Startups

AI touches everything, everywhere all at once at Disrupt

Comment

TechCrunch Disrupt 2023 in San Francisco, September 19-21 gif creative

Like it or not, AI is part of our lives from here on out — for better or worse. In the past six months alone, TechCrunch has written nearly 600 articles focused on the impact of AI technology in our lives across industries as varied as film, healthcare, marketing and supply chains to name but a few.

The AI Stage at TechCrunch Disrupt 2023

At TechCrunch Disrupt 2023, you’ll find AI’s influential fingerprints throughout the show’s programming. It all starts at ground zero: the AI Stage — one of six new industry-specific stages this year. Come and explore the rapidly expanding capabilities and potential of artificial intelligence, and dig into the science behind the deep tech, the products it powers and the ethical, social and legal challenges that come with it.

We’ll announce the full stage lineup this summer, but here’s a very early sneak peek at who and what you’ll see and hear:

AI touches everything at TechCrunch Disrupt 2023

We hope you’re ready to get your AI fix, because that technology crosses into just about every industry imaginable. You’ll find informative and fascinating AI programming on our other new industry-specific stages. Check out a couple sneak peek AI highlights from the other stages — more AI-related speakers and sessions will be announced soon!

The SaaS Stage

The Security Stage

  • We’ll be talking with Marietje Schaake, technology policy pioneer and fellow at the Institute for Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence at Stanford University, and Meredith Whittaker (Signal Foundation) on protecting your data and security in the age of AI.

The Builders Stage

Previously known as the TechCrunch+ stage. This is where you’ll find panels and interviews with experts diving into the nuts and bolts of building and running a startup.

  • Hussein Yahfoufi, a product manager at Arta Finance and the co-founder of the newsletter GPT Hacks, will be on a panel discussing bootstrapping startups and may include some helpful tips on how to build with AI when strapped for cash.

AI breakouts and roundtables

Drill down to gain even more AI knowledge at the many roundtable discussions and breakout sessions scheduled throughout the day. Here are a couple Audience Choice AI contenders:

  • AI for Social Good: How Technologists & Nonprofits Can Partner to Deliver Lasting Impact
  • How the Fortune 500 Is Buying AI Software (or Not!)
  • Revolutionizing Healthcare with AI: Real-Life Use Cases and Solutions
  • Revolutionizing Retail: Using AI and Data Analytics to Drive Customer Engagement

AI touches the Startup Battlefield 200

We’re deep into vetting this year’s Startup Battlefield 200 cohort of outstanding startups to exhibit at Disrupt 2023. We’re guessing AI will be a force, but we’re keeping a tight lid on who might make the cut. However, AI made its presence known last year. Check out the videos of these three AI-focused SB 200 startups:

AI is here to stay in a big way. At Disrupt you’ll find multiple opportunities to increase your knowledge, make connections and develop collaboration possibilities across multiple industries and sectors.

Join the global startup community at TechCrunch Disrupt 2023, September 19–21 in San Francisco. Buy your pass now and save up to $625.

Is your company interested in sponsoring or exhibiting at TechCrunch Disrupt 2023? Contact our sponsorship sales team by filling out this form.

More TechCrunch

Apple is bringing new accessibility features to iPads and iPhones, designed to cater to a diverse range of user needs.

Apple announces new accessibility features for iPhone and iPad users

TechCrunch Disrupt, our flagship startup event held annually in San Francisco, is back on October 28-30 — and you can expect a bustling crowd of thousands of startup enthusiasts. Exciting…

Startup Blueprint: TC Disrupt 2024 Builders Stage agenda sneak peek!

Mike Krieger, one of the co-founders of Instagram and, more recently, the co-founder of personalized news app Artifact (which TechCrunch corporate parent Yahoo recently acquired), is joining Anthropic as the…

Anthropic hires Instagram co-founder as head of product

Seven orgs so far have signed on to standardize the way data is collected and shared.

Venture orgs form alliance to standardize data collection

As cloud adoption continues to surge toward the $1 trillion mark in annual spend, we’re seeing a wave of enterprise startups gaining traction with customers and investors for tools to…

Alkira connects with $100M for a solution that connects your clouds

Charging has long been the Achilles’ heel of electric vehicles. One startup thinks it has a better way for apartment dwelling EV drivers to charge overnight.

Orange Charger thinks a $750 outlet will solve EV charging for apartment dwellers

So did investors laugh them out of the room when they explained how they wanted to replace Quickbooks? Kind of.

