December 2017
Andreessen Horowitz has a new, $450 million bio fund
Almost exactly two years ago, the venture firm Andreessen Horowitz took the wraps off a $200 million “biofund” that aimed to invest at the intersection of biology and engineering and…
Instana raises $20 million for its microservice monitoring and management service
Instana, a company that helps enterprises monitor and manage their microservice deployments with the help of automation and artificial intelligence, today announced that it has raised a $20 million Series…
Alibaba will soon begin selling cars using these gigantic vending machines
Alibaba last week announced a deal to help Ford sell electric vehicles in China but, aside from the big names involved, the most intriguing part was a proposed vending machine…
Helpster, a platform for temp job seekers in Southeast Asia, raises $2.5M
Helpster, a two-year-old startup that connects blue-collar workers with employers in Southeast Asia, has closed $2.5 million in new funding. The startup operates in Thailand and Indonesia with around 50…
Finiata, the finance platform for SMEs, freelancers and the self-employed, bags €18M funding
Finiata, the finance platform targeting SMEs, freelancers, and the self-employed that was founded by Sebastian Diemer, who previously co-founded credit scoring and loans company Kreditech, appears to be on somewhat…
Paddle, the software sales platform founded by a Thiel Fellow, raises $12.5M
Paddle, a U.K. startup that offers software companies a single platform for the entire software sales process — including trials and licenses, payments, and analytics — has raised $12.5 million…
Teabox, the company pioneered the concept of selling tea to direct to consumers online, has served up $7 million in fresh funding to grow its five-year-old business. This new infusion…
China’s CCTV surveillance network took just 7 minutes to capture BBC reporter
It took Chinese authorities just seven minutes to locate and apprehend BBC reporter John Sudworth using its powerful network of CCTV camera and facial recognition technology. This wasn’t a case of…
Exec who reportedly said Netflix doesn’t believe Danny Masterson’s accusers no longer works there
The Netflix executive who reportedly told one of Danny Masterson’s alleged rape victims that the company doesn’t believe them is no longer employed there. Andy Yeatman, Netflix’s director of global…
SoundCloud resuscitates home screen with personalized playlists
After laying off 40% of its staff and securing $169 million in emergency funding, SoundCloud’s first product push is a much needed step in the right direction. It’s filling its…
Crunch Report | Glow-in-the-Dark Plants
Blue Origin’s Crew Capsule 2.0 takes first flight, scientists at MIT make glow-in-the-dark plants and Google is opening an AI center in China. All this on Crunch Report.
They say Christmas season gets earlier every year, and the same seems to apply to CES. The year’s biggest tech show is a little less than a month away, yet…
Wizeline expands its outsourced IT services business into southeast Asia
Wizeline, a provider of outsourced programming services, is expanding its global footprint with agreements to partner with a slew of development shops across Southeast Asia. Founded in 2014, the company’s…
The price is right! Pace raises £2.5M to automate hotel room pricing based on demand
Pace, a London startup that has developed tech that uses machine learning to let hotels set room prices dynamically based on demand, has raised £2.5 million in seed funding. The…
Plenty of Fish doubles down on conversations with new features
Match Group, which houses a large portfolio of dating app brands – including most notably, Tinder, Match, and OKCupid – is prepping a notable upgrade to one of its older…
Microsoft looks to make Bing results smarter with new AI-powered features and Reddit partnership
At a special AI-focused event today in San Francisco, Microsoft announced a number of feature updates to Bing that it hopes will make results smarter by leveraging the company’s AI…
Microsoft makes Azure Bot Service generally available for developers
Microsoft introduced the Azure Bot Framework more than two years ago and companies have been building chatbots for a variety of scenarios ever since. Today, the company made generally available the…
The new reality of mobile AR and computer vision venture capital
Mobile AR from Apple, Google and Facebook and computer vision/machine learning (CV/ML) are focusing the minds and wallets of VCs in Silicon Valley, China and beyond. The $2.5 billion invested in…
Half of Amazon app users have been switched to a new, swipe-based 1-Click checkout
Has Amazon’s ‘one-click’ checkout on mobile looked a little different to you lately? A number of users of Amazon’s mobile applications have recently reported seeing a new checkout option that…
PuTTY Begone! Microsoft will ship an OpenSSH client
The first thing I download on a new Windows machine – after Chrome, of course – is PuTTY. This tried-and-true OpenSSH client has served millions of devs quite well for…
39 senators tell FCC: ‘Abandon this radical and reckless plan’
In a letter to FCC Chairman Ajit Pai, 39 senators (all Democrats, though Republicans have also voiced concern) urge the agency to stop its plan to eliminate net neutrality rules.…
Redbox unveils its service for digital movie purchases and rentals
Redbox, the company behind the ubiquitous supermarket kiosks for renting DVDs, is moving into the world of digital streaming. Technically, Redbox On Demand is still in beta, but this marks…
Comcast reiterates a shifting promise of ‘no paid prioritization’
Comcast has promised before that it does not and will not engage in paid prioritization, and today the company has reiterated that stance — after being called out for having…
Gfycat wants to fix your low-fidelity GIFs with machine learning
We all love to share GIFs — and there are plenty of ways to do that, through online portals or keyboards — but often times because there is so much…
Security robots are being used to ward off San Francisco’s homeless population
Is it worse if a robot instead of a human is used to deter the homeless from setting up camp outside places of business? One such bot cop recently took…
INSIKT raises $50 million to lend to low-income communities
Loans can be the hardest to get for the people who need them the most. An estimated 45 million Americans don’t have a credit score and others have trouble bringing up their…
Twitter says Russians spent ~$1k on six Brexit-related ads
Twitter has disclosed that Russian-backed accounts spent $1,031.99 to buy six Brexit-related ads on its platform during last year’s European Union referendum vote.
Here are the deadlines for all your online holiday shopping orders
While some folks still head to the stores on Black Friday and throughout December, many of us are turning to the web for Christmas shopping. Just one complication: shipping tends…
Pepsi one-ups Budweiser brewer by ordering 100 Tesla electric semi trucks
PepsiCo is the latest company to reveal that it’s placed orders for Tesla’s forthcoming electric semi-truck – and also the company with the largest order so far. The beverage company…
Nasty Gal founder Sophia Amoruso just raised venture funding for her new company
Sophia Amoruso famously founded the retailer Nasty Gal, growing it from an eBay store that sold vintage items to a darling of the fashion world that was seeing more than…
