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Satya Nadella, chief executive officer of Microsoft Corp., gestures as he speaks during a panel session on day two of the World Economic Forum (WEF) in Davos, Switzerland, on Wednesday, Jan. 24, 2018. World leaders, influential executives, bankers and policy makers attend the 48th annual meeting of the World Economic Forum in Davos from Jan. 23 – 26.
Jason Alden | Bloomberg | Getty Images

Microsoft has acquired TakeLessons, a start-up with a website where people book paid online and in-person classes on a variety of subjects, a Microsoft spokesperson confirmed Friday. Terms of the deal weren’t disclosed.

The move shows Microsoft remains committed to providing opportunities for people to find educational content, and not just in the business realm. More than 6% of Microsoft’s revenue comes from LinkedIn, and the professional networking platform generates part of its revenue from premium subscriptions that include access to LinkedIn Learning, through which subscribers can complete online courses.

LinkedIn is different from TakeLessons because it offers live training for private classes from instructors and live group classes. While LinkedIn Learning specializes in content on leadership, sales and other business subjects, TakeLessons has courses available on many consumer-oriented subjects, including music, languages and the arts.

“TakeLessons is a unique, trusted online marketplace that connects diverse, qualified and vetted instructors with students of all ages pursuing their goals,” a Microsoft spokesperson told CNBC in an email. ”This acquisition is in response to the growing demand on personalized hybrid opportunities and expands our product offerings to TakeLessons consumers, a leading online learning platform.”

TakeLessons was founded in 2006 and is based in San Diego. Investors include Crosslink Capital, Moore Venture Partners, SoftTech VC and Triangle Peak Partners.

“With the help and grit of the exceptional TakeLessons team, hundreds of millions of people from every corner of the world have visited TakeLessons, and taken many, many million minutes of lessons — learning everything from STEM to Farsi, guitar to horseback riding, parkour, tennis, singing, and yes, even beefing up on Excel macros,” TakeLessons founder and CEO Steven Cox wrote in a LinkedIn post.

The coronavirus pandemic has benefited online learning. Covid “accelerated the market for online learning solutions,” Coursera said earlier this year as it filed to go public. And the number of hours people spent on LinkedIn Learning doubled year over year in the fourth quarter, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella told analysts on a conference call in January.

WATCH: Microsoft CEO: Flexibility key to future of hybrid work

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Waymo to begin testing at San Jose airport this fall

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Waymo to begin testing at San Jose airport this fall

Waymo partners with Uber to bring robotaxi service to Atlanta and Austin.

Uber Technologies Inc.

Alphabet’s Waymo unit will begin test-driving robotaxis at its first California-based airport, the company said Thursday.

The autonomous car unit has been cleared to begin testing driverless rides at the San José Mineta International Airport in San Jose, California, this fall. Waymo said it plans to offer paid rides at the airport later this year.

“With San José at the epicenter of the biggest sporting events of 2026, Waymo is an ideal mode of transportation that will help visitors move around the area smoothly and safely,” San José Mayor Matt Mahan said in a release.

The vehicles will pick up passengers at the Ground Transportation Centers in Terminal A or B and roll out to locations in Waymo’s San Francisco Bay Area service area, according to the release.

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Once fully operational, it will be the second international airport where the company has service.

In 2023, Waymo launched at Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport, which has become the most popular Waymo destination in its Phoenix metropolitan service area, a Waymo spokesperson said Thursday.

Waymo has continued to expand its driverless, ride-hailing service across the U.S. after already launching commercial operations in Austin, Texas, as well as Atlanta, San Francisco, Phoenix and Los Angeles.

In March, Waymo expanded its service to include an additional 27 square miles of coverage around the San Francisco Bay Area, including Mountain View, Palo Alto and San Jose.

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Ex-Salesforce co-CEO Bret Taylor’s Sierra is the latest $10 billion AI startup

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Ex-Salesforce co-CEO Bret Taylor's Sierra is the latest  billion AI startup

Bret Taylor, chairman of the board of directors of OpenAI, attends the annual Allen and Co. Sun Valley Media and Technology Conference at the Sun Valley Resort in Sun Valley, Idaho, on July 8, 2025.

David A. Grogan | CNBC

Bret Taylor’s artificial intelligence startup Sierra has just joined an exclusive club: The company sports a new $10 billion valuation after raising $350 million in fresh capital.

Sierra is one of just a handful of AI startups, including OpenAI, Anthropic, xAI, Safe Superintelligence and Thinking Machines that are valued at or above $10 billion.

Investors are pouring money into this competitive group of companies in the hopes that they’ll eventually hit the public markets.

Taylor is the chairman of OpenAI’s board, and previously served as co-CEO of Salesforce alongside Marc Benioff. Taylor co-founded Sierra in 2023. The company builds and implements AI agents for customer service. AI agents can carry out tasks autonomously on behalf of their users.

Shares of Salesforce fell 5% Thursday after the company reported weak guidance and concerns lingered about how AI is affecting software companies.

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Sierra said its agents are already being used by “hundreds of millions of people” to help with tasks like refinancing homes, ordering lunch, delivering furniture, understanding insurance deductibles and fixing technology, among other things.

Greenoaks led Sierra’s latest funding round, the company said. Its valuation more than doubled from its most recent raise in October.

“We’re in this for the long term,” Sierra said in a blog post on Thursday.

The company said it will use its fresh funding to invest in its platform and focus on domestic and international expansion.

Sierra’s funding follows a flurry of other major AI raises in Silicon Valley. Earlier this week, Anthropic announced it had closed a $13 billion funding round at a $183 billion post-money valuation.

WATCH: Sierra co-founder Bret Taylor on AI agents’ role in an evolving global landscape

Sierra co-founder Bret Taylor on AI agents' role in an evolving global landscape

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Broadcom earnings primer: AI chip demand and growth are key

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Broadcom earnings primer: AI chip demand and growth are key

Broadcom CEO Hock Tan.

Lucas Jackson | Reuters

Broadcom is scheduled to report earnings for its fiscal third quarter after the close of regular trading on Thursday.

Here’s what analysts are expecting, according to a consensus from LSEG.

  • Earnings per share: $1.65
  • Revenue: $15.83 billion

Broadcom, which develops custom chips for Google and other huge cloud companies and also makes networking gear needed to tie thousands of artificial intelligence chips together, is expected to report revenue growth of 21% from $13.07 billion a year ago.

Analysts project revenue growth will hold steady the rest of this year and accelerate a bit in 2026.

Broadcom has been one of the chief beneficiaries of the AI boom thanks largely to its accelerator chips, which the company calls XPUs. The processors are generally simpler and less expensive to operate than Nvidia’s graphics processing units, or GPUs, and they’re designed to run specific AI programs efficiently.

Analysts at Cantor Fitzgerald wrote in a report last week that they expect to see increased signs of demand from Google and Meta.

“Additionally, all eyes will turn towards any visibility of current AI Custom Silicon engagements converting into customers with high-volume ramps in sight,” wrote the analysts, who recommend buying the stock.

The analysts estimate that custom silicon could generate $25 billion to $30 billion in revenue for Broadcom next year and more than $40 billion by around 2027. The company generated total revenue of $51.6 billion in the latest fiscal year.

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Shares of Broadcom are up 30% this year and have almost doubled in the past 12 months, lifting the company’s market cap to $1.4 trillion.

In the fiscal second quarter, AI revenue jumped 46% from a year earlier to more than $4.4 billion, with 40% from networking. CEO Hock Tan said that number should reach $5.1 billion in the third quarter, “as our hyperscale partners continue to invest.”

Some of Broadcom’s expansion has been fueled by acquisitions, most notably the purchase of server virtualization software vendor VMware for $61 billion in 2023. VMware is key to Broadcom’s infrastructure software business, which accounted for 44% of sales in the most recent quarter.

WATCH: Nvidia has best percentage of revenue from AI

Nvidia will be the ‘best beneficiary’ of AI spending, says Morgan Stanley’s Joseph Moore

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