Crunch Hype

Maybe there will be some surprises at next week’s Google event. At this rate, however, we’re not entirely optimistic at the prospect. Just as the Pixel 3 got the full hands-on treatment in Hong Kong, a new contender has emerged. Like a number of recent leaks, these new renders of the Pixel Slate come courtesy […]

In what might be the most ridiculous stunt ever pulled in the art world, a Banksy piece has, in a sense, self-destructed. Right in front of an audience of would-be buyers. A framed canvas version of Banksy’s Girl with Balloon was set to be auctioned at Sothebys in London. As the auction came to a […]

Apple, Amazon and Microsoft have already held their big fall events — and now it’s Google’s turn. Over the past couple of years, the October event has become an increasingly important platform, as the company continues to press into various hardware categories. And really, it’s Google’s last chance to make a big splash ahead of […]

A few day after making the latest version of Windows 10 available to users, Microsoft has suspended the update, citing multiple reports of user data loss. “We have paused the rollout of the Windows 10 October 2018 Update (version 1809) for all users as we investigate isolated reports of users missing some files after updating,” […]

The best apps and online services are helpful tools that seamlessly integrate into everyday life. We’ve gathered some of our recommendations that can help with tracking your work, improving on sleep, and taking a mental break.

On Tuesday, Tencent Music Entertainment filed for an IPO in the US that is expected to value it in the $25-30 billion range, on par with Spotify’s IPO in April. The filing highlights just how different its social interaction and digital goods business is from the subscription models of leading music streaming services in Western […]

Quartet Health, a startup backed with nearly $100 million from GV, Oak HC/FT and more, has quietly lost its COO, CPO and replaced its CEO this month.

Henrique Dubugras and Pedro Franceschi, the co-founders of Brex, have raised $125 million at a $1.1 billion valuation just four months after the startup's public launch.

Amazon has sold a lot of Echo Dots. Like a crazy, silly, unfathomable number of the things. Over the past two generations, it has arguably become the single-largest driver of the smart speaker craze. There’s nothing exceptional about the product, of course. It’s a simply designed hockey puck of a product, designed to mostly stay […]

After a few months of hype, version 9.0 of the software that runs on Teslas is rolling out starting today. There’s a bit of a catch, though: one of the bigger expected features — one that would let Tesla’s autopilot handle passing cars and automatically make highway interchanges — is being delayed for now. So […]

Facebook Messenger could soon let you use your voice to dictate and send messages, initiate voice calls and create reminders. Messenger for Android’s code reveals a new M assistant button atop the message thread screen that activates listening for voice commands for those functionalities. Voice control could make Messenger simpler to use hands-free or while […]

For a lot of consumers, Pokémon GO wasn’t their first exposure to augmented reality — it was the dog-selfie lens inside Snapchat. In the past few years, consumer use hasn’t evolved too heavily when it comes to what people are actually using AR for, even though technical capabilities have taken some giant leaps. Snap was an […]

Outside the crop of construction cranes that now dot Vancouver’s bright, downtown greenways, in a suburban business park that reminds you more of dentists and tax preparers, is a small office building belonging to D-Wave. This office — squat, angular and sun-dappled one recent cool Autumn morning — is unique in that it contains an […]

Reelgood, a startup aimed at helping cord cutters find their next binge, is out today with its biggest update yet. The company has been developing its streaming guide over the past year to solve the issues around discovery that exist when consumers drop traditional pay TV in favor of streaming services like Netflix, Hulu, HBO, […]

Good news! California has passed a law banning default passwords like “admin,” “123456” and the old classic “password” in all new consumer electronics starting in 2020. Every new gadget built in the state from routers to smart home tech will have to come with “reasonable” security features out of the box. The law specifically calls […]

Shirish Sathaye has joined the enterprise-focused VC Cervin Ventures as a general partner. He remains a partner in Formation 8's second fund.

For the 37.5 million adults who have trouble hearing without a hearing aid, Bose has a new product for you. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration today approved audio technology company Bose to market a new hearing aid device. Dubbed the Bose Hearing Aid, it’s designed to let people with audio impairments fit, program and control the […]

It’s 2018, and pop culture is one giant ouroboros. Exhibit A: Wolverine: The Long Night, the new comic miniseries inspired by the podcast that was inspired by the comics. Is this a first? Maybe? Who can say? Who really cares anymore? Comics are pop culture now, and the nerds have definitively won the war, and […]

When consumers think of search, they mainly think of Google, but under the hood of enterprises and other organizations, there are hundreds of other kinds of challenges that require search technology. Today, one of the bigger companies providing search functionality, Elastic, saw just how valuable that business can be, by way of a very strong […]

