Hello and welcome back to Startups Weekly, a weekend newsletter that dives into the week’s startups and venture capital news. Before I jump into today’s topic, let’s catch up a bit. Last week, I wrote about All Raise’s expansion, Uber the TV show and the unicorn from down under. Remember, you can send me tips,
With 72 unicorns created since 2009 and $8.7 billion in venture funding last year, the UK is Europe’s leading startup hub. Although it remains uncertain how Brexit will impact startups’ ease of recruiting and rapid scaling, initial pains are unlikely to displace London from its position as a global center for finance, media, retail, and
Does quantum computing really exist? It’s fitting that for decades this field has been haunted by the fundamental uncertainty of whether it would, eventually, prove to be a wild goose chase. But Google has collapsed this nagging superposition with research not just demonstrating what’s called “quantum supremacy,” but more importantly showing that this also is
Twitter today reported its earnings for the quarter that ended September 30, and the numbers delivered a big surprise, falling on both sales and earnings per share. Revenues came in at $824 million, and EPS at $0.05. That represents sales up 9% year-over-year but far below what analysts had been expecting: (non-GAAP, diluted) EPS of 20
At this week’s International Astronautical Congress, where the space industry, international space agencies and researchers from around the world convene to discuss the state of space technology and business, I asked NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine about what role he sees for startups in contributing to his agency’s ambitious Artemis program. Artemis, named after Apollo’s twin
The Daily Crunch is TechCrunch’s roundup of our biggest and most important stories. If you’d like to get this delivered to your inbox every day at around 9am Pacific, you can subscribe here. 1. Facebook starts testing News, its new section for journalism Facebook’s news section, which was previously reported to be imminent, is here:
Bespoke Financial wants to provide cannabis businesses with the same kind of financial services that other businesses get, but that dispensaries and growers can’t yet access. The regulations around cannabis operations are so stringent at the local level — and so nebulous at the federal level — that national banks won’t give businesses in the
Tesla has launched the third iteration of its solar roof tile for residential home use, which it officially detailed in a blog post on Friday and in a call with media. Tesla CEO Elon Musk kicked off the call with some explanatory remarks on the V3 Solar Roof, and then took a number of questions
NASA is looking for liquid gold on the Moon — not oil, but plain old water. If we’re going to have a permanent presence there, we’ll need it, so learning as much as we can about it is crucial. That’s why the agency is sending a rover called VIPER to the Moon’s south pole —
Huawei was understandably cautious in the lead to the Mate X. Watching Samsung’s Galaxy problems unfolding in what seemed like slow motion caused the company to rethink its strategy. Shortly after the Fold went back to the drawing board, Huawei announced it would be doing the same in order to dot all of its Is
While Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg seemed cheerful and even jokey when he took the stage today in front of journalists and media executives (at one point, he described the event as “by far the best thing” he’d done this week), he acknowledged that there are reasons for the news industry to be skeptical. Facebook, after
Hello and welcome back to Equity, TechCrunch’s venture capital-focused podcast, where we unpack the numbers behind the headlines. This week Kate and Alex held the reins as a duo (check out our chat with Greylock’s Sarah Guo from last week here) to dig into an enormous raft of news. And don’t worry, it’s not all late-stage
HowNow, the workforce learning platform, has raised $3 million (£2.4m) in a “pre-series A” funding round. The round is led by Mark Pearson’s Fuel Ventures and brings the total raised by the startup to $4.5 million. Other investors include Andy Murray OBE; Michael Whitfield and Chris Bruce (founders of Thomsons Online Benefits); Bernie Sinniah (former
Netflix is ready to take its lower-cost, mobile-only plan beyond India as it looks to expand the reach of its service in other international markets. The American on-demand video streaming giant launched a new price tier for users in Malaysia that would allow people in the nation to access the video service for RM 17
Facebook’s news section, which was previously reported to be imminent, is here: The company is rolling out Facebook News in a limited test. In a blog post, Facebook’s Campbell Brown (vice president of global news partnerships) and Mona Sarantakos (product manager, news) said that news articles will continue to appear in the main News Feed. However,
