tech:

taffy

Google Earth Downloaded More Than One Billion Times

Google Earth has been downloaded more than one billion times since it was first introduced in 2005, said Brian McClendon, VP of Engineering, Google Earth and Maps, writing in a blog post. “When we founded Keyhole, back in 2001, we never imagined our geospatial technology would be used by people in so many unexpected ways,” he adds. In case you are wondering what Keyhole is, it was the Mountain View-based digital mapping company that Google acquired in 2004. Keyhole’s technology combined a multi-terabyte database of mapping information and images collected from satellites and airplanes, and it went on to form the backbone of Google Earth.

Just how much is one billion? Well, one billion hours ago we were living in the Stone Age…

Just in

Tembo raises $14M

Cincinnati, Ohio-based Tembo, a Postgres managed service provider, has raised $14 million in a Series A funding round.

Raspberry Pi is now a public company — TC

Raspberry Pi priced its IPO on the London Stock Exchange on Tuesday morning at £2.80 per share, valuing it at £542 million, or $690 million at today’s exchange rate, writes Romain Dillet. 

AlphaSense raises $650M

AlphaSense, a market intelligence and search platform, has raised $650 million in funding, co-led by Viking Global Investors and BDT & MSD Partners.

Elon Musk’s xAI raises $6B to take on OpenAI — VentureBeat

Confirming reports from April, the series B investment comes from the participation of multiple known venture capital firms and investors, including Valor Equity Partners, Vy Capital, Andreessen Horowitz (A16z), Sequoia Capital, Fidelity Management & Research Company, Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal and Kingdom Holding, writes Shubham Sharma. 

Capgemini partners with DARPA to explore quantum computing for carbon capture

Capgemini Government Solutions has launched a new initiative with the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) to investigate quantum computing's potential in carbon capture.