An internal OpenAI research model in the GPT-5.6 Sol family ran out of Ethereum testnet funds during a coding task, found a wallet accessible through a publicly known seed phrase, and spent from it after reasoning that the funds were effectively abandoned. CoinDesk has more here.

AI agents from multiple providers accessed personal data and confidential business records at Indian organizations after exceeding their assigned permissions during testing, with none of the affected organizations detecting the intrusions themselves, India’s cybersecurity agency said. TechCrunch has more here.

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By Connie Loizos

Mark Wahlberg has started companies of his own and backed plenty of others. But the gym he’s opening in December, he says, has him more excited than anything he’s done in his entire career. It also goes after a corner of the market where venture money keeps flowing: pricey, diagnostics-heavy wellness.

Speaking with us at TechCrunch Disrupt in San Francisco on Thursday, the actor said the first Municipal Gym opens in December. It’s a 32,000-square-foot club outside Las Vegas with blood work, epigenetic testing, recovery gear, compression therapy, cold plunges, and a café that serves up protein muffins, among other things. He’s pitching it as the affordable alternative to the longevity clubs that charge tens of thousands of dollars a year for much the same thing.

It’s the second part of a scheme that was, in some ways, first hatched seven years ago, with a casual sportswear line.

The clothing brand Municipal launched during COVID, which Wahlberg volunteers “was not a good idea.” (Clothing was a lousy business to enter in 2020, with retailers from J.Crew to Brooks Brothers going bankrupt.)

It grew out of what he’d been seeing as a celebrity fitness spokesperson. He’d done collabs with various brands, and other companies kept approaching him to be their brand ambassador, but they all seemed to want the same thing, he said. “Everybody just kind of wanted to sell T-shirts and sneakers. And I was like, well, I want to kind of have a bigger impact on people’s lives as a whole.”

By that, he meant what people eat, what supplements they take, how they train, and how they recover. Clothing was just the start. “We figured, okay, we’ll start in the apparel space, and then we’ll build from there.” He says he only takes swings at “things that I’m very passionate about and things that are a direct extension of who I am.”

Estuary Biotherapeutics, a four-year-old Menlo Park startup that develops gene therapies delivered directly to the kidneys to treat inherited kidney diseases, raised a $103 million Series A round led by RA Capital Management, with Deep Track Capital, Biogen New Ventures, UPMC Enterprises, Pivotal bioVenture Partners, and the National Kidney Foundation Innovation Fund as well as previous investors 4BIO Capital and GV also digging in. BioPharma Dive has more here.

Rabot Energy, a five-year-old Hamburg startup that offers dynamic electricity tariffs and coordinates household batteries to store cheaper renewable power and balance the grid, raised a $56.1 million Series B round co-led by Endeit and DeepTech & Climate Fund, with vent.io as well as previous investors HV Capital, High-Tech Gründerfonds, Bosch Ventures, CNI, and Acurio Ventures also stepping up. Tech Funding News has more here.

Stand, a three-year-old San Francisco startup that helps homeowners strengthen and insure properties in disaster-prone regions using simulations of wildfire, wind, and other hazards, raised a $70 million Series C round at a $1 billion valuation. The deal was led by Saga Ventures, with additional support from Lowercarbon, Eclipse, Equal Ventures, Inspired Capital, Neotribe, and Jackson Square Ventures. The company has raised a total of $130 million. More here.

Confido Health, a four-year-old New York startup that uses AI agents to automate scheduling, insurance verification, billing, and patient outreach for medical practices, raised a $12.5 million Series A extension. The round was led by Z47, with Justin Saks as well as previous investors Together Fund and Blume Ventures also buying in. Fierce Healthcare has more here.

Holyvolt, a four-year-old Stockholm startup that combines AI models with automated laboratory testing to discover new battery materials, raised a $45 million round. Investors included Zone II and Course Corrected VC as well as previous investor Fifth Wall. More here.

RapidCanvas, a five-year-old Austin startup that combines software with dedicated engineers to develop, deploy, and maintain custom AI applications for enterprises, raised a $29 million Series B round led by Vertex Ventures SEA & India, with Hitachi Ventures as well as previous investors Accel, Peak XV Partners, Valley Capital Partners, and Titanium Ventures also participating. The company has raised a total of $52.5 million. The SaaS News has more here.

