TechCrunch Industry News
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PerchPeek raises $11M to woo ‘great resignation employees’ with easy relocation
Relocating employees can involve up to 20-30 different complex processes, while many of the support packages on the market can be inflexible and expensive. Plus, relocating services are usually only available to company leaders, not staff. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Better.com loses more senior execs as employees brace for another mass layoff
Things are getting worse at Better. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Walmart is expanding autonomous delivery pilot with GM’s Cruise this year
Cruise plans to expand the self-driving delivery pilot it has with Walmart in Arizona, the company’s senior government affairs manager said in a recent public meeting with state legislators. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Reusable packaging startup bags $3.1M to pick a fight with single-use packaging
Quick pop quiz: Is it better to recycle your cardboard boxes, or use a sturdier packaging bag that can be used again and again until it meets its maker again? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
New York’s Thrive Capital closes its eighth fund with a whopping $3 billion
Thrive Capital, the venture firm founded in 2009 by a then-25-year-old Joshua Kushner, says it has closed its eighth fund with approximately $3 billion in capital commitments, $500 of which it plans to invest in early-stage startups and another $2.5 billion that it has earmarked for later-stage companies. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Amazon reaches deal to continue accepting Visa payments worldwide
Amazon and Visa have resolved their simmering dispute over payment fees in the UK and elsewhere, Reuters has reported. Amazon threatened to stop accepting Visa in the UK starting January 19. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Blueland raises more money to avoid shipping water around and reduce single-use plastics
The cleaning products you use in your house are 99% water. Yes, the same stuff that comes out of the spigot at your house. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
New Waymo Via partnership gives it access to 200,000 shippers and carriers
Waymo Via, Waymo’s autonomous trucking and cargo unit, has found another long-term strategic partner to see it through to commercialization. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Stronghold launches $100M venture arm to invest in underrepresented founders and fintech
Payments infrastructure company Stronghold has launched a venture capital arm to deploy $100 million of its balance sheet capital in startups and funds in three core strategies. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Singapore-based alternative protein startup Next Gen Foods gets $100M Series A for U.S. growth
Alternative protein startups have attracted a lot of investor attention over the past couple of years and the trend looks set to continue. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Grubhub expands its ‘Grubhub Goods’ convenience offering nationwide
Food delivery app GrubHub is expanding its branded convenience offering nationwide, the company announced on Tuesday. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Gaia, a platform to finance IVF treatments, closes $20M Series A led by Atomico
Gaia is a startup that is effectively out to ‘de-risk’ the whole process of IVF fertility treatment, using products like personalized insurance and payment plans. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
3D social network BUD raises $15M in Series A+ round
Investors are justling to find the next killer app for the metaverse. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Chasing Cruise and Waymo, Chinese AV company AutoX plans to begin testing in San Francisco
AutoX, a Chinese autonomous vehicle company that has made plays in both the U.S. and its home country, is now making a move into San Francisco, an area where its biggest competitors are creeping towards commercialization. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Indiegogo will designate legit crowdfunders with a ‘Trust-Proven’ badge
Indiegogo has a trust problem. It’s something the company is keenly aware of. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Sardine’s algorithm helps crypto and fintech companies detect fraud
It’s a great time to be in the fraud detection business in crypto and fintech. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Tinder introduces a way for members to go on virtual ‘blind dates’
Tinder is bringing back the idea of the “blind date” through a new in-app feature, launching today. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
eAgronom closes $7.4M Series A to create a farming-based carbon credits platform
There are plenty of competitors in so-called FMS (Farm Management Software), but so far no global dominant leader has emerged. Agrivi has raised $7.3M, Granular $24.9M and Farmlogs $37M. So there’s clearly plenty of scope for more. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
SpaceX loses 40 Starlink satellites to a geomagnetic storm
80% of Starlink satellites launched by SpaceX on February 3 won't reach their intended orbit. SpaceX has revealed that a geomagnetic storm had a severe impact on the satellites. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Artiphon drops the hardware requirement for its musical camera app, Orbacam
We’ve been following Artiphon closely over the years. Back in late 2020, I took a liking to the music startup’s latest smart instrument, the Orba. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
American Express launches its first all-digital consumer checking account
American Express has launched its first all-digital consumer checking account, the company announced on Tuesday. The new offering, American Express Rewards Checking, is currently available for eligible U.S. Consumer Card Members. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Joby Aviation to launch air taxi service in South Korea
California-based electric vertical takeoff and landing startup Joby Aviation plans to offer an air taxi service in South Korea in partnership with SK Telecom (SKT), one of the country’s largest telecommunication companies. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
A Twitter slap fight goes wrong
Certain VCs who tweet a lot have grown a little vituperative of late, with some of the most powerful people in the industry lashing out in unprecedented ways. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Apple to charge 27% fee for Dutch dating apps using alternative payment options
Following a court order, developers working on dating apps don’t have to use Apple’s in-app purchase system in the Netherlands. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
In Ford’s transition to EVs, cost-cutting takes center stage
Ford has made cost-cutting a key piece of its EV strategy as the company works to improve profit margins while meeting what CEO Jim Farley has called “incredible demand” of its new electric vehicle models. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Blockchain bridge Wormhole confirms that exploiter stole $320 million worth of crypto assets
Wormhole, a popular cryptocurrency platform that offers bridges between multiple blockchains, announced on Twitter that it noticed an exploit. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Travel booking app Hopper upgrades its valuation to $5B on secondary sale
Hopper, the mobile travel booking startup and app that lets users book flights, hotels, cars, and — most recently — short-term home rentals a la Airbnb and VRBO, has been on a fast pace of growth in the wake of Covid-19 travel restrictions loosening up in the last year, with 70 million downloads to date. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
SpaceX reveals $500 monthly ‘Premium’ Starlink service with speeds up to 500 Mbps
SpaceX has a new tier for its Starlink satellite internet service with higher performance but pricing that might make your eyes water, called Starlink Premium, with speeds between 150 and 500Mbps. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
GM’s Chevy Silverado EV already has 110,000 reservations
General Motors said it has secured more than 110,000 reservations for its new all-electric Chevrolet Silverado, which includes reservations from more than 240 fleet operators, Chair and CEO Mary Barra said in the company’s full-year and fourth quarter earnings letter to shareholders. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Tesla recalls Full Self Driving feature that lets cars roll through stop signs
Tesla is issuing an over-the-air update to recall a "Full Self-Driving" (FSD) beta feature that allowed cars to roll through stop signs, which appeared in FSD 10.3. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Superpedestrian gets $125M to expand tech that corrects unsafe scooter riding
Shared e-scooter company Superpedestrian is gearing up to deploy its Pedestrian Defense safety system at scale, a feature that allows the company’s e-scooters to detect and correct unsafe riding behaviors, like riding on sidewalks or the wrong way down a one-way street, in real time. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
AllSpice thinks hardware developers lack their own ‘GitHub,’ so it is building one
The idea behind the company was to get engineers back to spending the majority of their time designing and building hardware products. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Joni Mitchell joins Neil Young, pulls her music from Spotify over vaccine misinformation
Spotify’s Joe Rogan headache is about to get a lot worse. Earlier this week, musician Neil Young announced that he would pull his music from the streaming service to protest Spotify’s relationship with Joe Rogan. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Google will let legacy G Suite users migrate to free Google accounts
Earlier this month, Google announced that it would kill free Google Workspace accounts that were using the G Suite legacy free edition. As spotted by Ars Technica and following customer backlash, Google has updated its support page and says that it plans to offer more options to existing users. Google Workspace as it exists today […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Amazon must pay $2M and end program after price-fixing investigation by Washington AG
Amazon must pay $2.25 million and permanently shut down a previously suspended sales program, following an investigation and lawsuit by the Attorney General of Washington alleging it was essentially price-fixing. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Compound aims to be a one-stop-shop for tech employees to manage their finances
Jordan Gonen and Jacob Schein had both worked in the tech industry for a few years when they realized they lacked a clear understanding of their own finances. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Apple will reportedly allow iPhones to accept contactless payments
Small businesses might soon be able to accept payments using their iPhones without extra hardware. Apple could start rolling out the feature through a software update in the next few months. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Paack pulls in a $225M Series D led by SoftBank to scale its E-commerce delivery platform
By now, many of us are familiar with the warehouse robots which populate those vast spaces occupied by the likes of Amazon and others. In particular, Amazon was very much a pioneer of the technology. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
FTC fines online shop $4M for hiding reviews below 4 stars
We all know online reviews must be taken with a grain of salt, but generally you’d like to think that a product with a 4.5-star average is better than one with a 3.5-star average. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Twitter’s experimental ‘Flock’ feature will let you share tweets with your closest friends
Twitter is still working on a feature that will give you a way to blast tweets that can only be seen by the friends you choose first revealed in July last year. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Starship Technologies picks up €50M from the EU’s investment arm to expand its fleet of autonomous delivery robots
Starship Technologies, one of the bigger names in the world of autonomous delivery robots — those little caboose-like, boxy delivery vehicles that self-drive around cities — has been on a roll during Covid-19. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Ola Electric valued at $5 billion in new funding
Ola Electric said on Monday it has raised $200 million in a new financing round even as the Indian ride-hailing giant’s spin off struggles to deliver its maiden electric scooter to customers and questions about its work culture are being raised. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
FarmRaise aims to become a financial services giant, starting with farm grants
You have to start somewhere. So when Jayce Hafner and Sami Tellatin bonded as Stanford MBA classmates over their shared belief that making U.S. farms more efficient would be good for farmers, good for the country, and a great business. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Peloton CEO acknowledges corrective actions, denies ‘halting all production’ of bikes and treadmills
Ahead of the company’s upcoming earnings, Peloton CEO John Foley took a break from a “quiet period” to address a number of reports related to poor device sales. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Netflix had its lowest year of subscriber growth since 2015
Despite producing global hits like “Squid Game” in 2021, Netflix’s fourth quarter returns show the streaming giant struggling to maintain a lead over its competitors. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Clench your jaw to skip a track: That’s the magic of Wisear
By adding some electrodes and some electronics to your earbuds, Wisear can make your music experience a lot more hands-free than before. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
French robotic exoskeleton maker Wandercraft eyes US expansion courtesy of a $45M Series C
Wandercraft was founded in 2012, with the vision of improving mobility of wheelchair users. The company’s solution comes by way of exoskeletons, which can offer wearers the ability to walk with robotic assistance. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Wrangle secures $2M to automate company workflows
The company’s no-code software can automate any kind of process: employee onboarding, contract approvals, help tickets or any other recurring work. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Harness releases open version of continuous delivery product with access to source code
Harness, a startup from AppDynamics founder Jyoti Bansal, has been building a platform of developer tools over the last five years. In 2020, the company made its first foray into open source when it bought continuous integration tool Drone. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices
Castiron serves up a $6M seed round to support ‘food artisans’
The pandemic hasn’t been easy for anyone, but the food service industry has been hit particularly hard. More than 90,000 restaurants and bars have closed, leaving workers unemployed in an already precarious industry. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices