The global ridesharing company, which has come under added scrutiny for allegations of sexism and various other lawsuits in recent months, may be finding itself in more hot water. According to The Wall Street Journal, the Department of Justice is evaluating whether managers breached the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, which relates to bribing foreign officials. Read More
For the third year, MetaProp NYC is bringing together a group of startups focused on real estate tech. This time, the companies are tackling issues like green buildings, apartment entry and parking. Most of them are based in New York, but some come from as far away as Singapore.
“Our incoming accelerator cohort is indicative of the increasingly fast global growth and demand for… Read More
OpenStack, the massive open-source project that aims to bring the power and ease of use of public clouds like AWS and Azure to private data centers, today launched Pike, the sixteenth major version of its software. Read More
A handful of tech companies have just been given Emmy awards for a variety of behind-the-scenes accomplishments. Yeah, I didn’t know it was a thing either! Well, I kind of knew. They just don’t play it up a lot. But it’s still a little weird to see Apple win one for Siri, Microsoft win one for Skype and… Comcast win one for its X1 remote. Really?! Read More
I haven’t played another FPS besides Overwatch in months, which makes me qualified to state that Overwatch is the best FPS on the market. That said, until today, it was lacking a deathmatch mode. And players wanted deathmatch. Though after playing a few rounds, it’s clear why adding this mode was not a priority.
Before this update, the only way to play the game was through… Read More
There are a variety of reasons that people are excited about the possibilities but it’s safe to say that the number one positive that’s shared by everyone is the sheer scale of possible customers that will be able to experience augmented reality on day one of iOS 11. Hundreds of millions of potential users before the year is out is a potent pitch. I’ve seen some very cool… Read More
The contract still needs some finishing touches, but Expedia CEO Dara Khosrowshahi has indicated to The Wall Street Journal today he plans to accept the Uber CEO position. Read More
Two years ago, Ember launched a crowdfunding campaign on Indiegogo to build a mug that keeps hot drinks hot and iced drinks cool. Contributors gave the company nearly $362,000. Fast-forward and the five-year-old startup has now raised just north of $24 million altogether, including a $13 million Series C round that it quietly closed last week. Read More
One of the many considerations we will have should we decide at last to colonize another planet is where we’ll live. Should we bring inflatable habitats? Should we ship girders and metal sheets? Or should we 3D-print the structures right there on the planet in question? Two universities’ early efforts to do so earned them a combined $400,000 at a NASA competition held last week. Read More
Remember Whisper, the anonymous chat app? It’s been a while since we’ve heard much from the company, but it’s still around and has recently lost a bunch of high-profile board members. Read More
The news broke Sunday that Dara Khosrowshahi, CEO of Expedia, has been offered the top job at Uber. But it was unclear whether Khosrowshahi had accepted. Expedia Chairman Barry Diller said yesterday that he expected Khosrowshahi to take the job, but that it wasn’t finalized just yet. And now Yahoo Finance is reporting that Uber HR has told employees the offer is official. Read More
Last November I covered how Europe’s VR meetup community has more than doubled in its member base of freelancers, startups and companies. The region continues to grow. Read More
Apple has set its annual iPhone event for September 12, as reported by The Wall Street Journal and rumored previously. Multiple sources have also told TechCrunch that this is the current date Apple is aiming for. But, as always, it doesn’t announce early in case it needs to shift the date based on whether it feels it’s ready. The additional factor, as indicated in the Journal,… Read More
Tech giants Google, Microsoft, and Facebook are all applying the lessons of machine learning to translation, but a small company called DeepL has outdone them all and raised the bar for the field. Its translation tool is just as quick as the outsized competition, but more accurate and nuanced than any we’ve tried. Read More
As Tropical Storm Harvey continues to inundate the Texas Gulf Coast, Facebook users have one more reason to donate to relief efforts. Facebook announced Tuesday that it would match the Harvey disaster relief funds raised by its users up to $1 million. To contribute match-eligible funds to Harvey recovery efforts on the platform, Facebook users can follow the message on top of their News… Read More
An SEC filing turned up this morning showing that Product Hunt’s Ryan Hoover is investing out of a $3 million AngelList Angel Fund going by the name Weekend Fund. We previously reported that Hoover was a deal lead through the Angel Funds product — but now we know the size and name of the vehicle. Read More
Skype recently introduced a feature designed to cement its place among business users who aren’t as interested in things like emoji reactions or “Stories.” It now supports conducting technical interviews via its service through a new Skype Interviews feature. From a dedicated website, interviewers can test candidates in seven programing languages over Skype using a… Read More
A day after making its Whole Foods debut, the original Echo is no longer for sale from Amazon’s site, a move that could indicate the imminent arrival of a new device. The timing is certainly right. The original Echo is long, long overdue for an upgrade. The smart assistant has gone mostly untouched since entering the market two years ago — even as other devices like the Dot have… Read More
Peter Thiel and a group of libertarians are funding an offshore human clinical trial of a herpes vaccine, skirting FDA regulations and sparking a heated debate over U.S. safety rules. Read More
The tech industry can’t seem to keep its hands off of politics, diversity and social initiatives. And that’s a good thing. At Disrupt San Francisco 2017, some of these tech leaders will speak not only about their tech, but also about how they’re tackling some of the biggest problems we face as a society. Read More
