TechCrunch Industry News

Last year, Instagram unveiled Shops as part of Facebook’s larger pivot toward e-commerce. Shops is front-and-almost-center on the app’s bottom navigation bar, even more readily accessible than the button to upload a new photo. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

During a banner year for connected fitness, Peloton stumbled, as its two treadmills – the Tread+ and Tread – drew the scrutiny of the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC). The two eventually collaborated for the planned recall of 125,000 Tread+ units, while offering fixes to 6,450 Treads. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Microsoft is moving into the next phase of its plan to bring Xbox Cloud Gaming to as many devices as possible, bringing it to Xbox Series X/S and Xbox One consoles this holiday season. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

American automaker General Motors expanded its recall of Chevrolet Bolt electric vehicles on Friday due to fire risks from battery manufacturing defects. The automaker said it would seek reimbursement from LG Chem, its battery cell manufacturing partner, for what it expects to be $1 billion worth of losses. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Cities like New York City, San Francisco and New Orleans are moving to enact COVID-19 vaccination requirements for indoor dining. So OpenTable, the online restaurant reservation service, is rolling out features to help restaurants streamline vaccination checks. Today, OpenTable announced a partnership with the biometric security company CLEAR, which allows users to create a digital […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

An Indian startup that operates a business-to-business marketplace for manufacturing items is the latest to attain the coveted unicorn status in the South Asian market. Bangalore-based Zetwerk said on Monday it has raised $150 million in a Series E financing round led by New York based D1 Capital Partners. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

If Spotify is still a growth-focused company, shouldn't it preserve its capital to invest in exclusive podcasts and the like — efforts that may grant it pricing power in the future? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Remember that weird Will Smith movie about robots? Yeah, neither do we. But Elon Musk does. Tesla is developing a 5’8” Tesla Bot, with a prototype expected sometime next year. The news comes during Tesla’s inaugural AI Day, which was streamed on the company’s website Thursday night. The bot is being proposed as a non-automotive […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Databricks, the open-source data lake and data management powerhouse has been on quite a financial run lately. Today Bloomberg reported the company could be raising a new round worth at least $1.5 billion at an otherworldly $38 billion valuation. That price tag is up $10 billion from its last fundraise in February when it snagged […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Needing to get your car fixed is like having a toothache: It’s painful, hard to ignore and likely means someone messing around under the hood. RepairSmith, launched in 2019, wants to make that process a little smoother through its mobile auto repair service that sends a mechanic right to the driver’s home. The startup is […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Waze might have a way to keep your kids entertained during a drive without handing them a tablet: distract them with your navigation app. The company has added a PAW Patrol experience. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Fortnite now boasts its own version of one of the pandemic’s hottest games. Fortnite-maker Epic just introduced into the game a new limited-time mode called Impostors; it follows the hit format that sent Among Us to Twitch’s front page — and Congress — during the pandemic’s earlier days. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

OnlyFans — the platform where adult creators can directly monetize their audience — is pushing its safe-for-work app OFTV, which is available on iOS and Google Play. The ad-free app launched in January, sharing over 800 videos from OnlyFans creators, like cooking tutorials, yoga routines, and interviews. But this week will be the first time […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

EV startup Canoo has hired hundreds of employees and is homing in on a production date, but critical milestones including landing a battery supplier remain, according to the company’s second quarter earnings report. Canoo’s earnings report comes just a few weeks after the company’s first investor relations day when it named Dutch company VDL Nedcar […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Blue Origin, the space company helmed by billionaire Jeff Bezos, is taking NASA to court. The company filed a complaint with a federal claims court on Monday over the agency’s decision to award a lunar lander contract solely to rival company SpaceX. The complaint, which Blue Origin successfully petitioned to have sealed, says NASA’s evaluation […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Way back in January 2020, Sonos sued Google over patent infringement. Today, the streaming speaker company scored an early victory with the U.S. International Trade Commission. A preliminary ruling penned by ITC chief administrative law judge Charles Bullock finds that Google infringed on five patents. “Today the ALJ has found all five of Sonos’ asserted […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

