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Airbnb buys ‘Airbnb for disabled people’ startup Accomable in accessibility upgrade
Airbnb, the accommodation and travel startup that is now valued at $31 billion, is today announcing an acquisition that points to how it wants to…
OnePlus adds a six-inch screen and face unlock for the 5T
OnePlus has carved out a nice niche for itself over the past couple of years. The company’s never been too preoccupied with the rush toward…
Lyft acquihires the Kamcord team for engineering talent
Ride hailing provider Lyft has brought in 12 members of the Kamcord team, essentially acquiring its engineering talent, though not any of the broadcast live…
Kairos’ $25M venture fund will invest in ideas that help the middle class
Kairos, the organization for young entrepreneurs founded in 2008 as Kairos Society, has lifted the veil on its first venture fund that it teased earlier…
Revising the results of last year’s study, Posit Science still effectively combats dementia
Revising the results of their headline-grabbing, decade-long study, researchers from top universities still believe that a brain training exercise from app developer Posit Science can…
Instagram Stories adds no-frills photo-only posting from mobile web
Instagram really wants the developing world on Stories. They won’t be able to use Instagram’s augmented reality masks or share videos, but starting today mobile…
PayPal to sell $6 billion in consumer loans to Synchrony Financial
PayPal announced today it has agreed to sell $5.8 billion in consumer credit receivables to Synchrony Financial, in an expanded relationship between the companies. The…
MegaBots says it will shut down if it can’t reach its next crowdfunding goal
It took a while, but last month the latest iteration of MegaBots’ giant fighting robot finally did battle with a 6.5-ton machine from Japan’s Suidobashi…
Watch SpaceX launch the mysterious ‘Zuma’ spacecraft
SpaceX will be launching a Falcon 9 with a special payload aboard today, with a two-hour long launch window opening up at 8 PM EST…
Facebook, Google and others join The Trust Project, an effort to increase transparency around online news
“Fake news” and other misinformation, online propaganda, and satirical content people believe is true have filled the web via search engines and social media, and have…
New Venzee tool brings data transformation and validation to your blockchain project
If the blockchain is going to be an immutable record, you need to start with clean data. The question is, how do you get clean…
Shopify now offers merchants built-in, cheaper UPS shipping
Shopify has teamed up with UPS to provide merchants on its platform with special rates normally only available to bigger business customers, and direct Shopify…
Segment has a plan to help companies comply with GDPR data privacy requests
Segment is a startup that helps companies collect customer data from a variety of siloed sources and place that data in a single usable record. Today,…
Hands-on with Microsoft’s high-end Surface Book 2
Microsoft’s Surface Book 2 is the most powerful mobile Surface device yet. It easily blows away the Surface Pro, Surface Laptop and, of course, the…
Veteran VCs Trae Vassallo and Neil Sequeira attract $151 million to their new firm, Defy Partners
They’re back. After staying heads down for the past year, Trae Vassallo and Neil Sequeira, two longtime venture capitalists whose individual brands are well-known to…
Where and why venture capitalists invest close to home
Public market investors have the luxury of being able to make, invest and move their money anywhere they’d like. But the same isn’t true for…
Hitlist lands on Android to help you find bargain travel deals
Hitlist, an app that serves up bargain-priced flights and travels deals, has finally winged its way to Android after years on iOS and the web. The…
Inboard Technology raises $8 million to be the Tesla of electric skateboards
If you’re a company working on an electric skateboard that’s already raised nearly $500,000 on Kickstarter and slayed the Shark Tank sharks what do you do for…
Tencent reportedly invests $150M in cinema ticketing startup Maoyan
Tencent announced another impressive quarter of financials yesterday, but the Chinese internet giant — which is creeping towards a $500 billion market cap — made…
Pip is a retro games console for kids to learn coding
Another UK startup is using Pi electronics as the foundation for an edtech business idea, and Kickstarter to try to crowdfund their product: A learn-to-code…
Pixelz raises $7 million for outsourced photography post-production
PIxelz, a Danish provider of post-production photographic software and services, has raised $7 million to build out its business in Europe. Read More