According to a new study conducted by the Center for American Entrepreneurship and NYU’s Shack Institute of Real Estate, the US may be losing its competitive advantage as the dominant nucleus of the startup and venture capital universe. The analysis, led by senior Brookings Institution fellow Ian Hathaway and “Rise of the Creative Class” author Richard Florida, examines the flow […]

The Gillmor Gang — Frank Radice, Keith Teare, Michael Markman, Denis Pombriant, and Steve Gillmor . Recorded live Sunday, September 23, 2018. Turn out or turn off, media as anesthesia, what it is until it isn’t. G3: Believe Me — Elisa Camahort Page, Francine Hardaway, Maria Ogneva and Tina Chase Gillmor. Recorded live Friday, September […]

Jake Bright Contributor Jake Bright is a writer and author in New York City. He is co-author of The Next Africa. More posts by this contributor Africa Roundup: Paga goes global and 4 startups raise $99M in VC Polestar unveils first production EV with aim to overtake Tesla If mobile money was the first phase […]

Magic Leap has announced they are acquiring Computes, a decentralized mesh computing startup. Terms of the deal weren’t disclosed. From Magic Leap’s blog post: From the beginning, Chris Matthieu and Jade Meskill started Computes, Inc. based on the principle of enabling the next generation of computing. We believe Magic Leap is the perfect home to […]

Cloud hosting company Scaleway is launching object storage in public beta. The company uses an Amazon S3-compatible API, which means you could easily replace your Amazon S3 bucket with a Scaleway bucket by changing the API end point. The basic object storage package starts at $5.75 per month (€5 per month), which includes 500GB of […]

Salesforce’s Marketing and Commerce Cloud is the company’s smallest division today, so to help beef it up, the company is making an acquisition to add in more features. Salesforce has acquired Rebel, a startup that develops interactive email services for businesses to enhance their direct marketing services: recipients of interactive emails can write reviews, shop and […]

Since its launch, one of the top complaints about YouTube’s live TV streaming service, YouTube TV, was that its DVR feature would often default users to the video-on-demand version of the show — which means you’d have to watch the commercials. It’s been one of the biggest drawbacks to YouTube TV, and a selling point for […]

Tim Merel Contributor Tim Merel is managing director of Digi-Capital. More posts by this contributor The Reality Ecosystem: What AR/VR/XR needs to go big China could beat America in AR/VR long-term Last year 30 leading venture investors told us about a fundamental shift from early stage North American VR investment to later stage Chinese computer vision/AR […]

Analytics company Mixpanel is currently tracking the install base of iOS 12. And the latest version of iOS is quite popular as it’s already installed on roughly 47.6 percent of all iOS devices. 45.6 percent of devices still run iOS 11, and 6.9 percent of iOS users run an older version. Adoption rate is an […]

Deliverr, a startup that helps retailers offer a Prime-like delivery experience has raised a $7.1 million Series A led by Joe Londsdale’s 8VC, with participation from Zola founder Shan Lyn Ma, Flexport chief executive officer Ryan Peterson and others.

Statistically speaking, there are roughly five podcasts for every human on the face of the Earth. And now they all finally have a home on Spotify. The streaming music giant this week opened podcast submissions to everyone through the beta of Spotify for Podcasters platform. The submission process is wonderfully simple — In fact, I […]

Amazon’s Alexa app has just been given a major visual overhaul, largely focused on helping users set up and control their smart home. From the app’s new devices tab, users can view all their different Alexa-enabled devices and groups on one screen, as opposed to switching between tabs like before. And the app is much […]

Hello and welcome back to Equity, TechCrunch’s venture capital-focused podcast, where we unpack the numbers behind the headlines. This week was a treat. We had Danny Crichton in the studio. We had Connie Loizos in the studio. I was in the studio. And our guest, the excellent Andy McLoughlin, a partner at UnCork Capital, was in the […]

Consumer messaging apps like WhatsApp are not only insanely popular for chatting with friends but have pushed deep into the workplace too, thanks to the speed and convenience they offer. They have even crept into hospitals, as time-strapped doctors reach for a quick and easy way to collaborate over patient cases on the ward. Yet […]

There’s concern for the freedom of the press in Hong Kong after the government declined to renew the visa of a veteran Financial Times’ editor, dealing an alarming blow to the country’s thriving journalism community. Victor Mallet, the FT’s Asia news editor who is also vice-president of the Foreign Correspondents’ Club, is effectively being expelled after he was […]

