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Earlier than we soar into the remainder of the information, a phrase about Grok, the AI mannequin created by xAI, an Elon Musk firm that just lately acquired his social media service X. Sure, that is associated to transportation.
Grok, which may analyze photographs and reply to questions, is supposed to be a competitor to fashions like OpenAI’s ChatGPT. Grok has turn out to be a centerpiece of X, the place customers work together with the AI chatbot. It’s additionally turn out to be more and more combative and gone on a number of antisemitic tirades, praised Hitler, and even made rape threats. (These posts have been taken down.)
And simply yesterday, AI reporter Max Zeff found that xAI’s latest mannequin, Grok 4, appears to seek the advice of social media posts from Musk’s X account when answering questions in regards to the Israel and Palestine battle, abortion, immigration legal guidelines, and different controversial points.
How is any of this associated to transportation? Grok is coming to Tesla automobiles as quickly as subsequent week, in keeping with Musk.
A well known white hat hacker who makes use of the deal with “Green the Only” dug into Tesla’s firmware and made a number of discoveries. For instance, drivers will be capable to select sure Grok “personalities,” together with ones which might be NSFW (not protected for work), argumentative, children story, horny, therapist, unhinged, and extra. He additionally discovered that “Grok currently requires premium connectivity and pairs into your existing account.”
Somewhat chook
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Offers!
In one other episode of “Is it 2016?” Rivian micromobility spinout Additionally raised one other $200 million with a post-money valuation of $1 billion. Sure, that’s proper, a micromobility firm that has but to disclose its first product.
As we’ve reported earlier than, there may be quite a lot of hype and anticipation round Additionally — and Jony Ive’s LoveFrom connection to the model definitely helps elevate its profile.
Different offers that received my consideration this week …
Talking of buzzy EVs which have raised eye-popping rounds, senior reporter Sean O’Kane interviewed the founders of Slauson & Co., a Los Angeles enterprise agency that launched 5 years in the past and was an early investor within the Jeff Bezos-backed Slate Auto. Need to compensate for Slate Auto information? We created a helpful Slate Auto timeline that covers all our scoops and information. We are going to replace this commonly.
Finnish e-motor startup Donut Lab raised €25 million ($29.2 million) in a seed funding spherical led by Risto Siilasmaa, the founding father of cybersecurity firm WithSecure (previously F-Safe). Risto has additionally joined Donut Lab’s board.
INSHUR, an insurance coverage merchandise service centered on the on-demand financial system, raised $35 million from Trinity Capital. The brand new funding will help INSHUR’s continued enlargement throughout america.
Notable reads and different tidbits
Autonomous automobiles
President Trump has nominated Jonathan Morrison to move the Nationwide Freeway Site visitors Security Administration. Morrison has a historical past of tussling with Tesla.
In the meantime, it appears to be like like Tesla is making an attempt to unfold its robotaxi wings. The corporate utilized to check and function autonomous automobiles in Arizona in a bid to deliver its fledgling robotaxi service to the Metro Phoenix space. Our story has a number of attention-grabbing tidbits and explains the AV allowing course of in Phoenix. One vital level: The corporate will even want a TNC allow to supply ride-hailing providers.
Musk additionally commented that robotaxis will come to the Bay Space as soon as they obtain regulatory approval in “a month or two.” There’s only one challenge with that: The California DMV, which regulates AVs, says Tesla hasn’t even utilized for a driverless testing or deployment allow but. As of at the moment, Tesla solely has an autonomous automobile testing allow for public highway testing with a security driver, which it’s held since 2014.
Waymo continues to develop, and never simply geographically. The corporate is opening up its robotaxi service in Phoenix to youngsters. There are caveats right here, particularly that the kids can solely join by way of a verified mother or father’s account. They usually must be ages 14 to 17, so no 13-year-olds. That implies Waymo needs to avoid center schoolers and solely present service to these in highschool.
In the meantime, Waymo is sniffing round New York Metropolis (a famously restrictive place for AVs) and Philadelphia. The corporate kicked off “road trips” within the two Northeastern cities. Highway journeys might be seen as early testing, though in New York Metropolis the automobiles will all be manually pushed and used to map and gather information.
Electrical automobiles, batteries, & charging
A number of new EVs broke cowl this previous week: Mercedes-Benz CEO Ola Källenius took the upcoming all-electric GLC for a take a look at journey; Subaru stated it is going to reveal its new all-electric compact crossover SUV at 7:30 p.m. ET on July 17; and Volvo shared details about the carbon footprint of the all-electric ES90, which begins manufacturing later this summer time.
In the meantime, I spent a number of days within the 2026 Rivian quad-motor R1S and R1T. That is the second technology of the flagship EV and the EV maker’s costliest trim, which prices between $115,990 and $125,990, relying on the model.
Try the total article about my take a look at drive, which digs into the tech behind the second-generation flagship EV.
