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Cancer AI Alliance joins medical and tech expertise together with $40M to collaborate on next-gen care

A group of major medical institutions specializing in cancer care have formed a partnership to better take advantage of AI’s potential to advance the space. With $40 million of cash and resources from big tech backers, the Cancer AI Alliance (CAIA) could be a huge step forward in precision medicine.

The members of the alliance are Fred Hutchinson, which will coordinate the new effort, Johns Hopkins, Dana Farber, and Sloan Kettering — to be precise, the cancer research arms of these organizations.

Fred Hutch President and Director Tom Lynch announced the intitiative on stage at the Intelligent Applications Summit in Seattle, where the institute is based; VC firm Madrona, which put on the event, has been closely involved in the process as advisors to the Hutch. “We believe this has the potential to be transformative. This represents an unprecedented ability… to agree that working together will enable progress,” Lynch said.

He gave the example of a patient with a rare pediatric cancer going at one center, but the scientific knowledge to better treat it is siloed at another center, wrapped in proprietary methods and handling protocols. Perhaps in ten years that knowledge will filter out through the scientific literature, but as he pointed out, the kid with a non-responsive leukemia doesn’t have that long.

AI isn’t some miracle worker, of course, and the tug on the heartstrings isn’t meant to imply that this problem would quickly and easily be solved by some hypothetical treatment-finding model. But if a treatment or study that could help move things forward is not visible between these organizations, it slows down the whole field.

The problem is that sharing data between medical organizations is not simple, due to regulations, safety considerations, and mismatches between formats and databases. Even if the study to help that kid with leukemia at Sloan Kettering is present at Johns Hopkins, there’s no guarantee it will be present in a way that can be shared in a legal and technically feasible way.

The new organization aims to solve this by means of federated learning, a type of secure data collaboration where the raw data stays private, but can be used for the purposes of training AI and other computational systems.

If the research organizations can contribute to a shared goal, like training a drug discovery or diagnostic model for a cancer they all know exists, while complying with HIPAA and other data controls, they will happily do so. Creating a collaborative system under this model is the goal of CAIA, but it’s still a ways out, according to Jeff Leek, VP and Chief Data Officer of Fred Hutch.

It’s certainly possible, he explained, but it’s a difficult problem on the tech side that can only be approached once you have the principal participants in place. Lining up these cancer research centers, and binding them with the money and expertise from Microsoft, AWS, Nvidia, and Deloitte was the necessary first step, and not a trivial one. Now the actual shared infrastructure, standards, and specific goals (such as pursuing a model for a specific cancer or treatment) can begin to take shape.

The $40 million is a mix of operating cash, services, and intangibles from the four companies mentioned, and will be deployed on an unspecified timeline except that CAIA expects to be functional by the end of this year. The initiative should be “producing its first insights” by the end of 2025.

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Cosmetics giant Rituals confirms data breach of customer membership records

Netherlands-based cosmetics giant Rituals has confirmed a data breach affecting customers’ personal information after hackers stole reams of data from its membership database.

The company disclosed the breach on Wednesday, according to an email sent to customers that TechCrunch has viewed and verified. 

Rituals said it identified an “unauthorized download” of members’ data in April that contained customers’ full name, date of birth, gender, postal and email address, and phone number, as well as their preferred Rituals store and account type.

When reached by TechCrunch, Rituals spokesperson Eline van Malssen said the hacker stole membership data about customers in Europe and the United Kingdom.

TechCrunch has learned that some customers notified by Rituals are based in the United States. The spokesperson confirmed the incident also affects some U.S. customers.

Rituals did not describe the nature of the cyberattack and the company said its investigation was underway to understand how the data breach happened. 

The cosmetics giant is the latest retailer to have customer membership data stolen in the past year, following a string of intrusions at U.K. grocery and shopping chain Co-op and Marks & Spencer, among others. Customer records can be attractive targets for hackers who steal the data and extort the company for a ransom in exchange for not publishing the information online.

