A year ago, at a demo day south of San Francisco, we watched a number of recently formed startups pitch investors on their companies. One that stood out to us at the time was Zubale, a Mexico City-bas
A handful of years ago, the on-demand or “gig” economy was seen as an innovative system of modern work that provided workers and consumers alike with flexibility, independence and convenie
Hello Alfred — the startup that assigns in-home assistants to take care of your recurring chores and tasks — has announced the launch of a new service tier that will provide more properties and re
What if instead of just accepting Uber rides, gig workers could pick from higher-paying skilled tasks around town like stocking shelves, checking inventory or driving a forklift at a local grocer? Whe
Homebodies across the U.S. have reason to celebrate. Postmates — the on-demand food delivery service so popular in major cities that it’s a verb now — just launched in 134 new markets. Those
PullRequest has been on a whirlwind lately, but it’s the kind that any startup would likely welcome. The company was in Y Combinator last August just trying to learn the startup ropes. By Decemb
PullRequest, a Y Combinator Summer 17 graduate, announced a $2.3 million seed round today led by Google’s new AI fund, Gradient Ventures. The Slack Fund, Fika Ventures, Defy Ventures, Lynett Capita
It's tough out there for on-demand drivers, and every second en route counts if they want to hit that bonus or just bring enough home to make the rent. Mystro hopes to put 33 percent more money per ye
On-demand laundry has proven a tough business for some. Washio folded up its business last year, selling its assets into competitor Rinse. At the time Rinse’s founder Ajay Prakash told TechCrunc
Just days after <a target="_blank" href="http://deliveroo.com/">Deliveroo</a>, a popular on-demand restaurant food delivery startup in Europe, <a target="_blank" href="https://techcrunch.com/2016/08/0
HourlyNerd, a Boston-based startup, aspires to be more than an on-demand staffing service for skilled employees. It wants to be a full-service platform for large companies to change the way they thi
I recently posted on Facebook a short rant about digital transformation for established enterprises. The skinny is that there are endless amounts of why and barely no opining on the what or how when i
Last May, Lee Hnetinka shut down his on-demand delivery service WunWun, which was a direct a competitor to Postmates, and then sold the company’s assets to Alfred, a TechCrunch Disrupt SF 2014
The end of on-demand is nigh. The media cover down rounds and startups winding down on a weekly basis, and, as funding stops, it seems as if every "Uber for X" is doomed to fail. However, all on-deman
Tim Attia, co-founder and CEO of Slice Labs, said there’s “a ticking time bomb” threatening the on-demand economy — namely, insurance and liability. Attia’s tackling that pro
If you think about it, money is a ridiculous concept. Without going into a William Jennings Bryan gold standard history lesson, let’s just say the idea that I can hold this thing, this little clo
I spent a good part of my day yesterday attending the On-demand Economy conference at MIT. It was an interesting if somewhat academic look at the changes facing us as individuals, organizations and as
If the on-demand economy was a young pup in the late 2000s, then it has since evolved into a much more sophisticated animal: strong, resilient and capable of adapting to its environment. This movement
This past year will be remembered as the year of the on-demand economy. For many people, especially those outside of Silicon Valley, it seemed to come out of nowhere. On the consumer side, this was al
Words are impactful. They may not break your bones, as the saying goes, but they do guide the way we all think, debate, decide and act. When it comes to the words we use to define our industry -- the
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