Nvidia released a new stack of robot foundation models, simulation tools, and edge hardware at CES 2026, moves that signal the company’s ambition to become the default platform for generalist robotics, much as Android became the operating system for smartphones.  Nvidia’s move into robotics reflects a broader industry shift as AI moves off the cloud and into machines that can learn how to think in the physical world, enabled by cheaper sensors, advanced simulation, and AI models that increasingly can generalize across tasks.  Nvidia revealed details on Monday about its full-stack ecosystem for physical AI, including new open foundation models…

Uber, Lucid Motors, and Nuro have revealed the production-intent version of their collaborative robotaxi at the 2026 Consumer Electronics Show, and TechCrunch got a sneak peek ahead of the reveal. It’s a vehicle that’s been in the works for more than half a year now, part of a deal that saw Uber invest $300 million into Lucid and commit to buying 20,000 of the company’s EVs. On Monday, the companies said the robotaxi is already being tested on public roads ahead of a planned commercial service launching in the San Francisco Bay Area later this year. Based on the Lucid…

A couple of weeks after Merriam-Webster named “slop” as its word of the year, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella weighed in on what to expect from AI in 2026. In his classic, intellectual style, Nadella wrote on his personal blog that he wants us to stop thinking of AI as “slop” and start thinking of it as “bicycles for the mind.” He wrote, “A new concept that evolves ‘bicycles for the mind’ such that we always think of AI as a scaffolding for human potential vs a substitute.” He continued: “We need to get beyond the arguments of slop vs sophistication…

Kate Lowry, a former vice president at Insight Partners, is suing the firm, alleging disability discrimination, gender discrimination, and wrongful termination, according to a suit filed on December 30 in San Mateo County, California, and seen by TechCrunch.   Insight Partners did not immediately respond to TechCrunch’s request for comment.  Lowry told TechCrunch she filed the suit because she believes “too many powerful, wealthy people in venture act like it’s OK to break the law and systemically underpay and abuse their employees.” “It’s an oppressive system that reflect[s] broader trends in society that use fear, intimidation, and power to silence and isolate truth. I’m trying to change…

Today at the Consumer Electronics show, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang officially launched the company’s new Rubin computing architecture, which he described as the state of the art in AI hardware. The new architecture is currently in production and is expected to ramp up further in the second half of the year. “Vera Rubin is designed to address this fundamental challenge that we have: The amount of computation necessary for AI is skyrocketing.” Huang told the audience. “Today, I can tell you that Vera Rubin is in full production.” The Rubin architecture, which was first announced in 2024, is the latest…

Three offshore wind developers are suing the Trump administration after the Department of the Interior halted five projects worth a total of $25 billion on December 22. If completed, the projects would generate a total of 6 gigawatts of electricity. Two lawsuits were filed Thursday and Friday last week by Ørsted and Equinor, which are developing the 704 megawatt Revolution Wind and the 2 gigawatt Empire Wind, respectively. Another was filed on December 23 by Dominion Energy, which is building a 2.6 gigawatt farm off the coast of Virginia. Revolution Wind is nearly 90% complete, while Empire Wind and Coastal Virginia…

LEGO announced its new SMART Play system at CES on Monday, adding interactive, responsive LEGOs to the famously analog franchise. The SMART Play system includes a 2×4 brick, SMART Tag tiles, and SMART Minifigures. The SMART Bricks and Minifigures can sense nearby SMART Tags, which are 2×2 studless tiles with unique digital IDs that tell the Bricks and Minifigures how to act. If the SMART Tag comes in a set for building a helicopter, for example, then the Smart Brick will light up and make propeller sounds that would help bring a helicopter to life. Its built-in accelerometer would make…

A hacktivist remotely wiped three white supremacist websites live on stage during their talk at a hacker conference last week, with the sites yet to return online. The pseudonymous hacker, who goes by Martha Root — dressed as Pink Ranger from the Power Rangers — deleted the servers of WhiteDate, WhiteChild, and WhiteDeal in real-time at the end of a talk at the annual Chaos Communication Congress in Hamburg, Germany.  Root gave the talk alongside journalists Eva Hoffmann and Christian Fuchs, who wrote an article about the hacked sites for the German weekly paper Die Zeit in October.  As of…

Chinese lidar maker Hesai announced plans on Monday to double its production capacity from 2 million units to 4 million units this year, as it looks to corner the global market for the laser-based sensors. That would be well up from the 1-million-plus unit mark that Hesai hit in 2025. Hesai’s push to grab more market share comes just one month after leading U.S. lidar-maker Luminar filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy. That company is not expected to continue operating once its bankruptcy plan is approved, though it is looking to sell the lidar business. Hesai has raised hundreds of millions…

BMW is finally getting the next-generation Alexa voice assistant and it’s coming with a generative AI upgrade. Amazon said Monday that the 2026 BMW iX3 will be equipped with Alexa+, the same generative AI tech that launched in millions of the e-commerce giant’s smart devices last year. This will be the first vehicle to come with Amazon’s next-generation voice assistant, the companies announced during the 2026 Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. The launch is one part of Amazon’s effort to bring its LLM-powered voice and digital assistant to every device — whether handheld or in the driver’s seat —…