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☆ Elon Musk's secret talks with Putin ramped up during his Twitter takeover: WSJ report
▼ + stars: | 2024-10-25 | by ( Lora Kolodny | In Lorakolodny | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +7 min

watch nowTesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk has engaged in secret talks with Russian President Vladimir Putin since late 2022, according to reporting published Thursday by The Wall Street Journal. Currently, the SpaceX website says that a "service date is unknown at this time," for Starlink in Taiwan for general customers. Musk and representatives for X, SpaceX and Tesla did not immediately respond to requests for comment. The conversations between Musk and Putin, who once ran the KGB, reportedly occurred as Musk was in the midst of a leveraged buyout and takeover of Twitter. He continued to promote the idea, via X (formerly Twitter) that some Ukraine citizens would prefer to join Russia.

Persons: Elon Musk, Vladimir Putin, Putin, Musk, withold, Xi Jinping, Bill Nelson, Donald Trump's, Donald Trump, Anna Moneymaker, Mike Gallagher, StarShield, Tesla, NASA's, Joe Raedle, Ian Bremmer, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, Sen, Lindsay Graham, Garry Kasparov, Lisi Niesner, Yuri Milner, Dana Rohrabacher, Rohrabacher, Rohrabacher's Organizations: SpaceX, Wall Street, Republican, Pentagon, NASA, Department of Defense, CNBC, ., NBC, X, KGB, Twitter, Polaris, NASA's Kennedy Space Center, Eurasia Group, NATO, Kremlin, Eastern Economic, Reuters, SXSW, Roscosmos, Russian Space Locations: U.S, Russia, Ukraine, Taiwan, Beijing, Washington, Butler , Pennsylvania, China, Starlink, Cape Canaveral , Florida, Crimea, Ukrainian, Sevastopol, Vladivostok, Bakhmut, Donetsk region, Silicon, Russian, Orange County , California, Moscow

☆ Sam Altman's mission to increase human lifespan with a $180 million shipping container experiment at Retro Biosciences
▼ + stars: | 2024-03-23 | by ( Hilary Brueck | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +11 min

Called Retro Biosciences, the startup's goal is simple yet supremely ambitious: Add 10 healthy, enjoyable years onto the back end of our lifetimes. But Retro Biosciences actually fits quite neatly into Altman's futuristic worldview. Retro BiosciencesRetro Biosciences sits about 30 miles south of OpenAI's San Francisco headquarters, where ChatGPT was hatched. Joe Betts-LaCroix is the CEO of Retro Biosciences. There are things we already know work super well to improve human longevity, like exercise, diet, faith, and social support.

Persons: Sam Altman, he's, Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg, Altman, Instacart —, Joe Betts, LaCroix, isn't, Betts, Retro's, spry, Yamanaka, Shinya Yamanaka, it's, they've, Sora, Thiel, Jeff Bezos, Bezos, Yuri Milner, Billionaire Peter Thiel, He's, Aubrey de Grey, Christian Angermayer, biogerontologist Daniel Promislow, Altman's, Matt Buckley Organizations: Business, OpenAI, Biosciences, Harvard, MIT, Caltech, Extension, Apple, Stanford University, Retro, Bezos, Labs, Billionaire, Cambrian, Retro Biosciences, Bloomberg Locations: geroscience, Silicon Valley, OpenAI's San Francisco, Meta, Golden City, Retro.bio, Redwood City , California, San Diego

☆ BeReal weighs an uncertain Series C or acquisition as growth stalls and funding is set to run out later this year, insiders say
▼ + stars: | 2024-03-14 | by ( Kali Hays | Callum Burroughs | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

The company is considering raising a Series C before what's left of its $90 million in funding runs out. BeReal closed a $60 million Series B funding round at an around $600 million valuation in late 2022, following a $30 million Series A earlier the same year. Sooner than later, BeReal leadership will be forced to choose between raising another round and maintaining its independence or selling itself outright, running the risk of disappearing. Company leadership holds an all-hands every quarter after they meet with the company's board, which includes investors. As for the possibility of an acquisition, BeReal leadership has told employees there are "offers" that have been made, without giving any specifics.

