California puts the brakes on Waymo’s robotaxi application

TechCrunch Newsletter [TechCrunch PM Logo]( By [Christine Hall]( Wednesday, February 21, 2024 Good afternoon, and welcome to TechCrunch PM! Today, we bring you stories on Waymo, which was dealt a blow by California; Match Group starting a relationship with OpenAI; and efforts made to reduce climate-harming farming practices in India. And we’re using expletives in headlines. Let’s get started! — [Christine]( [ image] Image Credits: Allen J. Schaben / Getty Images TechCrunch PM Top 3 [Waymo’s expansion halted](: The robotaxi company’s plans to provide its service in Los Angeles and San Mateo counties was put on pause by the California Public Utilities Commission’s Consumer Protection and Enforcement Division, at least until June. It’s standard practice, we are told, but it still smarts given Waymo was already testing in Santa Monica. [A ConnectWise security flaw made it easy to exploit](: Hackers are going at a high-risk vulnerability within ConnectWise’s remote access tool. Researchers tell TechCrunch that they can see early signs of threat actors moving on to “more focused post-exploitation and persistence mechanisms,” causing one researcher to describe what was going on in these terms: “I can’t sugarcoat it — this shit is bad.” [Decentralized cloud-y skies](: Meet NodeShift, a young company providing a single API to give access to excess compute, storage and graphics accelerators from independent data center operators and through connections to low-cost decentralized web services like Akash and Filecoin. [TechCrunch PM Top 3 image] Image Credits: DBenitostock / Getty Images More top reads [Love is in the OpenAi air](: Match Group and OpenAI swiped right and are now working together in a partnership that includes over 1,000 enterprise licenses for the dating app giant. Match is going all in on artificial intelligence to the tune of $20 million this year that will have ChatGPT helping Match employees with work-related tasks. Apple’s new bites: iPhone users got a special treat today with Apple’s new app called [Apple Sports](, where they have access to real-time scores, stats and other information about their favorite teams and leagues. Meanwhile, the consumer tech giant is [preparing its iMessage app]( for the time when quantum computers will be able to break today’s cryptography standards. And Apple now says it [does want a percentage]( of donations made to a certain meditation app. [Permit us to move faster](: PermitFlow is building a “TurboTax for construction permitting,” and if you have ever purchased a piece of land to put a house on, you’ll know why an easier process is needed. [Hadrian Automation’s CEO wants to defy history and revitalize American industry](: Learn why Chris Power made the factory the product as he worked to leverage software and automation anywhere he could. [CFOs need love, too](: Colombian-based Simetrik grabbed some new capital as it continues to develop its building blocks that automate tasks for company CFOs. [Google and AI safety](: AI is becoming smarter by the day, and you can get generative AI models to do some interesting things. With that in mind, Google DeepMind formed a new organization called AI Safety and Alignment that brings together not only existing teams already working in this area, but also new cohorts of GenAI researchers and engineers. [Moonshot AI’s new valuation is a moonshot indeed](: In the race to build the next big large language model, China’s Moonshot AI got a moonshot of help with $1 billion in new funding to boost its valuation to $2.5 billion. I hope they spend it all in one place. [Meet the startup helping Indian farms with carbon offsets](: Varaha works with partners to onboard smallholder farmers and help them follow sustainable and regenerative farming practices that result in the creation of nature-based carbon credits, which the startup sells to companies mainly in Europe. [More top reads image] Image Credits: Tinder On the pods Today on [Equity]( was all about this week’s leading startup and venture capital news. Even with the short week, Alex Wilhelm had plenty to talk about, including [Loora’s $12 million round](, Dili [closing on $3.6 million](, Reddit’s [neat way]( to get power users invested in its upcoming IPO and a few new venture capital funds. [Listen here](. Over on [Found](, Rebecca Szkutak and Dominic-Madori Davis spoke with Shan-Lyn Ma, the co-founder and CEO of wedding planning platform Zola, on how she built her business and how it handled the pandemic. [Listen here](. 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