China’s third-largest bike sharing service, which raised $90M, is reportedly closing down
Bike-sharing, the year’s hottest startup trend in China and beyond, looks like it is about to see the biggest casualty of its cut-throat competition. Bluegogo,…
China’s Baidu just announced the strangest smart speakers
Chinese internet Baidu is widely-credited for being one of the first to dive deep into artificial intelligence, hiring Coursera co-founder Andrew Ng (who has since…
Algorithmia now helps businesses manage and deploy their machine learning models
Algorithmia started out as an online marketplace for — can you guess it? — algorithms. Many of these algorithms that developers offered on the service…
HealthMatch wins TechCrunch Startup Battlefield Australia
TechCrunch is proud to announce HealthMatch is the winner of the TechCrunch Startup Battlefield Australia and FluroSat is the runner up. A panel of expert…
Duolingo can now help you learn Chinese
Earlier this year, Duolingo launched its Japanese course, which marked the first time the popular language learning service offered support for an Asian language. Since…
Twitter removes verified checkmarks from several white supremacists’ profiles
A few hours after announcing a review of its verification program, Twitter began revoking the verified status of some accounts. White supremacists Richard Spencer and…
Crunch Report | This Black Friday could be the biggest ever for mobile and we found a new planet
Today’s Stories This Black Friday could be the biggest ever for mobile shopping Amazon blames the postal service for Amazon Fresh delivery issues Scientists found…
Forever 21 tells customers that some credit card numbers may have been stolen
This week, the clothing retailer Forever 21 disclosed to customers that it was hacked earlier in 2017. While the company has not yet offered many…
What to expect from Tesla’s big electric truck reveal
Tesla is set to take the lid off its electric truck tomorrow for the first time, after months of teasing the big rig. CEO Elon…
Google Maps got a redesign
Google Maps is getting an upgrade. The company said in a blog post that it has updated driving, navigation, transit and explore maps to better…
Scientists found a new Earth-sized planet nearby… and it might be habitable
Forget Mars, scientists have discovered a new Earth-sized, possibly habitable, planet just 11 light years away. Known as Ross 128b, the newly discovered planet orbits…
Twitter to revoke verification for some accounts as part of overhaul
Twitter says that it’s making progress on its plan to review its authentication system, which it’s conducting in the wake of backlash against the social…
Watch Startup Battlefield Australia live right here
Here we are in Sydney, Australia, hosting our signature Startup Battlefield competition. We have an amazing lineup of speakers who all share a ton of knowledge and…
Procter & Gamble just bought this venture-backed deodorant startup for $100 million cash
Native Deodorant, a San Francisco-based natural deodorant brand, just sold to Procter & Gamble for $100 million cash. Native, which positioned itself as an online distributor…
A disappointing debut for Google’s Pixel Buds
Pixel Buds are a valiant effort to stand out while embracing a trend adopted by just about every name in the field, resulting in a…
Tesla opens two largest Supercharger stations and a customer lounge
Tesla has opened new Supercharger stations in California, the largest its built to date. These are a new kind of Supercharger for the automaker, with…
Email marketer SendGrid up 13% following IPO
Marketing email company SendGrid had a decent first day on the New York Stock Exchange on Wednesday. After pricing shares at $16, the company closed at…
Facebook teen-in-residence defects to Google and launches “Lies”
At age 17, Michael Sayman was Facebook’s youngest employee ever. Having already launched 5 apps, he wowed Mark Zuckerberg, earned a demo spot on stage…
TechShop shuts down all U.S. locations, declares bankruptcy
A bit of sad news for the maker community today: TechShop is shutting down nationwide. Founded in 2006, TechShop is (or, I guess, was) pretty…
Zyl is a photo management app with a few AI-powered tricks
Meet Zyl, a smart photo app to view, manage and share all your photos. Formerly called Comet, the French startup is now using deep learning…
Black Friday will be the biggest mobile shopping day ever in the U.S., forecast claims
A new report from App Annie predicts that time spent doing mobile shopping via apps will grow 45 percent in the U.S. during the week…
Google adds a slew of new Assistant features for app developers
