Ah, wonderful to see you again, sir. The usual? Kool-Aid Grain Alcohol Martini with a twisty straw. Of course. And I see you’re wearing a new watch. The MQT Essential Mirror. Quite striking. I see the watch has a quartz ETA movement – an acceptable movement by any standard – and a very elegant face
Month: November 2018
Google has announced its plan for combating election interference in the European Union, ahead of elections next May when up to 350 million voters across the region will vote to elect 705 Members of the European Parliament. In a blog post laying out a narrow approach to democracy-denting disinformation, Google says it will introduce a
Give the gift of organization this year. Bags are often ignored but are a critical part of anyone’s mobile gear. They’re the outward representations of our techie styles, and we put far too little thought into where we keep our most prized possessions. Here’s a collection of bags TechCrunch reviewed over the last year. You’ll find waxed canvas
One of the most immediate — and already live — applications for robotics and artificial intelligence in general has been in using unmanned robots in warehouses and other environments, where they replace humans in repetitive jobs such as sorting and moving objects from A to B. Now, Beijing-based robotics startup Geek Plus (aka Geek+) says
Wluper, the London-based tech startup building a conversational AI to power domain specific voice assistants, has raised $1.3 million in seed funding. Leading the round is “deep tech” VC IQ Capital, with participation from Seedcamp, Aster, and Magic Pony co-founder Dr Zehan Wang. Founded in 2016 and originally backed by Jaguar Land Rover’s InMotion Ventures,
French crowd-lending platform October (formerly known as Lendix), wants to educate more people about new ways to borrow money. That’s why the company is launching a project called Grandir Ensemble (grow together). 11 big companies are borrowing €100,000 each on October at a 2.5 percent interest rate. October users will be able to lend as
Movinga, the European house removals and relocation platform, has closed €15 million in further funding. The round was led by London-based growth investor ETF Partners, with participation from existing backers Santo Venture Capital, Earlybird, and Rocket Internet. The company says the new capital will support “further process automation”, the launch of new services, and international
Instarem, a Singapore-based startup that helps banks transfer money overseas cheaply, has raised a Series C round of over $20 million for global expansion. The round is led by MDI Ventures — the VC arm of Indonesian telecom operator Telkom — and Beacon — the fund belonging to Thai bank Kasikorn — as well as
There’s hardly enough room to turn around in Livin Farms’ office. Pretty standard, really, in Central, Hong Kong, where space is at a perpetual premium. It’s a small operation for the HAX-backed startup — there’s space for a few desks and not much more. The startup’s last product, the Hive, stands next to the door.
A win for privacy on LinkedIn could be a big loss for businesses, recruiters, and anyone else expecting to be able to export the email addresses of their connections. LinkedIn just quietly introduced a new privacy setting that defaults to blocking other users from exporting your email address. That could prevent some spam, and protect
Facebook has recruited Kate Patchen, a veteran of the U.S. Department of Justice who led its antitrust office in Silicon Valley, to be a director and associate general counsel of litigation. Patchen takes up her post amid ongoing scandals and reputation crises for her new employer, joining Facebook this month according to her LinkedIn profile. The
Apple probably didn’t intend to let competitors take advantage of Siri Shortcuts this way, but you can now launch Google Assistant on your iPhone by saying “Hey Siri, OK Google” . But don’t expect a flawless experience — it takes multiple steps. After updating the Google Assistant app on iOS, you need to open the
Facebook has said it will appeal against a £500,000 penalty issued by the UK’s data watchdog in October following a lengthy investigation into the Cambridge Analytica data misuse scandal. The ICO announced in July that it intended to fine Facebook the maximum possible amount under the UK’s old data protection regime, saying it was “clear”
[embedded content] Affetto is a robot that can smile at you while it pierces your soul with its endless, dead state. Created by researchers at Osaka University, this crazy baby-head robot can mimic human emotions by scrunching up its nose, smiling, and even closing its eyes and frowning. Put it all together and you get
Machine learning is everywhere now, including recruiting. Take CVCompiler, a new product by Andrew Stetsenko and Alexandra Dosii. This web app uses machine learning to analyze and repair your technical resume, allowing you too shine to recruiters at Google, Yahoo, and Facebook. The founders are marketing and HR experts who have a combined fifteen years
