Darrell Etherington
Writer
The Latest from Darrell Etherington
With new owner Naver, Wattpad looks to supercharge its user-generated IP factory
Toronto-based Wattpad is officially part of South Korean internet giant Naver as of today, with the official close of the $600 million cash and stock acquisition deal. Under the terms of the acquisiti
SpaceX launches and lands a Falcon 9 rocket booster a record 10th time
SpaceX has launched another 60 Starlink satellites — making 180 delivered to orbit in under two weeks — but the launch early Sunday morning was more notable because it set a new, key record for Fa
How one founder realized the potential of sustainable energy stored deep below our feet
On this week’s Found podcast, we sat down with Dandelion co-founder and President Kathy Hannun. Kathy came up with the idea for Dandelion while working at Google X, tackling some of the world
SpaceX might try to fly the first Starship prototype to successfully land a second time
SpaceX is fresh off a high for its Starship spacecraft development program, but according to CEO Elon Musk, it’s already looking ahead to potentially repeating its latest success with an unplann
SpaceX successfully launches and lands its Starship prototype rocket
SpaceX flew the 15th prototype of its Starship fully reusable next-generation rocket today, with a test flight that included a successful climb to around 30,000 feet, as well as a controlled flip, des
SpaceX launches 60 more Starlink satellites, claims over 500,000 service pre-orders so far
SpaceX has launched 60 more of its Starlink internet broadband satellites — on “Star Wars Day,” no less, and only five days after it launched the last batch. The company has now delivere
Firefly Aerospace raises $75M Series A at a $1B+ valuation, plus $100M in secondary sale
Firefly Aerospace has raised a total of $175 million, across a $75 million Series A round that valued the company north of $1 billion, and a $100 million secondary transaction which consisted of the s
Wealthsimple raises $610M at a $4B valuation
Canadian fintech giant Wealthsimple has raised a new round of $750 million CAD (~$610 million) at a post-money valuation of $5 billion CAD (~$4 billion). The round was led by Meritech and Greylock, an
How one founder made the most of Y Combinator in a pandemic year
This week, we welcome guest Hana Mohan to our podcast Found. Hana is the co-founder and CEO of MagicBell, a new startup she created with Josue Montano that recently graduated from Y Combinator’s
Heirlume raises $1.38M to remove the barriers of trademark registration for small businesses
Platforms like Shopify, Stripe and WordPress have done a lot to make essential business-building tools — like running storefronts, accepting payments and building websites — accessible to
FAA authorizes SpaceX’s next three Starship test launches
SpaceX is continuing its Starship spacecraft testing and development program apace, and as of this afternoon it has authorization from the U.S. Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) to conduct its nex
Blue Origin will start selling tickets for New Shepard space tourism flights on May 5
Blue Origin seems very close to flying paying customers on its New Shepard sub-orbital rocket, having conducted a dress rehearsal of astronaut loading and unloading on its latest mission. Today, it al
MagicBell raises $1.9M to build a plug-and-play notification platform for product teams
One of the key ingredients in effective product development is receiving timely and relevant notifications about customer use, engagement, potential issues and more. Engineers, developers and product
SpaceX launches 60 more Starlink satellites
SpaceX has launched another batch of Starlink satellites, adding 60 more to the constellation on orbit. This is the 24th Starlink launch in total, and means SpaceX has now sent up more than 1,500 Star
Learn how to create an effective earned media strategy with Rebecca Reeve Henderson at TC Early Stage 2021
TechCrunch’s Early Stage 2021 is back for part two of our bootcamp-for-entrepreneurs event, with a focus on marketing and fundraising. Building on the first half of the event in April, this two-
Hear about building AVs under Amazon from Zoox CTO Jesse Levinson at TC Sessions: Mobility 2021
Last year, autonomous driving startup Zoox was acquired by Amazon in a deal worth $1.3 billion. Since then, Zoox has continued to pursue its existing strategy of developing and deploying autonomous pa
How one founder partnered with NASA to make tires puncture-proof and more sustainable
This week’s episode of Found features The SMART Tire Company co-founder and CEO Earl Cole, a one-time Survivor champion whose startup is working with NASA to commercialize some of its space-age
SpaceX successfully launches astronauts with a re-used Dragon spacecraft for the first time
SpaceX has another successful human space launch to its credit, after a good takeoff and orbital delivery of its Crew Dragon spacecraft on Friday morning. The Dragon took off aboard a Falcon 9 rocket
Watch SpaceX launch its second crew of Space Station astronauts on a flight-proven Falcon 9 live
SpaceX is set to launch its second operational commercial crew mission to the International Space Station for NASA, with a liftoff time of 5:49 AM EDT (2:49 AM PDT) on Friday morning. The flight will
Backed by Nas and Dapper Labs CEO, SportsIcon launches to deliver NFTs bundled with exclusive athlete content
Non-fungible tokens (NFTs) have a natural fit with sports memorabilia, another category of speculative asset whose value is primarily dependent on the prices its adherents are willing to pay. A new st