After flagging concerns over the financial risks associated with non-fungible tokens, some of China’s authorities are putting forward guidance on how to best make use of the novel technology. The government of Shanghai says it supports “leading companies to explore building NFT exchanges,” according to the city’s 14th Five Year Plan on the digital economy
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Kindly His’ at home semen test kit Hormonal healthcare can be intimidating, since it touches on the most intimate parts of our lives. Kindly Health wants to make it accessible to more people, with a combination of at-home diagnostic tests (including semen tests and tests for polycystic ovary syndrome), telehealth consultations and supplements. The Bangalore-based
Clearview AI has been hit with another sanction for breaching European privacy rules. The Athens-based Hellenic data protection authority has fined the controversial facial recognition firm €20 million and banned it from collecting and processing the personal data of people living in Greece. It has also ordered it to delete any data on Greek citizens
ChowNow, a startup that builds branded online ordering systems for restaurants, today announced layoffs internally, TechCrunch has learned. According to several sources who spoke to this reporter on the condition of anonymity, around 100 people were affected across teams including onboarding, operations, and sales. “We, like every company, plan our annual budgets far ahead of
It seems like every time a demo day ends, there’s a new one waiting around the corner – and as you know, TechCrunch is no stranger to covering them. Oftentimes these events are filled with traditional seed-stage tech companies based in Silicon Valley. But today, we’re highlighting the demo day for a new wave of
The web3 bandwagon really took off in 2021 and 2022 as entrepreneurs and investors both sought to make their mark in the nascent industry. But Latin America stood out thanks to its comparatively high crypto adoption: According to Kim Grauer, head of research at Chainalysis, Latin America has consistently captured between 8% and 10% of
In the midst of absolutely no internal chaos whatsoever, Twitter’s accessibility team launched a much-requested feature test. Ten percent of users, who make up the test group, will be served reminders to add image descriptions to their photo uploads. Image descriptions, or alt text, are exactly what they sound like: descriptions of what appears in
Biofuels are the sirens of renewable energy, luring startups with enchanting promises of enormous markets, from aviation to trucking and shipping. Companies just can’t help throwing themselves at the problem, and more than a few have been dashed to pieces in the process. One new startup, though, hopes it’s Ulysses in this tale, able to
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. Goodness! Have a scroll through the TechChrunch homepage today — it’s like drinking from a fire hose here the past couple of days! There’s so much news that it’s legitimately hard to
It has been a busy few months for Atomico, the European venture capital (VC) juggernaut founded by Skype co-creator Niklas Zennström some 16 years ago. After promoting three investors to partner back in April, it then brought in former Revolut and Uber executive Don Hoang as partner a month later. To cap off this frenzy,
Tonal, an at-home fitness company last valued at $1.6 billion, has laid off 35% of its workforce in what the company says was a “responsible” decision made in order to grow at a more sustainable rate. “Tonal is prioritizing becoming a self-sustaining business with an emphasis on profitability,” the company said in a statement confirming
Kids and teens are now spending more time watching videos on TikTok than on YouTube. In fact, that’s been the case since June 2020 — the month when TikTok began to outrank YouTube in terms of the average minutes per day people ages 4 through 18 spent accessing these two competitive video platforms. That month,
Jun.14 — Apple Inc. is working on new Apple Watch models and health features, spanning display and speed upgrades, an extreme sports edition and body temperature and blood sugar sensors. Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman reports in this edition of “Power Up.”
