Bluecore, the automated marketing platform for ecommerce brands, has today announced the close of a $35 million Series C round of funding. Norwest Venture Partners led the round, with participation from existing investors including Georgian Partners, FirstMark Capital, and Felicis Ventures. As part of the deal, NVP’s Scott Beechuk will join the board of directors at Bluecore. When… Read More
Voyage, the self-driving technology company that spun out of Udacity earlier this year when some executives and students decided to commercialize their work, has been testing its autonomous vehicles in a retirement community in San Jose, and is looking to expand its trial.
The testing at Villages Golf and Country Club in California has involved using a modified Ford Fusion equipped with… Read More
LinkedIn, the Microsoft-owned social network for the working world with some 500 million members, has made a large business out of recruitment — with some 11 million job listings on the site at any given time, and the recruitment market providing the company with its largest source of revenue. Now it is taking another step ahead in building out that business with a new product:… Read More
East Palo Alto was the number one murder capital in the nation, despite being in the heart of Silicon Valley. This is where, Rocio Lopez, a DREAMer and a Product Designer at Sumo Logic, grew up before she broke into tech. Rocio’s future is now in jeopardy as President Trump recently announced that as of October 5, 2017 DACA renewals will no longer be accepted. Read More
Following in the footsteps of Facebook and iMessage, Tinder has today introduced Reactions, letting Tinder users send each other custom animated responses. These reactions include Hearts, Eye Roll, Round of Applause, Martini Throw, etc. This makes it even easier for Tinder users to casually use the app without actually having to work at the conversation. In January of last year, Tinder… Read More
Google Assistant is adding a little dimensionality to its voice characterization: The virtual AI companion got an update that adds a voice option called “Voice II” which sounds decidedly male (via Engadget). The second voice option is available in Assistant’s settings (not yet live for all, so your mileage may vary) and applies to the Home app as well as to your… Read More
Dyson is building an electric car, the company revealed last week, and now we know a bit more about their specific plan to bring one to market. Dyson won’t look to partner, and will instead build the vehicle hardware from the ground up itself, according to a new Wired interview with Dyson CEO Max Conze. By relying on its own battery and motor tech, Dyson hopes to be able to beat the range… Read More
As the Echo and Alexa from Amazon continue to set the pace for what to expect from voice-based interfaces and home hubs, Amazon is expanding them to Asia for the first time today. Today, the e-commerce giant announced that Echo and Alexa are now on sale in India, and later this year, they will also launch in Japan. The devices are launching “by invitation” today. Users request these… Read More
DeepMind, the U.K. AI company which was acquired in 2014 for $500M+ by Google, has launched a new ethics unit which it says will conduct research across six “key themes” — including ‘privacy, transparency and fairness’ and ‘economic impact: inclusion and equality’. Read More
The Salesforce product line has always been distinctly horizontal, meaning it’s a general set of tools that can be used across any industry. The company has left it to customers, partners and developers to build industry-specific tools on top of the platform. This began to shift ever so slightly last year when Salesforce took a turn toward the vertical with a set of tools devoted… Read More
Whether you’re a founder on a fundraising mission or an investor searching for the perfect addition to your portfolio, you want to make the most of your limited time at Disrupt Berlin. But with thousands of attendees, how do you cut through the noise to make the right connections with the right people? It’s CrunchMatch to the rescue. Read More
Roofstock is a two-year-old, Oakland, Ca.-based marketplace for buyers and sellers of single-family homes that have tenants residing in them. The idea behind it is appealing a couple of levels, including because both institutional and retail investors can buy and sell homes without forcing renters to leave the property during a transaction — a big problem for many families in the Bay… Read More
The European Commission under Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager definitely means business. Today it issued not one but two notices related to ongoing investigations of tech giants Apple and Amazon and how they are not paying what is due in taxes. The result is a doozy. The EC says that Ireland has failed to collect up to €13 billion in taxes from iPhone maker Apple —… Read More
Late last month, Spanish media got wind that the Barcelona-based on-demand delivery app Glovo had closed Series B funding, but now the company is making the news official. Read More
Considering all of the fanfare that Snap gave to its heavily hyped Spectacles launch, the product is selling at a slower rate than many would probably guess.
Onstage today at the Vanity Fair Establishment Summit, Snap CEO Evan Spiegel disclosed that the company had sold “over 150,000 units” of Spectacles sunglasses. Spiegel interestingly compared Spectacles sales to those of the… Read More
Today’s Stories
Missouri forms public-private partnership to advance Hyperloop One route
Tesla electric semi truck possibly spied in new photo
Judge delays Waymo/Uber trial until December 4th
Credits
Written and Hosted by: John Mannes
Filmed by: Joe Zolnoski
Edited by: Joe Zolnoski
Notes:
Believe it or not they actually gave Tito jury duty. Read More
TechCrunch is headed to Australia to dig deep and find the disruptive early-stage startups of tomorrow. This is literally our first ever Startup Battlefield Australia (tickets here) and the country’s burgeoning tech scene means that high-growth startups are proliferating across the country, from the Snowy Mountains to the Great Plains and beyond.. We’re excited to welcome some… Read More
Mozilla has announced the latest recipients of its Open Source Support grants, totaling $539,000. The web tech company regularly helps out smaller projects, and this round in particular favored ones aimed at safety and security. Read More
One of the Senate’s main cybersecurity proponents wants assurances that voting systems in the U.S. are ready for their next major threat — and he’s going straight to the hardware makers to get it. Oregon Senator Ron Wyden called on six of the main voting machine manufacturers in the U.S. to provide details about their cybersecurity efforts. Read More
Uber’s board of directors unanimously voted today to move forward with a proposed investment by SoftBank and Dragoneer Investment Group. The deal isn’t finalized just yet, so it’s not clear how much money the firms will invest in Uber. As TechCrunch previously reported, the amount could be between $8 billion and $10 billion. “Today, after welcoming its new directors… Read More
