Startups
Tech startup news that breaks down the funding, growth, and long-term trajectory of companies across every stage and industry. Startup coverage includes climate, crypto, fintech, SaaS, transportation, and consumer tech.
Musk raises $6B for AI startup. Also, is TikTok dodging Apple’s commissions?
Welcome to Startups Weekly — Haje’s weekly recap of everything you can’t miss from the world of startups. Sign up here to get it in your inbox every Friday. Musk’s…
Despite recent successes, IPO market still won’t fully open until 2025
Experts say macroeconomic factors including the upcoming election and the current state of the economy will deter too many IPOs this year.
EQT snaps up API and identity management software company WSO2 for more than $600M
WSO2, a company that provides API and identity management services for enterprises, has been acquired by EQT for more than $600M.
Allozymes puts its accelerated enzymatics to work on a data and AI play, raising $15M
Allozymes uses a method in which millions of enzymes can be tested per day, rather than just a few hundred.
It’s hard for early-stage founders to say no to revenue from a large customer, whose needs might not align with the broader customer base.
How Y Combinator’s founder-matching service helped medical records AI startup Hona land $3M
Y Combinator’s founder matching tool has quietly become one of most powerful offerings. That’s how medical records AI startup Hona was founded.
Hubble Network makes Bluetooth connection with a satellite for the first time
Hubble Network has become the first company in history to establish a Bluetooth connection directly to a satellite — a critical technology validation for the company, potentially opening the door…
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They thought they were joining an accelerator — instead they lost their startups
Lacey Hunter thought all was well as she put her startup through the three-month Newchip accelerator. Then the organization filed for bankruptcy in May 2023. Things went from bad to worse later that year when she discovered warrants of her company — rights to buy an ownership stake — had become part of the proceedings,…
It’s not building any startup, but building a defensible AI startup presents its own set of unique challenges.
Here’s your shot across the bow — there’s a little over one month left to nominate your startup for Startup Battlefield 200 at Disrupt. Join this elite group for a…
Dropbox, Figma CEOs back Lamini, a startup building a generative AI platform for enterprises
Lamini, a new startup with funding from Andrew Ng, has emerged from stealth with a generative AI platform aimed at enterprises.
Renda, which provides order fulfillment for businesses in Africa, takes in $1.9M
The logistics industry in Nigeria, like any informal sector, struggles with poor infrastructure and other inefficiencies, making it difficult for businesses — both large and small — to move and…
Digital fraud detection startup BioCatch hits $1.3B valuation as Permira buys majority stake
Digital fraud detection company BioCatch has a new majority shareholder in the form of U.K private equity firm Permira.
ButcherBox acquires ‘Shark Tank’-featured startup Truffle Shuffle
ButcherBox is known for grinding its way forward, bootstrapping to more than $600 million worth of revenue. The company hasn’t traditionally been on the M&A path, but today it announced…
Freshworks acquires Device42 for $230M, appoints Dennis Woodside as new CEO
Freshworks, the publicly listed SaaS firm, is acquiring U.S.-based startup Device42 for $230 million, the company disclosed in an SEC filing. Alongside the acquisition disclosure, Freshworks revealed that founder Girish…
Tiger Global-backed Innovaccer in talks to raise $250M in new funding, sources say
Innovaccer, a health tech startup that aggregates patient data across systems and care settings, is in advanced stages of talks with investors to raise as much as $250 million in…
TechCrunch Minute: Razer’s Zephyr mask lands it in regulatory hot water
Razer is in trouble with the FTC over masks it made and sold during the COVID pandemic. The matter is going to cost it around $1.1 million, and some bad…
Exciting news for those who want to experience the buzz of TechCrunch Disrupt 2024 in San Francisco without breaking the bank or needing an extensive schedule! We’ve just released our…
Belgium’s Aikido lands $17M Series A for its ‘no BS’ security platform aimed at developers
Developers have a problem. It used to be the case that only large enterprises needed to worry themselves with security, but today, every startup is capable of holding huge amounts…
A tech-wide reckoning that began in 2022 and ran throughout into 2023. Though 2024 has gotten off to a rough start, it has yet to reach the peak of the…
In 2019, Jyoti Bansal co-founded San Francisco-based security company Traceable alongside Sanjay Nagaraj. With Traceable, Bansal — who previously co-launched app performance management startup AppDynamics, acquired by Cisco in 2017…
Chicago-based Hyde Park Venture Partners closes $98M Fund IV with two investments made so far
Hyde Park Venture Partners is known for having visibility into more than 90% of mid-continent startups and being early backers of companies like ShipBob, FourKites, G2, LogicGate and Dentologie.
Midi is building a digital platform for an oft-overlooked area of women’s health
When Joanna Strober was around 47, she stopped sleeping. While losing sleep is a common symptom of perimenopause, she first had to go to multiple providers, including driving 45 minutes…
Changpeng Zhao, also known as “CZ,” the founder and CEO of crypto exchange Binance, has been sentenced to four months in prison. Six days ago, the US Department of Justice…
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How European disability tech startups are leveraging AI
Making life better for people with disabilities is a laudable goal, but accessibility tech hasn’t traditionally been popular among VCs. In 2022, disability tech companies attracted around $4 billion in early-stage investments, which was a fraction of fintech’s intake, for example. One reason is that disability tech startups are often considered too niche to attain…
Productive solar technologies draw investors as global off-grid solar sector funding slumps
Productive Use of Renewable Energy (PURE) technologies, especially those in the solar irrigation and cold chain segment, saw increased investor interest last year, despite a 43% funding slump recorded in…
Seam wants to make customer data accessible to every business user
As data access becomes increasingly tied to business success, making data available to all business users, regardless of their data-wrangling skills, has grown in importance. The founders of Seam, an…
The Browser Company, makers of the Arc web browser, released its Windows version today. The company started testing the Windows client in December, and it said that more than 150,000…
A pair of Airbnb alums is bringing intelligence and automation to data protection
When Julie Trias and Elizabeth Nammour were working together at Airbnb on the company’s data team, they had to deal with data spread across a variety of sources, and that…
‘Wallet-as-a-service’ startup Ansa raises $14 million with female investors leading the way
Ansa, a startup that helps merchants develop and offer branded virtual wallets, has raised a $14 million Series A round of funding, the company has told TechCrunch exclusively. Renegade Partners…
