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Automakers accelerate their interest in startups
It’s no secret that automakers have shown more interest in startups lately. Nor is it any secret what’s driving that surge, given the massive shifts the industry faces from the rise of electric cars, autonomous vehicles, ride-hailing services and other emerging technologies and transportation business models. We set out to quantify combined investment by automakers in startups… Read More
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How tbh hit #1 by turning anonymity positive
The innovation of tbh, teen-speak for To Be Honest, was getting rid of the typing. Whether asking or answering questions, open text fields invite abuse when combined with anonymity. Even an innocuous question like “What do you think of me?” can lead to mean-spirited comments if responders don’t have their names, and therefore any accountability, attached. Read More
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How to run a token sale
Seed funding is drying up. Accelerators are scrambling for revenue. Things are changing drastically in the startup ecosystem. So how do you raise money when your product needs more than some Django code and an AWS instance? You run an ICO, right? Read More
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ipsy launches its beauty product e-commerce business Shopper as hit hits 3M subscribers
ipsy, a subscription service that delivers a collection of products to its users every month, has spent the last six years building up a community with millions of people obsessed with beauty products. And now that the company has more than 3 million subscribers — with a $10 per month subscription cost — it’s ready to get a little bit more aggressive by getting directly… Read More
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Freight startup Flexport soars from ‘unsexy’ to $800M valuation
Flexport handles the boring logistics of a trillion-dollar business: the transport of shipping containers around the world. Because the work of freight forwarding seemed so bland, it was long ignored by the tech world. But digitizing the paperwork let Flexport speed up shipping so clients keep less inventory on hand while never running out. Read More
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Co-founder Brian Fenty becomes CEO at TodayTix
There’s a new CEO at TodayTix, though he’s definitely not new to the company — Chairman Brian Fenty is becoming chief executive, while his co-founder (and the previous CEO) Merritt Baer is becoming the Head of Europe. TodayTix sells theater tickets in cities across the United States (including New York, Chicago and San Francisco), but its European presence is currently limited… Read More
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Pinterest opens up more than 5,000 interests for advertiser targeting through its Taste Graph
Pinterest builds itself around visual discovery — the idea that you can come to the site or app, see something you like, and immediately dive down a rabbit hole. The company has built an extensive suite of tools internally to figure out which rabbit hole to divert users to, and now it’s opening up some of that knowledge to advertisers. Pinterest said today that it’s… Read More
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Zenefits tries a rebrand and hands off insurance brokerage
Zenefits co-founder Parker Conrad was shown the door in February last year, paving the way for then-COO David Sacks to take over the company and try to turn it around. After about a year of working on that, Sacks stepped back and brought in Jay Fulcher as its new CEO, the former CEO of Ooyala and Agile Software. Since then, Fulcher has been taking a heat test on the company and the brand… Read More
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Pointy, a startup that lets local retailers easily put stock online with a simple gadget, raises $6M
Pointy, an Irish start startup that lets local retailers put their stock online so that they can be discovered via search engines, has raised $6 million in Series A funding. The round is being led by Frontline Ventures, alongside Paul Allen’s Vulcan Capital, Draper Associates and a number of notable angel investors. Read More
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ClassPass begins testing variable pricing as it expands beyond studio fitness
On the heels of its $70 million Series C, an expansion to new markets, and a partnership with Blink Fitness, the popular workout subscription service ClassPass is now beginning to experiment with variable pricing. The test was revealed by new ClassPass CEO Fritz Lanman, speaking on stage at TechCrunch Disrupt SF this afternoon. The idea to try out a virtual currency of sorts came about… Read More
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And the winner of Startup Battlefield at Disrupt SF 2017 is… Pi
Startups participating in the Startup Battlefield have all been hand-picked to participate in our highly competitive startup competition. They all presented in front of multiple groups of VCs and tech leaders serving as judges for a chance to win $50,000 and the coveted Disrupt Cup. After hours of deliberations, TechCrunch editors pored over the judges’ notes and narrowed the list down… Read More
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Why women are coming forward about harassment and discrimination
It’s been the talk of the summer in Silicon Valley. CEOs at Uber and SoFi lost their jobs after whistleblowers came forward, alleging sexism and harassment. Powerful venture capitalists, including Dave McClure from 500 Startups lost their jobs after women, including Sarah Kunst, accused him of making inappropriate advances when seeking a job at his venture firm. Workplace harassment… Read More
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Our favorite pitches from Alchemist Accelerator’s 16th batch
Alchemist Accelerator, known for its specialty in working with enterprise startups, held its 16th demo day at Microsoft’s offices in Mountain View, California. 18 startups pitched ideas ranging from more traditional marketplaces to frontier aerospace technology. Addressing the packed auditorium before the pitches began, Ravi Belani, managing partner at Alchemist, reasserted his core… Read More
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YC wants to let people invest in its startups through the blockchain
ICOs — or initial coin offerings — are emerging as a route for startups to raise money from a wide pool of investors through cryptocurrency networks. Speaking at the TechCrunch Disrupt conference in San Francisco, Y Combinator president Sam Altman painted a mixed picture of the role of ICOs in the tech world today. It wasn’t all good. Read More
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10x, founded by the ex-CEO of Barclays, raises $46M to take on ancient banking infrastructure
The fintech revolution continues apace, and while many startups are hoping that newer and better tech will help them take business away from traditional banks, today a company has received a large round of funding to help those incumbent institutions better compete. 10x Future Technologies is a startup that has built a ground-up platform that incorporates machine learning, cloud services… Read More
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Pymetrics attacks discrimination in hiring with AI and recruiting games
Identify the traits of your top performing employees and hire people like them, but without the discrimanatory bias of traditional recruiting. That’s the promise of Pymetrics, an artificial intelligence startup that today announced $8 million in new funding onstage at TechCrunch Disrupt SF. Read More
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