Equity

• Hugging Face’s co-founder on bringing open-source AI to life with cute robots

  Hugging Face’s new AI robot, the Reachy Mini, has already racked up $1 million in sales just five days after launch. But the company isn’t trying to build a chore-doing humanoid just yet. Instead, Hugging Face sees the Reachy Mini as a hackable, desk-friendly device that's part entertainment, part entry point for developers and consumers to experiment with AI in physical form. On this episode of Equity, co-founder Thomas Wolf joins to explain why open-source AI needs hardware, how Hugging Face is thinking about robotics long term, and what might happen if people actually start coding apps for their robots. We'll also get into: How Hugging Face plans to leap from software to hardware. Hugging Face's ambitions to one day sell a full-sized humanoid robot. The role of privacy in consumer robotics, and how open-source can address it. Equity is TechCrunch’s flagship podcast, produced by Theresa Loconsolo, and posts every Wednesday and Friday.  Subscribe to us on Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify and all the casts. You also can follow Equity on X and Threads, at @EquityPod.  Credits: Equity is produced by Theresa Loconsolo with editing by Kell. We’d also like to thank TechCrunch’s audience development team. Thank you so much for listening, and we'll talk to you next time. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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• Why Hugging Face's new robot is the Seinfeld of AI devices

  Hugging Face just launched Reachy Mini, an open source AI robot with big googly eyes and not much utility, and that’s kind of the charm. On this episode of Equity Kirsten Korosec, Max Zeff, and Anthony Ha break down the bot's debut, why it’s giving Seinfeld energy, and what it says about the future of open source hardware. Listen to the full episode to hear more news from the week, including: Grok’s wild week and Linda Yaccarino’s abrupt exit from X How Rivian’s micromobility spinoff, Also, snagged another $200 million to build e-bikes, even though it hasn’t launched a product yet.  LangChain reportedly closing a new round that would push its valuation to $1 billion, thanks in part to a pivot toward monetizing its developer tools Equity will be back next week, so stay tuned! Equity is TechCrunch’s flagship podcast, produced by Theresa Loconsolo, and posts every Wednesday and Friday.  Subscribe to us on Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify and all the casts. You also can follow Equity on X and Threads, at @EquityPod.  Credits: Equity is produced by Theresa Loconsolo with editing by Kell. We’d also like to thank TechCrunch’s audience development team. Thank you so much for listening, and we'll talk to you next time. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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• Is SaaS on its way out? The future belongs to agents, according to Narada AI's CEO

  “SaaS is going away,” says Dave Park, co-founder and CEO of Narada AI. The company is betting on a future where AI agents, not humans, navigate enterprise software on our behalf. Today on Equity, Park joins Rebecca Bellan on Equity to talk about the rise of agentic AI, what it actually is, how it differs from traditional automation, and what real-world changes enterprises need to make to deploy it at scale. The timing for the conversation is ripe: YC’s most recent batch included 70+ agentic startups, and major players like Grammarly are building full AI work stacks through partnerships and acquisitions. Listen to the full episode to hear more about: What most people misunderstand about automation and who’s getting caught in the agentic hype How tools like Narada could eventually help solopreneurs and smaller teams, not just the enterprise giants Why the future of software might not be “using” apps at all Equity will be back on Friday with our weekly news rundown, so don’t miss it! Equity is TechCrunch’s flagship podcast, produced by Theresa Loconsolo, and posts every Wednesday and Friday.  Subscribe to us on Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify and all the casts. You also can follow Equity on X and Threads, at @EquityPod.  Credits: Equity is produced by Theresa Loconsolo with editing by Kell. We’d also like to thank TechCrunch’s audience development team. Thank you so much for listening, and we'll talk to you next time. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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• Why Cloudflare wants AI companies to pay for content

  Cloudflare wants AI companies to pay up. The cloud infrastructure provider is launching a new experiment called Pay per Crawl that would let publishers charge AI firms every time their bots scrape a site, and it could reshape how content is accessed and monetized online. Today on TechCrunch’s Equity podcast, hosts Kirsten Korosec and Max Zeff dig into Cloudflare’s big swing, why it’s a natural next step after a year of laying groundwork for bot-blocking tools, and whether the plan to sit at the center of a pay-for-content protocol is genius…or just wishful thinking. Listen to the full episode to hear more about: How ICEBlock, an app for anonymously reporting ICE sightings, went viral thanks to backlash from former prosecutor Pam Bondi, and is now one of the most-downloaded free iPhone apps in the U.S. Why Figma’s S-1 filing could set the stage for a blockbuster IPO, and what its 48% revenue growth says about demand for design tools What Grammarly's acquisition of Superhuman signals about its vision for the "agentic future" of productivity Tesla co-founder JB Straubel’s new venture and how the old EV battery-powered AI data centers might just challenge Tesla's own storage business Equity will be back next week, and for those of you in the U.S., enjoy the long holiday weekend! Equity is TechCrunch’s flagship podcast, produced by Theresa Loconsolo, and posts every Wednesday and Friday.  Subscribe to us on Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify and all the casts. You also can follow Equity on X and Threads, at @EquityPod.  Credits: Equity is produced by Theresa Loconsolo with editing by Kell. We’d also like to thank TechCrunch’s audience development team. Thank you so much for listening, and we'll talk to you next time. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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• Big Tech lands an early win in legal battles against publishers

  This week, two major AI companies scored early wins in court, with federal judges siding with Meta and Anthropic in separate lawsuits over how their models were trained on copyrighted material. The decisions represent the first real legal validation of AI companies’ argument that training models on books, images, and other creative works can be considered “fair use” — even if those materials weren’t obtained with permission. It’s a big deal for companies building generative AI, and a potential turning point for the many lawsuits still in motion.  Today, on TechCrunch’s Equity podcast, hosts Max Zeff and Anthony Ha were joined by Sean O’Kane (who graciously stepped in while Kirsten headed off to the Nevada desert to see the next big act of Redwood Materials, the battery recycling and materials startup founded by former Tesla CTO JB Straubel) to dive deeper into the rulings. While neither case sets a precedent yet, Anthony noted that appeals are likely, and broader challenges could ultimately shape how AI companies interact with entire industries going forward. Listen to the full episode to hear more highlights from the week, including: Kalshi’s $185M round, and what it says about the rising (and legally murky) world of prediction markets The startup betting on reusable satellites, and why the Department of Defense is paying attention Tesla’s robotaxi rollout in Austin, and how it stacks up against Waymo and other AV companies’ approaches Equity will be back next week, so stay tuned! Equity is TechCrunch’s flagship podcast, produced by Theresa Loconsolo, and posts every Wednesday and Friday.  Subscribe to us on Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify and all the casts. You also can follow Equity on X and Threads, at @EquityPod.  Credits: Equity is produced by Theresa Loconsolo with editing by Kell. We’d also like to thank TechCrunch’s audience development team. Thank you so much for listening, and we'll talk to you next time. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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