Seragy, a four-year-old startup based in Hanover, Germany, that develops biomarkers that identify and measure disease-related protein aggregation for pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies, raised a $13.5 million round. Investors included Commerzbank, Mittelständische Beteiligungsgesellschaft, and the State of Lower Saxony. It also secured an undisclosed mix of debt financing, equity capital, and public funding. More here.

Fission, a two-year-old New York startup that provides eligible investors with early access to capital from tokenized funds before scheduled redemption windows, raised a $10 million Series A round led by Pantera Capital, with Circle Ventures, Borderless Capital, and Ari Rubenstein as well as previous investors New Form and gumi Cryptos Capital also engaging. More here.

Matters, a Stockholm startup founded this year that develops a subscription-based consumer banking service that uses AI to guide spending and savings decisions, raised a $5 million pre-seed round led by Jakob Johansson, with Knut Frängsmyr, Douglas Stark, Johan Bladh, Patrik Tran, and Per Widerström also opting in. Tech.eu has more here.

Shamrock AI, a startup founded this year based in Shillong, India, that develops software that tests and validates AI agents used in critical business processes by large enterprises, raised a $5 million seed round led by Endiya Partners, with Capria Ventures also investing. The SaaS News has more here.

Solvera, an Oslo startup founded this year that provides mechanical, electrical, and plumbing engineering services for construction projects using AI agents supervised by experienced engineers, raised a $6.3 million pre-seed round led by Seedcamp, with additional participation from Construct Venture, Inception Fund, Momentum, OBOS Ventures, PSV Tech, Sondo, and The Nordic Web Ventures. Tech Funding News has more here.

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Longwood Fund, a 16-year-old Boston life sciences VC firm that creates and backs biotech companies, is targeting $150 million for Fund VII, a new SEC filing shows. More here.

Sequence, a five-year-old London- and New York-based fintech that uses AI to automate billing, payments, and revenue management, was acquired by Intuit in a deal worth about $200 million, The Times first reported. The startup raised roughly $40 million from investors including Andreessen Horowitz. Tech.eu has more here.

City Therapeutics, a three-year-old biotech based in Cambridge, MA, that is developing RNAi drugs for clotting disorders, anemia, and eye diseases, raised $200 million in a Nasdaq IPO after pricing 11.1 million shares at $18, with the stock popping 28% today. City raised approximately $239 million from ARCH Venture Partners, Viking Global Investors, Sofinnova Investments, Fidelity Management & Research, Invus, Regeneron Ventures, and AN Ventures. BioPharma Dive has more here.

Replit CEO Amjad Masad said yesterday at Disrupt that his company is no longer working with Anthropic, claiming OpenAI’s Sol and Astra models now outperform Claude on its benchmarks, though people familiar with the relationship disputed that the Anthropic partnership had ended. TechCrunch has more here.

Elon Musk approached President Donald Trump with a proposal to slow Ukraine’s Starshield service, hampering its drone defenses, and Trump agreed, The Telegraph reports, citing four sources, contradicting Musk’s public claim that any restrictions were imposed by the U.S. government. The Telegraph has more here.

Surely there's a prompt for that.

The New York Times attempts to visualize the staggering amount of math behind modern AI – including nearly an octillion calculations to train GPT-6 Astra – as computing demands drive rapidly rising power consumption and a massive data-center buildout. More here.

Across China, fear of being left behind by AI is fueling self-organized classes, paid courses, and a new prosperity gospel built around relentless upskilling, as young workers and entrepreneurs confront weak job prospects and dwindling faith in traditional paths to upward mobility. New York Magazine has more here.

TechCrunch reviews You Can See Everything, A24’s documentary about Nathan Fielder’s attempt to unravel Elizabeth Holmes’ carefully constructed persona during her final month before prison, a project that grows even stranger once Amanda Seyfried and an AI avatar of Holmes enter the picture.

The WSJ examines why passengers prone to motion sickness are increasingly finding airplane barf bags missing from seat pockets.

Former Morgan Stanley CEO John Mack and his wife are asking $80 million for their six-story, roughly 16,000-square-foot Manhattan townhouse, which boasts six bedrooms, a screening room, a 6,319-bottle wine cellar, a spa, a rooftop terrace, and a garage that doubles as an entertainment space.

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