In order for Google Assistant to be a real contender against the likes of Alexa, it needs third party app support. In order to get…
Facebook open sources Open/R distributed networking software
Facebook is no stranger when it comes to open sourcing its computing knowledge. Over the years, it has consistently created software and hardware internally, then…
Amazon reportedly blames the U.S. Postal Service for Amazon Fresh issues
Amazon is blaming the U.S. Postal Service for having to shut down Fresh in some areas, Recode reports. Internally, sources told Recode that Amazon is…
Amazon’s latest Whole Foods price cuts include deeper discounts for Prime members
Amazon today unveiled a preview of its official rewards program for Whole Foods shoppers by slashing prices on turkeys and other items ahead of the…
Drivy launches its car rental marketplace in the UK
French startup Drivy is expanding to another European country. This time, the company is launching in the U.K. For now, the service is mostly live in London…
Forward brings its personalized healthcare service to Los Angeles
Forward, the San Francisco-based startup that’s looking to refashion healthcare services in Apple’s image, is expanding with its first location in Los Angeles. Weaving together…
Postmates launches in first international city
On-demand platform Postmates is launching in Mexico City, its first international market, today with more than 1,000 merchant partners and courieres on board. That means…
Adeptmind raises $4.5M from Fidelity to bring smarter search to retailers
If you’ve ever searched for a product on any website that’s not Amazon or Google, you’ve probably had a bad time trying to find something…
Amazon drops plans for its own ‘skinny bundle’ TV service, report says
Amazon is cancelling its plans to offer a “skinny bundle” internet TV service, according to a report from Reuters out this morning, mirroring another from…
Roxy grabs $2.2 million seed investment to build Alexa-like voice devices customized for business
Some of the biggest names in technology are all in on voice-controlled devices like the Amazon Echo and Google Home, but Roxy, a Seattle-based startup…
The Moto Z’s latest Mod turns the phone into a Polaroid instant camera
The Moto Z’s selection of modular backings have been pretty hit or miss (largely miss, if I’m being honest), but this one’s pretty clever. Sure,…
Criteo founder raises $19 million for ride-sharing app Less
Criteo has long been named as one of the most successful French startups, quickly reaching unicorn level and even going public in the U.S. Former…
Microsoft makes Databricks a first-party service on Azure
Databricks has made a name for itself as one of the most popular commercial services around the Apache Spark data analytics platform (which, not coincidentally,…
Microsoft joins the MariaDB Foundation and launches Azure Database for MariaDB
Microsoft today announced that it is joining the MariaDB Foundation, the nonprofit behind the popular relational database founded by the original developers of MySQL. As…
Kickstarter reboots its Patreon competitor, Drip
Kickstarter hasn’t done a lot with Drip since acquiring the service from the Ghostly International record label a year and a half ago. Since then,…
Sprint adds free Hulu service to its Unlimited Freedom plan
As had been rumored this week, Hulu and Sprint today announced that Hulu’s service will now come bundled with Sprint’s unlimited wireless plan. Starting on…
Two compliance companies merge to build a $100M firm
Once upon a time there were two compliance companies. Smarsh was owned by Los Angeles-based private equity firm, K1 Investment Management. It worked with mostly SMBs.…
Amazon brings Echo and Alexa to Canada
Amazon has finally brought its line of Alexa-powered Echo speakers to Canada. The release of Echo hardware has been long awaited by America’s northern neighbor,…
With $70M from Alphabet, United Masters replaces record labels
The records labels are obsolete. They haven’t kept up as music evolved from selling CDs to streaming songs to promote concert tickets and merchandise. Labels…
Health IQ raises $34.6 million for life insurance for healthy people
People who work out and eat healthily shouldn’t have to pay as much for life insurance. That’s the concept behind Health IQ, a startup that’s…
Google’s jobs search engine gets salary ranges, a better location filter and more
Google Search’s built-in jobs search engine, which launched earlier this year, is getting an update today. For the most part, these new feature address some…
LinkedIn rolls out its Career Advice mentoring program to US, UK and India
LinkedIn, the Microsoft-owned social platform for the working world with some 530 million members, has made a big push in the last couple of years…
