All posts tagged: stealth

A Stealth Startup Thinks It Just Hacked the Memory Shortage

A Stealth Startup Thinks It Just Hacked the Memory Shortage

Published by skeptic

Kepler also says it has improved the density of SRAM using ferroelectrics, which can read and write data at lower voltages than the mechanisms typically used to process and store data in semiconductors. The startup did this by developing a new, low-voltage, composite material that works with this ferroelectric approach. Sasi Manipatruni, a Kepler cofounder and its chief technology officer, says the Kepler team went through 35 iterations of composites before they landed on a material class that they thought would make memory chips easier and cheaper to make. “Once we found a way to solve the physics problem—as in the physical limitations for HBM—we came up with a material innovation that helps with the amount of memory you can have between chips,” he says. In its early build-outs with GlobalFoundries, Kepler says it was able to convert a fab into a “next-generation” fab in just eight months, compared to a typical 24-month timeframe. “Out goal is to take the fabs and architectures already built, and push them to the limits of physics,” Olaosebikan says. …

Eric Wu’s newest company, out of stealth since May, is going after construction’s labor crunch

Eric Wu’s newest company, out of stealth since May, is going after construction’s labor crunch

Published by skeptic

Eric Wu built and ran Opendoor, one of the more ambitious real estate startups of the last decade, before stepping away in 2022 after fast-rising interest rates abruptly slowed down home sales. He spent a year resetting — he’d been running the company for eight years at that point — and could have easily jumped into investing when he felt done with his hiatus. But like a lot of founders, he’s so convinced that AI will be the defining tech platform of his lifetime that he more recently decided instead to dive back into company building. As he told me during a call earlier this summer, “I knew if I looked back in 10 years and didn’t do something related to it, I’d probably regret that.” The opportunity Wu is chasing — building AI copilots for construction workers and other field laborers, something he describes as a hands-free expert coach for the people physically building things — isn’t exactly a secret. The construction industry is short workers by a wide margin. The trade group Associated …

New Images Reveal China’s Stealth Drone At Secretive “Area 51” Base

New Images Reveal China’s Stealth Drone At Secretive “Area 51” Base

Published by Jenni Sidey

Aviation researcher Andreas Rupprecht posted footage on LinkedIn that appears to show China’s next-generation high-altitude intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance drone, an aircraft he estimates is “comparable in size to the US Air Force’s B-21 Raider.” Rupprecht wrote on LinkedIn that the WZ-X drone was spotted at a secretive air base in China’s Xinjiang region, known to some as China’s version of Area 51: Two new images of the PLAAF’s latest and largest intercontinental HALE ISR #UAV, provisionally referred to simply as the #WZ-X, have been leaked, apparently showing the aircraft somewhere in Xinjiang. The UAV was first spotted on satellite imagery in May 2025 at the PLAAF’s UAV test centre at Malan Air Base in the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region of northwestern China. Rupprecht continued: In recent years, Malan/Uxxaktal (ZWML) has developed into the PLAAF’s main test centre for trialling UAVs and UCAVs of all types, while also serving as the base of the 178th UAV Brigade. Satellite imagery from 2022 onwards shows extensive expansion of the base’s infrastructure, including new hangars, taxiways and facilities …

XDOF, just three months out of stealth, is in talks for a Series B at a .2B valuation

XDOF, just three months out of stealth, is in talks for a Series B at a $1.2B valuation

Published by skeptic

Less than three months after emerging from stealth, XDOF, a startup that collects real-world teleoperation data for training general-purpose robots, is in late-stage talks to raise a Series B at a valuation of about $1.2 billion valuation led by 8VC, several people with knowledge of the deal said. XDOF was co-founded by UC Berkeley researchers Philipp Wu (CEO) and Fred Shentu (CTO) in 2024. TechCrunch reported on the startup’s $70 million Series A in June, with participation from Thrive Capital, Andreessen Horowitz, Lux, and Spark Capital. XDOF wasn’t planning to raise again so soon after that round. But the company’s rapid growth — with annualized revenue approaching $50 million — prompted VCs to approach it about a new round, the people said. TechCrunch was unable to learn the total capital being raised or whether the valuation includes the new funding. The terms of the deal are not final and could still change. XDOF and 8VC didn’t respond to our request for comment. The startup aims to build the data pipelines, collection tools, and annotation systems …

The Powerful Stealth AI Model ‘Ox Alpha’ Is Now GLM-5.3-Flash, and You Can Use It

The Powerful Stealth AI Model ‘Ox Alpha’ Is Now GLM-5.3-Flash, and You Can Use It

Published by skeptic

The anonymous Ox Alpha AI model that popped up on OpenRouter, the unified AI platform, last week has been claimed by the Chinese company Z.ai. Now officially known as GLM-5.3-Flash, the model is both powerful and cheap, challenging the capabilities and cost of popular models from Anthropic and OpenAI.  When it was first teased, Ox Alpha became the most popular model for the week on OpenRouter and all of its traffic was served through Chinese-made AI chips. After it was confirmed to be the company behind the new model, Z.ai’s stock price soared, Bloomberg reports.  Ox Alpha was described as a “frontier model built for efficient coding, sustained agentic work, and real-world production use,” according to an OpenRouter post on X. In a follow-up post, the platform confirmed that the provider wouldn’t train on your prompts.  Z.ai’s GLM family are open-weight models, where core components are publicly released, allowing anyone to download and use them. (That’s different from open-source AI models, which make all pieces of the model available, including the source code, weights, and …

Who’s behind the new ‘stealth model’ Ox Alpha?