Embedded accounting startup Layer secures $2.3M toward goal of replacing Quickbooks

While an increasing number of companies are investing in AI, many are struggling to get AI-powered projects into production — much less delivering meaningful ROI. The challenges are many. But…

Weka raises $140M as the AI boom bolsters data platforms

PayHOA, a previously bootstrapped Kentucky-based startup that offers software for self-managed homeowner associations (HOAs), is an example of how real-world problems can translate into opportunity. It just raised a $27.5…

Meet PayHOA, a profitable and once-bootstrapped SaaS startup that just landed a $27.5M Series A

Restaurant365, which offers a restaurant management suite, has raised a hot $175M from ICONIQ Growth, KKR and L Catterton.

Restaurant365 orders in $175M at $1B+ valuation to supersize its food service software stack 

Venture firm Shilling has launched a €50M fund to support growth-stage startups in its own portfolio and to invest in startups everywhere else. 

Portuguese VC firm Shilling launches €50M opportunity fund to back growth-stage startups

Chang She, previously the VP of engineering at Tubi and a Cloudera veteran, has years of experience building data tooling and infrastructure. But when She began working in the AI…

LanceDB, which counts Midjourney as a customer, is building databases for multimodal AI

Trawa simplifies energy purchasing and management for SMEs by leveraging an AI-powered platform and downstream data from customers. 

Berlin-based trawa raises €10M to use AI to make buying renewable energy easier for SMEs

Lydia is splitting itself into two apps — Lydia for P2P payments and Sumeria for those looking for a mobile-first bank account.

Lydia, the French payments app with 8 million users, launches mobile banking app Sumeria

Cargo ships docking at a commercial port incur costs called “disbursements” and “port call expenses.” This might be port dues, towage, and pilotage fees. It’s a complex patchwork and all…

Shipping logistics startup Harbor Lab raises $16M Series A led by Atomico

AWS has confirmed its European “sovereign cloud” will go live by the end of 2025, enabling greater data residency for the region.

AWS confirms will launch European ‘sovereign cloud’ in Germany by 2025, plans €7.8B investment over 15 years

Go Digit, an Indian insurance startup, has raised $141 million from investors including Goldman Sachs, ADIA, and Morgan Stanley as part of its IPO.

Indian insurance startup Go Digit raises $141M from anchor investors ahead of IPO

Peakbridge intends to invest in between 16 and 20 companies, investing around $10 million in each company. It has made eight investments so far.

Food VC Peakbridge has new $187M fund to transform future of food, like lab-made cocoa

For over six decades, the nonprofit has been active in the financial services sector.

Accion’s new $152.5M fund will back financial institutions serving small businesses globally

Meta’s newest social network, Threads, is starting its own fact-checking program after piggybacking on Instagram and Facebook’s network for a few months.

Threads finally starts its own fact-checking program

Looking Glass makes trippy-looking mixed-reality screens that make things look 3D without the need of special glasses. Today, it launches a pair of new displays, including a 16-inch mode that…

Looking Glass launches new 3D displays

OpenAI co-founder and chief scientist Ilya Sutskever has left the company. Replacing Sutskever is Jakub Pachocki, OpenAI’s director of research.

Ilya Sutskever, OpenAI co-founder and longtime chief scientist, departs

Intuitive Machines made history when it became the first private company to land a spacecraft on the moon, so it makes sense to adapt that tech for Mars.

Intuitive Machines wants to help NASA return samples from Mars

As Google revamps itself for the AI era, offering AI overviews within its search results, the company is introducing a new way to filter for just text-based links. With the…

Google adds ‘Web’ search filter for showing old-school text links as AI rolls out

Blue Origin’s New Shepard rocket will take a crew to suborbital space for the first time in nearly two years later this month, the company announced on Tuesday.  The NS-25…

Blue Origin to resume crewed New Shepard launches on May 19

This will enable developers to use the on-device model to power their own AI features.

Google is building its Gemini Nano AI model into Chrome on the desktop

It ran 110 minutes, but Google managed to reference AI a whopping 121 times during Google I/O 2024 (by its own count). CEO Sundar Pichai referenced the figure to wrap…

Google mentioned ‘AI’ 120+ times during its I/O keynote

Firebase Genkit is an open source framework that enables developers to quickly build AI into new and existing applications.

Google launches Firebase Genkit, a new open source framework for building AI-powered apps

In the coming months, Google says it will open up the Gemini Nano model to more developers.

Patreon and Grammarly are already experimenting with Gemini Nano, says Google

As part of the update, Reddit also launched a dedicated AMA tab within the web post composer.

Reddit introduces new tools for ‘Ask Me Anything,’ its Q&A feature