After all the leaks and teases, Lamborghini has finally announced its new hybrid-engine Countach. Thankfully, almost everything you need to know about the car is in its model designation: LPI 800-4. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Foxconn is getting more serious about its electric vehicle ambitions. The company told investors during an earnings call that it plans to build EV factories in the US and Thailand in 2022. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Full-size pickup trucks are the meat of the U.S. automotive business; it’s a red-hot category with the Ford F-150 leading the pack in sales and the Chevrolet Silverado and Ram pickups fast followers. But the air is thin at the top. What’s often lost in truck coverage is how fiercely automakers compete to woo discerning […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Earlier this year, Reddit raised $250 million, bringing the 16-year-old site up to around $800 million in total funding. Today, it announced plans for an even more massive windfall, with a Series F led by Fidelity. The company has secured $410 million, with plans to raise up to $700 million. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Archer Aviation is seeking $1 billion in damages from Wisk Aero, according to court filings Tuesday, significantly escalating the ongoing legal battle between the two air taxi rivals. Wisk “deployed a knowingly false extra-judicial smear campaign that projected stand-alone defamatory statements about Archer to the world,” the filing says. On this basis, Archer claims that […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Impossible sent me a tube of its plant-based sausage to try ahead of today’s news. As an aside, the big box with several frozen packs inside was maybe not the most efficient way to send it, but I don’t know, maybe there’s no great way to send frozen foodstuffs. Someone feel free to disrupt that […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This morning, Wix announced a new product for business owners called Branded App by Wix, which allows users to develop native apps without writing code. The publicly-traded company provides tools for people and businesses to manage their online presence, but it’s most well-known for its drag-and-drop website builder. Now, the platform is expanding its user-friendly […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Leafly is turning to a SPAC with Merdia Merger Corp. I to go public. The deal, valued at about $532 million and expected to generate proceeds of up to $161.5 million, includes Leafly’s recent capital raise of $31.5 million from investors. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Ariana Grande strutted and soared around a candy-colored series of Fortnite sets in Epic’s latest major in-game live music event. The multi-day “tour” offered gamers and Grande fans alike plenty to enjoy while showcasing Epic’s impressively smooth and visually inventive vision for live events that millions of people can enjoy simultaneously. Fortnite players have known […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Siga OT Solutions, an Israeli cybersecurity startup that helps organizations secure their operations by monitoring the raw electric signals of critical industrial assets, has raised $8.1 million in Series B funding. Siga’s SigaGuard says its technology, used by Israel’s critical water facilities and the New York Power Authority, is unique in that rather than monitoring […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Yesterday’s leak didn’t leave much to the imagination. And today’s big Nest reveal confirms pretty much everything we saw — which is precisely what happens when Google’s the one doing the leaking. Still, this morning’s announcement marks one of the biggest refreshes to Google’s home security line in recent memory, with updates to various configurations […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

UK-based open banking bulk payment startup Comma has raised £4.34 million ($6m) in a Seed round of funding led by Octopus Ventures and Connect Ventures. They were joined by investors Village Global, and the founders of Wagestream, Peter Briffet and Portman Wills. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Fleets weren’t long for this world, but Twitter’s product teams aren’t slowing down on bringing new stuff to Spaces, the company’s own take on audio rooms. Twitter introduced Spaces in a limited test last year, expanding the Clubhouse copycat feature more broadly to anyone with at least 600 followers in May. Now, Twitter is giving […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Heatworks has at long last opened pre-orders for the Tetra, a countertop dishwasher that debuted at CES 2018. The Tetra doesn't require any plumbing, just an electrical outlet. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Ever considerate of its users, Facebook has determined that its privacy settings needed a bit of a shuffle to keep things clear and easy to find. To that end they’ve taken the “privacy settings” settings and scattered them mischievously among the other categories. “We’ve redesigned our entire settings menu on mobile devices from top to […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

