Crunch Hype

Ford and Argo AI today released details about its fourth-generation self-driving test vehicle. Built on the 2020 Ford Escape Hybrid, the vehicle has everything needed to standup a self-driving service, the Detroit automaker said. It’s equipped with an improved battery system, new sensors, and sensor cleaning technology. The previous three generations of test vehicles used […]

The 2020 iPad Air comes at an interesting time in Apple’s release cycle. The iPad Pro is still strong from a specs perspective but is now technically a half generation or so behind in CPU. The new pro models won’t arrive for (theoretical) months. So what you end up with is a device that shares […]

Every year at its MAX user conference, Adobe shows off a number of research projects that may or may not end up in its Creative Cloud apps over time. One new project that I hope we’ll soon see in its video apps is Project Sharp Shots, which will make its debut later today during the […]

Tel Aviv-based visual search and product discovery platform Syte, already used by brands like Farfetch and Fashion Nova, plans to expand in the United States and Asia-Pacific region after its latest funding. The startup announced today it has raised a $30 million Series C, with an additional $10 million in debt. The round was led […]

2020 is June’s time to shine. With an increasing number of people stuck and home, trying (and often failing) to fend for themselves in their kitchen, the smart oven startup has a solid opportunity to considerably expand its users base. “The rise in at-home cooking has caused us to reevaluate June’s cook-programs to achieve more […]

As continentally confined Americans look for domestic vacation options that won’t expose them to too much risk of infection from the pandemic that’s still raging across the country, the RV rental company RVshare has raised over $100 million to capitalize on its historic opportunity. The company’s new cash has come from the private equity firms […]

Ideally, mental wellness should be considered part of a healthy daily routine, like exercise. But even exercise is difficult to turn into a regular habit. Peloton addressed physical fitness by combining smart stationary bikes with live classes and community features to create an engaging experience. Now a new startup, MindLabs, is taking a similar approach […]

The EU parliament has backed a call for tighter regulations on behavioral ads (aka microtargeting) in favor of less intrusive, contextual forms of advertising — urging Commission lawmakers to also assess further regulatory options, including looking at a phase-out leading to a full ban. MEPs also want Internet users to be able to opt out […]

Using social networks to connect with neighbors and local services has surged during the Covid-19 pandemic, and Facebook — with 2.7 billion users globally — is now looking at how it can tap into that in a more direct way. In the same week that it was reported that Nextdoor is reportedly gearing up to […]

Over 90% of the fastest-growing open-source companies in 2020 were founded outside the San Francisco Bay Area, and 12 out of the top 20 originate in Europe, according to a new study. The “ROSS Index”, created by Runa Capital lists the fastest-growing open-source startups with public repositories on Github every quarter. Interestingly, the company judged […]

Snapchat is about to launch “First Person,” the first of its original series to be shot on Snapchat Spectacles. The idea of filming a documentary using AR-centric eyewear might sound gimmicky, but “First Person” is tackling a weighty topic: climate change. The series is produced by journalist Yusuf Omar (who said he’s been wearing Spectacles […]

Bradley Tusk has become known in recent years for being involved in what’s about to get hot, from his early days advising Uber, to writing one of the first checks to the insurance startup Lemonade, to pushing forward the idea that we should be using the smart devices in our pockets to vote. Indeed, because […]

GM just took the wraps off the Hummer EV and it looks great. The vehicle is coming to dealers in 2022, with pre-orders starting in 2021. You can watch the unveiling here. The vehicle is detailed here. With 1,000 HP, 350 mile range, and autonomous drive modes, it’s an impressive vehicle though still significantly more […]

We are about seven months into a pandemic and just two weeks from a presidential election. At this point, surprises are a dime a dozen. So it should feel very 2020 that Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is about to stream Among Us, the hit game of 2020, on Twitch alongside mega-streamer pokimane and political analyst HasanAbi. […]

GMC has a new all-electric version of its classic Hummer oversized SUV. This thing is a beast, as you might expect, with an advertised 350-mile range and a 3-second zero to 60 mph time. It’s a bit ridiculous to be honest, which is kind of what the Hummer has always been about so that makes […]

General Motors today revealed the GMC Hummer EV, its first electric pickup. The vehicle has a 350 range, 1,000 HP, and up to 11,500 pound feet of torque (through fuzzy math). And with a starting price of $80,000, it’s easily twice the cost of a gas-powered pickup. Yes, it sort of looks like the Tesla […]

