Digs, a Vancouver, Washington-based startup that is developing a collaboration tool for homebuilders and their vendors, is coming out of stealth today and announcing a $7 million seed funding round from Fuse, Flying Fish, Betaworks, Legacy, PSF, GFR, and others. The company was co-founded by Ryan Fink and Ty Frackiewicz. For Fink, this is his second attempt at a home-centric
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Atomic AI, which uses machine learning to explore the potential of RNA in drug discovery, raised a $35 million series A round. They have developed a machine learning model that can accurately predict the structure of RNA molecules based on a limited set of data. They have since improved their model and are using it
Risilience, a SaaS-based analytics platform that helps companies assess their climate risk and plan their transition toward net-zero carbon emissions, has raised $26 million in a Series B round of funding. Spun out of the University of Cambridge’s Centre for Risk Studies (CCRS) back in 2021, Risilience says it has already amassed a number of high-profile
In the current environment, Start-ups are having to do a couple of seemingly contradictory things at the same time. Firstly, they have to keep employees (the ones they want to keep, at least) happy. The other is attract new employees in a market where there remains fierce competition for talent. In their armoury to address
Common wisdom in digital photography says that megapixels aren’t everything. They matter to an extent, but smartphone makers have a long history of leaning too heavily on those numbers as a kind of shorthand for camera quality. In other words, they play an important role but need to work in concert with a number of
“If you could open this article sort of Rolling Stone style…” Brennan Lee Mulligan suggests, then without changing his tone, pitches his lede: “In a Corvette, racing down the 5, [podcast producer] Taylor Moore swerves, then bites right into a massive wheel of brie cheese…” It’s what you’d expect from Mulligan, who got his start
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman believes AI can help usher in “unbelievable abundance,” but he says he wants to ensure that such abundance is shared. Toward that end, Altman has embraced a theory of 19th century political economist Henry George, who in his own lifetime worried about wealth amassing in the hands of the few following
“We think it will be the best place to invest,” said the Tiger Global partner. Manish Singh 10 hours Tiger Global believes India is likely to produce the highest equity returns globally in the future, its partner Scott Shleifer said on an investor call Tuesday, projecting high confidence in the key overseas nation even as
Battery startup Our Next Energy announced this morning that it closed a massive $300 million Series B in an effort to get its $1.6 billion gigafactory up and running. The new round values the company at $1.2 billion post-money, marking a stunning rise for the two-and-a-half-year-old company, which closed a $25 million Series A in
If you’ve ever made an Amazon order with a particular seller because the estimated delivery for the item appears to match when you need it, only to be frustrated when a different (later) delivery estimate appears after you’ve completed the payment process, this action by Poland’s competition and consumer watchdog may be of interest: It’s
Welcome to the dark night of the smart speaker. A few years back, the category felt inevitable — and, frankly, why not? We’ve smartened our phones and watches. Why shouldn’t our homes be the next step? For decades, many looked longingly at home automation. Smart blinds that opened with your alarm clock might as well
Spotify’s success with Wrapped, its year-end review, designed for social sharing, may be pushing the company toward building more social experiences directly into its mobile app. The company for many months has been testing different iterations of a “friends activity” tab on its mobile app, and investors have now taken notice. During the streamer’s Q4
Female-focused telehealth startup, Teal Health, is popping up today to announce an $8.8 million seed round with a roster of heavy hitting investors on board — including (Serena Williams’) Serena Ventures, (Chelsea Clinton’s) Metrodora Ventures, and (Laurene Powell Jobs’) Emerson Collective. The February 2020-founded San Francisco-based startup’s first product will be a service that supports
To get a roundup of TechCrunch’s biggest and most important stories delivered to your inbox every day at 3 p.m. PST, subscribe here. As January is coming to a close, the TechCrunch team is firing on all cylinders (do we still say that, in a time of electric cars? What is a better expression these
