Top News | The AI browser race is on: Just last month, The Browser Company released its first AI browser, Dia, with a chatbot built into the sidebar that can do basic searches, answer questions, summarize files, and so forth. It turns out, that was just the first shot in a new AI-powered battle for browser supremacy. This week, TWiST 500 mainstays Perplexity released their own take on an AI browser, Comet, which doesn’t just include a bespoke chatbot but adds true agentic capabilities to the browser experience, performing actual tasks like booking flights and making reservations on your behalf. We also got word this week that ChatGPT makers OpenAI plan to enter the browser arena with their own take on a Google Chrome killer, likely arriving in the next few weeks. Harmonic AI raises $100M: The startup comes from one of the pod’s fav founders and CEOs of the moment, Robinhood’s Vlad Tenev. (He serves in a non-operational “Executive Chairman” role.) Harmonic’s AI systems are designed specifically to tackle complex multi-faceted math problems, forming what could one day become a “mathematical superintelligence.” The company’s flagship model, Aristotle, will be released to both researchers and the public at large some time this year. Kleiner Perkins led the Series B, which also includes contributions from Sequoia, Index Ventures, and Paradigm, and values Harmonic at $875 million. Some AI experts turned down Meta money: The Verge followed up with some of the top AI engineers who turned down lucrative offers from Meta’s recruiters to jump ship. According to the insiders, Meta was offering an average of around $1-$1.4 million in annual compensation (combining salary, annual bonus, and stock) for these new AI roles, but the deals were tied to ambitious performance metrics that some worried could be “weaponized” against them in the future. The Verge report also suggests that OpenAI lost a lot more talent to the Meta offers than competitors Anthropic and DeepMind. Read into that whatever you like!
| TWiST500 | Late last night (surprisingly so for a big media announcement!), Elon Musk and some members of his xAI team debuted their brand-new flagship AI model, Grok 4, and unveiled a $300 monthly subscription plan, known as SuperGrok Heavy. | The presentation included a number of grandiose claims. Grok is being developed at a “ludicrous rate of progress.” It’s now the “smartest AI in the world,” and “smarter than almost all graduate students, in all disciplines, simultaneously.” And if that weren’t intimidating enough, Grok is advancing “vastly faster than any human.” Musk and his xAI team expect Grok to begin discovering new technologies and even new physics by the end of this year. | Still, despite its success with advanced math equations and standardized tests, Musk noted that Grok in some ways “may lack common sense.” This was certainly on display earlier in the week. The Grok 3 chatbot that’s currently integrated into xAI’s X platform was adjusted to respond with more politically incorrect, less “safe” opinions, so long as they are factually verifiable. But this tweak resulted in a flood of racially insensitive and otherwise inappropriate responses, including Grok referring to itself as “MechaHitler.” (Grok was temporarily disabled and the issue seems to have been resolved, at least for now.) | X CEO Linda Yaccarino actually announced her resignation the day after the “MechaHitler” incident, but the New York Times suggests the two incidents are unrelated. There’s still no verified account of exactly what went down behind-the-scenes but signs do point to some tension among X leadership. Musk responded to Yaccarino’s resignation announcement with a relatively terse “thank you for your contributions” and her account’s bluecheck mark is already gone. | And somehow, that’s not even all of this week’s big X/xAI news! San Francisco Superior Court Judge Harold E. Kahn also ruled that former TV anchor Don Lemon’s lawsuit against Musk and X — over a deal to relaunch his CNN show exclusively on the platform — can move forward. Musk has tried, unsuccessfully, to move the case’s venue to his native Texas. Well, you can’t win them all… Perhaps Grok has some helpful legal advice. – Lon | A message from CLA | Innovation takes balance. CLA's CPAs, consultants, and wealth advisors can help you get from startup to where you want to end up. Get started now at https://www.CLAconnect.com/tech | This Week in Startups | E2149: It’s a brand-new TWiST, and Jason and Alex are considering all the news that matters to founders and investors. Today that includes Tesla’s plans to introduce Wifi hotspots within their rides, Nvidia’s historic $4 trillion valuation, Perplexity’s slick new AI powered browser bringing the fight to Google’s Chrome, Waymo’s new “teen” accounts, and lots more. Plus Tim Ranzetta stops by to talk about financial education and his nonprofit, Next Gen Personal Finance. | E2148: Jason’s back in Austin, and he and Alex are running down a huge holiday weekend in tech news. Exits are heating up with $67.7B in Q2 activity, QSBS got a major expansion in the Big Beautiful Bill, Robinhood is pushing boundaries with its tokenized SPV innovation, PLUS Jason’s thoughts on Elon Musk’s new “America Party” and a brand new NFL-themed Polymarket. | E2147: Alex hosts another blockbuster panel of insiders, with Astasia Myers from Felicis, Matt Turck of First Mark Capital, and D.A. Wallach from Time BioVentures joining for a deep-dive on the biotech Great Depression, the post-Q2 startup landscape, revenue durability and product market fit in AI, supporting founders from academia, innovations in fertility and pre-natal treatments, and much much more. | TWiST Partner Offers | Squarespace: Turn your idea into a beautiful website! Go to http://www.squarespace.com/twist for a free trial. When you’re ready to launch, use offer code TWIST to save 10% off your first purchase of a website or domain. INBOUND: Connect with visionary leaders like Dario Amodei and Amy Poehler at INBOUND 2025 September 3-5 in San Francisco, the epicenter of tech innovation, and transform your business strategy for the AI era. Use code TWIST10 for 10% off your General Admission ticket at inbound.com/register. Bolt: Don’t be left behind. Build apps quickly without knowing how to code with Bolt.new. Try it free at Bolt.new/twist.
| LAUNCH Accelerator | Our current Accelerator batch is graduating! Watch 11 strong startups pitch to Jason and our investor-judges. We are livestreaming the event on Monday, July 28th at 12:30 PM PT. Register here. | Want to Work for This Week in Startups? | We’re looking to fill two in-person sales positions at our Austin, Texas HQ! First, a high-performing Sales Executive to help us seek out and promote clients, sponsorships, branded content, and more. Plus an experienced Sales Manager to lead, coach, and scale our sales executive team, while setting performance goals. Love the podcast and have B2B sales experience? We want to hear from you! | SF Live-Work Space Now Available | Need a flexible living and working environment in San Francisco? This thoughtfully designed loft-style residence at 787 Bryant St., the heart of the vibrant SOMA district and the city’s creative hub, is now available for rent or purchase. Check the listing for more details. | Founder University | Applications are open for Founder University Cohort 11, a 12-week remote pre-accelerator program tailored towards navigating early-startup practices, building an MVP, and growing traction. Submit your application at Founder University— Cohort 10 will kick off Summer 2025! | The TWiST500 newsletter is the new, updated, and improved TWiST Ticker. |
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