This December 16 and 17, we’re hosting our very first TC Sessions: Space event. It’ll be a virtual, live-streamed two-day show, including conversations with some of the best and brightest in the space industry. We’re thrilled to be hosting Lisa Callahan, vice president and general manager of Commercial Civil Space at Lockheed Martin. She’ll join […]

Netflix plans to give users in India access to its service at no charge for a weekend as part of a test to expand its reach in the country, a top company executive said Tuesday. The American streaming giant, which today reported slow user growth for the quarter that ended in September, recently stopped offering […]

Google faces a big antitrust suit, Amazon offers to pay customers for shopping data and we review the iPhone 12. This is your Daily Crunch for October 20, 2020. The big story: DOJ files antitrust suit against Google The suit accuses Google of “unlawfully maintaining monopolies in the markets for general search services, search advertising, […]

Apple HomePod owners, starting today, will be able to use the newly announced “Intercom” feature to send messages between their HomePod smart speakers. The feature, which arrives via a software update, brings this and several other new features to Apple’s smart speakers, including those introduced at Apple’s event last week where the company debuted its […]

You may not have full knowledge, skills and understanding of everything immediately but you'll position yourself at the forefront of the world’s software development needs right off the bat.

In a normal year, the Cloud Foundry project would be hosting its annual European Summit in Dublin this week. But this is 2020, so it’s a virtual event. This year, however, has been a bit of a transformative year for the open-source Platform-as-a-Service project — in more ways than one. With Cloud Foundry executive director […]

Synthetaic is a startup working to create data — specifically images — that can be used to train artificial intelligence. Founder and CEO Corey Jaskolski’s experience includes work with both National Geographic (where he was recently named Explorer of the Year) and a 3D media startup. In fact, he told me that his time with […]

Snap shares were up nearly 20% in after-hours trading after the company showcased a massive earnings beat, besting analyst expectations on both revenue and earnings per share for Q3. The company was already hovering above an all-time-high, with Tuesday’s beat poised to send the share price from just above $28 to just short of $34 […]

Shares of consumer video service Netflix are down sharply after the bell today, following the company’s Q3 earnings report. Why is Netflix suddenly worth about 5% less than before? A mixed earnings report, a disappointing new paying customer number, and slightly slack guidance appear to be the answer. Heading into the third quarter, Netflix told […]

After the COVID-19 pandemic drove impressive subscriber growth earlier this year, Netflix’s numbers have come back down to Earth. The streaming service added 15.77 million net new subscribers in the first quarter of the year, followed by 10.09 million in Q2. It only projected 2.5 million for Q3. Today’s earnings report shows the company falling […]

Adobe’s work on a chain of custody that could link online images back to their origins is inching closer to becoming a reality. The prototype, part of the Content Authenticity Initiative (CAI), will soon appear in the beta of Photoshop, Adobe’s ubiquitous image editing software. Adobe says the preview of the new tool will be […]

NASA’s OSIRIS-REx probe is about to touch down on an asteroid for a smash-and-grab mission, and you can follow its progress live — kind of. The craft is scheduled to perform its collection operation this afternoon, and we’ll know within minutes if all went according to plan. OSIRIS-REx, which stands for Origins Spectral Interpretation Resource […]

Hello and welcome back to Equity, TechCrunch’s venture-capital-focused podcast where we unpack the numbers behind the headlines. It’s a big day in tech because the U.S. federal government is going after Google on anti-competitive grounds. Sure, the timing appears crassly political and the case is not picking up huge plaudits thus far for its air-tightness, but […]

For all of the investors preaching that augmented reality technology will likely be the successor to the modern smartphone, today, most venture capitalists are still quite wary to back AR plays. The reasons are plentiful, but all tend to circle around the idea that it’s too early for software and too expensive to try to […]

This morning Root Insurance, a neoinsurance provider that has attracted ample private capital for its auto-insurance business, is targeting a valuation of as much as $6.34 billion in its pending IPO. The former startup follows insurtech leader Lemonade to the public markets during a year in which IPOs have been well-received by investors focused more […]

The pandemic has put stress on companies dealing with a workforce that is mostly — and sometimes suddenly — working from home. That has led to rising needs for security and governance tooling, something that Egnyte is looking to meet with new features aimed at helping companies cope with file management during the pandemic. Egnyte […]

Amazon has launched a new program that directly pays consumers for information about what they’re purchasing outside of Amazon.com and for responding to short surveys. The program, Amazon Shopper Panel, asks users to send in 10 receipts per month for any purchases made at non-Amazon retailers, including grocery stores, department stores, drug stores and entertainment […]