Quantum Machines, an Israeli startup launched by three Ph.D. physicists, wants to build the operational and control layer for quantum computing. Today, it announced a $5.5 million seed investment led by TLV ventures with participation from Battery Ventures. The three principals have been studying quantum computing for a decade and they understand that to commercialize
Facebook failed to prevent its platform being used to auction a 16-year-old girl off for marriage in South Sudan. Child early and forced marriage (CEFM) is the most commonly reported form of gender-based violence in South Sudan, according to a recent Plan International report on the myriad risks for adolescent girls living in the war-torn region. Now
Google is expanding its efforts to support media to Asia Pacific after the search giant brought its Google News Initiative to the region. Known as GNI, the program is designed to “help quality journalism thrive in the digital age” by providing grants (i.e. cash without equity) to media organizations that are judged to have potential. The
TechCrunch will soon be returning to Africa to hold its Startup Battlefield competition dedicated to the African continent, in Lagos, Nigeria, on December 11th. The event will showcase the launch of 15 of the hottest startups in Africa on stage for the first time. We’ll also be joined by some of the leading investment firms
Wind Mobility, a Berlin-based mobility startup that offers “dockless” e-scooter (and electric bicycle) rentals, has raised $22 million in seed funding, throwing its hat into the European competitor to Bird and Lime ring. It follows recent raises by Sweden’s VOI ($50 million Series A led by Balderton) and Germany’s Tier (€25 million Series A led
TechCrunch has obtained an internal memo published by Facebook’s outgoing head of public policy Elliot Schrage in which he blames himself for hiring PR firm Definers. He admits to having the company push negative narratives about competitors, but says Facebook did not ask or pay Definers to publish fake news. COO Sheryl Sandberg left a
In a short but amply-hyped interview with CNN, Facebook’s founder and chief executive again responded to criticism over the company’s most recent crisis. The interview, excerpted from a longer Q&A for a CNN series called “Human Code,” hit most of the main questions that critics have raised about Facebook’s failings and Zuckerberg’s unilateral control over
The Morgan Stanley Multicultural Innovation Lab, Morgan Stanley’s in-house accelerator focused on companies founded by multicultural and female entrepreneurs, hosted its second Annual Showcase and Demo Day. The event also featured companies from accelerators HearstLab, Newark Venture Partner Labs and PS27 Ventures. (Note: I was formerly employed by Morgan Stanley and have no financial ties.) The showcase represented
It was November 20, 1998, when an unprecedented international coalition of astronomers, engineers, and rocket scientists saw years of collaboration come to fruition with the launch of the International Space Station’s first component. Since then the largest spacecraft ever built has hosted innumerable astronauts, experiments, and other craft. Here are a few notable moments in
Autodesk announced plans to acquire PlanGrid, a San Francisco startup that helped moved blueprints from paper to the iPad when it launched in 2011. This digitization of construction fits with Autodesk’s vision of digitizing design in general and CEO Andrew Anagnost certainly recognized the transformational potential of the company he was buying. “There is a
Nearly every online publisher has launched or announced a paywall — but of course, even the ones who are successful won’t convince every reader, or even the majority of readers, to sign up. Now Piano and True[x] say they’ve found more effective way to monetize the rest of the audience, without threatening crucial subscription revenue.
Apple always has an interesting ad for the holiday season. This time, it’s a cute little animated short film. It feels like a hybrid between a Pixar movie and a Wed Anderson creation. [embedded content] Named “Share Your Gifts”, the ad focuses on a dreamy teenager who spends a lot of time on her MacBook.
A ruling in late October against a little known French adtech firm that popped up on the national data watchdog’s website earlier this month, is causing ripples of excitement to run through privacy watchers in Europe who believe it signals the beginning of the end for creepy online ads. The excitement is palpable. Impressively so,
The social media singularity continues with the arrival of Snapchat Stories-style slideshows on LinkedIn as the app grasps for relevance with a younger audience. LinkedIn confirms to TechCrunch that it plans to build Stories for more sets of users, but first it’s launching “Student Voices” just for university students in the US. The feature appears
15 weeks after Facebook announced its “Your Time On Facebook” tool that counts how many minutes you spend on the app, the feature is finally rolling out around the world. Designed to help you manage your social networking, the dashboard reveals how many minutes you’ve spent on Facebook’s app on that device each day for
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