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Alibaba reports Q4 revenue up 6.6% YoY to ~$30.7B, AI startups in the Bay Area raised $27B+ in 2023

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Alibaba reports Q4 revenue up 6.6% YoY to ~$30.7B, above $30.4B est., a ~$452M net income, down 86% YoY from ~$3.2B in Q4 2023, and announces a $4B dividend. - Link

AI startups in the Bay Area raised $27B+ in 2023, more than 50% of global AI funding, up from $14B in 2022, when the region accounted for 29% of all AI funding. - Link

OpenAI's new ChatGPT voice assistant jokes, chides, apologizes, pretends to blush, and deals with interruptions, aided by building GPT-4o as a single model. - Link

Tencent reports Q1 revenue up 6% YoY to ~$22B, above ~$21.95B est., and net profit up 62% YoY to ~$5.8B, above ~$4.8B est., boosted by new WeChat monetization. - Link

Uber announces plans to acquire Delivery Hero's Foodpanda business in Taiwan for $950M in an all-cash deal, expected to close in the first half of 2025. - Link

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Startup Demo of the Day:

Wegic is an AI web designer and developer, powered by the latest GPT-4o model. - Link

Founder University is a 12-week pre-accelerator program run by Jason/LAUNCH for builder founders. We're investing $25k in 20-30 companies from Cohort 7. Apply at founder.university/letsbuild.

This Week in Startups

E1947: Jake Loosararian, Co-Founder and CEO of Gecko Robotics, discusses the development of specialized robots for infrastructure inspections, the origin and future of his startup, and the integration of digital twins and fixed sensors to enhance the value of these inspections. - Watch

E1946: Ian Cinnamon, co-founder of Apex, and Mark Suster discuss the growing interest in space technology among startups and investors, touching on the role of Los Angeles in fostering Apex's growth, the advancements in satellite manufacturing, and the evolving landscape of space technology. - Watch

E1945: Matt Wilkerson joins Jason to discuss Extern, focusing on the concept of externships as a solution to the issues of student loans and work experience. They also delve into how externships help students determine their career paths and the impact of Extern on the job market, and Matt offers advice for new founders. - Watch

E1944: David Weisburd, Joshua Berkowitz, Donald Stalter and Jason discuss xAI raising $6 billion, with Sequoia Capital leading the round. They also examine trends in venture capital and their effects on the startup ecosystem. - Watch

E1943: Bob Moesta discusses his methodology for decoding customer insights, emphasizing the importance of deep listening, challenging conventional wisdom about customer knowledge, and utilizing the Jobs-to-be-Done framework to understand consumer behaviour. - Watch

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For everything AI, check out the podcast, “The Next Wave” https://www.youtube.com/@TheNextWavePod.