Call to ban sale of IoT toys with proven security flaws
Ahead of 2017’s present buying season, UK consumer rights group Which? has warned parents about the risks of giving connected toys to their children, and…
Hear from leading venture capitalists at Disrupt Berlin
TechCrunch Disrupt is returning to Berlin this December, and among the founders and developers speaking, we’re pleased to have leading venture capitalists on stage to…
Tencent’s profit surges 69% thanks to its thriving games business
Tencent, Asia’s highest-valued technology company, has smashed analyst forecasts for its Q3 2017 after it posted a profit of 18 billion RMB ($2.7 billion) on…
The AR-powered fighting MekaMon robot goes on sale at Apple Stores
After selling out of its initial run of 500, U.K.-based Reach Robotics scored a $7.5 million funding round to help it produce a more consumer-ready…
Perkbox acquires digital rewards platform Loyalty Bay
Two companies are better than one: Perkbox, the U.K. startup that helps companies engage and reward employees and customers, has acquired London-based Loyalty Bay, which…
Qualcomm announces investment in Mobike and eight other Chinese startups
Qualcomm is continuing its charm offensive in China, a critical market where it has suffered hard blows in recent years including a $1 billion anti-trust…
Tesla says a new lawsuit alleging racial harassment at its California factory is a “hotbed of misinformation”
Tesla has hit back at a class-action lawsuit that alleges its Fremont, California manufacturing plant is a “hotbed for racist behavior.” Filed earlier this week…
U.S. government issues alerts about malware and IP addresses linked to North Korean cyber attacks
US-CERT, the Department of Homeland Security team responsible for analyzing cybersecurity threats, has posted a warning about cyber attacks by the North Korean government, which…
Square Cash is letting some users buy and sell Bitcoin
Square is testing cryptocurrency support in their Cash app, according to TechCrunch reader Zach Miles on Twitter and confirmed by the company. The trial, which…
Get your tickets for the TechCrunch Meetup in Singapore on November 23!
Last week we announced our upcoming Meetup in Singapore on November 23, and now here comes the all-important ticket information. Head to this link HERE…
Marketing email company SendGrid raises $131 million after pricing its IPO at $16
SendGrid, the Denver-based marketing email company, raised $131 million after pricing its IPO at $16, above the expected range of $13.50 to $15.50. The company…
MasterCard has filed a patent on its own blockchain-based money transfer solution
In about 2014, most bitcoin companies quickly pivoted to the “next big thing:” blockchain. Among them were the financial and fintech houses that were eager…
Google shares developer preview of TensorFlow Lite
Developers were pretty psyched by the announcement at Google I/O back in May that a new version of TensorFlow was being built from the ground up…
Africa Roundup: Lori Systems wins BFX Africa, Andela raises $40M, Jumia lends to SMEs, Safaricom launches incubator
Logistics transportation company Lori Systems won best of show at TechCrunch’s Startup Battlefield Africa after gaining majority votes of the event’s 15 judges. The Kenyan…
ScanMyPhoto’s Mitch Goldstone talks about the ephemerality of media
In this episode of Technotopia I talk with Mitch Goldstone, the founder of ScanMyPhotos. Mitch started his company with a mission to scan the millions…
Essential offers up an Android Oreo beta for the Essential Phone
Android smartphone maker Essential promised that it would be releasing an update to Android 8.0 Oreo for its devices soon, and now there’s a beta…
UK plans $80M in tech initiatives, double tech visas to 2,000 to shore up support amid Brexit anxiety
While the UK continues to try to find solid ground to begin its contentious Brexit negotiations, the government today announced several initiatives to try to…
Don Katz dishes on Audible.com storytelling with ‘Invisible Man,’ Ralph Ellison
Though lots of moving parts have to be corralled together in order to found, expand and manage a business as large as Audible.com, founder Donald…
These are the 15 startups participating in Startup Battlefield Australia
On Thursday, November 16th in Sydney, Australia, the first Startup Battlefield Australia kicks off with 15 startups competing to win the competition, $25,000 Australian dollars cash,…
Unpacking Lyft’s projected financials
Last Friday, Bloomberg reported a sheaf of Lyft’s financials that paint a reasonably-sharp picture of the ridesharing company’s past and expected business performance. The short version, as you…
Twitch’s launches Achievements and Stream Summaries to help creators grow their channels
At last month’s Twitchcon, the game streaming site Twitch’s annual conference, the company unveiled a suite of new tools for video creators on its platform…
Microsoft’s period of congenial cooperation could be over
A couple of years ago while a guest of Marc Benioff on stage at Salesforce’s Dreamforce customer conference, Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella said something that…
Mozilla terminates its deal with Yahoo and makes Google the default in Firefox again
With the launch of Firefox Quantum, Mozilla released what’s probably the most important update to its browser in recent years. It’s faster, lighter and you…
This tech startup is trying to tackle waste in Africa
Kenya has a waste management problem, especially in the country’s capital of Nairobi. As of 2016, Nairobi was producing around 2,400 tons of waste every…
A mesh network spontaneously erupts in the US and helps connect Puerto Rico
When goTenna put out their Mesh device earlier this year, I thought the off-grid gadgets would be great for an emergency kit or back country…
Attending CES 2018? TechCrunch wants to see your company
CES is a horrible, god-awful experience that will shave years off your life. The casinos, the food, the people, the germs. Horrible. All of it.…
Obama’s former chief data scientist, DJ Patil, joins Venrock as an adviser
DJ Patil, the chief data scientist under President Barack Obama, has joined Venrock Capital as an adviser. Patil has long been a proponent of using data…
Match Group is still in talks to acquire Bumble with a valuation over $1B
In August we reported from our sources that Match Group made an offer to acquire Bumble for $450M. Bumble declined the offer, and at the time…
For the next six hours you can guide a robot through a web of miniature Reddit-themed escape rooms
Something weird is about to happen on Reddit. Starting at 10 a.m. PT on Tuesday, an AI-powered robot the size of a computer mouse will…
Poshmark raises $87.5 million for fashion resale marketplace
Poshmark, the app for fashion consignment, has raised another $87.5 million in funding led by Singapore-based Temasek. Menlo Ventures, GGV Capital, Mayfield and others also…
Google Cloud Spanner update includes SLA that promises less than five minutes of downtime per year
Cloud Spanner, Google’s globally distributed cloud database got an update today that includes multi-region support, meaning the database can be replicated across regions for lower…
Pinterest rolls out its own version of QR codes
If you are walking around a retailer, you might have seen a sign or something along those lines posted to check out its Pinterest account…
Pinterest Lens now gives users a way to figure out their outfits with the clothes in their closet
Looking for outfits and what to wear is one of the bigger use cases on Pinterest, but as the company looks to try to make…
Dropbox partners with Autodesk to help users collaborate on large design files
Dropbox announced a couple of products today to make it easier for Autodesk users to access and share large design files. The products include an…
YouTube partners with Ticketmaster to sell concert tickets on artists’ video pages
YouTube today announced a partnership with Ticketmaster that will see the Google-owned video network connecting fans with concert tickets and tour information directly on artists’ YouTube…
iOS 11.2 is going to support faster 7.5W Qi wireless charging
The iPhone 8, iPhone 8 Plus and iPhone X all support wireless charging using the Qi standard. It means that iPhones are now compatible with…
Twitter launches lower-cost subscription access to its data through new Premium APIs
Twitter tried to mend its relationship with developers earlier this year with the launch of a new API platform which focused on streamlining APIs and…
Philo ditches sports to introduce a $16 per month live TV service
Philo, a streaming service backed by cable TV content providers, today launched a low-cost, sports-free live TV service priced at just $16 per month. That’s…
Firefox aims to win back Chrome users with its souped up Quantum browser
The last half-decade hasn’t been great for Firefox marketshare. Chrome first overtook Mozilla’s browser back in late-2011 and now hovers above 60-percent, according to StatCounter…
iUNU aims to build cameras on rails for growers to keep track of their crop health
You’ve probably spent a lot of time keeping track of your plants and all the minor details, like the coloration of the leaves, in order…
Apple could reportedly add TrueDepth features to the rear iPhone camera
