This Robot Costs $70,000

👋 Good morning/evening (wherever you are). It’s Thursday.

I mentioned this in a previous email, but most of you probably missed the video of the world’s first open-source robot (priced at $70K):

Apparently, it’s “already in use at Cornell, Carnegie Mellon & major AI labs for robotics research and education”:

Makes you think.

Do you still say “please” and “thank you” to AI…just in case they remember in 10 years?

You’re not alone…

OK let’s keep going ↓

Here’s what you should know:

• OpenAI’s Stargate project sets its sights on international expansion

  The UK has emerged as one of its top choices.

• Former Y Combinator president Geoff Ralston launches new AI ‘safety’ fund

  It’s called the Safe AI Fund (SAIF).

• OpenAI launches Flex processing for cheaper, slower AI tasks

  It reduces API costs by exactly half.

• New Beta version of LMArena

  If you’ve never heard of this, try side-by-side prompting.

• Google One AI Premium is free for college students until Spring 2026

  Imagine if you had AI in college…maybe you would played one more game of beer pong the night before your finals.

• Google criticized over its ‘sparse’ Gemini 2.5 Pro safety report
  Experts say this makes it difficult to determine which risks the model might pose.

• AI is using facial recognition to help bring lost pets home

  The AI system collects up to 512 data points per pet, using machine learning to search for matching animals.

• EU Bans Use of AI Assistants in Virtual Meetings

  “No AI Agents are allowed.”

• Biostate AI, ACP to develop AI models to predict MS progression

  Adaptable models to address complexity of disease

• AI powers major leap in understanding Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s Diseases

  Researchers at Rice University and the Changping Laboratory have developed a new artificial intelligence tool called RibbonFold.

The numbers:

• Exaforce raised $75 million in Series A funding to bring AI agents to security operations centers, reducing human workload and improving security outcomes.

• Goodfire raised $50 million in Series A funding to advance AI interpretability research and expand its platform for decoding how AI models work.

• 1Fort raised $7.5 million to accelerate its AI platform that helps insurance brokers automate and bind business policies faster.

• RISA Labs raised $3.5 million to reduce cancer treatment delays by automating oncology workflows and cutting down administrative burden.

From Crunchbase:

Dealmaking involving venture-backed startups is up slightly year to year overall, and part of that uptick is thanks to artificial intelligence.

In Q1, 81 deals involving AI startups were consummated, per Crunchbase data.

That number is nearly a 33% increase from both Q1 and Q4 2024 — both of which saw 61 M&A deals.

Thought starters:

Excerpts from a Deadline article:

Citing recent comments by James Cameron, Netflix Co-CEO Ted Sarandos said he hopes AI can make films “10% better,” not just “50% cheaper.”

The executive was asked by a Wall Street analyst during the streaming giant’s first-quarter earnings call Thursday about the diminished “fear” in the industry about the threat of AI to jobs and IP.

“There’s a ton of excitement about what AI can do for content creators,” Sarandos replied. He then brought up the sentiments from Cameron. During a podcast interview this month, the Avatar director said filmmakers can cut the cost of major tentpoles “in half” by using the technology.

“I read the article too about what Jim Cameron said about making movies 50% cheaper,” Sarandos said. “I remain convinced that there’s an even bigger opportunity to make movies 10% better. So, our talent today is using AI tools to do set references, pre-vis, VFX sequence prep, shot planning, all kinds of things today that kind of make the process better. Traditionally, only big-budget projects would have access to things like advanced visual effects such as de-aging. Today, you can use these AI-powered tools to enable smaller-budget projects to have access to big VFX on screen.”

During the earnings call, the Netflix CO-CEO emphasized the rapid advances in AI, citing 2019 film The Irishman as a benchmark.

“If you remember that movie, we were using very cutting-edge, very expensive de-aging technology that still had massive limitations, still created a bunch of complexity on set for the actors,” Sarandos said. “It was a giant leap forward for sure, but nowhere near what we needed for that film.”

Five years later, the exec continued, Irishman D.P. Rodrigo Prieto directed Pedro Páramo, his first project as a feature director. “Using AI-powered tools, he was able to deliver de-aging effects on the screen at a fraction of what it cost for The Irishman,” Sarandos said. “In fact, the entire budget of the film was about what the VFX cost on The Irishman. So, same creator using new tools, better tools, to do what was impossible five years ago – that’s incredibly exciting. So, our focus is simple: Find ways for AI to improve the member and the creator experience.”

Meme of the day:

Thanks for reading,

Eddie

Are we friends on LinkedIn and X? Let’s connect — DM me or hit the follow button.

P.S. If this was valuable, forward it to a friend. If you’re that smart friend, subscribe here.

P.P.S. Interested in reaching other ambitious readers like you? To become a sponsor, reply to this email.