Coding school Holberton today announced that it has entered into an agreement to be acquired by African Leadership Group (ALG). The seven-year-old company, with physical schools across the globe in addition to its core online platform, will split in two. Holberton’s technology platform will become part of ALG’s existing ALX online learning platform and the
Shota Horii, his twin brother Yuta Horii and Jun Taketani co-founded SmartBank in 2019 after selling their previous startup Fablic, a Japanese online secondhand marketplace, to Rakuten in 2016. While operating Fablic, the trio found that many users still used cash to pay and manage their day-to-day finance. The founders wanted to address the issue in the consumer finance industry
Ring, the maker of internet-connected video doorbells and security cameras, said in its latest transparency report that it turned over a record amount of doorbell footage and other information to U.S. authorities last year. The Amazon-owned company said in two biannual reports covering 2021 that it received 3,147 legal demands, an increase of about 65%
Knowing how much and which kind of inventory your brand needs involves a complex web of data that companies often keep up with via spreadsheets or legacy systems that don’t provide a full picture of the business. Syrup Tech, now armed with $6.3 million in new funding, is feeding all that data, like transactions, marketing
The remittance inflows to sub-Saharan Africa over the past decade have been on an upward trajectory since 2020; last year, it increased by more than 6% to $45 billion. However, the steady rise of remittance inflows to the region hasn’t made this activity cheaper. According to the World Bank, sub-Saharan Africa remains the most expensive
Just before World Emoji Day on Sunday, we are getting a glimpse of new emojis that we might get to use on our phones in a few months. Folks at Emojipedia have drawn up a draft version of selected submissions in Emoji 15.0 that contains, among others, a pushing hand, a shaking face (or I’m
Metal and carbon fiber company Markforged (best known for its Digital Forge platform) announced today that it acquired Digital Metal to further increase its lineup of machines that can produce metal parts. The company was previously owned by Swedish metal powder manufacturer Höganäs AB. The acquisition highlights Markforged’s push into additive manufacturing for industrial customers,
As the global venture capital market slows, it’s also evolving. In the second quarter of 2022, global venture totals dipped, but inside of that slowdown is a shift away from the super-late-stage deals that helped push the value of VC deal-making to all-time highs last year. And we’re seeing regional differences that could indicate that
China’s Tesla challenger Xpeng isn’t content with just making electric vehicles. It’s also betting on ridable robot unicorns for kids. Xpeng Robotics, a bionic robot maker affiliated with Xpeng, just raised an impressive $100 million in a Series A round led by IDG Capital, at a time when venture investments are slowing in China. Other
Persistent Energy has raised $10 million Series C funding to grow its clean-tech venture building business in Africa, in a round led by Kyuden International Corporation, a subsidiary of the Japanese Kyushu Electric Power Group, and Financial Sector Deepening (FSD) Africa Investments. The equity round also saw the participation of six new private investors, high
TikTok’s attempt to switch legal basis for targeting advertising at users in Europe looks to be in trouble after Italy’s data protection watchdog stepped in and issued a warning of legal inadequacy just days ahead of the planned privacy policy change. The user-generated video sharing platform attracted attention from privacy experts last month when it
Google has responded to dating app maker Match Group’s antitrust lawsuit in a scathing new court filing which refers to Match’s original complaint as a “cynical attempt” to take advantage of Google Play’s distribution platform and other tools while attempting to sidestep Google’s fees. The two tech giants have been battling it out in court
Despite the venture capital asset class sitting on historic levels of dry powder, many investors aren’t deploying it, leaving their portfolio companies scrambling for financing. Venture funding has been declining across the board this year, but the tone of how this temporary pullback could impact companies is starting to change. The mood at the beginning
As the market swoons, venture capital firms continue to announce new funds. TechCrunch reporters covered five of these more in-depth Tuesday, as you will see below. Meanwhile, I corresponded with three firms about their funds and any concerns that limited partners had brought up during the fundraising stage. Haris Khurshid, general partner at Chalo Ventures,
The $2.5 million Rimac Nevera all-electric hypercar has begun rolling off the assembly line, launching on the world stage as the fastest production car and an emblem of the Croatian EV maker’s advanced battery technology. The sleek, low-slung 1,914-horsepower two-seater is the first model to test the strength of the November merger between French supercar
The fashion industry has come under fire of late for its outsize impact on the environment. From cradle to grave, it accounts for between 4% and 10% of the world’s carbon emissions and around 20% of the world’s wastewater. Only about 15% of the clothes in the U.S. are recycled, the Environmental Protection Agency estimates.
Twitter followed through on its promise to force Elon Musk to buy the company on Tuesday, suing the SpaceX and Tesla CEO in a Delaware court. The company’s board doubled down last week after Musk’s legal team sent Twitter a letter stating his intentions to withdraw from the deal. Twitter board chairman Bret Taylor tweeted