Google trains a video game-playing AI to be your companion, Arm unveils its first Neoverse chips for self-driving cars

Top News

Google Deepmind trains a video game-playing AI to be your co-op companion. - Link

Arm unveils its first Neoverse chips for self-driving cars, seeking to grow its non-smartphone revenue; the first vehicles are likely in four to five years. - Link

Volley’s AI-enabled ball machine for racquet sports can simulate gameplay. - Link

Journey acquires mental health startup Felt to enhance its employee assistance program. - Link

Perplexity is licensing Yelp's data and integrating its maps, reviews, and other details in responses when users ask for restaurant recommendations. - Link

Over 78% of B2B marketers rate LinkedIn as the most effective social media platform for reaching objectives. Why? Because there are over 62 million decision makers on LinkedIn, and they mean business! Get $100 off your first advertising campaign at linkedin.com/thisweekinstartups. Ad

Advice of the Day

The Law of Shitty Clickthroughs

Andrew Chen discusses how over time, all marketing strategies lead to declining clickthrough rates (banner ads are a prime example). Novelty wears off, competition increases, and market saturation leads to less qualified customers, but finding new, untapped marketing channels is a potential solution. - Link

Startup Demo of the Day:

PitchBob.io is an AI pitch deck generator & startup co-pilot to help wantrepreneurs become entrepreneurs. - 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

E1912: Sunny and Jason demo AI products, including Groq's speed, Opus from Claude 3, Mistral, Groq Playground, and EMO by Alibaba. They also explore the use of "guardrails" in Large Language Models and apply Claude to interpret Ikea instructions. - Watch

E1911: Josh Mohrer discusses his experiences with Uber's early days in New York, solo entrepreneurship, and AI's impact on the tech industry. He also explores the future of work, the integration of AI into daily life, and the changes in technology across generations. - Watch

E1910: Jonathan Neman discusses the innovation and scale of Sweetgreen, the future of the fast-casual industry, and how robotics and technology are being integrated into the restaurant sector. - Watch

E1909: Lon Harris and Jason do a business breakdown on the movie "Moneyball." They discuss how Oakland A's unconventional, data-driven approach to assembling a baseball team reflects paradigm shifts similar to those in startups versus incumbents, emphasizing the importance of adaptability, first-principle thinking, and commitment. - Watch

E1908: Shyam Sankar of Palantir discusses the transformation in Silicon Valley's view on defence technology, highlighting Palantir's origins post-9/11 and its contributions to national security, including preventing terrorist attacks. They delve into the evolution and significance of defense technologies such as Palentir's Gotham Platform, the role of AI and robotics, and the impact of large language models and radio frequency (RF) in modern warfare. - Watch

This Week in Startups Paid Partnerships

Lemon.io connects businesses with top-tier developers for projects of any scale. Enhance your development team with skilled professionals and get 15% off your first 4 weeks of developer time at https://www.lemon.io/twist/.

OpenPhone adds work phone numbers to your existing devices. No new hardware required; all you need is an app. Get an extra 20% off any plan for your first 6 months by signing up at https://www.openphone.com/twist.

Marketing Against the Grain is a podcast hosted by Hubspot CMO Kipp Bodnar and Zapier CMO Kieran Flannigan. They bring you the latest in marketing trends, growth tactics and innovation.