All 11 of xAI's Original Co-Founders Have Now Left the Company
Manuel Kroiss and Ross Nordeen, the last two remaining co-founders of Elon Musk's AI startup xAI, have both departed. That makes it a clean sweep. All 11 original co-founders are gone. Kroiss led pretraining, Nordeen was Musk's right-hand operator. Musk admitted xAI "was not built right the first time" and is rebuilding it under SpaceX, which acquired xAI in February.
https://www.aiandtech.news/article/xai-all-cofounders-departed
Manuel Kroiss and Ross Nordeen, the last two remaining co-founders of Elon Musk's AI startup xAI, have both departed. That makes it a clean sweep. All 11 original co-founders are gone. Kroiss led pretraining, Nordeen was Musk's right-hand operator. Musk admitted xAI "was not built right the first time" and is rebuilding it under SpaceX, which acquired xAI in February.
https://www.aiandtech.news/article/xai-all-cofounders-departed
www.aiandtech.news
All 11 of xAI's Original Co-Founders Have Now Left the Company
Manuel Kroiss and Ross Nordeen, the last remaining co-founders, have left xAI. All 11 original co-founders are now gone as Musk rebuilds the company under SpaceX.
China Bars Manus AI Founders from Leaving as Meta's $2B Acquisition Goes Under Review
China blocked Manus CEO Xiao Hong and chief scientist Ji Yichao from leaving the country while regulators review Meta's $2 billion acquisition of the startup. Manus was dubbed China's next DeepSeek after launching what it called the world's first fully autonomous AI agent. Beijing opened a national security review shortly after the deal was announced, and the travel restrictions signal how seriously they're treating it. Cross-border AI acquisitions are the new front in the US-China tech rivalry.
https://www.aiandtech.news/article/china-bars-manus-founders-meta-acquisition
China blocked Manus CEO Xiao Hong and chief scientist Ji Yichao from leaving the country while regulators review Meta's $2 billion acquisition of the startup. Manus was dubbed China's next DeepSeek after launching what it called the world's first fully autonomous AI agent. Beijing opened a national security review shortly after the deal was announced, and the travel restrictions signal how seriously they're treating it. Cross-border AI acquisitions are the new front in the US-China tech rivalry.
https://www.aiandtech.news/article/china-bars-manus-founders-meta-acquisition
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Sony Raises PS5 Prices Again. The PS5 Pro Now Costs $900.
Starting April 2, the PS5 Pro jumps $150 to $900. The standard PS5 disc edition hits $650, and the PlayStation Portal goes up $50. Sony cited "continued pressures in the global economic landscape." The PS5 launched at $499 in 2020. At $900, the Pro is now more expensive than most gaming PCs in the same performance tier.
https://www.aiandtech.news/article/ps5-pro-price-increase-900-april-2026
Starting April 2, the PS5 Pro jumps $150 to $900. The standard PS5 disc edition hits $650, and the PlayStation Portal goes up $50. Sony cited "continued pressures in the global economic landscape." The PS5 launched at $499 in 2020. At $900, the Pro is now more expensive than most gaming PCs in the same performance tier.
https://www.aiandtech.news/article/ps5-pro-price-increase-900-april-2026
Starcloud Raises $170M to Build Data Centers in Orbit. It Hit Unicorn in 17 Months.
Starcloud just closed a $170M Series A at a $1.1B valuation, making it one of the fastest YC startups to reach unicorn status. The company already launched a satellite carrying an Nvidia H100 GPU. Next up: Starcloud 2 with Blackwell chips later this year, and eventually Starcloud 3, a 200kW spacecraft designed to deploy from SpaceX Starship. The pitch: orbital data centers that are cost-competitive with terrestrial ones, once launch costs fall.
https://www.aiandtech.news/article/starcloud-170m-series-a-space-data-centers
Starcloud just closed a $170M Series A at a $1.1B valuation, making it one of the fastest YC startups to reach unicorn status. The company already launched a satellite carrying an Nvidia H100 GPU. Next up: Starcloud 2 with Blackwell chips later this year, and eventually Starcloud 3, a 200kW spacecraft designed to deploy from SpaceX Starship. The pitch: orbital data centers that are cost-competitive with terrestrial ones, once launch costs fall.
https://www.aiandtech.news/article/starcloud-170m-series-a-space-data-centers
Bethesda Is Shutting Down The Elder Scrolls: Blades on June 30
Bethesda is pulling the plug on the mobile dungeon crawler after more than 6 years. It'''s already been delisted from the App Store, Google Play, and Nintendo Store. As a last hurrah, everything in the in-game store is now one Gem each. The game peaked at 1M iOS downloads in its first week but never became a commercial success. Metacritic: "Generally Unfavorable."
https://www.aiandtech.news/article/elder-scrolls-blades-shutdown-june-2026
Bethesda is pulling the plug on the mobile dungeon crawler after more than 6 years. It'''s already been delisted from the App Store, Google Play, and Nintendo Store. As a last hurrah, everything in the in-game store is now one Gem each. The game peaked at 1M iOS downloads in its first week but never became a commercial success. Metacritic: "Generally Unfavorable."
https://www.aiandtech.news/article/elder-scrolls-blades-shutdown-june-2026
OpenAI Closes a $122 Billion Funding Round. IPO Is Next.
