A new startup is setting out to help companies build and harness communities around their products, enabling them to side-step multiple disparate tools and manage everything in a single platform. Founded out of the Czech Republic in 2021, Talkbase launched out of stealth just a couple of weeks back, backed by $2 million in pre-seed funding
[embedded content] The final day of Disrupt kicked off in style with a conversation featuring four-time NBA All Star Draymond Green. It was a spirited chat, covering the power forward’s push into media, including his podcast “The Draymond Green Show” and deals with channels like TNT. Green also spoke at length about investing, managing mental health
When Parker Conrad founded Rippling in 2016, the HR company initially focused on the process of onboarding employees. It has since evolved to manage all aspects of employee data, from payroll and benefits, to the apps employees use, to a device management platform that enables Rippling’s customers to retrieve, wipe clean and store employee computers
A month after Adobe announced its plans for acquiring Figma, the popular digital design startup, Figma CEO and co-founder Dylan Field sat down with our own enterprise reporter Ron Miller at Disrupt 2022 to discuss the deal and his motivations for selling to Adobe, a company that Figma’s own marketing materials have not always described
Propeller, a new climate-tech investor with a focus on the ocean, tells TechCrunch that it has hooked $100 million for its first seed fund. Co-founded by former HubSpot CEO Brian Halligan, the venture firm said in a statement that it backs and incubates startups in areas like ocean carbon removal, algae packaging, offshore wind, desalination
Worker burnout is real. Reports suggest that work-related chronic stress could be costing businesses up to $190 billion annually in reduced output and sick days, not to mention the much-discussed “Great Resignation” where workers are jumping ship in search of a greater work-life balance. In 2019, the World Health Organization (WHO) declared burnout an “occupational
The Warriors’ Draymond Green took the stage at TechCrunch Disrupt today where he discussed his podcast, social media… and yes, the Jordan Poole punch. Green has spent the last several years building up his resume off the court, most notably through his popular podcast, “The Draymond Green Show.” Green touched on how his podcast has
The construction materials market is fragmented, according to GlobalFair CEO Shaily Garg, because it involves layers of both supply chain and logistics complexities. In a 2021 survey for the National Association of Home Builders and Wells Fargo, the vast majority of builders said that the time it takes to obtain materials — and the cost
Banyan, a platform for product purchase data that allows customers such as banks, fintechs, hotels and merchants to automate expense management and more, today announced that it raised $43 million in a Series A funding round — $28 million in equity and $15 million in debt — led by Fin Capital with participation from M13,
Plastics are great for so many things, but they stay around for an awfully long time. Intropic leaps to the rescue with a set of enzymes that can be added to plastics at the very beginning of their life cycle, before it is even turned into products. The additives the company makes have been proof-of-concept
Challenger bank N26 is launching a new trading feature in its app — N26 Crypto. Users will be able to easily trade crypto assets using money in their N26 account. Behind the scenes, N26 is partnering with Bitpanda to handle trading and custody. N26 is going to slowly roll out N26 Crypto across Europe. At
Jio Platforms has quietly launched its first laptop, entering into a new product category as the Indian telecom giant aggressively expands its offerings. The laptop, called JioBook, runs JioOS, a custom Android-based OS that has been “optimized for superior performance” and local languages support. The laptop, manufactured in India, is selling at 15,799 Indian rupees,
Fresh off his fourth NBA ring and a blockbuster opening night, Golden State Warriors power forward and 4x NBA champion, Draymond Green, will help us kick off the final day of Disrupt in style. Join us tomorrow at 9AM PT at the Disrupt stage in-person, or catch it live on TechCrunch’s homepage. Green has spent
Questus CEO Jeff Rosenblum joins Caroline Hyde to discuss his new book “Exponential” looking into how the best companies don’t interrupt but empower. Also, his thoughts on Peloton’s rise and fall, and why Superbowl ads are pointless.