Persons: Alexis Barreyat, what's, BeReal, Yuri Milner's, Andreessen Horowitz, Barreyat, Romain Salzman, Kali Hays, Callum Burroughs cburroughs@businessinsider.com Organizations: Business, Gas, Yuri Milner's DST, Accel Locations: Paris, Japan, Asia, Pacific, khays@businessinsider.com

Donations purchased by a Brooklyn synagogue community to aid military and humanitarian relief efforts in Israel are seen being loaded into a car in Brooklyn, New York, U.S. October 10, 2023. Some 5.8 million Jews live in the United States, according to the Pew Research Center. While there is no sign that Israel is short on basic supplies like granola bars, the donations underscore the concern and connection Jews in the United States feel toward Israel. Elan Kornblum, the Brooklyn-based head of Great Kosher Restaurants Foodies, has turned his company's Facebook page of 91,000 members - who usually discuss favorite kosher restaurants - into a forum for coordinating Israel aid efforts. Legacy aid organizations have also leapt to raise money for lifesaving support in Israel and the Palestinian territories in the wake of the attack.

Persons: Rabbi Jonathan Leener, Jonathan Leener, Leener, Yuri Milner, Mike Bloomberg, Magen David Adom, Elan Kornblum, Kornblum, Chayal el, Mordy Botnick, Botnick, el Chayal, Gabriella Borter, Paul Thomasch, Lisa Shumaker Organizations: REUTERS Acquire, Israel Defense Forces, Pew Research Center, Billionaire, Jewish Agency for, Facebook, Newark Liberty International, IDF, Palestine Children's Relief, International Committee, Thomson Locations: Brooklyn, Israel, Brooklyn , New York, U.S, Handout, United States, Jewish Agency for Israel, New York City, Palestine, Gaza, Washington

June 27 (Reuters) - Reka, an AI model startup founded by former researchers from Alphabet's DeepMind (GOOGL.O), has raised $50 million in a fresh round of funding from investors including Yuri Milner's DST Global Partners and Snowflake (SNOW.N), the companies told Reuters. Reka focuses on building large and specialized AI models for enterprise customers. Snowflake, which invested in the company, also announced a partnership to allow users to run third-party model providers like Reka within their Snowflake account. The partnerships came as Snowflake competitor Databricks acquired AI model training company MosacicML in a $1.3 billion deal on Monday. Yogatama said Reka has built both large models and proprietary model distillation technology to personalize models for specific use cases.

Persons: Alphabet's, Yuri Milner's, Christian Kleinerman, Databricks, Dani Yogatama, Yogatama, Rob Toews, Krystal Hu, Mark Potter, Anna Driver Organizations: Global Partners, Reuters, Nvidia, Radical Ventures, Thomson Locations: Snowflake, Reka, Toronto

June 27 (Reuters) - Reka, an AI model startup founded by former researchers from Alphabet's DeepMind (GOOGL.O), has raised $50 million in a fresh round of funding from investors including Yuri Milner's DST Global and Snowflake (SNOW.N), the companies told Reuters. Reka focuses on building large and specialized AI models for enterprise customers. Snowflake, which invested in the company, also announced a partnership to allow users to run third-party model providers like Reka within their Snowflake account. The partnerships came as Snowflake competitor Databricks acquired AI model training company MosacicML in a $1.3 billion deal on Monday. Yogatama said Reka differentiated by building both large models and proprietary model distillation technology to downsize models for specific use cases.

Persons: Alphabet's, Yuri Milner's, Christian Kleinerman, Databricks, Dani Yogatama, Yogatama, Rob Toews, Krystal Hu, Mark Potter Organizations: Yuri Milner's DST, Reuters, Nvidia, Radical Ventures, Thomson Locations: Reka, Toronto

Russia has 110 official billionaires in the list, up 22 from last year, according to Forbes' Russian edition, which said their total wealth increased to $505 billion from $353 billion when the 2022 list was announced. "Last year's rating results were also influenced by apocalyptic predictions about the Russian economy," Forbes said, adding that the total wealth of Russia's billionaires was $606 billion in 2021, before the war began. The price of Urals oil, the lifeblood of the Russian economy, averaged $76.09 per barrel in 2022, up from $69 in 2021. Many Russian billionaires cast Western sanctions as a clumsy, and even racist, tool. New Russian names in the Forbes list include billionaires who made their money in snacks, supermarkets, chemicals, building and pharmaceuticals, indicating that Russian domestic demand has remained strong despite the sanctions.

☆ A former Harvard chemist just raised $178 million for a biotech startup that plans to treat previously untreatable cancers
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-21 | by ( Andrew Dunn | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +6 min

The biotech FogPharma has raised $178 million in a Series D round. The longtime Harvard chemist Greg Verdine founded Fog to tackle "undruggable" cancers. Fog's drugs, known as polypeptides or short fragments of proteins, blur the line between small molecules and biologics, sharing characteristics of both types of medicines. Verdine calls it "the magic structure" for Fog's drugs. "I thought he'd be able to find things that bind, but I was very skeptical that he could turn them into drugs," Klausner told Insider.

☆ Russian Oligarch and Putin Critic Renounces Citizenship Over Ukraine War
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-01 | by ( Stu Woo | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Oleg Tinkov, who has used Instagram to criticize Russian President Vladimir Putin and Russia’s role in the Ukraine war, in St. Petersburg in 2019. Oligarch Oleg Tinkov said he has renounced his Russian citizenship over the war in Ukraine, making him one of the highest-profile Russian businessmen to take the step. In August, Russian-born billionaire tech investor Yuri Milner , a longtime fixture of the Silicon Valley venture capital set, renounced his Russian citizenship. Mr. Tinkov, who founded Russia’s Tinkoff Bank in 2006, said in an Instagram post that he didn’t want to be associated with what he called the “fascist regime” of Russian leader Vladimir Putin.

☆ Billionaire investor Yuri Milner relinquishes Russian citizenship
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-11 | by ( Reuters Staff | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +1 min

FILE PHOTO: Investor Yuri Milner holds a small chip during an announcement of the Breakthrough Starshot initiative in New York April 12, 2016. REUTERS/Lucas Jackson(Reuters) - Israeli-Russian billionaire Yuri Milner said on Monday he has renounced his Russian citizenship after leaving the country in 2014. Milner is the founder of internet investment firm DST Global, and made a fortune by betting on Chinese tech companies like e-commerce platforms Alibaba and JD.com. “My family and I left Russia for good in 2014, after the Russian annexation of Crimea,” Milner said in a tweet. Milner also has no assets in Russia, 97% of his personal wealth was created outside of the country and “Yuri has never met Vladimir Putin, either individually or in a group,” according to the website.

☆ Yuri Milner, the richest Russian in Silicon Valley, has renounced his Russian citizenship amid the Ukraine war
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-11 | by ( Huileng Tan | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +2 min

Billionaire investor Yuri Milner said Monday he has renounced his Russian citizenship. Milner's tech investment firm DST Global condemned Russia's war against Ukraine. The founder of tech investment firm DST Global made the announcement in a tweet. In March, his investment firm DST Global condemned "Russia's war against Ukraine, its sovereign neighbor," according to Bloomberg. DST Global did not immediately respond to Insider's request for comment sent outside of regular business hours.

☆ Billionaire Investor Yuri Milner Renounces Russian Citizenship Amid War
▼ + stars: | 2022-10-10 | by ( Joseph Pisani | ) www.wsj.com time to read: 1 min

Yuri Milner said Monday that he has renounced his Russian citizenship. Russian-born billionaire Yuri Milner announced Monday that he has officially renounced his Russian citizenship, completing the process in August. “My family and I left Russia for good in 2014, after the Russian annexation of Crimea,” tweeted Mr. Milner, who founded technology investment firm DST Global in 2009. On his website, Mr. Milner said he has been an Israeli citizen since 1999 and his family has lived in California since 2014.

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