Countries worldwide have pledged to reduce their energy usage and reach net-zero energy targets by 2050. To get there, they will need to find clever ways to decarbonize especially dirty businesses, including the buildings sector. The push to clean up the built environment has spawned a lot of policy, as well as overlapping acronyms, including
Two quantum-adjacent technologies — quantum sensing (QS) and quantum communication (Qcomm) — are as important as quantum computing hardware itself since they help make quantum computers function more accurately. A Sydney-based startup called Q-CTRL has built quantum-sensing software that helps reduce errors on quantum computers. Today, the company announced that it has raised another $27.4
Laptops and tablets are getting better and more powerful by the day but our fingers aren’t getting any more precise, and for extended writing and work, it’s still more helpful to have a keyboard and a larger screen at hand. These types of products have been around for at least a decade, but what’s new
Peacock is no longer offering its free tier to new customers, a spokesperson for NBCUniversal confirmed to TechCrunch on Tuesday. The company says it’s shifting its focus to its Premium offering and that doing so will allow the streaming service to remain competitive in the marketplace. The change was first reported by The Streamable. The
Brain researchers have relied on devices called microelectrode arrays for decades, but the technology behind these tools is increasingly outdated. Precision Neuroscience is building a modern alternative that’s not only an order of magnitude better, but far less invasive to put in. With a newly raised $41 million in the bank, they’re all set to
If you thought egg prices were out of control, the SaaS inflation rate is outpacing the rest of the economy. In the U.S., SaaS expenses are growing 3.5x faster than market inflation. In Australia and the UK, that rises to 5x, according to Eldar Tuvey, founder and CEO of Vertice. “If cutting SaaS costs is
Dutch social enterprise Fairphone, which makes modular and — the claim is — more sustainable and ethical consumer electronics, has nabbed a chunk of funding to continue scaling a circular-economy-aligned smartphone business. The €49 million (~$53 million) “growth capital” investment — from an international consortium of impact investors, led by new shareholders Invest-NL, the ABN
Big Tech take note: In what looks like a meaningful — and long overdue — reforming step, the European Commission has committed to dial up its monitoring of how data protection authorities at the EU Member State level enforce the bloc’s flagship data protection rules — committing to regular checks on “large scale” General Data
Everyone’s talking about unplugging these days — climbing a mountain, trekking through the forest, finding your way to a truly secluded beach. Central to that concept is turning off notifications, uninstalling work apps or even — if you’re feeling especially brave — leaving the phone at home for a week or two. But is paradise
Welcome back to Found, where we get the stories behind the startups. This week, Darrell and Becca catch up with Rosie Nguyen, the co-founder and CCO of Fanhouse, a startup that helps content creators monetize their work. Rosie talked about her initial reluctance to become an entrepreneur but how issues at other content platforms pushed
Showing that there’s real investor enthusiasm for identity management platforms, Saviynt, which enables companies to secure apps, data and infrastructure in a single platform, today announced that it raised $205 million in debt from AB Private Credit Investors’ Tech Capital Solutions group. Founder Sachin Nayyar, who returned to Saviynt as CEO this week alongside newly-appointed
As venture capital investments slowed down in 2022, some startups turned to private credit, including debt capital, as a way to supplement their operations in the meantime. However, the policies and procedures paperwork that goes with these deals aren’t always easy to understand. Finley CEO Jeremy Tsui told TechCrunch that private credit is a $1.2
Even if insects don’t sound appealing to you, black soldier flies could play an essential role in the food chain in the coming years. In particular, these flies’ larvae can become an important source of proteins for livestock and fish. That’s why Entocycle is raising another $5 million in a Series A funding round led
I have wanted a robot pet at least since Sony introduced the original Aibo in 1999 — probably earlier, but Aibo made it seem tangible. Since then, there’s been a steady stream of attempts at making robot pets a reality that matches what we often see in futuristic science fiction — including a recent Aibo
After eight months, Netflix’s Kids Mystery Box feature has officially rolled out to Android devices today. Android users worldwide can now discover new children’s shows and TV characters by clicking on the “Mystery Box” in the “Favorites Row” at the top of the Netflix homepage. The company today updated its previous announcement post from May,