Forward Health, the U.K. startup that has built an app to help healthcare professionals communicate in a secure and compliant way, has picked up $3.9 million in seed funding. Leading the round is Stride.VC, the new VC fund from Fred Destin, formerly a Partner at Accel, and Harry Stebbings, producer of the “The Twenty Minute […]

Samsung’s last quarter of business saw its slowest growth of profits in a year thanks to weak sales of its flagship Galaxy S9 smartphone. But the company is about much more than just phones, and that’s why it is forecasting a record operating profit of nearly $15.5 billion for its upcoming Q3 results. The Korean […]

Adults, not teens. Messaging, not Stories. Developing markets, not the US. These are how Snapchat will make a comeback, according to CEO Evan Spiegel . In a 6,000-word internal memo from late September leaked to Cheddar’s Alex Heath, Spiegel attempts to revive employee morale with philosophy, tactics, and contrition as Snap’s share price sinks to […]

Polestar has started assembling verification prototypes of its upcoming plug-in hybrid sports car as Volvo’s standalone electric performance brand prepares to produce customer cars next year. Verification prototypes of the Polestar 1 vehicle, which are built largely by hand, mark the first testing phase for production. The vehicles will be crashed and driven through different kinds of […]

So long, Tronc. We hardly Tronced you. Why, it seems like only yesterday you Tronced into our world as an utterly insane “Pixels to Pulitzers” marketing video that was somehow too satirical to be satire. Today, Tronc confirmed rumors that its retrofuturist onomatopoetic name wasn’t long for this world. Soon, the company that owns the […]

This is sure to exacerbate fears that Facebook will further exploit Instagram now that its founders have resigned. Instagram has been spotted prototyping a new privacy setting that would allow it to share your location history with Facebook. That means your exact GPS coordinates collected by Instagram, even when you’re not using the app, would […]

Cities all over the world have been hit with the rise of on-demand services like Lyft, Uber, DoorDash, Postmates, Caviar and so many others in recent years. Last year, there were 5.4 million on-demand workers in the country. This year, there are an estimated 6.8 million people working in the on-demand economy, according to now-former Kleiner Perkins […]

I’ve said it right here on these very pages: If hardware is hard, robotics are next to impossible. That truism is not better exemplified by this week’s closure of Rethink Robotics. A well-respected name in automation, the Boston-based company produced a pair of robotics that have become mainstays in research facilities and warehouse floors alike. […]

On Thursday, Vice President Mike Pence called for Google to end its development of a search engine custom built to accommodate China’s disposition for censorship. Pence gave the speech at a conservative think tank in D.C., dipping into a range of anti-Beijing sentiments, from intellectual property concerns to tariffs and the trade war. Pence didn’t […]

Today’s bombshell Bloomberg story has the internet split: either the story is right, and reporters have uncovered one of the largest and jarring breaches of the U.S. tech industry by a foreign adversary… or it’s not, and a lot of people screwed up. To recap, Chinese spies reportedly infiltrated the supply chain and installed tiny […]

Tesla CEO Elon Musk trolled the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission in a tweet Thursday afternoon, poking the bear that just days before had agreed to settle securities fraud charges against the billionaire entrepreneur. The tweet, sent out at 1:16 pm PT Thursday, says: “Just want to that the Shortseller Enrichment Commission is doing incredible […]

When you send something to space, it's good to have redundancy. Sometimes you want to send two whole duplicate spacecraft just in case — as was the case with Voyager — but sometimes it's good enough to have two of critical components. Mars Rover Curiosity is no exception, and it is now in the process of switching from one main "brain" to the other so it can do digital surgery on the first.

Five years ago, no startups from Latin America were participating in prestigious U.S. accelerators. It seemed that Latin America was not yet on anyone’s radar. Nowadays, dozens of Latin American startups, principally from Colombia, are joining U.S. accelerators.

On the heels of Backstage Capital’s announcement to launch an accelerator for startups led by underrepresented founders, the venture capital firm has selected its fourth location. Backstage Capital decided on three of the cities ahead of time and held a public vote to determine the fourth. Well, the results are in and Backstage Capital has […]

2018 has been a good year for ridiculous, gargantuan LEGO builds. Just weeks ago, there was that life-size, driveable LEGO Bugatti. Now someone has gone and built a mega-sized recreation of Apple’s new Cupertino “spaceship” campus — otherwise known as Apple Park. Coming in at roughly 85,000 pieces, the build took designer Spencer_R a little […]

Tesla’s Autopilot is often touted as the most capable and advanced driver assistance system available on the market today. But in Consumer Reports’ view that honor actually goes to Cadillac’s Super Cruise. The consumer organization gave Super Cruise the top spot in its first-ever ranking of partially automated driving systems because it is the best at […]