Hey, friends! Welcome back to Week in Review, where every Saturday we recap a handful of the top TechCrunch stories from the past seven days. Want it in your inbox? Get it here! This week marked the in-person return of TechCrunch Disrupt, with our team taking the show back into the real world after two … Read more
Welcome back to This Week in Apps, the weekly TechCrunch series that recaps the latest in mobile OS news, mobile applications and the overall app economy. Global app spending reached $65 billion in the first half of 2022, up only slightly from the $64.4 billion during the same period in 2021, as hypergrowth fueled by … Read more
In the midst of the pandemic, Pantheon Design, a maker of industrial 3D printers from Vancouver, BC, suddenly found itself getting orders from factories in the Midwest, the center of heavy industries. The reason? These manufacturers were having a hard time getting parts out of China as COVID-19 restrictions in the country squeezed global supply … Read more
Welcome to Startups Weekly, a nuanced take on this week’s startup news and trends by Senior Reporter and Equity co-host Natasha Mascarenhas. To get this in your inbox, subscribe here. As far as weeks go, this one was as disruptive as they come. TechCrunch Disrupt 2022 has officially come to a close after an iconic … Read more
Welcome to The TechCrunch Exchange, a weekly startups-and-markets newsletter. It’s inspired by the daily TechCrunch+ column where it gets its name. Want it in your inbox every Saturday? Sign up here. Should early-stage founders ignore the never-ending debate on server infrastructure? Up to a point, yes: Investors we talked to are giving entrepreneurs their blessing … Read more
After seeing a ton of venture capital investment flow into independent beverage startups recently, it was time to take a step back and see if this kind of company actually made sense as a venture investment. For one, the competition for space on grocery store shelves is fierce, eclipsed only by the fact people are … Read more
Maro has developed a platform that helps families and schools navigate tough conversations about mental health. The company, which exhibited as part of the Battlefield 200 at TechCrunch Disrupt, launched its first product, Maro Parents, in 2020. Now, the company is gearing up to launch Maro for Schools next week to help schools screen students … Read more
After attempting to sell its tech to large food service companies, cooking automation startup Jasper has shifted to direct-to-consumer. In a recent conversation, CEO Gunnar Froh told TechCrunch about the pivot and gave a general update on the company, a member of this year’s Battlefield 200 at Disrupt 2022. When Gunnar founded Jasper several years … Read more
Sathya Elumalai was finding it hard to manage his mother’s health after she was diagnosed with four chronic conditions. Rather than guess her health status for the day, he decided to co-found Aidar Health, to get that information directly and reliably. In founding Aidar, Elumalai also created and launched MouthLab, a device it claims tracks … Read more
Taylor Swift’s latest album “Midnights” has dropped, and it might be setting a new standard for China’s digital music industry. Within a day of its release, the 13-track album, priced at 35 yuan or $4.83, has racked up nearly 200,000 copies on Tencent’s QQ, one of the largest music streaming platforms in China. While $4.83 … Read more
To get a roundup of TechCrunch’s biggest and most important stories delivered to your inbox every day at 3 p.m. PDT, subscribe here. Christine is in an airport lounge and Haje is perched on the corner of a cafe bench, as the TechCrunch team is in transit post-Disrupt today. We miss our work besties already … Read more
A new startup wants to help online media outlets make money by making it easier for consumers to access paywalled content without being locked in to multiple subscriptions. Demoing as part of the Battlefield 200 cohort at TC Disrupt this week, Zette is trying to achieve something that others before have tried. Since the dawn … Read more
Popular podcast platform Pocket Casts has released its mobile clients under an open source license. WordPress parent company Automattic acquired Pocket Casts last July, having been acquired by a group of public radio companies, including NPR, back in 2018. Pocket Casts is one of the most popular “podcatcher” apps outside the big tech ecosystems of … Read more
The amount of capital raised by Black entrepreneurs continues to decrease. The latest Crunchbase numbers show that Black founders raised $187 million in Q3, a staggering decline from the nearly $1.1 billion they received in Q3 2021 and a sizable drop from the $594 million the cohort raised in Q2. Black founders raised just 0.12% … Read more
Cloud cost optimization startups have become ubiquitous, and they’ve found a friendly ear among enterprise clients looking to cut costs amid the downturn. But should younger startups similarly scrutinize their cloud spend? According to several cloud investors, startups should prioritize building over optimization — unless it’s going to save them a big chunk of money. … Read more
Champ Suthipongchai Contributor Share on Twitter Champ Suthipongchai is founder and GP at Creative Ventures, a deep tech firm that invests in early-stage companies. If you’re hiring for your startup, you need to understand one thing: This is arguably one of the worst times to be looking for talent. While inflation continues to skyrocket and … Read more
After staging our first TechCrunch Disrupt in San Francisco in three years, Slack is much quieter than usual this morning. My colleagues are flying home to cities as far flung as Taipei, Paris and London; I just took a streetcar home, which should keep my expense report simple. Moscone Center did not look like we’re … Read more
Indian conglomerate Reliance will spin off and list its financial services, a move that it said will allow the oil-to-telecom giant to enter and expand into financial services such as consumer and merchant lending business and also build fintech for “all Indians.” Reliance, run by billionaire Mukesh Ambani, said in a statement that it will … Read more
On Tuesday, activist investor Starboard Value revealed a significant stake in Salesforce, sending the company’s stock climbing more than 7%. A hedge fund founded in 2002 by Jeffrey Smith and Mark Mitchell, Starboard has a history of affecting change at major companies, spurring the spinning off of media startup Patch from AOL in 2014 and … Read more
Over the last 10 years startups in Africa’s off-grid solar sector have attracted over $2.3 billion funding. However, the largest share of the financing has gone to just seven pay-as-you-go (PayGo) Africa-based scaleups, leaving hundreds others in the early-stage struggling to fundraise, according to the biennial Gogla-World Bank report. The seven most funded solar startups … Read more
As we prepare for the third annual Sight Tech Global (December 7-8, free & virtual, register here), a technology event that tracks the advances in technology supporting people who live with blindness, two big shifts are front and center. First, new digital experiences, notably virtual reality, are testing known approaches to accessibility. There are no … Read more
Disney collaborated with Accelerator participant Obsess, an e-commerce platform known for creating interactive virtual storefronts, to release a new web3 experience for its Disney Music Emporium online store. The 3D 360 virtual experience lets fans discover soundtracks and songs from popular Disney films and TV shows by clicking on various vinyl records and CDs throughout … Read more
If you couldn’t make it to San Francisco to attend TechCrunch Disrupt in person, the next is the next best thing. With it, you can access all the sessions that went down on the Disrupt stage, the TechCrunch+ stage along with select presentations from both the Discovery stage and breakout sessions — today, October 21 only! … Read more
Just when Beatriz Acevedo thought she was out, an opportunity to start Suma Wealth pulled her back in. The California-based company, which exhibited as part of the Battlefield 200 at TechCrunch Disrupt, is designed for Latinos and offers in-culture financial content, products and experiences to help them gain control of their economic power and build … Read more
The ninth installment in the iconic franchise’s main series games, “Pokémon Scarlet & Violet” melds the best parts of “Pokémon Legends: Arceus” and “Pokémon Sword & Shield” to debut Pokémon’s first open world game, out November 18. I know what you’re thinking. “Legends: Arceus,” which came out earlier this year, was often described as an … Read more
Google says the Indian competition regulator’s order is a “major setback for Indian consumers and businesses” and it is reviewing the decision to evaluate “next steps.” The Competition Commission of India fined Google $161.9 million on Thursday for anti-competitive practices related to Android mobile devices and ordered a number of redressal measures that could force … Read more
Amazon says over half a dozen hardware vendors have indicated that they cannot enter into a TV manufacturing relationship with the e-commerce group over fear of retaliation from Google. The revelation, officially shared for the first time by Amazon, was made by an Amazon India unit to the country’s antitrust watchdog as part of a … Read more
Shares of Delhivery have dropped by over 32% since Thursday, tumbling below its issue price from May, after the Indian logistics firm posted muted quarterly business growth this week. Delhivery said this week that its supply chain service and truckload business volumes had shrunk in the quarter ending September. Shares of Delhivery plunged on the … Read more
YouTube is raising prices for its Premium subscription plans across many countries including the US, the UK, Canada, and Argentina. News of the price hike emerged after several users in these regions received emails about a rise that will be effective from November 21. The video streaming service’s Premium plan for families lets up to … Read more
Uber has started offering electric vehicles to customers in certain parts of the Delhi-NCR region and says it will be expanding its efforts over the coming months. The electric cabs are currently only available for pre-scheduled trips. “As the leading mobility app in India, we are committed to supporting the Indian government’s emission goals. Expect … Read more