For mobile users, Discord is adding one new feature that you’d find on a more traditional social app. The company rolled out an option for users to customize their profiles across its iOS and Android apps Tuesday, following the feature’s release on the desktop version of Discord in late June. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Three-and-half months after launching the Magic Keyboard with Touch ID, Apple is finally breaking it out from its iMac bundle. The accessory is now available as a standalone, through Apple Stores and the company’s site. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

After months of testing with upwards of 100,000 beta testers, Citizen today is launching its premium Protect offering for all users. The subscription service runs $20 a month and opens up a number of features on the app. Chief among the new paid features is a “Get Agent” button, which offers access to a Citizen […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

While the company isn’t revealing everything about it just yet, this morning Google gave the world its first official peek at its next flagship phone: the Pixel 6. Here’s what we know so far: It’ll come in two forms: Pixel 6 and Pixel 6 Pro. The base 6 will have a matte aluminum finish with […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Columbus, Ohio-based Finite State, a startup that provides supply chain security for connected devices and critical infrastructure, has raised $30M in Series B funding. The funding lands amid increased focus on the less-secure elements in an organizations’ supply chain, such as Internet of Things devices and embedded systems. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Apple is responding to user complaints and feedback about the controversial changes to the Safari mobile browser with today’s launch of iOS 15 and iPadOS 15 beta 4. The new Safari design first introduced at WWDC had moved the tab bar (URL bar) to the bottom of the screen — a fairly radical change for […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

As we’ve known for about a week, today was the day Panic’s charming/whacky/curious/all-of-the-above Playdate gaming device (and its crank!) went up for pre-order. The buzz around the little retro-inspired handheld seemed strong — but would that translate into actual sales? Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

It’s always exciting to see a new company enter the consumer hardware space — and deliver a solid first product out of the game. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Rocket Lab is back in business launching rockets, after an issue during its last launch in May caused a total loss of the payloads on board. The company was quick to investigate the issue, and announced just over a week ago that it had completed that work, identified the problem and implemented corrective action to […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Electric air taxi startup Lilium has tapped German manufacturer Customcell to supply batteries for its flagship 7-seater Lilium Jet. The battery IP is the result of “multiple players,” a Lilium spokesperson told TechCrunch, but the manufacturing will be the sole job of Customcells. While Lilium declined to specify the number of battery systems as part […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Today after the bell amidst a deluge of major technology company earnings reports, Alphabet reported its own second-quarter performance. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

It’s been just over five months since Carl Pei first told the world about Nothing. Perhaps it’s just the way time moves these days or maybe it’s the fact that the company has trickled out information in the intervening months. Whatever the case, it feels like we’ve been waiting on today’s full Ear (1) reveal […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Polestar plans to launch in nine more markets this year, doubling its global presence as it seeks to sell more of its electric sedans. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The next time someone jokes at a cocktail party about Elizabeth Holmes’ baritone voice, remind them how dumb is it that we give more money to people with deep voices. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

It takes a really specific consumer to buy an Android phone, yet use Apple Music. But the small overlap in that venn diagram may be getting bigger. Last month at WWDC, Apple unveiled a free update for Apple Music subscribers that added lossless audio streaming and spatial audio with support for Dolby Atmos. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Conventional wisdom holds that one ought let sleeping does lie. But no one says you’re barred from tracking them while they do. New York-based smart collar maker Fi announced today that it’s adding sleep to the list of the device’s tracking. The added feature uses the collar’s on-board motion sensing to monitor your best friend’s […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

With a couple of generations of wireless earbuds under its belt, OnePlus finally has the AirPods Pro — and the rest of the premium market — in its sights. As part of an event today that also includes the launch of its budget Nord 2, the company officially announced the OnePlus Buds Pro. The top-line […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Playdate, the adorable whimsy-and-nostalgia-box/handheld game system built by Panic (with some help from Teenage Engineering), has taken one more big step toward reality: it has an official pre-order date. And it’s soon! The company announced this morning that pre-orders for the handheld will go live on July 29th at 10 a.m pacific. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Fintech startup Upgrade is launching a new credit card today. The Upgrade Bitcoin Rewards Card is a classic Visa credit card that works across the Visa network. But you get 1.5% in bitcoin rewards when you make payments. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices