Crunch Hype

The crowded world of subscription businesses offers ongoing opportunities to screw up your relationship with subscribers. At Disrupt San Francisco 2019, I spoke with Forerunner Ventures’ Eurie Kim, Lola CEO Alex Friedman and KiwiCo CEO Sandra Oh Lin about key issues and priorities for scaling a subscription service post-launch. A primary theme: building relationships with […]

Shipwell, the software platform for managing trucking logistics, has raised $35 million and is expanding its suite of services to become a full-service hub for logistics management. The new round led by Georgian Partners comes as the company has just expanded its suite of tracking and management tools to integrate with FedEx’s parcel shipping services. […]

Spotify recently added a feature that will occasionally pop up a full-screen recommendation of a new album the service thinks you’ll like, based on a combination of your listening taste and human curation. Now, it’s going to allow artists and their teams to pay to target their fans through this same feature, effectively turning the […]

Ahead of the launch of Apple TV+ on November 1, Apple’s Apple TV app has begun to roll out to other platforms beyond Apple’s own streaming media player, Mac computers, and iOS devices. Earlier this month, for example, the app arrived on Roku devices. Today, it’s hitting Fire TV Stick and Fire TV Stick 4K. Specifically, […]

With $11 million in funding and a mission to open up the doors of regenerative therapies to dogs across the nation, the Los Angeles based startup Gallant is now opening its doors for the first time. The company was founded by DogVacay founder and chief executive Aaron Hirschhorn after seeing his own pet’s struggle with […]

Mobile banking app Current, which began as a teen debit card controlled by parents, expanded to offer personal checking accounts earlier this year. Now the company says it has grown to host over 500,000 accounts on its service and has closed on $20 million in Series B funding to further its growth. The round included […]

Richard Branson’s Virgin Galactic wil find out what the public markets think of its ambitious plan to make commercial space tourism a reality on Monday. The company’s shareholders have approved a merger announced earlier this year with Chamath Palihapitiya’s special Social Capital Hedosophia holding company, and that will take effect Friday, followed by a debut […]

If you thought storming into a highly secured government facility with your electronics but without permission was a smart idea, you’d be wrong. But that didn’t stop Rep. Matt Gaetz and close to three-dozen of his Republican colleagues on Wednesday from doing exactly that. Gaetz, a Republican congressman from Florida, proudly announced in his tweets: […]

Randori, a Boston-based start-up from a former Carbon Black executive and a former Red Team consultant, announced its first product today called Randori Recon, a service designed to act with a hacker’s mindset to surface all of your company’s external weaknesses. Brian Hazzard, co-founder and CEO, says he had worked with his co-founder David Wolpoff […]

It’s no secret that the art of customer service in the modern era is something that banks desperately need help with. One of the reasons why challenger banks have been able to find acceptance, new customers and — well — the ability to challenge existing banking companies is the mistreatment customers receive from their existing […]

HelloOffice, a new real estate brokerage business out of San Francisco, has nabbed $6.5 million in new financing and is absconding down to Los Angeles to open its first regional office. The company provides software to expedite the often painful (especially in San Francisco) task of finding office space (not the Mike Judge movie, which […]

Influencer marketing and the related area of spon con have become a cornerstone of how the internet’s wheels spin: personalities attract traffic and buzz, and help shift not just sentiment but often products for brands, giving boosts both to online engagement and commerce. Now, a London startup called Verve, which plays on the influencer theme […]

Grafana Labs, the commercial company built to support the open source Grafana project, announced a healthy $24 million Series A investment today. Lightspeed Venture Partners led the round with participation from Lead Edge Capital. Company CEO and co-founder Raj Dutt, says the startup started life as a way to offer a commercial layer on top […]

Data security startup Very Good Security, has raised $35 million in its latest round of funding. Its Series B, announced Thursday, was led by Goldman Sachs, with participation from existing investors Andreessen Horowitz — which led its $8.5 million Series A round — and Vertex Ventures US. Very Good Security’s offering is simple. Instead of […]

Disrupt Berlin is right around the corner. And there is plenty to look forward to. Join us December 11 and December 12 to hear from industry leaders, investors, and bright stars in the startup world. We’ll sit down with CEOs from big-name companies such as Away, UIPath, and Naspers, as well as leading investors from […]

Twitter today reported its earnings for the quarter that ended September 30, and the numbers delivered a big surprise, falling on both sales and earnings per share. Revenues came in at $824 million, and EPS at $0.05. That represents sales up 9% year-over-year but far below what analysts had been expecting: (non-GAAP, diluted) EPS of 20 […]

The contract between the UK’s National Health Service (NHS) and ecommerce giant Amazon — for a health information licensing partnership involving its Alexa voice AI — has been released following a Freedom of Information request. The government announced the partnership this summer. But the date on the contract, which was published on the gov.uk contracts […]

Security researchers have found dozens of Android apps in the Google Play store serving ads to unsuspecting victims as part of a money-making scheme. ESET researchers found 42 apps containing adware, which they say have been downloaded over 8 million times since they first debuted in July 2018. These apps look normal but act sneakily. […]

Netflix is ready to take its lower-cost, mobile-only plan beyond India as it looks to expand the reach of its service in other international markets. The American on-demand video streaming giant today launched a new price tier in Malaysia that would allow people in the nation to access the video service for RM 17 ($4) […]

Tines, a Dublin-based startup that lets companies automate aspects of their cybersecurity, has raised $4.1 million in Series A funding. Leading the round is Blossom Capital, the venture capital firm co-founded by ex-Index Ventures and LocalGlobe VC Ophelia Brown. Founded in February 2018 by ex-eBay, PayPal and DocuSign security engineer Eoin Hinchy, who was subsequently […]

Naspers’ 1.4 billion rand (≈$100 million) VC fund to support South African startups — Naspers Foundry — is accepting pitches, after making its first investment in online cleaning services company SweepSouth. The funding initiative also has a new leader, Phuthi Mahanyele-Dabengwa, who joined Naspers in July as a CEO reporting to Group CEO of Naspers, […]

Amazon has acquired Health Navigator, a startup that develops APIs for online health services. According to CNBC, which first reported the deal, Health Navigator will become part of Amazon Care, its pilot healthcare service program for employees. This is the second health startup acquired by Amazon. The first was online pharmacy PillPack, purchased by the […]

Microsoft posted quarterly results today that were well ahead of analysts’ expectations, but Azure’s growth rate continues to decline as it competes with AWS. The company’s revenue for the first quarter of the fiscal year rose 14% year-over-year to $33.1 billion. Net income increased 21% to $10.7 billion, or $1.38 per share. Revenue from Microsoft’s […]

PayPal reported third-quarter results today that were slightly ahead of analysts’ expectations, driven by an increase in total payment volume. The company’s quarterly revenue grew 19% year-over-year to $4.38 billion. Its GAAP net income was 39 cents per share, or $462 million, a 7% year-over-year increase. On a non-GAAP basis, net income was 61 cents […]

A couple of years ago, the cofounder and CEO of a blood-testing company was publicly taken to task for implying in articles and professional profiles that he has a PhD when in reality, he’d left a prestigious graduate group three years after enrolling, without a degree. The CEO is hardly alone in intentionally or otherwise […]

Tesla CEO Elon Musk forecast that the company’s energy business will eventually be the same size as— or even bigger than — its automotive sector, the latest sign that the company plans to put more time and resources to scaling up its solar and storage products. “It could be bigger, but it will certainly be of a similar […]

Tesla continues to produce the Model S and Model X more for “sentimental reasons than anything else,” CEO Elon Musk said Wednesday during a call with investors, calling the electric vehicles “niche” products. “They are really of minor importance to future,” Musk added. Sales of Tesla Model 3 vehicles far outpace its the company’s older […]

London-based fintech startup Revolut has two pieces of news to announce this week. First, Revolut is expanding to Singapore after a long beta period. The company already has 30,000 customers there and anyone can open an account now. Singapore residents will be able to take advantage of all of Revolut’s core features. You can open […]

Tesla CEO Elon Musk said on the company’s earnings call today that the company’s full self-driving mode, in a feature-complete release, could arrive as early as the end of this year. That would be made available in an ‘early access’ mode which is essentially a limited beta, and Musk qualified that this isn’t a sure […]

Bill McDermott has landed. Two weeks ago, he stepped down as CEO at SAP after a decade leading the company. Yesterday, ServiceNow announced that he will be its new CEO. It’s unclear how quickly the move came together but the plan for him is clear: to scale revenue like he did in his last job. […]

Tesla has started trial production of its Model 3 vehicle in its new Shanghai factory, which CEO Elon Musk called a “template for future growth.” This trial basis includes all aspects of production, including body, paint and general assembly. Tesla said it is clearing final regulatory hurdles such as finalizing its manufacturing license. Once complete, […]

Following the introduction of its digital well-being tools for Android at Google’s I/O developer conference last year, the company has since expanded the feature set to include new options, like Focus mode and better parental controls for families with children. Now, Google is trying something new. The company today introduced a set of “experimental” apps […]

The price of Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies tanked today, continuing a months-long slide that has seen the value of the digital currency slide by more than $2,000 from highs of above $10,000 earlier in the year. Investors are still speculating about the cause of the crash, but hopeful cryptocurrency bulls before today had hoped that […]

Founders start a company because they have an idea they want to bring to market. For a first-time founder, it can be overwhelming to develop a cap table and make all related decisions.

Koan, a three-year-old online platform that aims to help teams achieve their objectives and stay engaged, has raised $3 million in seed funding led by Uncork Capital and Crosslink. Koan, co-founded and led by CEO Matt Tucker — who previously cofounded Jive Software, an outfit that made social software for businesses and went public in […]

Personal finance startup Truebill announced today that it has raised $15 million in Series B funding. The new funding was led by Eldridge Industries, with participation from Evolution VC and previous investors, including Cota Capital, Lucas Venture Group and YouTube co-founder Jawed Karim. When the Y Combinator-backed startup raised seed funding back in 2016, it was […]

Natalie Massenet, the fashion entrepreneur who founded the designer fashion portal Net-a-Porter, chaired the British Fashion Council for four years and today runs Imaginary Ventures, a venture firm that’s focused on consumer startups, took the stage a bit ago at Vanity Fair’s New Establishment Summit. There, she was asked why Imaginary has funded more women […]

U.K.-based lunar rover startup Spacebit, a company developing robotic exploration hardware for use on the Moon, announced two new partners that will help it develop and finalize its technology ahead of its target mission date of 2021. The Ecuadorian Civilian Space Agency (EXA) and Mexico’s Dereum will be providing the technology that Spacebit will employ […]

Y Combinator graduate Vendr helps companies manage and renew enterprise software.

Employee onboarding isn’t all desk balloons and company T-shirts — it’s a critical moment when new hires begin integrating into the culture and workflows of their new company. So, it’s no surprise that one of the most frequently-asked questions among first-time founders is how to run a successful onboarding process.

America has an addiction problem. It’s a problem that serial entrepreneur Josh Bruno has seen first hand. And it’s why he has launched a new company called Path, which pitches access to specialized substance addiction treatment professionals as an employee health benefit, to do something about it. “I have unfortunately lost five friends now to […]

A small number of prolific U.S. Twitter users create the majority of tweets, and that extends to Twitter discussions around politics, according to a new report from the Pew Research Center out today. Building on an earlier study, which discovered that 10% of users created 80% of tweets from U.S. adults, the organization today says […]

In a perfect example of a small, new space startup teaming up with a legacy industry heavyweight with plenty of experience, Firefly is teaming up with Aerojet Rocketdyne. Firefly Aerospace was founded in 2013, and has raised $21.6 million so far to bring its first product, the Alpha small satellite launch vehicle, to market. Firefly […]

The Daily Crunch is TechCrunch’s roundup of our biggest and most important stories. If you’d like to get this delivered to your inbox every day at around 9am Pacific, you can subscribe here. 1. WeWork confirms an up to $8 billion lifeline from SoftBank Group; names new executive chairman Confirming earlier reports, The We Company […]

OnePlus’ 5G strategy has marked something of a shift for a company that has traditionally prided itself in a slow and steady approach to new features. Following the arrival of the OnePlus 7 Pro 5G this summer, the company is announcing its second 5G device for the U.S. market. This time, it’s opted for its […]

India said on Wednesday it plans to spend nearly $6 billion to revive loss-making state-funded telecom operators Bharat Sanchar Nigam Ltd (BSNL) and Mahanagar Telephone Nigam Ltd (MTNL). In a press conference, telecom minister Ravi Shankar Prasad said today the Narendra Modi government has given its in-principle approval to the merger of BSNL and MTNL […]

Harnessing new networking technologies that can turn any real-estate developer into their own wireless internet service provider, Wander is launching a $25 per month high-speed networking service for the lucky citizens of Santa Monica, Calif. The brainchild of a former Disney analyst, David Fields, and a former Intuit engineer, Dan Rahmel, Wander uses low-cost wireless […]