Heat pump tech is 170 years old. Pascal thinks it’s time for an update.

Plus more of TechCrunch's top stories to start your morning

View this email online in your browser  October 21, 2026 TechCrunch Top 3 Heat pump tech is 170 years old. Pascal thinks it’s time for an update.: Refrigerants startup Pascal has a new take on heat pump and cooling tech using a sponge-like material that promises to be 20% more efficient. Read More AI promises productivity, but for managers, it's mostly a headache for now: More than 50% of managers say they're finding it harder to evaluate employees' work after adopting AI, according to a new survey. Read More Foursquare co-founder says equity holders saw no returns from the company's acquisition: Foursquare raised $411 million in funding according to PitchBook data, but its equity holders saw no returns from its final acquisition. Read More A message from North.cloud North.cloud brings automation to cloud, data, and AI spend at scale.  North.cloud unifies spend intelligence and enables full automation across cloud, AI, and data providers. Finance and engineering can now understand, optimize, and automate infrastructure spend. Understand every dollar, manage AI usage, and forecast with confidence. We just raised a $60M Series B to help every team spend smarter. Start saving.  Learn more  Morning Must-Reads SpaceX's AI business is beating expectations: SpaceX hit profitability in the third quarter, with net income of $4.4 billion. AI was the engine. Read More Eric Schmidt reportedly owns about half as much of Anthropic as CEO Dario Amodei: Eric Schmidt’s fortune is about to get even bigger. Read More Google has joined Amazon in attacking Nvidia's stronghold with AI app developers: Google has joined Amazon in releasing a developer tool that makes it easy for PyTorch users to move their apps off Nvidia GPUs. Read More Anthropic’s cloud partnerships are getting messy: Anthropic is reportedly struggling to secure enough compute from cloud providers that increasingly view it as a competitor, even as its infrastructure spending balloons ahead of a planned November IPO. Read More SpaceX and Tesla boards form special committees to review merger: Elon Musk likes the idea but says he is not on either committee, which is made up of independent directors. Read More Last but Not Least Mach9 raises $34M after pivoting to AI CAD software: The startup initially set out to build better, faster, and cheaper surveying hardware in 2021. Read More Check out some of our other newsletters: StrictlyVC TechCrunch Events TechCrunch Mobility Want to adjust your daily newsletter schedule? You can do it right here Got a tip? Get in touch securely. Want to advertise on TechCrunch? advertise@techcrunch.com Has this been forwarded to you? Click here to subscribe to this newsletter. Unsubscribe Member Center Privacy Policy Copyright © 2026 TechCrunch Media LLC 501 2nd Street, Suite 650, San Francisco, CA 94107

Eric Schmidt reportedly owns about half as much of Anthropic as CEO Dario Amodei

Plus more of TechCrunch's top stories this afternoon

View this email online in your browser  October 20, 2026 TechCrunch Top 3 Eric Schmidt reportedly owns about half as much of Anthropic as CEO Dario Amodei: The former Google CEO owns about 1% stake in the leading AI lab, Bloomberg reported. Read More SpaceX's AI business is beating expectations: SpaceX hit profitably in the third-quarter, with net income of $4.4 billion. AI was the engine. Read More Google has joined Amazon in attacking Nvidia's stronghold with AI app developers: Google has joined Amazon in releasing a developer tool that makes it easy for PyTorch users to move their apps off Nvidia GPUs. Read More A message from Fidelity Your equity data deserves a system you don’t have to second-guess. Does your equity management platform keep raising renewal costs and waving red flags around data practices? Switching to a new solution might seem overwhelming, but it doesn't have to be. With Fidelity Private Shares, transitioning is simple and fast. Our expert team guides you through every step, helping to ensure your equity data is migrated seamlessly and securely. Learn More Afternoon Must-Reads Plants can speak using electricity, so this startup built an AI model to decipher their language: Electric Plant has built an AI-powered translator to help humans listen to what plants are saying with the subtle electricity coursing through their stems. Read More Anthropic’s cloud partnerships are getting messy: Anthropic is reportedly struggling to secure enough compute from cloud providers that increasingly view it as a competitor, even as its infrastructure spending balloons ahead of a planned November IPO. Read More Eka is worth $1.45B thanks to a physical AI model that has experts raving: Eka Robotics may be the first robotic arm that is actually good at picking a wide range of objects up, and it is so smooth and human-like, it is wowing the industry. Read More Meta's Muse hits 10M U.S. downloads in 40 days, a milestone reached by only 11 other apps: Meta's AI companion Muse has surpassed 10 million U.S. downloads in its first 40 days, joining an exclusive group of apps that includes Threads. New data also shows Muse is retaining users at higher rates than its AI rivals. Read More Figma co-founder Dylan Field thinks MCP is not a perfect protocol: Figma said it plans to support as many standards as possible without exposing all of its data. Read More Last but Not Least Spotify launches paid podcast memberships with perks beyond bonus content: Spotify's new paid memberships let podcasters offer fans exclusive perks, including ad-free listening, early access, and bonus content, while keeping 90% of the revenue. Read More Check out some of our other newsletters: StrictlyVC TechCrunch Events TechCrunch Mobility Want to adjust your daily newsletter schedule? You can do it right here Got a tip? Get in touch securely. Want to advertise on TechCrunch? advertise@techcrunch.com Has this been forwarded to you? Click here to subscribe to this newsletter. Unsubscribe Member Center Privacy Policy Copyright © 2026 TechCrunch Media LLC 501 2nd Street, Suite 650, San Francisco, CA 94107