Who’s behind the new ‘stealth model’ Ox Alpha?

Published by skeptic

A mysterious new AI model called Ox Alpha has driven certain corners of the internet into a frenzy of speculation about who actually built it. The free model was released on OpenRouter on Thursday, where it was described as “a reasoning model designed for coding, sustained agentic work, and production workload.” On X, Stripe CEO Patrick Collison (whose company is acquiring OpenRouter) described Ox Alpha as “very impressive.” So who’s actually behind Ox Alpha? The OpenRouter listing described it as a “stealth model” and said it was “developed and operated by a third-party provider who has chosen to remain anonymous during this preview.” Unsurprisingly, much of the speculation has revolved around China. AI analyst Andrew Curran posted on Friday that the initial speculation focused on the GLM models developed by Chinese company Z.ai, but “this morning people seem less sure of anything.” Similarly, an article on Wccftech first suggested that the evidence pointed to GLM, but an update suggested that Ox Alpha could be an unreleased version of Microsoft’s MAI. And on Reddit, there’s at …

Rillet raises 0M Series C at B valuation — 2 years after emerging from stealth

Rillet raises $100M Series C at $1B valuation — 2 years after emerging from stealth

Published by skeptic

AI accounting startup Rillet announced a $100 million Series C at a $1 billion valuation on Tuesday, led by Iconiq. Returning investors included Andreessen Horowitz and Sequoia. Rillet, which emerged from stealth in 2024, is quickly becoming one of the hottest AI startups in the enterprise resource planning (ERP) industry.  The company’s platform deploys AI to help finance professionals manage a company’s books. It says it can, for instance, automatically and continuously pull data from sources like Salesforce or Brex. Rillet touts more than 600 companies as customers and says it has doubled its ARR in the past three months. Nicolas Kopp, the company’s co-founder and CEO, said on X that this latest round came together in “less than 48 hours.” The company wasn’t planning to raise, he said, but interest grew because so much had happened since its last round, like an alliance with EY and the jump in ARR and customers.   “A year ago, we backed a bold vision for Rillet: that the general ledger could become more than a system of record …

Lucid unveils its 2027 Air EV lineup with a new Stealth package

Lucid unveils its 2027 Air EV lineup with a new Stealth package

Published by skeptic

Lucid unveiled its 2027 Air lineup, streamlining the options across its electric sedan range and adding a new Stealth & Sound Package for the entry-level Air Pure. The Air Grand Touring keeps its title as the longest-range EV on sale at up to 512 miles, and pricing holds flat across all four trims for the new model year. What’s new for 2027 The biggest change is in the configurator, not the car. Lucid says the 2027 pricing guides “reflect a more focused set of available options for Air Pure,” trimming the entry model’s long à la carte menu down to a tighter set of choices. The centerpiece is a new Stealth & Sound Package for the Air Pure, priced at $6,250, that bundles the most popular options into a single configuration. Buyers who add it can pick either 19-inch Aero Range Stealth or 20-inch Aero Lite Stealth wheels, plus a paint finish in Infinite Black Metallic, Stellar White Metallic, or Quantum Grey Metallic. Advertisement – scroll for more content The Touring, Grand Touring, and Sapphire …

‘A stealth tax on a basic necessity’: Readers slam airport drop-off fees after charges rise by a third

‘A stealth tax on a basic necessity’: Readers slam airport drop-off fees after charges rise by a third

Published by Daniella Wilson

Get the Travel Insider newsletter for tips, deals, and inspiration from our global travel editor Get inspired with our free Travel Insider newsletter Get inspired with our free Travel Insider newsletter It’s meant to be one of travel’s tender moments – a last hug, a lingering wave – but readers say the UK’s airports are pricing the emotional goodbye out of existence. Independent readers reacted with fury after analysis from the RAC found drop-off fees at Britain’s busiest airports have risen by a third on average since last summer, with a “farewell fee” at some terminals now costing more per minute than a black cab. Many readers pointed out that kiss-and-fly zones, dedicated terminal-side drop-off and pick-up lanes at airports designed for very quick passenger transfers, are free or far cheaper in Brussels, Spain and Paris, and questioned why the UK is virtually alone among major economies in charging for the privilege of dropping someone off. Others called for the government to cap the charges outright, while several said the fees hit hardest the people …

Marine Corps Says F-35B Stealth Fighter Crashed in California, Pilot Ejected Safely

Marine Corps Says F-35B Stealth Fighter Crashed in California, Pilot Ejected Safely

Published by Sam Flores

SAN DIEGO (AP) — The U.S. Marine Corps says the pilot of an F-35B stealth fighter is expected to live after ejecting from the jet before it crashed in California. The jet went down Friday near the Miramar air base in San Diego. “The pilot ejected, was transported to a local medical facility in stable condition for evaluation and treatment of non-life-threatening injuries,” the Marine Corps said in an updated statement. Aerial video from a news helicopter showed a plume of black smoke rising from the wreckage in a dirt field, with multiple military and firefighting vehicles and people standing nearby. What appeared to be white flame retardant covered the ground, and at least one person was spraying the wreckage with a fire hose. Wade Lott saw the crash as he drove to work at a concrete company just south of the flight line. “It just blew up, it was crazy,” said Lott, 36, who watched from his truck as two jets descended toward the runway together. The first landed without incident, but the second …