In June of 1999, Sequoia Capital and Kleiner Perkins invested $25 million into an early-stage company developing a new search engine called Google, paving the way for a revolution in how knowledge online was organized and shared. Now, Sequoia Capital is placing another bet on a different kind of search engine, one for physical objects […]
Facebook’s “Supreme Court” is now accepting comments on one of its earliest and likely most consequential cases. The Facebook Oversight Board announced Friday that it would begin accepting public feedback on Facebook’s suspension of former President Trump. Mark Zuckerberg announced Trump’s suspension on January 7, after the then-president of the United States incited his followers […]
A gig economy-powered consumer edtech platform is heading to the New York Stock Exchange. Edtech startup Nerdy, which owns the popular tutoring business Varsity Tutors, is seeking to become a public company through a special purpose acquisition vehicle, otherwise known as a SPAC. Nerdy will merge with TPG Pace Tech Opportunities (NYSE: PACE), a publicly […]
Rocket fuel technology startup Firehawk Aerospace has added $1.2 million to its existing seed financing, bringing the full amount invested in the round to $2.5 million. The new tranche comes from Harlow Capital Management, a Dallas-based firm run by Colby Harlow, who will join Firehawk’s board of directors as part of the deal. Firewhawk, which […]
Each year Okta processes millions of SaaS logons via its authentication system. It kindly aggregates that data to find the most popular apps and publishes an annual report. This year it found that the most popular tool by far was Microsoft Office 365. It’s worth noting that while app usage popularity varied by region, Office […]
To dig into African venture capital results, we're looking at a report concerning 2020 data from Briter Bridges, a research group that focuses on the continent's private capital market.
In recent years we’ve seen a whole bunch of visual/style fashion-focused search engines cropping up, tailored to helping people find the perfect threads to buy online by applying computer vision and other AI technologies to perform smarter-than-keywords visual search which can easily match and surface specific shapes and styles. Startups like Donde Search, Glisten and […]
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) has issued an official statement on the tumult of the past week in the public stock market. It’s a relatively brief statement and doesn’t mention any of the key players by name (aka GameStop, Reddit, Robinhood and others), but it does acknowledge that “extreme stock price volatility has […]
After a turbulent week for the stock market and halts to the trading of certain speculative securities including GameStop (GME) and AMC, consumer investing app Robinhood has raised new capital. The new funds total more than $1 billion, with the company telling TechCrunch that they were raised from its existing investor base. The New York […]
Another COVID-19 vaccine is almost ready to begin being distributed — a single-shot inoculation made by Johnson & Johnson’s Janssen Pharmaceuticals subsidiary. The company just released an efficacy report based on data from its Phase 3 trial, which found that the new vaccine is 66% effective overall in preventing moderate to severe incarnations of COVID-19 […]
Uber’s plan to acquire Autocab, a maker of SaaS for booking and dispatch software for the taxi and private-hire vehicle industry, which also operates a global trip marketplace for taxis and PHVs (iGo), is being looked at by the U.K.’s competition watchdog — which announced the launch of an inquiry today. The deadline for a […]
Sirenum, a platform for remotely managing a shift-based workforce across industries such as railway, aviation, construction and the gig economy, has raised a $2.7 million Series A funding round from new investors, including former Tesco CEO Sir Terry Leahy, alongside the William Currie Group. Sirenum says its subscription model platform simplifies the process of managing […]
French startup Chefclub announced earlier this week that it has raised a $17 million funding round led by First Bridge Ventures. SEB Alliance, the venture arm of kitchen appliance maker Groupe SEB, Korelya Capital and Algaé Ventures are also participating. Chefclub has been building a major media brand on social media platforms. It has attracted […]
Xiaomi, the world’s third-largest smartphone maker, today unveiled “Mi Air Charge Technology,” which it says can deliver 5W power to multiple devices “within a radius of several metres” as the Chinese giant invited customers to a “true wireless charging era.” The company said it has self-developed an isolated charging pile that has five phase interference […]
German startup Trade Republic is rolling out its app and service in France this week. This is a significant expansion move as Trade Republic has only been available in Germany and Austria so far. Trade Republic lets you buy and sell shares or exchange-traded funds (ETFs) from your phone with low, transparent fees. The company […]
The impact of United States government sanctions on Huawei is continuing to hurt the company and dampen overall smartphone shipments in China, where it is the largest smartphone vendor, according to a new report by Canalys. But Huawei’s decline also opens new opportunities for its main rivals, including Apple. Canalys says Apple’s performance in China […]
For American importers, finding suppliers these days can be challenging not only due to COVID-19 travel restrictions. The U.S. government’s entity list designations, human rights-related sanctions, among other trade blacklists targeting Chinese firms have also rattled U.S. supply chains. One young company called International Compliance Workshop, or ICW, is determined to make sourcing easier for […]
Hello and welcome back to Equity, TechCrunch’s venture capital-focused podcast, where we unpack the numbers behind the headlines. Natasha and Danny and Alex and Grace hopped online for our weekly show, sans Gamestop news (which you can find here) to talk about all the other busy news happening in startup world right now. Here’s a taste of what we got into: Qualtrics […]
The GameStop stock saga continues, Apple releases more details about its privacy changes and Qualtrics goes public. This is your Daily Crunch for January 28, 2021. The big story: Robinhood restricts GameStop trading Robinhood has responded to an upsurge in retail investors buying shares in companies like GameStop, AMC and Blockbuster by restricting trading on […]
