Qualcomm Ventures, Qualcomm’s investment arm, today announced four new strategic investments in 5G-related startups. These companies are private mobile network specialist Celona, mobile network automation platform Cellwize, the edge computing platform Azion and Pensando, another edge computing platform that combines its software stack with custom hardware. The overall goal here is obviously to help jumpstart […]
The European Commission has laid out a first set of antitrust charges against Amazon focused on its dual role as a platform for other sellers but also a retailer itself on its own platform — and its cumulative use of third party merchant data to underpin Amazon’s own retail decisions. Competition chief Margrethe Vestager said […]
This morning Hopin, a startup that provides online events software, announced that it has closed a $125 million Series B round of capital. The new funds come mere months after Hopin raised a $40 million Series A this summer. According to Hopin CEO Johnny Boufarhat, the new capital was raised at a $2.125 billion valuation, […]
Alphabet’s X ‘Moonshot Factory’ subsidiary has a lot of cutting edge projects in development, so it’s always exciting when one of them gets ready for real-world deployment. On Tuesday, X announced that its ‘Project Taara’ high-speed optical wireless broadband endeavor is working with internet provider Econet and its subsidiaries to begin rolling out its tech […]
Bucking the slowdown in most of the power sector caused by responses to the COVID-19 pandemic, renewable energy actually grew in 2020, and will represent about 90% of the total power capacity added for the year, according to the International Energy Agency. A surge in new projects from China and the US led the charge […]
Patreon and Acast are teaming up to make it easier for podcasters to publish episodes that are only available to the patrons financially supporting them on Patreon. Most paywall solutions for podcasts are pretty clunky or limited. That’s why Acast launched technology last year that allows publishers to release paywalled episodes that listeners can access […]
Berlin-based micro-mobility startup Tier has raised a significant Series C round of $250 million. SoftBank Vision Fund 2 is leading the round, which proves that the Vision Fund team is still focused on high-risk, high-potential bets. As a reminder, SoftBank has invested in many late-stage funding rounds through its Vision Fund team. Portfolio companies include […]
Debates over anti-competitive practices amongst China’s internet firms resurface every year in the lead up to Singles’ Day, a time when online retailers exhaust their resources and deploy sometimes sneaky tactics to attract vendors and shoppers. This year, just a day before the world’s largest shopping festival was scheduled to fall on November 11, China’s […]
Brynn Putnam has a lot to feel great about. A Harvard grad and former professional ballet dancer who opened the first of what have become three high-intensity fitness studios in New York, she then launched a second business in 2016 when — while pregnant with her son — she was exercising at home and couldn’t […]
Based in Hong Kong, Coherent helps insurance providers go digital. With their services more relevant than ever during the COVID-19 pandemic, the startup announced it has raised $14 million in new funding. The Series A round, led by Cathay Innovation with participation from Franklin Templeton, will be used to grow Coherent’s client base in Asia, […]
Bill Zhang lowered himself into lunges on a squishy mat as he explained to me the benefits of the full-body training suit he was wearing. We were in his small, modest office in Xili, a university area in Shenzhen that’s also home to many hardware makers. The connected muscle stimulator attached to the suit, called […]
As Ant Group seizes the world’s attention with its record initial public offering, which was abruptly called off by Beijing, investors and analysts are revisiting the fintech interests of Tencent, Ant’s arch rival in China. It’s somewhat complicated to do this, not least because they are sprawled across a number of Tencent properties and, unlike […]
Elon Musk’s tunneling and transportation startup The Boring Company is eyeing Austin for its next project based on several new job postings. The Boring Company, which last year landed a deal to construct and operate a “people mover” for the Las Vegas Convention Center, tweeted Monday that is was hiring in Austin. Engineering, accountant and […]
Sony has announced that it is entering the drone market with a new brand called Airpeak, though the specifics of the drone itself are left something of a mystery. It plans to launch the project next spring. The bare-bones announcement says only that Sony has been inspired by the “recent proliferation” of drones and the […]
Beyond Meat’s partnership with McDonald’s to develop the McPlant burger wasn’t enough to keep shares from collapsing after the company posted third-quarter earnings that fell far below analysts’ expectations. The big miss sent shares tumbling nearly 29% in after markets closed Monday after reporting it generated $94.4 million in revenues and a loss of 28 […]
When we recorded this Gillmor Gang, it was Day Four post-election, or midweek in counting the late incoming mail and other provisional ballots. We were largely convinced of the Biden victory, but that nagging doubt instilled in us by 2016 still pervaded the Zoom session. Saturday’s street party felt more like it, and the sheer […]
Back before just about every major TV network built a streaming app of their own, watching live TV on your smartphone was tricky. One of the first relatively simple options was the Slingbox. You’d set it up between your cable box and your TV, plug it into your network, and bam: you’re streaming live TV, […]
We review the iPhone 12 Pro Max and the iPhone 12 mini, Zoom settles with the FTC and Pfizer announces promising results for its COVID-19 vaccine trial. This is your Daily Crunch for November 9, 2020. The big story: Reviewing the biggest and smallest new iPhones TechCrunch Editor in Chief Matthew Panzarino tackled both extremes […]
Twitter is working to expand the use of its “misinformation” labels on misleading tweets. The company has developed a new feature, not yet live, that would pop up a “misleading information” label when a user tries to “Like” a tweet that’s been labeled as misinformation. The feature was discovered by reverse engineer Jane Manchun Wong in […]
Uber shares surged 7.38% to close at $48.18 following news that a vaccine candidate is 90% effective at preventing COVID-19, and could start coming to market in a matter of months. The announcement by drug makers Pfizer and BioNTech sparked widespread optimism and helped boost shares across industries that have been weakened by the COVID-19 pandemic, […]
