Tag: Daily Crunch

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Fri-yay Crunch!

We are pretty excited about Disrupt 2023 getting a whole stage dedicated to fintech. And while we’re talking about events…There’s just a few hours left to save $200 on TC Early Stage tickets in Boston in a couple of weeks, so get yer tickets while you can!

On that note, enjoy your weekend! — Christine and Haje

The TechCrunch Top 3

• Italy gives ChatGPT the boot: Italy’s government has been on a blocking kick lately. A few days ago, we wrote about a possible ban on cultivated meat, and today Italy wants to block ChatGPT, citing data protection concerns. Natasha L writes that the country’s data protection authority is opening an investigation into whether OpenAI is breaching the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation.
• Groupon gets its Czech book: Ingrid reports that Groupon has lost 99.4% of its value since its IPO and now has a new CEO who will run the business from the Czech Republic.
• Jio gets its game on: Manish writes that Mukesh Ambani, CEO of India’s streaming giant Jio, sees the Indian Premier League cricket tournament as “the perfect opportunity to revamp Jio’s service adoption strategy even as the firm recognizes that cricket streaming will not turn a profit for several years.”

Startups and VC

What do you do when you have a very successful and popular product (marijuana) that is legal in some places, but federally has been a Schedule 1 drug since 1970? Well, you can’t rely on any national institutions as your business partners, Haje reports. One of the major places that shows up is in payments and payment processing; even after recreational cannabis became legal in 21 states and decriminalized in another dozen or so, cannabis has become largely a cash business. In a world that is increasingly cashless, that’s a problem for both consumers and businesses. Smoakland is currently beta-testing a loophole that lets its customers pay by credit card. The secret, it turns out, is crypto.

Need some more to get you through the long bleak gap of “less tech news” known as the weekend? Don’tcha worry fam, we gotchu:

• Down in proverbial flames: Aria reports that Virgin Orbit burns up in uncontrolled descent.
• Teaching an old browser new tricks: Artie sidesteps the app stores by putting high-quality games in your browser, Haje reports.
• Pouring our hearts out: Haje reviewed a fancy-ass $700 coffee maker and concludes that xBloom makes perfect pour-over so you don’t have to, before asking if you would want to.
• Not worthless, but worth less: U.S. investors slash Byju’s and Swiggy valuation, reports Manish.
• This meeting could have been a summary: Ivan reports that Read’s AI-powered summary feature squeezes a meeting into a two-minute clip.

Yeah, of course, YC’s winter class is oozing with AI companies

Just over one-third of the fledgling startups in Y Combinator’s latest class say “that they are an AI company or use AI in some kind of way,” reports Rebecca Szkutak.

“You can’t blame the YC companies for leaning into AI,” she writes. “If you saw VCs dumping dollars — in a tougher fundraising market, no less — into a technology like AI that you could implement into your own business, why wouldn’t you?”

Three more from the TC+ team:

• Okay, here’s the game plan: Anna and Alex have the lowdown on European startups looking to raise money in 2023.
• Damn the torpedoes, full steam ahead: Investors are unfazed by Q1 crypto funding decline, writes Jacquelyn.
• You’re hired! Anastasiia Kuzmenko shares three recruiting metrics that can help startups make more data-driven hiring decisions.

TechCrunch+ is our membership program that helps founders and startup teams get ahead of the pack. You can sign up here. Use code “DC” for a 15% discount on an annual subscription!

Big Tech Inc.

Checkout.com has a new president who recently spoke with Mary Ann about being bullish on a U.S. expansion and how she “welcomes” comparisons to Stripe. Céline Dufétel says of the payments industry this year: “Now more than ever amid the uncertain economic landscape, CFOs and heads of payments are narrowing in on the impact of payments on topline growth and profitability. Increasingly, business leaders are recognizing the measurable impact of high-performing payments systems in maximizing acceptance rates, minimizing costly fraud concerns, and reducing operational costs.”

And we have five more for you:

• What’s going on with the TikTok ban?: We’re so glad you asked. Taylor gives you the play-by-play.
• TV turned on its side: No, you aren’t seeing your Hulu interface wrong. The streaming company changed some things around, including a revamped sidebar on the left, Ivan and Lauren write.
• You can’t do that on social media: The lower chamber of the French parliament passed an influencer bill cracking down on risky products. Romain has more.
• Going public: Helbiz stock tumbles on reverse split, but it’s okay because they are rebranding to Micromobility.com, Rebecca writes.
• Quite taxing: Amanda played an anime dating sim that does your taxes for you and has some notes.

