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It’s the end of the road for Cruise, and Bluesky is still taking off | Equity Podcast

Today, on TechCrunch’s Equity podcast, hosts Kirsten Korosec, Anthony Ha and Margaux MacColl are unpacking the week’s news, including GM’s decision to give up on self-driving startup Cruise. The choice initially came as a shock considering the $10 billion GM pumped into the company over the years, but it became clearer when examining Cruise’s tumultuous…

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Today, on TechCrunch’s Equity podcast, hosts Kirsten Korosec, Anthony Ha and Margaux MacColl are unpacking the week’s news, including GM’s decision to give up on self-driving startup Cruise. The choice initially came as a shock considering the $10 billion GM pumped into the company over the years, but it became clearer when examining Cruise’s tumultuous 2023 and 2024. 

Listen to the full episode to hear about:

• Freysa.ai’s public challenge and what’s motivating users to make the AI chat bot fall in love with them.
• Why VCs are lining up to back Lumen Orbit’s moonshot of data centers in space.
• Which startups are stepping up amid a looming TikTok ban and if we’ll see another company capture Bluesky’s success. According to Anthony, it all depends on, “luck, timing, and something to do with critical mass.”
• Who’s stepping up to fill Y Combinator’s place in Africa and where else we could see a pivot to local accelerators.

Equity is TechCrunch’s flagship podcast, produced by Theresa Loconsolo, and posts every Wednesday and Friday. 

Credits: Equity is produced by Theresa Loconsolo with editing by Kell. Bryce Durbin is our Illustrator. We’d also like to thank the audience development team and Henry Pickavet, who manages TechCrunch audio products.

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1 Comment

  1. @RemiStardust

    January 16, 2025 at 8:28 pm

    What’s up with the ads? I wanted to find the Bluesky part (labeling sections would be appreciated by the way) and three times I skipped, three times I had a Youtube-ad break!

    Reply

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Startup Battlefield: Health Tech & Life Sciences Pitches | Disrupt 2026

Founders from around the world pitch expert judges and compete for the Startup Battlefield Cup and $100,000. Each team gets six minutes to pitch and six minutes of Q&A with judges Dr. V. Agrawal (ODDBIRD VC), Andrew Brackin (Gradient), Nell Daly (Revenge Capital), James Joaquin (Obvious Ventures), and Miloni Madan Presler (IVP). This cohort’s competitors…

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October 14, 2026

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Founders from around the world pitch expert judges and compete for the Startup Battlefield Cup and $100,000. Each team gets six minutes to pitch and six minutes of Q&A with judges Dr. V. Agrawal (ODDBIRD VC), Andrew Brackin (Gradient), Nell Daly (Revenge Capital), James Joaquin (Obvious Ventures), and Miloni Madan Presler (IVP).

This cohort’s competitors include…

Mosqitter: Detecting and preventing mosquito-borne disease spread with real-time disease intelligence platforms that turn sensor networks into early warning systems for national health agencies.

Hiyd AI: Delivering proactive health insights by combining sleep, movement, and nutrition data through an ultra-slim, discreet wearable tracker and AI app.

TimeTeller GmbH: Measuring people’s biological clocks to determine optimal treatment timing through molecular diagnostics and AI, improving efficacy and reducing side effects.

NTangible: Helping coaches and front offices make smarter recruiting decisions by quantifying how athletes perform under pressure with a validated cognitive score.

Intero Biosystems: Accelerating drug development by producing miniature human organs that enable pharma companies to identify safer, more effective medications while reducing clinical trial costs.

#TechCrunchDisrupt2026

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Flock CEO Garrett Langley on Public Backlash, Surveillance Expansion | Disrupt 2026

Flock Safety sits at the intersection of an increasingly intense debate around the spread of surviellance technology, AI, and who’s using all of that information and to what ends. Founder and CEO Garrett Langley spoke at TechCrunch Disrupt 2026 to defend his stance that Flock is a net positive in the face of concerns about…

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Flock Safety sits at the intersection of an increasingly intense debate around the spread of surviellance technology, AI, and who’s using all of that information and to what ends. Founder and CEO Garrett Langley spoke at TechCrunch Disrupt 2026 to defend his stance that Flock is a net positive in the face of concerns about its work monitoring communities, cities, and enabling data sharing across law enforcement agencies.

As a sign of that backlash, as Langley spoke on stage, a protest against Flock was taking place outside of Moscone West in San Francisco.

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Satya Nadella’s ‘emergency brake’ and the race to secure AI agents | Disrupt 2026

TechCrunch’s Equity podcast team took over the Builders Stage Tuesday morning to tackle a growing challenge for the AI industry: What happens when AI agents go off-script, and who’s responsible for keeping them in check? Recent incidents, from Anthropic pulling internal evaluations off the live internet after agents misbehaved to Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella calling…

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TechCrunch’s Equity podcast team took over the Builders Stage Tuesday morning to tackle a growing challenge for the AI industry: What happens when AI agents go off-script, and who’s responsible for keeping them in check?

Recent incidents, from Anthropic pulling internal evaluations off the live internet after agents misbehaved to Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella calling for an “emergency brake” on AI models, have brought agent security into focus. The Equity team unpacked whether the problem calls for better engineering, new regulation, or both, and why startups are raising millions to secure AI agents.
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