoreAI CRM Shifts as Salesforce and Anthropic Ship Claudeforce
Salesforce and Anthropic have deepened an existing relationship, and the two companies announced Claudeforce on August 26. The arrangement runs in both directions, putting Claude inside Salesforce products and Salesforce inside Claude. For founders, the detail worth tracking is not the branding. It is that a major software vendor has now picked a default model…
Read MoreSmall Business Grants for Women Reopen With $45K Each
Applications opened this week for a program worth watching, because H&R Block reopened its Fund Her Future grant for women-owned small businesses on September 1. Four recipients will each receive $45,000 in funding plus a full year of business services. Running a business is hard enough without spending your evenings guessing at payroll rules. That…
Read MoreAI Agent Security Draws $50M as AIR Exits Stealth
Six months after two former military cyber operators founded the company, AIR left stealth with a $50 million round led by Sequoia Capital and Greenoaks. Swish Ventures and Netz joined, with private investors drawn from the cybersecurity and AI industries. The speed of that raise will get the attention. However, the more useful detail for…
Read MoreFrom $300,000 EVs to dancing bots: The El Segundo firm sliding into Tesla’s slipstream
After its multibillion-dollar bid to become the next Tesla failed, El Segundo’s Faraday Future is pivoting to humanoid robots. The company says it is applying the expertise and infrastructure it gained through its electric vehicle journey to become a front-runner in the global robot race. Skeptics say they are still uncertain whether its robots, which…
Read More‘American Idol’ star Antonella Barba arrested for allegedly shoplifting from NJ Target
Former “American Idol” contestant Antonella Barba is accused of shoplifting from a Target store in New Jersey — as the singer finds herself in trouble with the law again. Barba, 39, of East Orange, was charged with stealing items worth less than $200 at the Target in the Seaview Square Shopping Center in Ocean Township…
Read MoreCEO Succession Planning: What Apple’s Handoff Shows
John Ternus becomes chief executive of Apple today, completing a transition the company announced back on April 20. Tim Cook moves to executive chair, and Art Levinson, previously chair of the board, becomes lead independent director on the same date. Most founders will never hand off a company this size, yet the choreography here is…
Read MoreVendor Lock In Bites as OpenAI Cuts Off Cursor
OpenAI said it will end Cursor’s direct access to its models on November 12, roughly two weeks after SpaceX completed its $60 billion purchase of Cursor’s parent company, Anysphere, on August 14. The supplier ended the relationship because of who bought the customer, not because of anything the customer did. That is the detail founders…
Read MoreAI for Small Business Draws a $240M Bet on Owner
Owner raised $240 million in a Series D led by Goldman Sachs Alternatives on August 28, a round that values the company at $2.3 billion. Meritech, Redpoint, Headline and Benchmark partner Jack Altman also took part. If you run a small operation with no technology staff, this round is about you rather than about a…
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