Daily Crunch: Citing data privacy concerns, Italy temporarily bans ChatGPT by Christine Hall originally published on TechCrunch

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Thursdaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay! It’s one of our favorite days of the week. Definitely in the top 7. — Christine and Haje

The TechCrunch Top 3

• Crypto wallet in disguise: Ledger, a company that designs and manufactures crypto wallets, is now flush with actual cash. Romain writes that after raising over $380 million in 2021, in today’s dollars, Ledger brought in $108 million, raising at the same valuation and from a long list of investors.
• Even contact centers need tech: Customers have lots of questions, and to provide the best experience, you need more than just a friendly voice on the other end of the phone. That’s where Parloa comes in, raising $21 million to add a little automation to contact centers, Kyle writes.
• Cashing in on the generative AI frenzy: In Kyle’s second top story of the day, Fixie, backed by $17 million in venture capital, wants to make it easier for companies to build on top of language models.

Startups and VC

“Our story starts 15 years ago,” Frédéric Utzmann, founder and CEO of Effy, told Romain. After 15 years of bootstrapping, the energy renovation company is at a crossroads and just closed a $22 million funding round from Felix Capital to make the most of the opportunities in the energy renovation space.

The layoffs continue: Indian edtech Unacademy slashes another 12% jobs, and online used-car marketplace Shift cuts workforce by 30%.

Another fistful of wisdoms and nuggets:

• Taking on Twitter, too: Twitter alternative T2 launches new verification program and hires a Discord engineering head as CTO, Sarah reports
• Computer says no to fraud: Kyle reports that Oscilar emerges from stealth to fight transactions fraud with AI.
• Computer says no to other computers: DataDome uses AI to protect against bot-based attacks. The company just raised $42 million, Kyle reports.
• A captive audience: Ingrid reports that P97 fills up its tank with $40 million to fuel its gas station mobile commerce services.
• CEOs only: Natasha M writes that Hampton is tech’s new membership community for chief executive officers.

How to build a sales development representative strategy that will fill your B2B pipeline

Marketing teams deserve all of the credit for crafting innovative campaigns that break through the noise: Convincing someone to try out a new product or service takes real skill!

In practice, however, sales development representatives (SDRs) do most of the work required to land new customers, “making cold calls, writing email outreach, or sending outbound mail,” says GTM strategist Mike Tong.

Because it takes “about 15 touches for a prospect to want to see a demo,” Tong authored a TC+ guide for early-stage CEOs who need guidance around hiring and incentivizing SDR teams.

“Pipeline generation at early-stage companies is expensive and time consuming, often more so than the sales process itself. That said, getting it right is likely the most important thing you can do for your business.”

Three more from the TC+ team:

• Bork bork bork?: Anna takes a look at Sweden’s startup scene as Techstars drops its Stockholm program.
• Let me insure you: Anna talks to six VCs who explain why embedded insurance isn’t the only hot opportunity in insurtech.
• Reaching for the sky: Haje is back with his weekly Pitch Deck Teardown, looking at Northspyre’s $25 million Series B deck, which comes with a few good surprises. And a few, er, not good surprises.

TechCrunch+ is our membership program that helps founders and startup teams get ahead of the pack. You can sign up here. Use code “DC” for a 15% discount on an annual subscription!

Big Tech Inc.

It seems we can’t go that many days without more news on a company cutting jobs. This time, Roku is doing a second round of layoffs, this time of 200 employees, or 6% of its workforce, citing “a larger plan to lower its year-over-year operating expense growth and prioritize projects that it believes will have a higher return on investment,” Sarah writes. This comes four months after Roku laid off an initial 200 people.

Meanwhile, if you want to book an environmentally friendly ride, you’re in luck. Uber expands its Comfort Electric offering to 14 new markets in the U.S. and Canada, Rebecca reports. You can choose from Tesla Models S, 3, X and Y; the Polestar 2; the Ford Mustang Mach-E; the Audi e-tron; the Porsche Taycan; and the Hyundai Ioniq.

And we have five more for you:

• Driving off into the sunset: Waymo retires its self-driving Chrysler Pacifica minivan, Kirsten reports.
• Don’t answer this call: Security firms say a new supply chain attack is targeting customers of a phone system with 12 million users, Carly writes.
• Not enough: Ivan writes that developers say the new Twitter API tiers still miss the mark.
• Game on: Netflix is working on games for the TV where people can use their iPhone as the video game controller, Lauren reports.
• Changes are coming: Lyft’s new CEO has some ideas that might include dropping shared rides, Rebecca reports.

Daily Crunch: Ledger locks down another $108M to double down on hardware crypto wallets by Christine Hall originally published on TechCrunch

To get a roundup of TechCrunch’s biggest and most important stories delivered to your inbox every day at 3 p.m. PDT, subscribe here.

Hello, and welcome to Wednesday Crunch!

