Crunch Hype

Four years ago, Brandon Gell was an architecture student who spent most of his time working on 3D printing modular housing. Now, he’s the founder of Clyde, an extended warranty startup that wants to help small e-commerce businesses offer product protection. Today, the company announced it has raised a $14 million Series A led by […]

Facebook is announcing a handful of new features that will allow users to show their support for small businesses and get the latest updates as those businesses deal with the fallout — economic and otherwise — of the COVID-19 pandemic. The social network is introducing a new section called Businesses Nearby, which will allow you […]

Consumer fintech startups were massively successful in 2019, attracting millions of new users and disrupting traditional retail banks and financial services with mobile-first, consumer-oriented products. Despite the economic downturn in public markets and the massive wave of cuts at public and private companies in recent weeks, fintech startups have been raising a ton of money. […]

Spotify is introducing a new feature, Group Session, that will allow two or more of its Premium users in the same space to share control over the music being played. Essentially a “party mode” of sorts, Group Session participants can control what’s playing in real time as well as contribute to a collaborative playlist for […]

As a number of startups get back into fundraising in earnest, one that is on a growth tear has closed a substantial debt round to hold on to more equity in the company as it inches to being cash-flow positive. MemSQL — the relational, real-time database used by organisations to query and analyse large pools […]

Hello and welcome back to our regular morning look at private companies, public markets and the gray space in between. Last Friday something very odd happened: the public debut of Kingsoft Cloud, a company that we’ve covered before. I’m nigh-incredulous about this IPO for the host of issues that we discussed when the company first […]

U.S. Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin sided with Tesla in its ongoing fight with Alameda County. Speaking to CNBC, Mnuchin said that California needs to work with Tesla so Musk can quickly and safely open Tesla’s Fremont factory. This comes after Musk sued the county it operates in to allow Tesla to restart manufacturing operations. In […]

The ongoing global COVID-19 pandemic has sparked a lot of activity around remote care, but a new project by Mount Sinai hospital, working in collaboration with Google’s Nest, shows how even on-premise care can be made safer using remote technologies. Clinicians at Mount Sinai have begun using Google Nest Cameras in patient rooms, to provide […]

Good morning friends, and welcome back to TechCrunch’s Equity Monday, a short-form audio hit to kickstart your week. Another weekend at home, another week’s starting from the same spot. How are you holding up? Do you miss your commute yet? Just want to get some breakfast from a kitchen other than your own? I feel you. […]

Hunter Walk thinks your TAM slide is stupid. That’s one viewpoint that the seed-stage investor shared with TechCrunch that made us laugh during our recent conversation. Walk joined us for an Extra Crunch Live chat late last week that was a mix of advice and insight about what the seed-stage Homebrew partner looks for in […]

Over 14.4 million adults over the age of 18 in the United States exhibited some kind of alcohol use disorder and only about 7.9 percent of those people received treatment. Alcohol-related deaths kill roughly 88,000 people in the U.S. — making it the third leading preventable cause of death in the country. And alcohol-related illnesses […]

In an episode of Extra Crunch Live last week, Roelof Botha expressed excitement not only about the shift to teleconference platforms like Zoom, but the apps and bots that may spring up on top of the Zoom ecosystem. Interestingly, Zoom just announced the results of its Marketplace App competition, with Docket taking first place. Docket […]

The Station is a weekly newsletter dedicated to all things transportation. Sign up here — just click The Station — to receive it every Saturday in your inbox. Hi and welcome back to The Station, I’m your host Kirsten Korosec, senior transportation reporter at TechCrunch. If you’re interested in all the future and present ways people […]

Shiprocket, a New Delhi-based logistics aggregator that works with direct-to-consumer sellers including several social media influencers, has raised $13 million in a new financing round as it looks to expand its platform overseas. Silicon Valley-based investment firm Tribe Capital led Shiprocket’s Series C financing round. Innoven Capital and existing investor Bertelsmann India Investments also participated […]

Primer, a U.K. fintech that wants to help merchants consolidate their payments stack and easily support new payment methods in the future, has quietly raised £3.8 million in funding. Leading its £3.2 million seed round is Balderton Capital — which mostly does Series A — with participation from Taavet Hinrikus, who co-founded and previously led […]

Vochi, a startup operating out of Belarus that’s created a “computer vision”-based video editing and effects app for mobile phones, has raised $1.5 million in seed funding. Leading the round is Ukraine-based Genesis Investments (backer of BetterMe and Jiji). It follows pre-seed funding in April 2019 from Bulba Ventures, where Vochi founder and CEO Ilya […]

Hummingbird Bioscience, a startup focused on developing new treatments for cancer and other diseases, announced today it has added $6 million to its previously announced Series B, bringing the round’s total to $25 million. The extension was led by SK Holdings, and included participation from returning investors including Heritas Capital and SEEDS Capital, the investment […]

Spotify has secured another deal in India to fill much of the remaining void in its catalog in the country. The Swedish music streaming service said on Monday it has partnered with Indian music label Saregama to bring more than 100,000 retro and new age songs in over 2 dozen languages to users in one […]

JobHopin, a Vietnam-based startup building an automated job-recruitment platform for Southeast Asia, announced today that it has closed a $2.45 million Series A. This brings JobHopin’s total raised so far to more than $3 million, from investors including SEMA Translink, KK Fund, Mynavi Corporation, Edulab Capital Partners, NKC Asia and Canaan Capital. Founded in 2017 […]

White House officials are talking to Intel and TSMC about building semiconductor foundries in the United States, according to a Wall Street Journal report. U.S. tech companies and the government have been trying to reduce the country’s dependence on chip factories in Asia for years, underscored by national security concerns, the U.S.-China tariff war and […]

The head of what is arguably private equity’s most successful technology investment firm — Vista Equity Partners — made a rare appearance on Meet The Press to discuss the steps that the country needs to take to help minority-owned businesses recover from the economic collapse caused by the COVID-19 epidemic. Robert F. Smith is one […]

Jon Evans Contributor Jon Evans is the CTO of the engineering consultancy HappyFunCorp; the award-winning author of six novels, one graphic novel, and a book of travel writing; and TechCrunch's weekend columnist since 2010. More posts by this contributor Let housing rise from the empty offices and malls Magic Leap’s $2.6 billion bait and switch […]

“I just think change unfairly favors the startup, the nimble small company,” says Roelof Botha. The Sequoia partner, whose portfolio includes Unity, 23andMe, Instagram, Instacart, Xoom and YouTube, says he’s hopeful about the opportunities this pandemic has created for companies across a variety of sectors, including healthcare, cloud computing, social and others. We spoke for […]

“Upload” feels like a slight, funny show — until you realize that without the jokes, the story would be unwatchably bleak. The Amazon Prime Video series (created by Greg Daniels of “The Office,” “Parks & Recreation” and the upcoming “Space Force”) takes place in a near future where people can upload digital copies of themselves […]

Tesla filed a lawsuit Saturday against Alameda County in an effort to invalidate orders that have prevented the automaker from reopening its factory in Fremont, California. The lawsuit, which seeks injunctive and declaratory relief against Alameda County, was first reported by CNBC. The lawsuit was filed in U.S. District Court for California’s Northern District. Earlier […]

A specific type of small startup has a window to raise crowdfunding in a somewhat less regulated way than normally required in the US based on a temporary set of rule changes by the SEC announced this week. Excited yet?

Tesla CEO Elon Musk said Saturday the company will file a lawsuit against Alameda County and threatened to move its headquarters and future programs to Texas or Nevada immediately, escalating a fight between the company and health officials over whether its factory in Fremont can reopen. Tesla had planned to bring back about 30% of […]

We continue to look at how the coronavirus outbreak is impacting mobile apps; that big app crash caused by Facebook; new app releases from Facebook and Google; and Apple's plans to move WWDC online.

Given the endless drumbeat of layoff announcements — with deep cuts by Airbnb and Uber garnering much of the industry’s attention this week — it’s reasonable to wonder: what happens to all of the talent that’s being laid off? How does the changing supply and demand balance impact pay? Is anyone safe in this market? […]

A data breach at the U.S. Marshals Service exposed the personal information of current and former prisoners, TechCrunch has learned. A letter sent to those affected, and obtained by TechCrunch, said the Justice Department notified the U.S. Marshals on December 30, 2019 of a data breach affecting a public-facing server storing personal information on current […]

California Governor Gavin Newsom announced Friday that his state would issue a mail-in ballot to every registered voter for November’s election. Newsom issued the decision as an executive order in coordination with other California officials. The order will require all county election officials to provide mail-in ballots to voters, but it also provisions for in-person […]

The original Go was a mostly well-received addition to the Surface line when it arrived in late 2018. It was a nice, pint-sized alternatively, positioned fairly well to serve as a secondary device for some. It did the convertible double duty and traveled well, but otherwise was lacking in guts and versatility. Launching at the […]

Chris Lynch, a founder and former general partner at Boston-based seed-stage fund Accomplice, remembers “VC Mountain in Waltham.” Back then, entrepreneurs on funding quests would visit a building overlooking the Waltham Reservoir near Boston where they pitched to a few investors: Matrix Partners, Charles River Ventures and Highland Capital Partners. “And if they didn’t invest in […]