OpenAI just closed the largest startup raise in Silicon Valley history at a $852B valuation. Amazon, Nvidia, and SoftBank are among the investors. The company earns $2B/month but still loses billions annually and won't be profitable until 2030. Next up: a unified AI superapp (ChatGPT + Codex + browser + agents) and a public listing later this year.
https://www.aiandtech.news/article/openai-122-billion-funding-round-2026
OpenAI just closed the largest startup raise in Silicon Valley history at a $852B valuation. Amazon, Nvidia, and SoftBank are among the investors. The company earns $2B/month but still loses billions annually and won't be profitable until 2030. Next up: a unified AI superapp (ChatGPT + Codex + browser + agents) and a public listing later this year.
https://www.aiandtech.news/article/openai-122-billion-funding-round-2026
Meta Launches Ray-Ban Blayzer and Scriber — Prescription Smart Glasses at $499
Meta's first Ray-Ban frames built from the ground up for prescription wearers. Two styles: Blayzer (rectangular) and Scriber (rounded). Adjustable hinges and nose pads for a proper custom fit. Pre-order now at $499, ships to optical retailers April 14. Also adding hands-free nutrition tracking and Meta AI WhatsApp summaries to the broader lineup.
https://www.aiandtech.news/article/meta-rayban-blayzer-scriber-prescription-glasses
Meta's first Ray-Ban frames built from the ground up for prescription wearers. Two styles: Blayzer (rectangular) and Scriber (rounded). Adjustable hinges and nose pads for a proper custom fit. Pre-order now at $499, ships to optical retailers April 14. Also adding hands-free nutrition tracking and Meta AI WhatsApp summaries to the broader lineup.
https://www.aiandtech.news/article/meta-rayban-blayzer-scriber-prescription-glasses
A Data Leak Revealed Anthropic's Most Powerful AI Yet: Claude Mythos
A misconfigured data store at Anthropic exposed nearly 3,000 internal documents, including a draft announcement for a next-gen model called Claude Mythos (codename: Capybara). Anthropic confirmed it's real — describing it as "a step change" above Opus 4.6, with dramatically higher coding, reasoning, and cybersecurity scores. The draft also flagged "unprecedented cybersecurity risks." The leak came days before a second breach exposed Claude Code's source code.
https://www.aiandtech.news/article/anthropic-claude-mythos-data-leak
A misconfigured data store at Anthropic exposed nearly 3,000 internal documents, including a draft announcement for a next-gen model called Claude Mythos (codename: Capybara). Anthropic confirmed it's real — describing it as "a step change" above Opus 4.6, with dramatically higher coding, reasoning, and cybersecurity scores. The draft also flagged "unprecedented cybersecurity risks." The leak came days before a second breach exposed Claude Code's source code.
https://www.aiandtech.news/article/anthropic-claude-mythos-data-leak
www.aiandtech.news
A Data Leak Revealed Anthropic's Most Powerful AI Yet: Claude Mythos
A data breach exposed nearly 3,000 internal Anthropic documents, including a draft announcement for Claude Mythos — described as a step change above Opus 4.6 with unprecedented cybersecurity capabilities.
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Replit Tripled Its Valuation to $9B in 6 Months on Vibe Coding Momentum
$400M Series D. 40M users. 85% of Fortune 500 building on it. $1B ARR target by end of 2026. Replit spent years being written off as a "browser toy" — then vibe coding took off and the entire narrative flipped. For context: Cursor is at $29B, Lovable just hit $400M ARR. The vibe coding market is pricing its leaders fast.
https://www.aiandtech.news/article/replit-9b-valuation-400m-series-d
$400M Series D. 40M users. 85% of Fortune 500 building on it. $1B ARR target by end of 2026. Replit spent years being written off as a "browser toy" — then vibe coding took off and the entire narrative flipped. For context: Cursor is at $29B, Lovable just hit $400M ARR. The vibe coding market is pricing its leaders fast.
https://www.aiandtech.news/article/replit-9b-valuation-400m-series-d
Artemis II Has Launched. Humans Are Heading to the Moon for the First Time Since 1972.
NASA's Artemis II lifted off April 1 with four astronauts aboard — the first crewed moonshot in 53 years. They're not landing; the mission loops around the moon and returns in 10 days, getting farther from Earth than any humans ever have. It's a dress rehearsal for Artemis III (2027), which will actually land on the lunar surface. The launch had been delayed multiple times since late 2024. Wednesday's liftoff ended over a year of waiting.
https://www.aiandtech.news/article/artemis-ii-launch-moon-2026
NASA's Artemis II lifted off April 1 with four astronauts aboard — the first crewed moonshot in 53 years. They're not landing; the mission loops around the moon and returns in 10 days, getting farther from Earth than any humans ever have. It's a dress rehearsal for Artemis III (2027), which will actually land on the lunar surface. The launch had been delayed multiple times since late 2024. Wednesday's liftoff ended over a year of waiting.
https://www.aiandtech.news/article/artemis-ii-launch-moon-2026
Anthropic Cuts Claude Subscription Coverage for Third-Party AI Tools
From April 4, Claude subscriptions no longer cover usage on third-party agent tools like OpenClaw. Users now need extra usage bundles or a direct API key. The reason: automated agents were making thousands of API calls per day, way beyond what a flat monthly plan was priced for. Anthropic is offering one-time credits to soften the transition.
https://www.aiandtech.news/article/anthropic-ends-third-party-claude-subscription
From April 4, Claude subscriptions no longer cover usage on third-party agent tools like OpenClaw. Users now need extra usage bundles or a direct API key. The reason: automated agents were making thousands of API calls per day, way beyond what a flat monthly plan was priced for. Anthropic is offering one-time credits to soften the transition.
https://www.aiandtech.news/article/anthropic-ends-third-party-claude-subscription
www.aiandtech.news
Anthropic Cuts Claude Subscription Coverage for Third-Party AI Tools
Anthropic ended flat-rate subscription coverage for Claude on third-party agent tools like OpenClaw from April 4. Users now pay per usage or via API key.
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