TechCrunch

 MakerBot is laying off 30 percent of its staff as part of an ongoing effort to adapt to a changing market, the company announced in a blog post today. Read More

 Verizon and Yahoo are close to reaching a new acquisition deal, with a price tag that’s $250 million less than the $4.8 billion agreed upon last year, according to a Bloomberg report. A Verizon spokesperson declined to comment on the report. Even without confirmation, the story has been good for Yahoo stock — as of 11:51am Eastern, the price is up 1.4 percent since the market… Read More

 Comcast is launching a new app called Xfinity Stream, which will replace its older Xfinity TV app on mobile devices, as well as deliver a host of features for cable subscribers, including access to live TV, on-demand programming, DVR recordings and more. But the app serves another purpose, as well: Like the TV app it replaces, it will also be home to Comcast’s internet TV service… Read More

 Investors are seemingly growing more excited about L.A. by the day. The newest sign comes via a $40 million fund that L.A.-based Fika Ventures is announcing today. That’s none too shabby for a venture firm that was founded just last year. Fika was created by TX Zhuo, formerly a managing partner at Karlin Ventures, and Eva Ho, a former general partner and co-founder of San… Read More

 Adtech startups like to announce when they’ve hit $100 million in annualized revenue, but Vungle — which focuses on delivering in-app video ads — is doing a bit better than that. It says it’s now reached a $300 million revenue run rate. And while the last three months of the year tend to be the biggest quarter for advertising, CEO Zain Jaffer noted that… Read More

 There are few organizations in the world that can claim more expertise when it comes to storytelling than Pixar. The Disney-owned animation studio is known for its ability to consistently create world-class movies with gripping narrative alongside stunning visuals. Now, Pixar is helping others learn the secrets of great storytelling – for free, in partnership with online education… Read More

 Twitter’s recently launched “Explore” section will now feature live videos sourced from Periscope within its “Top Trends,” the company announced yesterday. The move will further integrate Twitter’s standalone live streaming app into its main platform, leaving even fewer reasons to keep a separate app dedicated to live streaming video around. The… Read More

 StockX, a marketplace for sneakers, has announced that they’ve closed a $6M round from a group of high-profile investors like Mark Wahlberg, Scooter Braun, and Wale. They join existing investors like SV Angel and Detroit Venture Partners. The sneaker reseller space couldn’t be hotter right now. GOAT, one of the largest app-based sneaker marketplaces has raised more than $30M in… Read More

 Josephine, the startup that lets people cook meals inside their homes and sell them to neighbors, is sponsoring a recently-introduced homemade food bill in California that aims to legalize the sales of prepared meals and other food from small-scale, home kitchen operations. Assemblymember Eduardo Garcia (D-Coachella) introduced the bill, AB 626, this week. Josephine is sponsoring this bill… Read More

 Planet, the company that recently acquired Google’s satellite Earth imaging business, just pulled off another monumental feat – launching 88 satellites into orbit at once, as part of the largest satellite payload on record with a total of 104 aboard an Indian Space Research Organization rocket (EDIT: As mentioned, the ISRO is the launch provider in this case, and all credit is due… Read More

 Walmart this morning announced it’s acquiring a leading outdoor retailer Moosejaw for approximately $51 million in an all-cash deal. Headquartered in Madison Heights, Michigan, the retailer has both a large online presence as well as 10 physical stores across Michigan and the midwest U.S. Walmart says it will allow Moosejaw to continue to operate its website and stores as a standalone… Read More

 Honda is extending its courtship of startups through its Xcelerator program with a new partnership announced Wednesday with DRIVE, a new startup hub in Tel Aviv, Israel that focuses specifically on smart mobility tech, including transportation and automotive solutions. The partnership will see Honda’s Silicon Valley Lab work directly with the DRIVE center, offering “expertise,… Read More

 IBM wants to bring machine learning to its traditional mainframe customers, and eventually to any technology with large data stores hidden behind a company firewall in what IBM calls a “private cloud.” Yes mainframes, those ginormous computing machines from an earlier age, are still running inside some of the world’s biggest companies including banks, insurance companies… Read More

 Developers have Stripe for payments, Mixpanel for analytics, and Twilio for communications, but what about location. That’s where Radar comes in. Radar was founded by Nick Patrick, former Foursquare and Handy employee, along with his fellow Foursquarer Coby Berman, after realizing that lots of apps need location services, but it’s tedious and difficult to build out on the back… Read More

 Groupon, the daily deals platform that has been restructuring itself and trying to shift into more profitable areas of e-commerce, today reported its Q4 earnings. The company reported sales of $934.9 million but with a net loss of $50.2 million, and a non-GAAP EPS of $0.07. Both are a beat for the company: analysts were expecting revenues of $912.8 million, and non-GAAP earnings per… Read More

 HTC will offer a mobile VR solution, and it’ll work with the company’s new top-end smartphone, the U Ultra, but it’ll be more than just a headset that lets the smartphone do most of the work like the Samsung Gear VR, according to HTC CFO Chia-lin Chang, who spoke to CNET. The plan is to introduce their mobile VR product sometime before the end of the year, Chang added. HTC… Read More

 MiDrive, a U.K. startup that helps you learn to drive with a driving test app and instructor marketplace, has lost Scott Taylor as CEO, after he departed the company last month. He’s been replaced by Asher Ismail, who previously joined miDrive as COO in May 2016. Curiously, the move comes shortly after miDrive has raised £2 million in further funding. Read More

 Employees throughout the world are are struggling to compete in a fast-moving and dynamic global job market, thanks to an unprecedented number of technological advancements and highly linked information networks. Read More

 Mozilla-backed Cliqz, a German startup building an anti-tracking browser with a built-in private search feature powered by aggregated usage of its products, is acquiring the consumer assets of ad-tracker privacy tool and browser extension Ghostery. Read More

 “When is another generation of Pokémon coming to Pokemon GO?!” It’s a question that the game’s players (including myself) have been shouting since… well, pretty much immediately after the game launched. We’ve finally got an official answer: “later this week”. The once oh-so-shaky servers have stabilized. The game is now available in most of… Read More