Google Classroom, the company’s platform that brings together Google Apps for Education and a number of tools for managing classes and content, is getting one of its regular summer updates today (right in time before the next school year starts).
While Classroom has traditionally focused on offering tools for teachers and students, this new version now also brings in parents and guardians. Read More
Pizza Hut is giving you more than just grease in your next pizza box: The maker of fine savory Italian pies has created a playable DJ interface out of cardboard using partner Novalia’s printable electronics tech. And so I must retire, and become the greatest pizza-based DJ the world has ever seen. My beats are delicious and unexpected, like jalapeño with pineapple. Currently booking… Read More
Cash Money Records will sound familiar if you’re a fan of Drake, Lil Wayne or Nicki Minaj — they all share the same record label. An Instagram photo with Apple Music executive Larry Jackson and label co-founder Birdman started a rumor yesterday. Bloomberg confirmed that Apple and Cash Money Records will work together on some exclusive content.
While Jackson has been in charge of… Read More
Several high-level employees at the early-stage venture firm Rothenberg Ventures have recently left, TechCrunch has learned. Among them is Tommy Leep, a partner and the head of Rothenberg’s San Francisco office, who left last month after spending two-and-a-half years with the firm. (A former product manager at Intuit, Leep spent the previous two years as “chief connector” at… Read More
Amazon has teamed up with Product Hunt — the San Francisco-based startup that helps curate and surface the hottest new apps, websites, gadgets, tech creations and more — by offering a collection of products for purchase that have previously trended on Product Hunt’s website. This new collection, called “Featured on Product Hunt,” is available as a part of… Read More
He mastered flying it, and then got a bigger drone. And then another bigger drone. Then came fighting the drones and building his own. Soon, Ettinger was considered by many to be the best drone fighter in the world.
Ettinger is only 16 years old, but he’s found success by getting to the heart of drone battling: Dream up something weird and make it real. Last year he surrounded his… Read More
110 protoypes, 460 hours of lab testing and 11 months of sleep studies later, Casper is ready to starting shipping out dog beds. The mail order mattress startup that is almost single-handedly propping up the world’s podcasters now offers its service to canine companions for $125 a pop. The Casper Dog Mattress model is remarkably similar to the company’s human offering, with… Read More
Airbnb’s ambitions to expand into the travel services market were outed ahead of plans this week, when an “Airbnb Trips” app was briefly available on the Google Play Store for download. The app which offered travelers the ability to book restaurant reservations and city tours, has since been pulled down by the company following news reports detailing its availability and… Read More
Sources are telling TechCrunch that Cisco is planning a significant cost reduction this week, which could involve budget cuts and layoffs. We’ve been hearing that the reductions will be announced on August 17th or 18th and that they will be a part of a push to cut costs by 15 percent, with managers given some flexibility around how they implement this. “A cost reduction of 15%… Read More
Women 2.0, a for-profit for-good media business that works to bring women into the tech industry and help them succeed there, has appointed Kate Brodock as President and Elisa Miller-Out as COO, according to founder Shaherose Charania. Charania will maintain a board seat, she said. The changing of the guard comes for Women 2.0 after a phase of scaling back. Founded in April 2006,… Read More
The Canadian company has never been afraid to take risks with the often-boring world of e-readers, and for that reason alone it is a welcoming presence. Without Kobo pushing the boundaries of screen size, build quality and features like waterproofing, it’s hard to imagine much innovation occurring in the Amazon-dominated space. With the Aura One, the company is doubling down yet again,… Read More
Uber is taking legal action to try to block forthcoming regulatory changes in London that could impact its ability to recruit drivers onto its platform — including a new requirement for drivers to have passed a written English language test in order to operate a private hire vehicle. Read More
At the height of iPhone rumor season, Japanese site Mac Otokara (which has a relatively good track record with rumors like this) reports that there will only be two iPhones unveiled this fall, the iPhone 7 and the iPhone 7 Plus. Mac Otokara claims that reliable sources confirmed these names. Throughout the summer, rumors have swirled that Apple would unveil three new iPhones: a standard iPhone… Read More
It’s still a ways from being a household name here in the States, but Huawei is starting to turn heads by offering some premium level specs for a (relative) song. The contrast is particularly clear a day after reviews for Samsung’s $800+ Note 7 went live. The Honor 8 cuts that unlocked pricing more than in half, while managing not to skimp on the specs. At the center of the device is… Read More
The race for aftermarket smarts in your car is heating up, and Automatic is delivering an always-on 3G data connection as its move to race ahead of the competition. The Automatic Pro dongle, which plugs into the OBD-II port used for diagnostics on any car made after 1996, now includes 3G data connectivity, with unlimited usage for the first five years in the price of the hardware. Automatic… Read More
“Ok VCs, CEOs, and company decision makers who follow me. Start planning now to make November 8 a day off. We need people to be able to vote,” Baker wrote, adding, “The fact that Election Day isn’t a national holiday is in and of itself an act of voter suppression.” Although the election was still months away, the idea took off, and dozens of tech companies… Read More
Since launching five years ago, Culture Amp has focused on employee engagement and corporate culture. Now, Culture Amp is tackling the performance review space — something its CEO Didier Elzinga (pictured above) has wanted to do since day one — with the launch of the Employee Effectiveness tool. “We built an early version of this when I started the company,” Elzinga… Read More
Google has had another appeal against Android antitrust charges turned down by a Russian court. At issue is how the company requires handset makers using its Android OS to also pre-load Google apps and services onto devices in order to get access to the Play app store. Read More
Apollo Shield, which was originally incorporated as Airfence Inc., has launched an anti-drone system that detects drones flying where they’re not authorized or wanted, and forces them to fly home. The startup intends to sell its technology to owners or managers of venues that have intense security needs such as oil refineries, nuclear facilities, airports, prisons, stadiums or hotels… Read More
Advertisers have plenty of options for running video ads — but they haven’t had a chance to run on one of the most engaging discovery-driven platforms on the Internet, Pinterest, quite yet.
That’s partly because the option simply wasn’t there on Pinterest. It was only in the past few weeks that the company finally started rolling out a native video player. And it was… Read More