Apple has packed a ton of sensors into the notch of the iPhone X. The TrueDepth camera system powers many features, from Face ID to…
N26 adds Apple Pay support in France, Spain, Italy and Finland
Fintech startup N26 just launched Apple Pay support in European countries where Apple already launched Apple Pay. Starting today, you can now add your N26…
Furbo unveils treat-tossing dog camera with smart alerts, like when your dog is pacing
Furbo, the dog camera that lets you communicate with your pet and also tosses treats to your dog when you’re away, has launched a new…
Valet startup Zirx relaunches as Stratim, a mobility service for GM’s Maven, Ford’s Chariot and others
When Zirx announced last February its plans to shut down its on-demand valet parking startup, it wasn’t clear what the company meant when it said it…
Cloudflare expands into mobile performance with Neumob acquisition
Cloudflare made a significant acquisition today when it acquired mobile VPN startup, Neumob. The purchase gives Cloudflare a mobile performance tool it was lacking, and…
Muse is a simple dedicated Amazon Alexa add-on for the car
Want to bring Alexa into your vehicle? You now have a few options, including a new $49.99 accessory from voice tech company Speak Music, which…
Eko’s ‘That Moment When’ is an interactive comedy series all about social awkwardness
A new video series called That Moment When is pretty much my kryptonite. And I mean that as a compliment. See, I’m the kind of…
Kinder, gentler debt collector TrueAccord raises $22 million
Bringing debt collection into the age of the soft touch, email and text-based world of the 21st century has netted TrueAccord $22 million in a…
Bossa Nova raises $17.5 million for retail robots
Why count inventory when the robots can do it? Retailers are using machines from a startup called Bossa Nova Robotics to analyze what’s selling on…
Your Google Home speaker is now also an intercom
One of the niftiest features of Google Home is now available for owners of the smart speaker after support for ‘Broadcast’ rolled out. The new…
Pacifica launches a new online therapy service that integrates with its self-help app
When admitting you are struggling with anxiety or depression is hard enough, asking for help can seem insurmountable. Pacifica’s self-help app was created to make…
Demystify hardware startups at Disrupt Berlin 2017
Hardware is hard, they say, and that’s why hardware will be a point of discussion at TechCrunch Disrupt Berlin 2017. We’re pleased to bring to…
Report: Apple is back to being the world’s top wearable maker
Apple is once again the biggest selling producer of wearables after its third-generation Apple Watch, released in September, helped it pip China’s Xiaomi to the…
Amazon’s AWS business is reportedly pulling out of China
It looks like Amazon is removing itself from the Chinese cloud services industry on account of stringent new data laws that went live in the…
Lofelt raises $5.4M to develop next-gen haptic tech for gaming, AR, VR, automobile, and more
Lofelt, a Berlin-based startup that is developing ‘next-generation’ haptic technology for use in a range of products — including gaming, AR, VR, automobile, consumer electronics,…
LightStep emerges from stealth with a tool for application performance monitoring
LightStep, a company which has developed a new tool for application performance management, has emerged from stealth with a $29 million dollar war chest. The…
HTC cancels plans to release wireless VR headset with Google in the U.S.
One of the only questions I’ve asked HTC VR execs consistently over the past several months is whether the Daydream version of its upcoming standalone…
Crunch Report | Apple could give us a bigger iPhone X, Lyft goes to Canada
Today’s Stories Apple could give us a bigger iPhone X next year Lyft heads to Toronto, Canada in December, the first city outside the United…
Lord & Taylor will start selling on Walmart.com
Walmart and Hudson’s Bay-owned department store Lord & Taylor just announced an interesting partnership — Lord & Taylor will start selling its catalog of high-end…
Equity Shot: The Uber-Softbank deal explained
Hello and welcome to another Equity Shot, a quick-hit episode of our venture-capital themed podcast. (Equity, released every Thursday, focuses on the money behind the…
Meet Boston Dynamics’ streamlined SpotMini
Boston Dynamics hasn’t talked much since it changed hands from Google’s ailing robotics wing to the deep pockets of Soft Bank, but the cutting edge…
The Apple Watch can accurately detect hypertension and sleep apnea, a new study suggests
A new study out from health startup Cardiogram and the University of California San Francisco (UCSF) suggests wearables like the Apple Watch, Fitbit and others…