When reached with questions about the incident, a Rituals spokesperson declined to comment on whether the company received any communication from the hackers, to share a more precise timeline of the breach, or to provide the exact number of affected members, citing unspecified “security reasons.”

According to its website, Rituals has over 41 million customers in its membership database. The retail giant made €2.4 billion euros ($2.8 billion) in revenue in 2025.

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Rivian R2 production has started despite tornado damage to factory

Rivian has rolled the first customer-ready R2 SUVs off the production line at its factory in Normal, Illinois, just days after it was hit by an EF-1 tornado that tore off part of the roof.

Despite the damage, founder and CEO RJ Scaringe told Bloomberg Television on Wednesday morning that Rivian doesn’t expect any delays to the R2’s rollout, which is crucial to the company’s survival.

“The tornado went through the south end of the plant, and ripped the roof off the building, and knocked down some of the plant as well, and so the last 72 hours have been around the clock,” he said. Scaringe explained that Rivian has had to change how and where it brings some materials into the factory to build the R2.

But “we’re not making any changes to the plan,” he said, referring to the company’s production roadmap.

Scaringe wasn’t asked when Rivian will make the first R2 deliveries during the interview. The company has previously said it will start shipping R2 SUVs before the first half of 2026 comes to an end.

Getting the R2 into production is a major milestone for the company. It’s the first production vehicle Rivian has made that has a chance to reach mass-market customers, as it costs far less than the company’s current R1 EVs. It’s also supposed to help the company finally reach profitability after years of losing money on every vehicle it sold.

The company has big expectations for the R2. Rivian told investors earlier this year that it expects to deliver between 20,000 and 25,000 of the SUVs by the end of 2026. If Rivian achieves that, it would become one of the fastest-scaling new EVs ever launched in the U.S., second only to Tesla’s Model Y.

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That said, Rivian is launching with a version of the R2 that costs nearly $13,000 more than the $45,000 price tag the company spent years promoting. The launch edition R2 starts at $57,990, with a slightly cheaper $53,990 variant coming by the end of this year. Rivian won’t sell an R2 for under $50,000 until the first half of 2027, and a true base model starting at $45,000 won’t hit the market until late 2027.

And that’s if the $45,000 R2 ever arrives at all. When Rivian announced pricing for the SUV in March, the company said the base model price will start “around $45,000” — not “at $45,000” as it had promoted on its website as recently as February.

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AI Overviews are coming to your Gmail at work

During its Google Cloud Next conference on Wednesday, the company announced a slew of Workspace-focused updates, including the addition of its AI Overviews feature to Gmail. The feature, which today uses AI to summarize Google Search results, will now do the same for Gmail users in the workplace.

According to Google, this will allow Gmail users to ask questions in search using natural language and then get concise answers without having to open and read different emails.

The company suggests the feature could be used to ask business-related questions about topics typically shared in emails, like those about performance improvements, project milestones, invoices, comments on decks, trip details, and more with straightforward answers.

The AI Overview will create an instant summary pulled from across multiple emails and conversations.

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While not everyone prefers to have AI as their first step to finding an answer, it is rapidly becoming the norm, both within Google’s products and elsewhere on the web.

In this case, Google says the AI Overviews in Gmail will be the default setting if the company has Gemini for Workspace in Gmail enabled, and if Workspace Intelligence access to Gmail is enabled. (End users must have “Smart features in Gmail, Chat, and Meet” and “Google Workspace smart features” enabled, too.)

The feature was previously available to consumers with Google AI Pro and Ultra subscriptions. Google says it will also now come to business, enterprise, and education customers as well through the following products:

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  • Business: Business Starter, Standard, and Plus
  • Enterprise: Enterprise Starter, Standard, and Plus
  • Consumers: Google AI Pro and Ultra
  • Other Editions: Frontline Plus
  • AI Add-ons: Google AI Pro for Education

Alongside the launch, Google said it’s also making AI Overviews in Drive broadly available to eligible Workspace and Google AI plans. It was previously in beta.

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