Eka is worth $1.45B thanks to a physical AI model that has experts raving

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

View this email online in your browser  October 20, 2026 TechCrunch Top 3 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 Walmart's Flipkart is quietly building a food delivery challenger in India: Flipkart has expanded access to its food-delivery service to thousands of employees ahead of its public launch. 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 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 Blackwall quadruples valuation to $2.2B as websites wrangle an increasingly crowded internet: Blackwall has raised $100M at a $2.2B valuation to continue building security and filtering tools that help websites grapple with growing bot and AI traffic. Read More SpaceX alum's aviation startup, Reliable Robotics, lands $115M, topping $1B valuation: Reliable Robotics extended its Series D round with $115 million in equity and $25 million in debt. Read More 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 US orders federal agencies to remove China’s DeepSeek AI from their systems: The US has ordered federal civilian agencies to remove DeepSeek products and third-party services built using its technology, citing national security concerns. Read More Oura adds new fitness metrics to show how workouts impact your body: While Oura has largely dominated the smart ring market for years, rivals like RingConn and Ultrahuman are emerging to dethrone it, putting pressure on the company to keep innovating. By launching more advanced workout metrics, Oura is looking to differentiate itself from competitors as the smart ring market gets more crowded. Read More Last but Not Least Inspired Capital closes $450M fourth fund as New York pushes back on Silicon Valley’s gravitational pull: The raise comes as venture dollars pile up on the West Coast. 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

Rivian's CEO says autonomy will enable 'dramatically different' vehicle designs

Plus more of TechCrunch's top stories this afternoon

View this email online in your browser  October 19, 2026 TechCrunch Top 3 Rivian's CEO says autonomy will enable 'dramatically different' vehicle designs: Founder and CEO RJ Scaringe said he thinks autonomy will allow his company to build radically different kinds of vehicles than the outdoorsy SUVs and trucks it currently makes. Read More AI assistant startup Town nabs unicorn valuation 4 months after launch: AI assistant startup Town nabbed a unicorn valuation on Monday, announcing a $108 million Series B round co-led by Forerunner Ventures and Menlo Ventures. Read More Tolan snags $30M for its AI companion that helps users navigate life: AI companion app Tolan has raised another $30 million after attracting more than 250,000 active users. 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 People are using AI to make their smart TVs dumb again: Fed up with ads, tracking, and sluggish interfaces, some smart TV owners are turning to AI agents to strip away bloatware and take back control of their TVs. Read More Amazon to fund 12 small nuclear reactors at former Indiana coal plant: Amazon and X-energy have inked another deal to deploy nuclear power to the grid. This one will generate nearly 1 gigawatt of electricity. Read More Amazon is taking its biggest shot at Nvidia yet with new TorchNeuron dev tool: Amazon wants to break Nvidia’s hold on PyTorch, the free toolkit used to build most AI apps, so that more developers run their apps on alternative chips like its own. Read More Musk pledges to give 'every kid in America' one of his SpaceX shares: Musk's post came just a few hours after Anthropic promised to put 5% of its shares into a new "public benefit fund," which it intends to use to make "large donations to traditional nonprofits or direct distributions to specific populations" after its upcoming IPO. Read More Replika’s founder built the AI assistant she pitched at Disrupt 12 years ago: Eugenia Kuyda's newest startup Wabi is positioned to take advantage of an idea she had more than a decade ago. Wabi offers a personal AI assistant with a twist, free and downloadable to anyone today. Read More Last but Not Least Nvidia launches new open models to run agents in the enterprise and on PCs : Nvidia is leaning hard into the trend of enterprise companies wanting to run their own open models in their own data centers and also trying to make on-device, private AI agents a thing. 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