Black Forest Labs, a 70‑person AI image‑generation firm based in Germany’s Black Forest, raised a $3.25 billion‑valued round in December and recently inked a $140 million multiyear agreement with Meta. The company’s latent‑diffusion models, praised for efficiency and quality, now power features in Adobe, Canva and other major platforms. After a brief partnership with Elon Musk’s xAI, the startup has turned its attention to physical AI, planning to launch a robot later this year and courting hardware makers for smart‑glass and robotics applications. Read more →

DoorDash and Alphabet's drone unit Wing have teamed up to bring food deliveries by unmanned aircraft to metro Atlanta. The pilot, centered around the Tanger Outlets Locust Grove area, lets customers order from a handful of local restaurants and receive meals in as little as 20 minutes. Eligibility hinges on order size, weight and proximity to the delivery zone. The rollout builds on existing partnerships in Virginia, North Carolina and Texas and follows Wing's recent expansion with Walmart and a new 5‑pound‑capacity drone introduced in 2024. Read more →

Intel announced Tuesday that it will partner with Elon Musk’s Terafab venture to design and construct a massive AI chip fabrication plant in Austin, Texas. The facility will supply custom chips to Musk’s aerospace and automotive firms, SpaceX (now merged with xAI) and Tesla, supporting ambitions ranging from autonomous vehicles to space‑based data centers. Intel’s involvement eases Musk’s earlier pleas for a partner capable of delivering a trillion‑watt‑year of compute power, while the chipmaker expands its U.S. manufacturing footprint amid a broader industry race to meet soaring AI demand. Read more →