A version of this article first appeared in CNBC’s Inside Wealth newsletter with Robert Frank, a weekly guide to the high-net-worth investor and consumer. Sign up to receive future editions, straight to your inbox.

Even as tax changes may reduce giving by the wealthy, a leading investment firm is pioneering a new model of philanthropy that could spur big donors to act now.

Iconiq Capital, which started in Silicon Valley with clients like Mark Zuckerberg and Jack Dorsey, has created collaborative philanthropy funds to jump-start giving. These so-called co-labs pool clients’ capital to make multiyear grants to a group of nonprofits focused on causes like climate equity and economic mobility. 

The most recent co-lab targets youth mental health and has raised $112 million from 10 families, with a goal of $200 million by the end of the year. Iconiq Impact, the firm’s charitable giving arm, has advised on nearly $900 million in grants over six years, mostly through the co-labs.

Iconiq Impact head Matti Navellou joined the San Francisco-based firm from UNICEF six years ago. She built the co-lab program after hearing that clients wanted to learn about philanthropy from their peers.

“It is a really lonely journey, and it’s hard to find peers at the same wealth level who are struggling with the same type of challenges,” she said. “How do you navigate the amount of people constantly pitching you? And how do you know where to focus?”

The nonprofit sector’s woes are compounded by President Donald Trump’s tax bill, which reduces tax incentives for wealthy donors and makes steep cuts to social safety net programs. Nonprofit groups, including the 30,000-member strong National Council of Nonprofits, said charities will have fewer dollars at their disposal while their services are more needed.

Navellou said charitable giving is more crucial than ever due to slashed federal funding. 

“There are so many areas where, truly, philanthropy can move the needle right now, and so this structure that has been set up is problematic because it doesn’t actually incentivize accountability for spending that money for what it is designed for, which is funding nonprofits,” said Navellou. “We aim to influence the faster movement of dollars out the door.”

Time is of the essence, but most Iconiq clients are busy founders who have little time to focus on philanthropy and have yet to build foundations, Navellou said. Foundations aren’t necessarily built for speed either, she said, as they are only required to donate 5% a year. Donor-advised funds are a popular low-effort option, but they aren’t obligated to disburse funds to charity.

The co-labs allow clients to direct funds to charities quicker and with less effort. Iconiq develops a “portfolio” of charities in concert with clients after a series of in-person and Zoom gatherings with fellow funders and outside experts on causes of interest. After weeks of conversations, Iconiq develops the “portfolio” with the funders’ blessing and takes care of the rest.

“What this does is it enables them to just move money much faster when they are in that time period of their life running companies,” Navellou said. 

Getting donors to trust not only Iconiq but also the charities, rather than micromanaging how the funds are allocated, is key to the process, she said. The multiyear, unrestricted grants allow charity leaders to focus on the work rather than the fundraising, she added. 

Bill Smith, founder and CEO of grantee Inseparable, said flexible funding allows nonprofits to adapt to a volatile policy climate. Inseparable is one of 25 nonprofits in the youth mental health co-lab, receiving about $1.3 million a year for five years starting this past December.

“One of the hardest things when you’re running an organization, especially an advocacy organization, where we have changing circumstances with different administrations and what’s going on in states all over the country — the flexibility of having unrestricted money lets us go where we need to go and do what we need to do without constraints from a funder,” he said.

Looking forward, Navellou said she wants to scale Iconiq Impact’s giving, which is made easier with collaborative contributions. Donors who aren’t Iconiq clients are welcome to participate in the co-labs, but funders are generally required to donate a single-digit million sum annually over three to five years, she said. 

After Iconiq’s charity portfolios are designed, they are “open source,” she said, meaning other donors can follow on with commitments of as little as $250,000 a year. It’s convenient for younger entrepreneurs who want to dip their toes in philanthropy, she said.

The great wealth transfer may be promising for philanthropy, Navellou said. She has noticed that the young adult children of Iconiq clients are quicker to act and care more about measurable impact rather than specific causes.

“There’s certainly a young cohort that do think about philanthropy differently, and I would say, are much more impatient around changing things and leveraging that capital in different ways, including through impact investing,” she said. “And I’d say they’re also issue agnostic, which is really interesting. They often will ask questions around data and letting the data inform and guide what they do, rather than coming to the table and saying, ‘I really want to move the needle on this issue.'”

Women are expected to receive about 70% of the $124 trillion that will pass down over the next 25 years, according to Cerulli Associates. This also bodes well for charitable giving, Navellou said. 

“What we’ve seen anecdotally, although there is data backing this as well, is that women tend to be more generous,” she said. “One area that’s really exciting is just a lot more female led philanthropy. We’re seeing that, and we’re really excited to build on that momentum that we’re seeing.”

OpenAI is putting a spotlight on an under-the-radar artificial intelligence startup that it believes is on the “front line” of China’s race to lead the world in AI — and its not DeepSeek. 

In a blog post on Wednesday, the company wrote that Beijing-backed Zhipu AI has made “notable progress” in the AI race, as global competition ramps up.

Zhipu AI, founded in 2019, has been referred by domestic media as one of China’s “AI tigers” — a class of large language model unicorns seen as key to Beijing’s efforts to rival the U.S. and reduce its dependence on American technology. 

While fellow “AI tiger” DeepSeek has received the lion’s share of international attention after it released its R1 model in January, OpenAI suggests that Zhipu’s expansion outside China and its ties to Beijing deserve more scrutiny. 

The startup has raised funds from several local governments, according to state media. “Zhipu AI leadership frequently engages with CCP officials, including Premier Li Qiang,” OpenAI claimed, pegging the value of state-backed investments in the startup at over $1.4 billion.

Zhipu AI reportedly has offices in the Middle East, the United Kingdom, Singapore and Malaysia, and is also running joint “innovation centers” projects across Southeast Asia, including in Indonesia and Vietnam.

Those factors could see Zhipu AI playing a key role in China’s “Digital Silk Road” strategy, as it offers AI infrastructure solutions to governments around the world.

“The goal is to lock Chinese systems and standards into emerging markets before US or European rivals can, while showcasing a ‘responsible, transparent and audit-ready’ Chinese AI alternative,” OpenAI said. 

Zhipu AI did not immediately respond to a request for comment on OpenAI’s statements. However, last week, Zhipu AI Chairman Liu Debing told reporters that the company hoped to contribute China’s AI power to the world.

These aims represent a threat to OpenAI, which has received Washington’s support to promote its foundational models as the world’s go-to AI offering.

During a visit to the UAE in May, U.S. President Donald Trump announced over $200 billion in commercial deals in the region, including one for building a Stargate UAE AI campus by OpenAI, Oracle, Nvidia and Cisco Systems. It’s expected to be launched in 2026. 

The Stargate Project is a $500 billion AI-focused private sector investment vehicle, announced by OpenAI in January in partnership with Abu Dhabi investment firm MGX and Japan’s SoftBank.

This month, OpenAI was also awarded a $200 million contract to provide the U.S. Defense Department with artificial intelligence tools, and announced “OpenAI for Government,” an initiative aimed at bringing its AI tools to public servants across the U.S. 

Zhipu is also said to be working with its domestic military, helping China’s military to modernize through advanced artificial intelligence, which saw it added to the US Commerce Department’s Entity List in January.

The company has reportedly initiated preliminary steps toward launching an initial public offering. It has previously been valued at 20 billion yuan ($2.78 billion), according to local media reports.

LAKE ORION TOWNSHIP, Mich. — In a nondescript supplier park in suburban Detroit, an electric vehicle startup backed by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos is building what it hopes will be America’s newest automaker.

The facility is filled with dozens of prototypes, crash-tested vehicles, a crude lab vehicle skeleton adorned with wires and, most importantly, a busy “beta” assembly line that has been building electric vehicles since December for the startup, Slate Auto.

Slate is using the location — a stone’s throw away from a massive General Motors assembly plant — to produce more than 70 vehicles for internal testing, certification and everything else a company needs to prepare to produce and sell vehicles in the United States.

The beta production line features roughly a dozen labeled stations for things such as the vehicle’s doors, tailgate and front ends that sit in bins or on surface areas made out of wood and steel parts.

Employees move back and forth between the bins, tables and assembly line as songs such as Whitney Houston’s “Saving All My Love for You” and Pat Benatar’s “Love is a Battlefield” echo throughout the lively facility.

The largely hand-built vehicles being made are bare-bones, two-seat, two-door electric pickup trucks that can also be converted to different body styles of SUVs, such as a five-seat fastback or into a squared-off look like a Jeep Wrangler.

The vehicles have injected-molded composite exteriors, crank windows, no infotainment systems and a litany of do-it yourself options. The plan is for every vehicle coming off the line to be the same to reduce complexity, before adding any additional features or different covers/tops.

Auto executives have tossed around the idea for such a modular, stripped-down vehicle amid the rise of connectivity and affordability concerns, but so far the challenges have outweighed the potential opportunities, or companies have struggled to keep prices down.

Slate believes it can succeed where others have failed through simplified manufacturing and lower costs – two areas where other EV startups have failed in recent years.

“This one’s going to be different for a number of reasons,” Eric Keipper, an auto veteran and Slate’s head of engineering, told CNBC after a tour of the company’s manufacturing facility. “We took the back-to-basics, only-the-essentials approach, and, really, we’re building a completely new category of product.”

Slate exited its “stealth mode” in late April by revealing its first vehicles — several two-door electric pickup trucks and converted SUVs — that it expects to begin deliveries of by the end of next year. It’s in the process of building out a full production facility at a former printing plant in Warsaw, Indiana, where it expects to have capacity for up to 150,000 vehicles a year.

It’s a daunting timeframe even for an established automaker, let alone a new startup that’s establishing its supply chains, production processes and workforce, among other things. Hand-building vehicles at a small facility is one thing; mass producing them is another.

“We’ve put together a really solid plan, and we’re working to achieve the plan,” Slate CEO Chris Barman told CNBC. “It doesn’t mean that we follow the plan exactly. We gotta pivot when different information comes, but we understand what we’ve got to do to ultimately get to the goal of having vehicles that meet all of our requirements.”

Slate revealed its unnamed vehicle (the company is telling customers to name it themselves) to notable fanfare, attracting more than 100,000 reservations that required a $50 deposit. For other companies, however, vehicles reservations have fallen significantly short of actual sales.

The company said it is conducting a Series C round of financing after raising $700 million in its first two rounds of financing. TechCrunch first reported the Series A round in 2023 raised $111 million from 16 investors, including Bezos.

Other EV startups have needed significantly more funding and have quickly blown through billions of dollars annually attempting to get a vehicle into production. But Slate believes it can be far less capital intense thanks to the engineering and production of the vehicle.

“We are building the affordable vehicle that has long been promised but never been delivered,” Barman said during the April 24 debut. “But with a twist, it’s a vehicle people are actually going to love and be proud to own.”

The company declined to discuss future targets such as sales and profitability, as well as expected capital requirements, other than that it plans to invest hundreds of millions of dollars in its Indiana plant.

The vehicle — which has a targeted starting price of under $20,000 with an up to $7,500 EV credit — features many “off the shelf” parts from suppliers, lowering costs. Its body also is exclusively injected molded composite instead of steel or aluminum, bringing down cost and weight.

It does not feature any “connectivity” such as a modem or large screens, just a small driver information screen. Instead of a center infotainment system, drivers can use their own devices such as a smartphone or tablet for navigation and music. Speakers also are optional.

The exteriors of the Slate vehicles also won’t be painted. The company says it was engineered to be wrapped with a vinyl film, eliminating the need for a costly paint shop — a massive investment for automakers.

The basis for the company is for consumers to be able to easily change the vehicle themselves or add whatever they’d like to it after purchase through the removal or addition of bolts. The company plans to offer some services such as the vehicle wrapping, but customers aren’t required to do those things through Slate and can purchase add-ons later.

Slate says the truck — about the length of a two-door Ford Bronco — features roughly a fifth less parts compared to a typical vehicle, including only 500 to 700 “end items,” or parts, for final assembly. That compares with a Slate estimate of 2,500-end item parts for other competitors and thousands of more overall pieces.

“Fundamentally, there’s no new technology because technology costs money to develop,” said Jamie Standring, formerly with Karma Automotive and Stellantis/Fiat Chrysler, standing by the beta assembly line.

Standring said the initial idea was to have the vehicle’s frame that everything is built upon be bolted together – almost like an erector set – to remove the need for a full body shop, much like it’s attempting to not use a paint shop. But the drawbacks eventually outweighed the benefits, he said.

The Slate truck is expected to ship with a standard 52.7-kWh battery with an estimated range of around 150 miles, or a 84.3-kWh pack with a target of 240 miles of range. Its battery supplier is SK On, according to the company. Its top speed is only 90 miles per hour.

“I’m really proud of the team for how they really thought out of the box,” Barman said. “We’ll have kits, and we’re doing it in a way that’s lean as well, but we want to offer people many choices.”

On the company’s website, there are 11 categories for customers to customize with a combined 160 options, excluding customizable exterior colors for wraps. That’s a lot of options – ranging from dozens of decals to lighting, audio and tires and wheels – for a customer to pick and a company to store and offer.

Slate executives say the point of the customization is for customers to be able to make the vehicle their own and easily upgrade or change it when they’d like, but auto analysts see it as one of many potential problem areas.

In addition to traditional startup challenges such as capital, profitability and scaling up, other hurdles include: A limited market for two-door vehicles, slower-than-expected adoption of EVs and regulatory uncertainty regarding federal tax credits that Slate is relying on for the vehicle’s affordability, among other things.

“They have an interesting idea,” said Stephanie Brinley, associate director in AutoIntelligence at S&P Global Mobility. “The question is, how many people really want to do that much themselves, and how big is the adjustable market?”

The sale of two-door regular cab pickup trucks like Slate’s debut vehicle only accounted for less than 90,400 registrations in 2024. That compares to more than 2.5 million registered four-door crew cab trucks.

Brinley, who attended Slate’s reveal event in California, said if the company wants to be sustainable, it would need to expand its product lineup to four-door models, which the platform seems to be able to support, as well as additional vehicles in the future.

“Just like every other startup before it, their sustainability is not going to be determined by the first product in the first six months,” Brinley said. “The first product just gets you in the door.”

A handful of auto startups such as Lordstown Motors, Electric Last Mile Solutions, Fisker, Canoo and Nikola all made it into various forms of production but went bankrupt. Even better capitalized EV startups such as Rivian Automotive and Lucid Group have continually had to raise capital to stay afloat.

Industry insiders also have raised concerns about the affordability of Slate’s vehicle once customers add options or a new SUV top, which can be installed and uninstalled using bolts.

“I think it’s super interesting. The idea behind it, we’ve talked about that idea a million times,” Tim Kuniskis, CEO of Stellantis’ Ram Truck brand, said recently when asked about Slate. “Now, what’s it going to actually transact at in the marketplace … when people start to option them up, it’s not going to be $20,000. It’s going to be $35,000, and by the time you get to $35,000, you’re in midsize truck territory. “

Slate has not announced pricing for customizations or exact pricing of the vehicle without a federal tax credit that’s in jeopardy under President Donald Trump.

“Slate is an example of why and how hard it is to produce a cheap EV” said Karl Brauer, a veteran auto analyst with iSeeCars.com. “They are producing an electric vehicle with only two seats, 140-mile range, manual windows, no touch screen, and it’s still $27,500 … To me, it’s not a competitive vehicle at that point.”

Brauer said there are other EVs close to that price, as well as smaller pickups such as the Ford Maverick hybrid with a lot more features that could be a better buy for consumers.

Both Brauer and Brinley gave Slate credit for trying something new and attempting to address affordability concerns, but the auto industry isn’t an easy busy to break into, even when starting from a blank slate.

“It’s modular. It’s cool. It’s a really clever idea,” Brinley said. “The question for me comes down to how many people want to do that? And we’ll find out, but I don’t know that it’s as high as they think it is.”

Berry unicorn startup Fruitist has surpassed $400 million in annual sales, thanks to the success of its long-lasting jumbo blueberries.

The company, which was founded in 2012, announced on Tuesday that it is changing its name from Agrovision to Fruitist. It previously only used the name for branding its consumer products, which also include raspberries, blackberries and blueberries.

As sales of its berries grow, Fruitist has raised more than $1 billion from outside investors, according to Pitchbook data. Notable backers include the family office of Bridgewater Associates founder Ray Dalio.

Fruitist is reportedly considering going public as soon as this year, even as global trade conflicts hit stocks and raise fears about a global economic slowdown.

The company has tried to set itself apart in a crowded space in part by positioning its berries as “snackable.” The snacking category has been one of the fastest growing in the food industry in recent years.

While many consumers still enjoy potato chips and pretzels, many big food companies have expanded their portfolios in recent years to include healthier options. The adoption of GLP-1 drugs and the “Make America Healthy Again” agenda pushed by Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. have made healthier snacking options even more attractive to both consumers and investors.

Today, Fruitist’s berries can be found in more than 12,500 North American retailers, including Costco, Walmart and Whole Foods. Sales of its jumbo blueberries alone have tripled in the last 12 months, fueling the company’s growth.