There’s a new streaming service in France called Salto. The companies behind the new service have been around for a while though. Salto is a joint initiative between TF1, France Télévisions and M6 — three major TV networks. Those companies already had their own apps with live TV and ad-supported catch-up content. And of course, […]

Investors do not seem concerned that the Department of Justice filed an antitrust suit against Google earlier today. The suit, seen by some as a stunt near the election, is one of a multi-part push to change the face of the technology industry, which has seen its wealth and power expand in recent years. For […]

Meadow was once called the Amazon of weed. Now it’s trying to be the Salesforce of weed, too. Meadow, the maker of a popular point of sale system for cannabis dispensaries, is today launching new tools for its clients. Called the Meadow Platform, it includes two key tools for dispensaries: a customer relationship manager (CRM) […]

As companies have moved to work from home this year, working on the internet has become the norm, and it turns out that Chrome OS was an operating system built for cloud-based applications. But most enterprise use cases are a bit more complex, and Google introduced some new features today to make it easier for […]

Microsoft today announced its plans to launch a new data center region in Austria, its first in the country. With nearby Azure regions in Switzerland, Germany, France and a planned new region in northern Italy, this part of Europe now has its fair share of Azure coverage. Microsoft also noted that it plans to launch […]

Invoca, which helps companies extract and use data from customer phone calls, is expanding today with the launch of products for e-commerce, customer experience and sales teams, as well as a new Invoca Exchange, where businesses can find all of the platform’s third-party integrations. The company is making these announcements as part of its virtual […]

Google was clearly anticipating today’s U.S. Department of Justice antitrust complaint filing – the company posted an extensive rebuttal of the lawsuit to its Keyword company blog. The post, penned by SVP of Global Affairs and Google Chief Legal Officer Kent Walker, suggests that the DOJ’s case is “deeply flawed” and “would do nothing to […]

Google Photos is reviving its photo printing subscription service and introducing same-day prints. The company earlier this year had briefly tested a new program that used A.I. to suggest the month’s 10 best photos, which were then shipped to your home automatically. But Google ended the test on June 30. During the trial, Google had […]

Remember Netscape Navigator and Internet Explorer? Those applications from the 1990s used emphatic metaphors in their names to talk about a simple task — browsing the web. Today, nobody would say that Google Chrome is a web explorer. Browsing the web has become an effortless — and often mindless — task. You grab your phone or […]

Montreal-based YPC Technologies today announced that it has raised a $1.8 million seed round. Led by Hike Ventures and Real Ventures, the funding includes participation from Toyota AI Ventures and Uphill Capital, among others, designed to help the company pilot its kitchen robotics technology. Toyota AI Venture’s funding came as part of the company’s “Call […]

Even as Blizzard pulls the plug on new updates for its StarCraft II game, nearly a decade after its launch, gaming investors are financing the next new thing coming from key members of the game’s early development team. Blizzard vets Tim Morten, the former production director for StarCraft II; and Tim Campbell, the lead campaign […]

Venture capital activity in Europe and Asia saw a strong return to form in Q3, data indicates. The two continents enjoyed more venture capital investment into their local startups than in some time, underscoring that strong VC results the United States saw in the third quarter were not a fluke, but part of a broader […]

Klar, a new online bank based in Mexico City, has become the first big bet that Prosus Ventures (the firm formerly known as Naspers Ventures) is taking in Latin America outside of Brazil. Founded by Stefan Moller, a former consultant at Bain & Co. who advised large banks, Klar blends Moller’s work experience in Mexico […]

Sym, a new platform that makes it easier for developers to integrate security and privacy workflows into their process, today announced that it has raised a $9 million Series A round led by Amplify Partners. Earlier this year, the company announced its $3 million seed round lead by Andy McLoughlin of Uncork Capital and Robin […]

Today at 2 p.m. ET/11 a.m. PT, Unusual Ventures’ Sarah Leary and John Vrionis are joining us over at the Extra Crunch Live stage! The Unusual Ventures team has investments spanning the consumer and enterprise space, including Robinhood, AppDynamics, Mulesoft, Winnie and more. That short list could be the basis for a fascinating chat, but […]

As the coming of winter combined with the coronavirus continues to put new restrictions on peoples’ movements, location-based apps are on the rise again. People are looking to find out who is close to them. Who is in their community. People are understandably looking for new friends and resources close to them. Apps that connect […]

The Polaris Slingshot has always wowed. Three wheels, open cockpit, and a design reminiscent of the Batmobile. It draws a crowd and is a blast to drive. I spent several weeks in the reworked Polaris Slingshot. The company just unveiled a new version that is finally available with an automatic transmission. Past versions were limited […]