Four years ago, Adnan Asar, the founder of the new addiction prevention service Lucid Lane, was enjoying a successful career working as the founding chief technology officer at Livongo Health. It was the serial senior tech executive’s most recent job after a long stint at Shutterfly and he was shepherding the company through the development […]

We’re not letting this pandemic disrupt Disrupt SF 2020. Like any determined early-stage startup founder, we’re adapting and moving forward. Can’t join us in person on September 14-16? No problem. Take advantage of Digital Startup Alley, a completely new way to disrupt. Place your startup in front of influential movers and shakers and keep your […]

Tesla has not been given the “green light” to open its factory in Fremont, Calif., Alameda County Health Officer Dr. Erica Pan said in a videostreamed town hall meeting Friday. Tesla made plans to open as early as Friday in defiance of the county’s extended stay-at-home order. Tesla said in an internal email sent to […]

Saar Gur is adept at identifying the next big consumer trends earlier than most: The San Francisco-based general partner at CRV has led investments into leading consumer internet companies like Niantic, DoorDash, Bird, Dropbox, Patreon, Kapwing and ClassPass. His own experience stuck at home during the COVID-19 pandemic spurred his interest in three new investment […]

Google today launched an update to its Duo video chat app (which you definitely shouldn’t confuse with Hangouts or Google Meet, Google’s other video, audio and text chat apps). There are plenty of jokes to be made about Google’s plethora of chat options, but Duo is trying to be a bit different from Hangouts and […]

Uber has pushed its target to achieve a measure of profitability to a quarter in 2021, reversing a decision made just three months ago to move up the goal to the end of this year. Uber will miss its target to reach an adjusted EBITDA quarterly profit in the fourth period of 2020, CFO Nelson […]

As the infrastructure for developing games becomes more advanced, studios have turned to buying best-in-class technology from others instead of building everything from scratch (often with inferior quality). This shift underpinned Unity’s rise as the most popular game engine. The current focus on games as ever-evolving social hubs that can remain popular for a decade […]

Tesla is aiming to ramp up “limited operations” at its factory in Fremont, Calif., a decision that puts the company and its CEO Elon Musk in direct conflict with a stay-at-home order in Alameda County. Employees received two emails — one from Musk and another from Valerie Workman, the company’s human resources director — indicating […]

After months of testing, Facebook’s redesign is finally official. Announced last year at F8, the more minimalist approach to its desktop design has been rolled out in waves. In March, the company added an option to try out the new version. Users could switch back and leave feedback for why they had done so. This […]

Target makes another acquisition, social platforms struggle with a “Plandemic” conspiracy video and Boston Dynamics’ robot Spot encourages social distancing. Here’s your Daily Crunch for May 8, 2020. 1. Target to acquire same-day delivery tech from Deliv Target, which already owns on-demand delivery service Shipt, is in the process of acquiring technology assets from same-day […]

Let's take a look at why the SaaS cohort is the apple of Wall Street's eye.

Since announcing the commercial availability of Spot, Boston Dynamics has presented a range of different gigs for the robot, from construction to telepresence. Last month, the company announced it was partnering with local hospitals interested in using the platform to perform remote visits for COVID-19 victims. Turns out the global pandemic has spurred all manner […]

Microsoft and Amazon are at it again as the fight for the Defense Department JEDI contract continues. In a recent series of increasingly acerbic pronouncements, the two companies continue their ongoing spat over the $10 billion, decade-long JEDI contract spoils. As you may recall (or not), last fall in a surprise move, the DoD selected […]

Hello and welcome back to Equity, TechCrunch’s venture capital-focused podcast, where we unpack the numbers behind the headlines. Every week we write this post with some opening line akin to wow, what a week, huh? This is yet another one of those weeks. Perhaps this is just life now, and every week will stretch before us, similar to […]

“Is Greta Thunberg a hypocrite?” Google that phrase and you will get thousands of results. It just goes to show that, to a large extent, the “Q&A” model is broken on the internet. Where once Yahoo Answers and Quora were considered the bright young things of Web 2.0’s “Read/Write Web”, today there is only the […]

Xiaomi, Vivo, Samsung, Oppo and other smartphone companies have received approval from some state governments in India to partially resume manufacturing and assembling of devices amid the ongoing lockdown in the world’s second largest handset market that completely shut operations at these plants in late March. The companies said that they have secured permission to […]

China is showing renewed interest in live streaming. As the coronavirus swept through the country and shut down premises in droves, businesses are turning online to drive sales. Many have adopted live streaming, a model that predates the short videos that dominate many of our mobile screens now. Ecommerce titans like Alibaba, JD.com and Pinduoduo […]