In the wooded hills south of Munich, Germany, engineers are drilling 8 km down in a bid to harvest limitless clean energy from Earth’s molten, radioactive core. The project could offer a blueprint for cost-effective geothermal energy extraction, helping Europe power cities, heat homes, and reduce its reliance on fossil fuels.  The drill belongs to Canadian company Eavor, one of a new crop of startups working to make geothermal a serious player in the energy transition. Armed with an arsenal of plasma pulse drills, steel shot cannons, and robot worms, they plan to unlock Earth’s heat almost anywhere on the planet.…

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TNW Backstage returns this week with a journey into the future of sound. Our featured guest is Xander de Buisonjé — Dutch singer, TV presenter, and founder of Breggz, a startup reshaping personal audio. Breggz was born from De Buisonjé’s (pronounced “boo-son-i-yay”) obsession with sound quality. After decades in the music industry, he had grown exasperated that artists would spend years years perfecting their sound — only for listeners to hear it through subpar devices. “I just want the world to hear what I hear,” he says. His mission led him to launch Breggz, which claims to have created the world’s first…

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A quarter of European organisations have banned Elon Musk’s generative AI chatbot Grok, according to new research from cybersecurity firm Netskope.  In contrast, the most popular AI app, ChatGPT, is only blocked by 9.8% of organisations in Europe. The runner-up, Google’s Gemini, is banned by 9.2%. Grok has been under the spotlight recently for a string of blunders. They include spreading false claims about a “white genocide” in South Africa and raising doubts about Holocaust facts.  Such mishaps have raised concerns about Grok’s security and privacy controls. The report said the chatbot is frequently blocked in favour of “more secure…

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TNW is tapping a touch of AI magic to discover the next big things in tech. As part of our mission to elevate the startups shaping our future, we’ve partnered with Bounce Watch to bring its powerful analytics to our repertoire of tools. Bounce Watch is an intelligence platform for company performance — and it’s seriously impressed us. The AI-powered system tracks and analyses business activity in real-time, delivering data on over 1 million startups and tailored industry insights.  It offers instant alerts on funding rounds, leadership changes, and key business signals. Investors, scouts, and corporate innovators use the data to…

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German Bionic has unveiled its latest wearable exoskeleton — and it comes equipped with an AI brain. Dubbed Exia, the robotic suit offers up to 38kg of dynamic assistance to make heavy lifting easier for humans. That means an item weighing 30kg feels more like 5 to the lifter’s lower back. But what really sets Exia apart from its predecessors is its capacity to adapt and learn. German Bionic claims Exia is the world’s first exoskeleton powered by augmented AI, a type of artificial intelligence designed to enhance human intelligence. Over time, each suit is designed to get better and…

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