Apple announced this morning it’s allocating more than $400 million toward affordable housing projects and other homeowner assistance programs in California, as a part of its earlier multiyear pledge of $2.5 billion to address the state’s housing crisis and homelessness issues. The funding is expected to support thousands of Californians with first-time homebuyer assistance or […]
India should set up a data regulator to oversee how companies collect, process, store, monetize and even destroy nonpersonal data (or data that has been anonymized), a panel tasked by New Delhi has recommended in a draft report. The eight-person panel said that companies such as Google, Facebook, Amazon and Uber have benefited from a […]
Hello and welcome back to Equity, TechCrunch’s venture capital-focused podcast where we unpack the numbers behind the headlines. This is Equity Monday, our week-starting primer in which we go over the latest news, dig into the week ahead, talk about some neat funding rounds and dive into the latest big news from the startup world. (You […]
Less than a month after picking up Simplecast for its podcast distribution and analytics tools, SiriusXM today is announcing an even bigger acquisition to raise its game in the realm of streamed spoken-word content. The satellite radio company said it has reached a deal to acquire Stitcher from E.W. Scripps for $325 million, a return of more than double […]
If you’re currently building a startup, you know what product you want to build. But do you know if people are actually going to notice you? Emily Heyward from Red Antler can tell you how to get people obsessed with your brand. Join us at TC Early Stage online to understand what makes a specific […]
Paige, the startup that spun out of the Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center and launched in 2018 to help advance cancer research and care by applying AI to better understand cancer pathology, is today announcing a milestone in its growth story: it has raised a further $20 million from Goldman Sachs and Healthcare Venture Partners, […]
Google today announced that it has signed up Verizon as the newest customer of its Google Cloud Contact Center AI service, which aims to bring natural language recognition to the often inscrutable phone menus that many companies still use today (disclaimer: TechCrunch is part of the Verizon Media Group). For Google, that’s a major win, […]
MIT’s Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Lab (CSAIL) has shared the results of a new project in which it built a two-fingered robotic gripper, which has soft pads for dedicated and fine manipulation of objects like cables, sheets and more. The robot’s design is based on how humans use their fingers to do things like […]
Analog Devices didn’t waste any time kicking off the week with a bang when it announced this morning it was acquiring rival chipmaker Maxim Integrated Products for $20.91 billion (according to multiple reports). The company had a market cap of $17.09 billion as of Friday’s close. The deal, which has already been approved by both […]
The chief executive of UK incumbent telco BT has warned any government move to require a rapid rip-out of Huawei kit from existing mobile infrastructure could cause network outages for mobile users and generate its own set of security risks. Huawei has been the focus of concern for Western governments including the US and its […]
Last year, Gartner found that robotic process automation (RPA) is the fastest growing category in enterprise software. So perhaps it shouldn’t come as a surprise that UiPath, a leading startup in the space, announced a $225 million Series E today on an eye-popping $10.2 billion valuation. Alkeon Capital led the round with help from Accel, […]
Amid intense scrutiny over TikTok as a potential national security risk in the U.S., WeChat, the essential tool for Chinese people’s day-to-day life, is also taking heat from Washington. White House trade advisor Peter Navarro told Fox Business on Sunday that “[TikTok] and WeChat are the biggest forms of censorship on the Chinese mainland, and […]
Google said on Monday that it has partnered with CBSE, an Indian government body that oversees education in private and public schools in the country, to deliver a “blended learning experience” across 22,000 schools in the world’s second largest internet market by the end of this year. The Search giant, which today also announced plans […]
The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) and state investment firm Temasek announced today that Project Ubin, its blockchain-based multi-currency payments network, has proven its commercial potential after tests with more than 40 companies. The initiative was launched in 2016. A prototype developed by Temasek and J.P. Morgan began undergoing testing last year to see how […]
Google said on Monday that it plans to invest $10 billion in India in the next five to seven years as the search giant looks to help accelerate adoption of digital services in the key overseas market. Sundar Pichai, chief executive of Google, today unveiled Google for India Digitization Fund through which the company will […]
Microsoft is shedding its empathetic chatbot Xiaoice into an independent entity, the U.S. software behemoth said (in Chinese) Monday, confirming an earlier report by the Chinese news site Chuhaipost in June. The announcement came several months after Microsoft announced it would close down its voice assistant app Cortana in China among other countries late last year. […]
Tesla has lowered the price of another vehicle. This time it’s the Model Y, an electric SUV the company started shipping in March. The long-range all-wheel drive version of the car is now listed with a purchase price of $49,990, or $3,000 less than what it was before. The car’s new pricing was first reported […]
After aggressive cost-cutting measures, including mass layoffs and selling several of its businesses, WeWork’s chairman expects the company to have positive cash flow in 2021. Marcelo Claure, who became WeWork’s chairman after co-founder Adam Neumann resigned as chief executive officer last fall, told the Financial Times that the co-working space startup is on target to […]
Hello and welcome back to TechCrunch’s China Roundup, a digest of recent events shaping the Chinese tech landscape and what they mean to people in the rest of the world. This week, the unprecedented national security law descended on Hong Kong, changing the day-to-day life of the people there, as well as businesses across the […]
Qualcomm has become the newest high-profile backer of four-year-old Reliance Jio Platforms, which has raised more than $15.7 billion in the past 12 weeks from as many investors. On Sunday evening, Qualcomm Ventures said it will invest $97 million in Reliance Jio Platforms to acquire a 0.15% equity stake “on a fully diluted basis” in the […]