As designers grow both in sheer numbers and within the hierarchy of organizations, design tool makers are adapting to their evolving needs in different ways. Figma, the web-based collaborative design tool, is taking a note from the engineering revolution of the early aughts. “What if there were a GitHub for designers?” mused Dylan Field, early
Enterprise software tool startups are so often birthed to either un-bundle or re-bundle what came before them. In an age where “consumerization of the enterprise” is a trendy phrase for investors, it was natural a startup would come along to bundle its take on some of the trendiest startup tools. Taskade appears to be the
Fabric, the startup that wants to make automated logistics available to retailers of all sizes, announced today it has raised $110 million in Series B funding. The round was led by Corner Ventures, with participation from Aleph, Canada Pension Plan Investment Board (CPPIB), Innovation Endeavors, La Maison, Playground Ventures and Temasek. This brings the total
StepLadder, another London-based startup aiming to help so-called “generation rent” get onto the housing ladder, has raised £1.5 million in seed funding. Backing the round is Spanish banking giant BBVA and fintech VC Anthemis via the London-based venture studio the pair have partnered on. Early investor Seedcamp also followed on, in addition to unnamed angel
I’ve been tearing my gadgets apart for as long as I can remember. Consoles, phones, printers, whatever — I’ve always needed to see what makes it all work. Sometimes they even work when I put them back together. As soon as Google announced that the new Pixel 4 had friggin’ radar built-in for detecting hand
Are we really doing this again? After the pivot to video. After Instant Articles. After news was deleted from the News Feed. Once more, Facebook dangles extra traffic, and journalism outlets leap through its hoop and into its cage. Tomorrow, Facebook will unveil its News tab. About 200 publishers are already aboard including the Wall
As Slack has grown in popularity, one of the company’s key differentiators has been the ability to integrate with other enterprise tools, but as customers use Slack as a central work hub, it has created its own set of problems. In particular, users have trouble understanding what apps they have access to and how to
Lotame, a company offering data management tools for publishers and marketers, today unveiled a new product called Cartographer — described by CMO Adam Solomon as “our new people-based ID solution.” In other words, it’s Lotame’s offering to help businesses connect their visitor and customer data across platforms and devices. We’ve written about plenty of other cross-device
The Daily Crunch is TechCrunch’s roundup of our biggest and most important stories. If you’d like to get this delivered to your inbox every day at around 9am Pacific, you can subscribe here. 1. WeWork confirms an up to $8 billion lifeline from SoftBank Group; names new executive chairman Confirming earlier reports, The We Company
The contract between the UK’s National Health Service (NHS) and ecommerce giant Amazon — for a health information licensing partnership involving its Alexa voice AI — has been released following a Freedom of Information request. The government announced the partnership this summer. But the date on the contract, which was published on the gov.uk contracts
Apple Arcade introduced the idea of all-you-can-eat subscription-based mobile gaming to the mainstream. Google Play Pass soon followed as a way to subscribe to a sizable collection of both apps and games on Android devices. Today, a startup called GameClub is launching in the U.S. to offer an alternative. For $4.99 per month, mobile consumers
The Daily Crunch is TechCrunch’s roundup of our biggest and most important stories. If you’d like to get this delivered to your inbox every day at around 9am Pacific, you can subscribe here. 1. Twitter Q3 misses big on revenues of $824M and EPS of $0.05 on the back of adtech glitches Twitter said the
In a wide ranging interview with Wall Street Journal global technology editor Jason Dean yesterday, Slack CEO and co-founder Stewart Butterfield had some strong words regarding Microsoft, saying his company represented an existential threat to the software giant. The interview took place at the WSJ Tech Live event. When Butterfield was asked about a chart
Modern Animal just raised a $13.5 million seed round of funding to fuel its mission of offering pets, humans and veterinarians a better experience. Led by Founders Fund with participation from Upfront Ventures, Susa Ventures and others, the round will enable Modern Animal to open its first location in Los Angeles early next year. Founded
Tines, a Dublin-based startup that lets companies automate aspects of their cybersecurity, has raised $4.1 million in Series A funding. Leading the round is Blossom Capital, the venture capital firm co-founded by ex-Index Ventures and LocalGlobe VC Ophelia Brown. Founded in February 2018 by ex-eBay, PayPal and DocuSign security engineer Eoin Hinchy, who was subsequently