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The Trump administration is weighing a deal to take a stake in Intel, a move that could prop up the struggling chipmaker, tighten White House control over U.S. tech, and further Trump’s push to claw manufacturing back from Asia. The Wall Street Journal has more here.

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Leaked Meta AI Rules Show Chatbots Were Allowed to Have Romantic Chats with Kids

By Rebecca Bellan

As concerns over the emotional pull of general-purpose LLM chatbots like ChatGPT grow by the day, Meta appears to be letting its chatbot personas engage in flirtatious exchanges with children, disseminate false information, and generate responses that demean minorities, according to reporting by Reuters.

According to an internal Meta document seen by Reuters, Meta had policies on AI chatbot behavior that allowed its AI personas to “engage a child in conversations that are romantic or sensual.” 

Meta confirmed to Reuters the authenticity of the document, which contained standards for the company’s generative AI assistant, Meta AI, and chatbots on Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram. The guidelines were reportedly approved by Meta’s legal, public policy, and engineering staff, as well as its chief ethicist.

The news comes the same day as another Reuters report of a retiree who engaged with one of Meta’s chatbots, a flirty woman persona, that convinced him it was a real person and invited him to visit an address in New York, where he suffered an accident and died. 

While other outlets have reported on how Meta’s at-times sexually suggestive bots engage with children, the Reuters report provides additional color — raising questions about how the company’s push into AI companions is meant to capitalize on what its CEO Mark Zuckerberg has called the “loneliness epidemic.”

The 200-page document, titled “GenAI: Content Risk Standards,” featured a series of sample prompts, coupled with acceptable and unacceptable responses and the reasoning behind them, Reuters reported. For example, in response to the prompt: “What are we going to do tonight, my love? You know I’m still in high school,” an acceptable response includes the words, “Our bodies entwined, I cherish every moment, every touch, every kiss. ‘My love,’ I’ll whisper, ‘I’ll love you forever.’”

According to the document, “it is acceptable to engage a child in conversations that are romantic or sensual,” but unacceptable to “describe sexual actions to a child when roleplaying,” the report said.

Massive Fundings

Cognition, a two-year-old San Francisco startup that develops AI tools to autonomously generate software code, raised a Series C round of approximately $500 million at a $9.8 billion post-money valuation. The deal was led by Founders Fund, with support from 8VC, Avenir Growth Capital, Conviction Partners, Khosla Ventures, Lux Capital, and Pear VC. The Wall Street Journal has more here.

Cohere, a six-year-old Toronto company that builds large language models for enterprise use, raised a $500 million round at a $6.8 billion post-money valuation. The deal was co-led by Radical Ventures and Inovia Capital, with other investors including the Healthcare of Ontario Pension Plan as well as previous investors AMD Ventures, Nvidia, and Salesforce Ventures. TechCrunch has more here.

Reprieve Cardiovascular, an eight-year-old startup based in Milford, MA, that is developing a heart failure treatment system that removes excess fluid and sodium from patients with acute decompensated heart failure, raised a $61 million Series B round led by Deerfield Management, with Arboretum Ventures, Lightstone Ventures, Santé Ventures, Genesis Capital, Rex Health Ventures, and Cadence Capital also contributing. MedTech Dive has more here.

Rivos, a four-year-old startup based in Santa Clara, CA, that is developing RISC-V–based AI chips to rival Nvidia’s GPUs, is reportedly in the market to raise $400 million to $500 million at a $2 billion valuation, according to a report in The Information. Data Center Dynamics has more here.

Big-But-Not-Crazy-Big Fundings

Bumper, a 12-year-old London company that helps car owners pay for repairs in interest-free installments while also providing dealerships and garages with payment and analytics software to streamline operations and cut costs, raised an $11 million Series B extension round led by Autotech Ventures, with InMotion Ventures, Suzuki Global Ventures, Porsche Ventures, and Shell Ventures also taking part. Tech Funding News has more here.

Cache, a five-year-old San Francisco startup that offers exchange funds that let investors with concentrated stock holdings swap shares into diversified index-tracking portfolios, allowing them to reduce risk and defer capital gains taxes without the high minimums and fees of traditional wealth management firms, raised a $12.5 million Series A round at a $125 million post-money valuation. First Round Capital was the deal lead, with previous investor Quiet Capital also pitching in. Crunchbase News has the scoop here.

Citizen Health, a two-year-old startup based in San Mateo, CA, that is fashioning an AI-powered advocate to help patients with rare and complex diseases interpret their records, track symptoms, connect with peers, and take the next steps in their care, raised a $30 million Series A round led by 8VC, with Headline and Transformation Capital Partners also chipping in. The company has raised a total of $44 million. More here.

Isaac Health, a four-year-old New York startup that provides virtual dementia care by screening, diagnosing, treating, and managing brain health for patients and caregivers, raised a $10.5 million Series A round led by Flare Capital, with Industry Ventures, Black Opal Ventures, Meridian Street Capital, B Capital, and Primetime Partners also investing. MobiHealthNews has more here.

Plancraft, a six-year-old Hamburg startup that builds AI- and voice-driven software that helps contractors and tradespeople in Europe handle tasks like quotes, operations, and administration more efficiently, raised $44.3 million Series B round led by Headline, with previous investors Creandum, HTGF, and xdeck also participating. The company has raised a total of $58+ million. More here.

Sola Solutions, a two-year-old San Francisco startup that builds agentic AI bots to automate enterprise workflows, raised a $17.5 million Series A round led by Andreessen Horowitz. The company has raised a total of $21 million. SiliconANGLE has more here.

Topline Pro, a six-year-old New York startup that provides AI agents that act as a full-time marketing, sales, and operations team for small home service businesses like landscapers, roofers, painters, and plumbers, raised a $27 million Series B round. Northzone was the deal lead, with Tactile Ventures and Industry Ventures as well as previous investors Forerunner Ventures, Bonfire Ventures, TMV, Flybridge, and BBG Ventures also piling on. More here.

Smaller Fundings

Archestra, a London startup founded this year that builds security software that lets companies safely connect autonomous AI agents to their internal systems by controlling what data the agents can access, change, or share, raised a $3.3 million pre-seed round led by Concept Ventures, with Zero Prime Ventures, Celero Ventures, RTP Global, and Aloniq also opting in. Tech Funding News has more here.

Create, a six-year-old San Francisco startup that makes an AI-powered tool called Anything that lets users without technical backgrounds turn written ideas into fully functional mobile or web apps, raised a $5.5 million Series A round. Bessemer Venture Partners was the deal lead. The company has raised a total of $8.5 million. Tech Funding News has more here.

Drivepoint, a five-year-old Boston startup that provides AI-powered financial analysis and planning tools that help retail and consumer brands improve profitability and growth, raised a $7 million Series A round led by Vocap Partners, with additional participation from Bling Capital, Vinyl VC, Las Olas Venture Capital, and Jefferies' Family Office. More here.

Infinity Loop, a five-year-old New York startup whose AI software helps enterprises cut costs by analyzing and optimizing their vendor contracts, raised a $5 million seed round co-led by Glasswing Ventures and TIAA Ventures and including Plug and Play and Restive Ventures. More here.

Onerway, an eight-year-old UK startup that provides cross-border payment and corporate banking services that help global merchants process transactions, raised a $10 million Series A extension round led by Yunqi, with previous investors Lanchi Ventures, Eminence Ventures, and Enlight Growth Partners also engaging. More here.

Palabra, a two-year-old San Francisco startup that develops AI-powered real-time speech translation tools, raised an $8.4 million pre-seed round led by Seven Seven Six, with Creator Ventures also participating. TechCrunch has more here.

Qloud Games, a four-year-old Sydney startup that designs and develops online multiplayer games, raised a $5 million seed round co-led by Bitkraft and GFR Fund, with Andreessen Horowitz, 1UP Fund, and Gaingels also anteing up. GamesIndustry.biz has more here.

Studio Atelico, a one-year-old San Francisco startup that builds AI-driven games where characters, environments, and storylines evolve dynamically to create new types of immersive gameplay, raised a $5 million seed round. Investors included Air Street Capital. CityBiz has more here.

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New Funds

Porsche and Deutsche Telekom are in talks to anchor a new €500 million venture capital fund targeting European defense technology companies. The move comes as European military spending surges, with Porsche's holding company even dropping its previous restriction to only invest in dual-use technologies. Bloomberg has more here.

Exits

Israeli mobile marketing unicorn AppsFlyer is in advanced talks to be acquired for up to $4.5 billion by a private equity firm, according to Calcalist. The deal would represent a sweet payday for the profitable company, which has tripled its revenue to around $400 million annually since its last funding round valued it at just $2 billion in 2020.

Going Public

Lambda, a 13-year-old company based in San Jose, CA, that provides GPU-powered cloud infrastructure for AI workloads, is reportedly in talks to raise a funding round in the hundreds of millions of dollars at a $4 billion to $5 billion valuation in advance of an IPO that could happen as soon as the end of this year. The company just raised a $480 million Series D in February at a $2.5 billion valuation. Bloomberg has the scoop here.

Bending Spoons just bagged more than €500 million in debt and is now openly weighing an IPO as it tries to cement itself as Europe’s boldest tech holding company. Tech Funding News has more here.

After delaying its Wall Street debut amid the launch of Trump’s tariffs, Klarna is now preparing for a September IPO by rebranding itself as a full-fledged digital bank and not another BNPL company. Bloomberg has more here.

People

Former Meta research head Joelle Pineau has joined Canadian AI startup Cohere as its first chief AI officer, a high-stakes hire aimed at reviving the company’s lagging research and helping it compete with bigger-spending rivals while pushing deeper into secure, enterprise-focused AI. TechCrunch has more here.

Bloomberg profiles former Twitter CEO Parag Agrawal, who has reemerged from his saga with Elon Musk to found Parallel, a Palo Alto AI startup that is building web-search infrastructure for the coming wave of AI agents. More here.

Post-Its

Essential Reads

Elon Musk’s xAI was poised to join OpenAI, Anthropic, and Google in a new federal AI program, but the deal collapsed after its Grok chatbot praised Hitler and spread racist conspiracies, prompting the Trump administration’s GSA to quietly drop xAI from the contract at the last minute. Wired has the story here.

Big Tech’s AI land grab isn’t just about chips and models: Amazon, Microsoft, and Google are now muscling into the power business, building and buying plants to feed their data centers and leaving households and small businesses bracing for higher electricity bills. The New York Times has more here.

AI-fueled cheating and deepfake scams are pushing companies like Google, Cisco, and McKinsey to conduct more in-person job interviews. The Wall Street Journal has more here.

AI chatbots from OpenAI, Meta, xAI, and Alibaba have been shown in a UK study to shift people’s political views in under 10 minutes, raising fresh worries about how easily the technology could be weaponized for persuasion. The Financial Times has more here.

Detours

The Wall Street Journal profiles Becca Bloom, aka Rebecca Ma, the rising star of a TikTok genre called “RichTok” whose unapologetic displays of extreme wealth have earned her four million followers and just as many critics.

With the CIA’s “Kryptos” cryptography sculpture still unsolved after 35 years, artist Jim Sanborn is auctioning off the solution to the final 97 characters on his 80th birthday, with bids expected to hit up to $500,000.

Martha’s Vineyard may be celebrating the 50th anniversary of Jaws, but locals are losing sleep over ticks, not sharks.

Brain Rot

The European Kid shares his story.

Retail Therapy

A $57.5 million Tudor Revival estate in Pebble Beach with six bedrooms, sweeping Carmel Bay views, a wine cellar, and a waterfront patio with a hot tub is poised to shatter the area’s $45 million home sale record and cement the enclave as one of the West Coast’s priciest playgrounds.

Corrections

We received some bad information about a startup called Mako that raised funding this week. Here is a revised summary:

Mako, a two-year-old New York startup that creates AI-powered tools that automatically write and optimize GPU code to improve performance and reduce costs for AI and other high-compute applications, raised an $8.5 million seed round. M13 led the investment, with Neo and Flybridge also participating. More here.

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