TechCrunch Top 3

Image Credits: Eric Slesinger

1. Not following the herd: As Russia's war in Ukraine rages on and Trump's commitment to European defense wavers, one American VC and former CIA employee, Eric Slesinger, is looking to European defense tech startups as the next big opportunity. Read More

2. Firing dissidents: Trump has fired Shira Perlmutter, the head of the U.S. Copyright Office. Rep. Joe Morelle accused the President of firing Perlmutter "with no legal basis […] a day after she refused to rubber-stamp Elon Musk's efforts to mine troves of copyrighted works to train AI models." Read More

3. Slap on the wrist: Google has agreed to pay Texas $1.4 billion to settle a couple of lawsuits accusing the company of tracking users' personal locations, incognito searches, and voice and facial data without their permission. Read More

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Morning Must-Reads

Image Credits: Brian Heater / TechCrunch

🤳 Passing it on: Apple is reportedly planning to increase the price of the upcoming iPhones set to launch this autumn. Rather than blaming tariffs, Apple is said to be trying to link the price hikes to other things like new features and designs. Read More

🏠 Building value: Egyptian startup Nawy aims to bring transparency and efficiency to the African property market. It just raised $52 million in Series A funding to validate its model of combining property listings with brokerage services. Read More

🤐 Tantrums abound: The FTC has voted yet again to delay a rule that requires companies to make it as easy to cancel a subscription as it is to sign up. The rule initially went into effect in January, but the enforcement of some provisions was delayed to May 14, and now, to give companies time to deal with the new "burden," the FTC is pushing the date out to July. Read More

🤝 Hogging the pie: OpenAI is outpacing rivals in capturing enterprises' AI spend, according to transaction data from fintech Ramp. Looks like a third of U.S. businesses were paying for subscriptions to OpenAI platforms as of April, up from 19% in January and 28% in March. Just 8% of businesses had subscriptions to Anthropic's products as of last month. Read More

🌲 Keep your steel industry: A materials scientist from the University of Maryland has figured out how to turn ordinary timber into a material stronger than steel. The innovation kicked the academic into founder gear, and his startup, Superwood, is on track to produce a first batch this year. Read More

Around the Web

💫 Back to earth: Bloomberg reports that progress on Stargate – Softbank's $100 billion AI infras project with OpenAI – has slowed as economic risks associated with Trump's tariffs hold up financing talks. Read More

💰 The quantum race: Israeli quantum computing startup Classiq has raised $100 million, reports Reuters. The startup's customer list reportedly includes BMW, Citi, Deloitte, Nvidia and others. Read More

🚘 Software-first wars: Legacy automakers have thrown billions at software-defined vehicles, but none seem to have figured it out yet. Inside EVs looks at the SDV landscape, why it's such a hard field, and why only Tesla seems to have succeeded so far. Read More

Before You Go

😣 Whoop, there it is: Wearable maker Whoop is backtracking after it published a blog post that said anyone who'd been a member for six months would receive free hardware upgrades. Customers weren't happy about it, but the company is addressing those concerns. Read More