A day spent driving a pre-production 2022 Mercedes Benz EQS provided an up-close look at what the German automaker has been doing with the billions of dollars it has dedicated to electrification. The EQS is a meticulously designed flagship sedan that brings together the automaker’s MBUX infotainment system, a new electric platform and advancements in […]
Recent roars from an investment firm, credited to put Indian startups on the global map in the past decade and a half, are turning local young firms into unicorns at a pace never seen before in the world’s second largest internet market. Tiger Global has finalized — or is in late stages of concluding — […]
Hello friends, and welcome back to Week in Review! Last week, I talked about Clubhouse’s slowing user growth. Well, this week news broke that they had been in talks with Twitter for a $4 billion acquisition, so it looks like they’re still pretty desirable. This week, I’m talking about a story I published a couple […]
“Most of the startups I give advice to about how to raise venture capital shouldn’t be raising venture capital,” an investor recently told me. While the idea that every startup isn’t venture-backable might run counter to the narrative to the barrage of funding news each week, I think it’s important to double click on the […]
Our new podcast Found is now available, and the first episode features guest Iman Abuzeid, co-founder and CEO of Incredible Health. Abuzeid’s story of founding and building Incredible Health, a career platform for healthcare professionals focusing specifically on nurses, is all about a focused entrepreneur building a unique skill set, and acquiring the experience necessary […]
Welcome back to This Week in Apps, the weekly TechCrunch series that recaps the latest in mobile OS news, mobile applications and the overall app economy. The app industry is as hot as ever, with a record 218 billion downloads and $143 billion in global consumer spend in 2020. Consumers last year also spent 3.5 trillion minutes using apps on Android […]
Chinese regulators have hit Alibaba with a record fine of 18 billion yuan (about $2.75 billion) for violating anti-monopoly rules as the country seeks to rein in the power of its largest internet conglomerates. In November, China proposed sweeping antitrust regulations targeting its interent economy. In late December, the State Administration for Market Regulation said […]
Practically every film production these days needs some kind of visual effects work, but independent creators often lack the cash or expertise to get that top-shelf CG. Wonder Dynamics, founded by VFX engineer Nikola Todorovic and actor Tye Sheridan, aims to use AI to make some of these processes more accessible for filmmakers with budgets […]
Sometimes you’ve just got to confirm an unannounced product to put the rumors to bed, I guess. That was Google’s strategy this afternoon, following earlier rumors from Android Central that a chip shortage had put the kibosh on the mid-budget phone. In a comment to TechCrunch, a Google spokesperson noted, “Pixel 5a 5G is not […]
Few companies have done better than Scale at spotting a need in the AI gold rush early on and filling that gap. The startup rightly identified that one of the tasks most important to building effective AI at scale — the laborious exercise of tagging data sets to make them usable in properly training new […]
Over the last few days, we’ve published several articles recapping panels from last week’s TechCrunch Early Stage virtual conference. Each story is based on an interview with a founder or investor who addressed some of the most common startup dilemmas. Predictably, they’re mostly focused on the how and why: How do I get into an […]
The planet-loving folks at the Sustainable Ocean Alliance started an accelerator a couple years back focusing on very early-stage companies, but this year they’re expanding the program to accept those that have already closed their first round. The mix of experimental and (comparatively) proven approaches may help diversify the accelerator’s growing network. “Last year, amidst […]
Efforts to unionize an Amazon warehouse in Alabama appear to have failed, Facebook takes down fake review groups and a monkey plays Pong with its brain. This is your Daily Crunch for April 9, 2021. The big story: Amazon beats back union push Union organizers lost a much-publicized election at Amazon’s Bessemer, Alabama warehouse, with […]
Ureeka founder Melissa Bradley explains how to prepare for a virtual pitch, allocate time, how to close meetings with a clear list of action items, and what to avoid.
A batch of job listings along with some Twitter whisperings suggests that scooter companies such as Lime and Superpedestrian are gearing up to operate in London and New York City — two of the last remaining frontiers of shared-scooter services. A review of job listings, company websites and LinkedIn shows that Lime and Dott are […]
Shorthand, the Australian startup behind a no-code platform that allows publishers and brands to create multimedia stories, has raised $10 million Australian (just under $8 million U.S.) from Fortitude Investment Partners. CEO Ricky Robinson told me via email that this is Shorthand’s first institutional round of funding, and that the company has been profitable for […]
However the outcome of today’s vote count turned out, there was one thing we knew for certain: it wasn’t going to mark the end of the battle between Amazon and the Retail, Wholesale and Department Store Union. With voting having broken overwhelmingly in Amazon’s favor, the union was quick to challenge the results. The RWDSU […]
Security researchers say APKPure, a widely popular app for installing older or discontinued Android apps from outside of Google’s app store, contained malicious adware that flooded the victim’s device with unwanted ads. Kaspersky Lab said that it alerted APKPure on Thursday that its most recent app version, 3.17.18, contained malicious code that siphoned off data […]
