Winnow, the U.K. startup that has developed smart kitchen tech to help commercial kitchens reduce food waste, continues to be on a roll. It counts the likes of IKEA, Compass Group, and AccorHotels as customers, and estimates its 600-plus clients are saving 4,300 tonnes of food waste annually through the use of the Winnow system. Read More
Essential has an offer that’s honestly very hard to refuse: The price of the Essential Phone (PH-1, going by technical model number), is now $200 cheaper, so $499 off-contract and unlocked. That’s an amazing price for their debut smartphone, which remains my favorite in terms of straight up industrial design (and it has one of the best color-tuned displays in devices right now in… Read More
Ever since Amazon’s acquisition of Whole Foods became official in August, food tech entrepreneurs have been holding their collective breath in anticipation of what comes next. First prices dropped; now, apparently, they’re on the rise.
Without knowing Bezos’ ultimate vision for an Amazon-owned Whole Foods, food tech companies must decide whether and how to compete. I offer… Read More
Oliver Cabell, a Minneapolis-based startup selling bags and other accessories, has raised $1.2 million to slip into the shoe business. The company’s high end canvas and leather bags caused a bit of a stir around TechCrunch’s offices a few years ago (we were too busy using the bags to review them) — and now the company’s ready to try on footwear to see how the new… Read More
A towering wall of computer screens blinks alive with crisis. A digital map of Los Angeles alerts to 911 calls. Television screens track breaking news stories. Surveillance cameras monitor the streets. Rows of networked computers link analysts and police officers to a wealth of law enforcement intelligence. Real-time crime data comes in. Real-time police deployments go out. This high-tech… Read More
This weekend, Apple took the wraps off of its first “Town Square” retail store in Chicago.
The location marks Apple’s 497th retail store. The new space replaces the company’s flagship North Michigan Ave store which opened in 2003. TechCrunch took a tour with Apple’s senior VP of retail, Angela Ahrendts, and saw the ins and outs of the company’s latest… Read More
Tesla has reportedly made a deal with the government in Shanghai to open up a manufacturing facility in the city’s trade-free zone, the Wall Street Journal reports. Foreign car-makers traditionally partner with local manufacturers, but that will reportedly not be the case with Tesla. Instead, Tesla will own the entire factory. That means Tesla will be able to cut some costs of production… Read More
Ian Rountree, the twenty something captain at the helm of Cantos Ventures, an SF-based micro-fund, is characteristic of a new breed of venture capitalists in tech — a group of small funds looking to go toe-to-toe with some of the valley’s most entrenched seed funds like First Round Capital and SV Angel. Rountree is experimenting with a strategy so antithetical to the venture… Read More
Google is reportedly gearing up to share revenue with news publishers, the Financial Times reports. The plan is to combine Google’s treasure trove of personal data with machine learning algorithms to help news publications grow and maintain its subscriber base. For each new subscriber Google brings to the table, the company will reportedly take up to a 30 percent finder’s… Read More
In spite of Silicon Valley’s awesome technology, human capital remains its most valuable resource. That, at least, is the opinion of best selling writer and entrepreneur Dan Schawbel. Read More
There’s a weird feeling afoot these days, in the Valley, and in San Francisco. Across the rest of the world — Denver, Santiago, Toronto, Berlin, “Silicon Glen,” “Silicon Alley,” “Silicon Roundabout“, Station F — it seems every city still wants to be a startup hub, dreaming of becoming “the new Silicon Valley.” But in the… Read More
My five-year-old MacBook Pro finally gave up the ghost. After traveling the world and surviving several CESes, it was time to finally lay the thing to rest. I had some misgivings about replacing the old workhorse with one of the new models, not the least of which was the company’s fairly unpopular decision to ditch all existing ports for a quartet of ThunderBolt 3 ports. Read More
Translation earbuds might eliminate some utilitarian reasons to know a language, but if you want to understand jokes, read poetry, or fall in love in a foreign tongue, you’ll have to actually learn it. Unfortunately, products like Rosetta Stone leave people feeling burned after claiming the process should be easy while never helping you practice talking with a real native speaker. You… Read More
As Facebook finds itself publicly on the hook for enabling Russian agents to spread divisive propaganda via its platform, be it in the form of fake news, ‘dark ads’, issue pushing Facebook pages, and even political rallies organized using its Event tools, there’s another side to the story of how tech tools are impacting the democratic process currently playing out in… Read More
If you have not yet had the pleasure of being introduced to Nathan for You, you’re in for a treat! The man behind the show, Nathan Fielder, is so wonderfully awkward in his delivery he might just make you pee your pants from laughing so hard.
Last week’s episode “Andy vs. Uber” almost made me do just that.
Warning: lots of spoilers in this post so stop reading if you… Read More
Over the last two years we have been working hard to improve the experience of TechCrunch products for our readers. Our tiny-but-mighty product team launched the brand new TechCrunch mobile app earlier this month and we couldn’t be more excited. It has been completely redesigned with the goal of giving you easy access to the news you care about most, no matter where you are. Read More
French VC firm CapHorn Invest recently closed a new $150 million fund (€130 million). Around 250 CEOs and executives of big established companies invested in the fund as limited partners. This is CapHorn Invest’s second fund. The firm plans to focus on Series A rounds, from $600,000 to $6 million (€500,000 to €5 million). What’s interesting about this VC firm is that it… Read More
Sea, the gaming and e-commerce company holding the first major U.S. IPO from a Southeast Asian tech firm, had a bumpy start to life on the NYSE after closing the day up around eight percent on its list price of $15. The company raised $884 million from its listing, but it could surpass $1 billion if all allotted shares are purchased by underwriters. The share — listed as… Read More
SoftBank is planning to create $100 billion Vision Fund sequels, Chariot is temporarily paused in San Francisco and Stitch Fix shows us what a good IPO looks like. All this on Crunch Report. Read More
