Chinese tech giant Baidu has started testing autonomous vehicles in London as part of its partnership with Lyft and Freenow, the German taxi and multi-mobility app that Lyft now owns. Baidu is the latest in a string of companies to test self-driving technology in the UK ahead of commercial robotaxi deployments.

The testing, which began Tuesday with human safety operators, comes nearly a year after the two companies struck a strategic partnership to deploy Baidu’s purpose-built Apollo Go RT6 robotaxi across key European markets through the Lyft platform. The vehicles will eventually be available through Freenow, which Lyft acquired in 2025 for about $197 million.

That deal gave Lyft a foothold in Europe’s ride-hailing market, where a handful of well-funded companies are now jockeying to be first to market with robotaxis.

London is particular is shaping up to be a key battleground in the region. In April, Waymo began testing its autonomous vehicles with human safety operators in the city. Uber and its self-driving tech partner, Wayve, also announced plans to launch a robotaxi service in London this year. That initial service — which customers can now sign up for on an interest list — will have human safety operators behind the wheel before fully driverless operations begin later.

Baidu and Freenow by Lyft (as the latter service is now called) said they expect to invite the public to hail their robotaxis in 2027. The companies, which didn’t provide a more detailed timeline, noted that the launch will depend on regulatory approval.

For now, dozens of test vehicles will operate within London’s borough of Brent. Lyft and Freenow said they continue discussions with safety and city officials, including Transport for London (TfL) and the Centre for Connected and Autonomous Vehicles (CCAV). The UK government is in the process of creating autonomous vehicle regulations and opened applications in May for companies interested in an AV pilot program that lets companies test self-driving vehicles under government oversight.

When the service does launch, Freenow by Lyft said it will operate a hybrid network — employing the same language rival Uber has used — meaning human drivers operating taxis and private-hire vehicles will work alongside the robotaxis.

“As a platform with deep roots in the taxi industry, our priority is ensuring that autonomous technology supports the professional drivers who keep London moving,” Thomas Zimmermann, CEO of Freenow by Lyft, said in a statement.

AI note-taking app Granola is launching an app for the Apple Watch in hopes that its users will want to record meetings and take notes without using their smartphones.

Users can set the Granola app as one of the watch faces to start transcribing at any time. The app can also surface reminders about upcoming meetings, and works with the iOS app, which launched last year.

The company’s co-founder, Chris Pedregal, told TechCrunch that the Apple Watch app is meant to be a way to capture in-person meetings without having to take your phone out of your pocket — for example, if someone is having a walking one-on-one meeting.

When Granola tested its app with employees who had Apple Watches, a big chunk of their mobile usage switched from iOS to the Watch, the company said.

In the past year, companies have released auxiliary devices that can be used with smartphones to record and transcribe meetings. Granola said it considered it easier to develop an app for Apple Watches rather than integrate with another hardware product at this point. Dictation app Monlogue earlier this year also added support for meeting note-taking, for both online and offline modalities, along with Apple Watch support.

Granola became a unicorn earlier this year with a $125 million Series C round that was led by Index Ventures.

On Tuesday, the AI company Recursive Superintelligence announced a $410 million compute deal with Amazon Web Services. The company, which emerged from stealth in May with $650 million in funding, is focused on building open-ended self-improving systems, a potentially compute-intensive approach to AI research. This multi-year deal is meant to provide flexibility as the company looks to scale up those systems.

Recursive’s $410 million outlay represents the bulk of the company’s fundraising to date— but on a call with TechCrunch, Socher emphasized that he expected it to be the first of many such deals. Today’s announcement is “likely going to be one of the smallest compute deals we’re going to sign in the next few years,” Socher said.

Recursive’s emphasis on self-improving AI systems means much of the budget that would traditionally go towards headcount and operations is put straight into compute, as the company seeks to automate its own product development process. 

“For us, it’s less about headcount and more about agent count,” Socher said.

There’s no investment component to Amazon’s involvement, in contrast to major labs’ habit of hybrid investment arrangements. But the sheer scale of the commitment allows AWS to commit significant resources to supporting Recursive’s unique needs, which may help to draw in other foundation-level AI companies going forward.

“Part of the agreement is that we’re going to co-develop infrastructure purpose-built for these types of company,” said Jason Bennett, VP for startups and venture capital at AWS.

Recursive self-improvement (RSI) has long been seen as an inflection point for AI, with some expecting an explosion of progress once AI can be improved without human involvement. But as more labs and companies pursue the idea, the specific requirements have become ambiguous, with some predicting an imminent breakthrough while others characterize self-improvement as more of a continuum.

But in Recursive’s case, the goal is to use the powers of RSI to develop actual products — and Socher expects to be releasing the earliest examples before the end of the year.

“We are excited to build like really amazing products that people can use, and you will see those within a few months, not within a few quarters or years,” Socher says. “In October or so, you’ll see some actually tangible, useful things that you’ll be able to play around with.”