During the last two days, 20 startups pitched their companies as part of TechCrunch’s Startup Battlefield at Disrupt 2022. These 20 companies were selected as the best of the brand-new Startup Battlefield 200 and competed for a chance to take home Battlefield Cup and $100,000. TechCrunch editors and expert judges winnowed them down to the
Singapore-based Skuad helps companies hire employees in different countries while staying compliant with local employment regulations and processing cross-border payroll. The startup announced today it has raised $15 million in Series A funding. Skuad has signed up more than 350 employers so far, mostly from North America, Europe and Southeast Asia. This funding round, which
Advanced Ionics, a climate-tech startup that hails from Milwaukee, Wisconsin, is striving to drive down the price of green hydrogen by slashing how much electricity is needed for electrolysis by as much as 50%. That’s an admirable goal, because despite all the talk of hydrogen as a “fuel of the future,” the industry is still
The UK’s media watchdog, Ofcom, has published a debut report on its first year regulating a selection of video-sharing platforms (VSPs) — including TikTok, Snapchat, Twitch, Vimeo and OnlyFans — following the introduction of content-handling rules aimed at protecting minors and others from viewing harmful user-generated video content online. As well aiming to shrink the risk
OnlyFans has been putting a lot of effort into upcycling its image from an adult content subscription platform to a Patreon-like home for all kinds of creators, but it’s far from moving away from them as users. Today CEO Ami Gan of the platform confirmed that adult content will still have a home on the
The digital landscape is evolving so fast that one’s four-year degree can hardly keep up with the myriad platforms and APIs emerging every day. That’s why Skills Union wants to connect tech startup workers looking to level up with an array of field-specific experts over live video. Online professional training isn’t new; it’s not uncommon
Here’s one of those questions you’ve probably never considered, but probably should: What goes on your fruit? Not out in the field — though obviously that’s something worth considering too — rather in that period between the picking and purchasing? Turns out pesticides aren’t just the stuff that gets sprayed out the back of a
The electric everything revolution is here, and with it an unprecedented demand for critical battery materials. The most precious of all? Lithium, the crucial ingredient in the lithium-ion batteries that will power everything from your Tesla to your iPhone. The problem is, extracting lithium is expensive, time-consuming, labor intensive and takes a serious toll on
Seems we may not be getting a surprise October Apple event, after all. The company just dropped what will, no doubt, be one of its last major hardware updates for the calendar year. The iPad Pro is getting a spec refresh revolving around an upgrade for the M1 to M2 chip. The new chip sports
Hartbeat Ventures is taking in its first institutional investment from J.P. Morgan, comedian and entrepreneur Kevin Hart announced today at TechCrunch Disrupt. He made the announcement alongside J.P. Morgan’s head of digital investment banking and digital private markets Michael Elanjian and Hartbeat Ventures’ president and co-founder Robert Roman. Hartbeat Ventures, an early-stage VC firm with
Nexta, an Egyptian startup that plans to launch its banking app in the coming months, has secured a $3 million investment from eFinance Group, a state-owned provider of digital payments solutions. This news follows the $2 million pre-seed round Nexta announced this March, which Egyptian early-stage VC Disruptech led. Last year, Nexta obtained a provisional
Last year, MaxAB, the food and grocery B2B e-commerce and distribution platform serving a network of traditional retailers across Egypt and Morocco, raised its $55 million Series A in two tranches; the latter accompanied its acquisition of the Morocco-based and YC-backed WaysToCap. The moves signaled MaxAB’s ambition to dominate Egypt’s and North Africa’s B2B retail
In 2018, Neil D’Souza, a software engineer by trade and previously the VP of product development at Thinkstep, came to the realization that his ten-plus-year effort to solve enterprise product challenges in the areas of sustainability, compliance and risk were having little impact. The way he saw it, they took too long, which minimized their
Munich-based software and services vacation rental startup, Holidu, has topped up its coffers with an oversubscribed €104 million (~$102M) Series E funding round of equity and debt, led by existing investor 83North, after seeing its year-over-year revenue grew 100% in 2021. The round saw a mix of other existing and new investors chipping in, including
Apple released a new version of its entry-level iPad that Apple simply calls “the iPad.” It’s a dramatic refresh as Apple is swapping the familiar design with rounded edges and a home button. Instead, the iPad now looks more like the iPad Air and iPad Pro. But there are some compromises. The new iPad starts
At TechCrunch Disrupt, Netflix VP of Gaming Mike Verdu dropped two bits of news about the streaming giant’s foray into games. Verdu said that Netflix is “seriously exploring a cloud gaming offering.” The company will also open a new gaming studio in Southern California. “It’s a value add. We’re not asking you to subscribe as