In STAT, health tech correspondent Mario Aguilar reported the public launch of Ash, the therapy chatbot from Slingshot AI. After operating quietly since Andreessen Horowitz first backed its mission to build "the world's first foundation model for psychology," Slingshot revealed both the product and a fresh tranche of funding: over $50 million more led by new investors Radical Ventures and Forerunner Ventures, bringing total financing to $93 million. Aguilar noted that Ash had been "hiding in plain sight," with some 50,000 beta users and a feature in a major magazine before opening to everyone. The piece describes Slingshot as founded about 18 months earlier by CEO Daniel Cahn, an AI engineer, and Neil Parikh, best known for the mattress company Casper. Coverage from a respected health and medicine outlet like STAT lends independent credibility to the launch.