Joyce Shen’s picks: musings and readings in AI/ML, July 20, 2026

📌 Musings and Readings

“Artificial Intelligence in Cardiology: Applications in Diagnosis and Risk Prediction” (Link)

“Verbalizable Representations Form a Global Workspace in Language Models” (Anthropic paper)

“Meta pulls new AI image feature after days of backlash” (Link)

“Amazon to launch Omaha drone delivery” (Link)

“Someone Used A.I. to Write an Unauthorized Biography of Me. I Don't Recommend Reading It.” (Link)

“Brex open sources CrabTrap to secure enterprise AI agents” (Link)

👏 Deals

Finto, a Munich, Germany-based company developing an AI-powered accounting automation solution, has raised $3.4m in seed funding.

Gradium, a Paris, France-based startup building a voice AI solution, has raised $30m in financing.

Auxilius, a Munich, Germany-based company providing a governance, risk, and compliance solution, has raised €1.3m in pre-seed funding.

Prolo, a London, UK-based company offering an AI-powered construction procurement solution, has raised £4.2m in seed funding.

Proaction, a Des Moines, IA-based company building an AI-native system for commercial fleet operations, has raised $4.2m in funding.

Thira, a Bellevue, WA-based company developing an enterprise automation solution that streamlines complex business workflow, has raised $21m in seed funding.

Rime, a CA-based voice AI company building speech models for AI agents, has raised $24m in series A funding.

InsideDesk, a Toronto, Canada-based company providing a dental practice revenue cycle management platform, has raised $12.6m in funding.

Oak, a Tel Aviv, Israel-based cybersecurity company developing an AI-native identity security solution, has raised $60m in seed funding.

DeweyLearn, a NYC-based company offering AI-driven learning intelligence, has raised $5m in series A funding.

Pulse Security, a CA-based company developing a cybersecurity program management solution, has raised $8m in seed funding.

Beacon Security, a NYC-based AI cybersecurity company providing an intelligent security platform, has raised $13m in seed funding.

Applied Computing, a London-based AI company developing foundation models for the energy and industrial sectors, has raised $20m in funding.

LimX Dynamics, a Shenzhen, China-based robotics company developing embodied AI and general-purpose robots, has raised $200m in funding.