On everyone’s mind today is the power of AI and whether we’re all doomed. Connie reports that 1,100+ notable signatories just signed an open letter asking “all AI labs to immediately pause for at least 6 months.” Meanwhile, Amanda explores how everything is “Goncharov” as the meme-makers are going mainstream with a huge assist from AI tech.

— Christine and Haje

The TechCrunch Top 3

• Future of work is borderless: Payday, now flush with $3 million in new capital, plans to expand its Africa-based operations to Canada and the United Kingdom, Tage writes. The company provides a way for those working remotely to receive payments in their currency of choice.
• “Alexa, call Grandma”: A new Amazon capability brings T-Mobile customers into the fold for making and receiving calls via an Alexa-enabled device, Ivan reports.
• In-suring new funds: India-based insurtech company Acko, which is already backed by Amazon, is in talks for $120 million in new funding. Manish has more.

Startups and VC

With a drier than normal investment scene, founders are looking for more effective ways to reach the right VCs. Thousands of founders have applied to land capital through a common app, Natasha M reports. The platform they’ve been using is Seed Checks. Founders are invited to apply using a one-minute form that asks for a deck, memo and region. The app is then blasted to 16 investors.

Autio, a location-based audio entertainment app co-founded by actor Kevin Costner and formerly known as HearHere, has raised $5.9 million. The funding round was led by iHeartMedia, Aisha reports. Autio uses GPS to narrate stories of landmarks, cities and towns nearby with the aim of fostering deep connections and understandings of the places users are traveling through.

And we have five more for you:

• Yeah, but does it use outside-in compression: Deep Render lands $9 million for its AI-powered video compression tech, Kyle reports.
• A growing market: Christine writes that Italy’s ban on cultivated meat could set the industry back.
• Wait, you can’t say that: Kyle reports that LeapXpert raises $22 million to monitor employee chats for compliance.
• Is that you, Bob?: Spera raises $10 million for its identity security posture management platform, Frederic reports.
• Putting the pieces back together again: Distressed Indian startup GoMechanic acquired by Lifelong Group-led consortium, reports Manish.

Ask Sophie: What to do if selected/not selected in H-1B lottery?

Dear Sophie,

After three tries, I was finally selected this year in the H-1B lottery! What do we do next?

— Wondering Winner

Dear Sophie,

I’m on STEM OPT. My employer put me in this year’s H-1B lottery for the third time, but I wasn’t selected again! What do I do?

— Lottery Loser

Three more from the TC+ team:

• Substacks of cash: Alex takes a look at Substack taking a different tack to raise more capital.
• Speak up!: Carly points out that Silence gets you nowhere in a data breach.
• So which one is it?: Are cryptocurrencies commodities or securities? Well, Jacquelyn discovers that depends on which U.S. agency you ask.

TechCrunch+ is our membership program that helps founders and startup teams get ahead of the pack. You can sign up here. Use code “DC” for a 15% discount on an annual subscription!

Big Tech Inc.

Lots of Google-related news today, so let’s summarize, shall we? The TechCrunch audience was particularly enamored with Aisha’s story about a new feature on extreme heat alerts. Why? Perhaps it’s because our weather is not cooperating with the current month. Meanwhile, Frederic reports on Google Cloud launching AlloyDB Omni; Ivan has your look at Google’s new ad transparency center; Manish reports on an Android antitrust case in India; Aisha writes about new Google Search features; and Lorenzo and Carly round it out with a story on hackers using spyware to target users in the UAE.

And with that, we hope you have a Google day!

Now here’s five more for you:

• Spot-ify the new changes: Spotify is testing out new card-style user profiles so that users can have more of a social profile on the platform, Sarah reports.
• Gone fishing for competition: The U.K. Competition and Markets Authority is moving forward with an in-depth probe of the $61 billion Broadcom-VMware deal. Ron has more.
• WWYD with tickets to this show?: Apple’s developer conference, WWDC, returns to Apple Park in June, Brian writes.
• Get your digital scissors ready: Amazon Pharmacy now automatically applies coupons on select brand name drugs, Aisha reports.
• Goooooaaaal!: Sarah writes that Apple is developing a “multiview” feature for watching sports that will enable Apple TV users to watch up to four streams at the same time.

Daily Crunch: After raising $3M seed, global fintech platform Payday plans to secure licensing in Canada, UK by Christine Hall originally published on TechCrunch

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Happy Tuesday Crunch!

To meet the changing startup landscape, we’re refreshing and reimagining TechCrunch Disrupt 2023 in a big way, with more of what you love and new ways to accelerate your growth — new stages, new content, and new opportunities. Panzer breaks down what you have to look forward to in his post today — don’t miss it! Oh, and if you were laid off recently, we are offering a free Expo+ pass to TC Disrupt 2023. Join us!

— Christine and Haje

The TechCrunch Top 3

• It was only a matter of time: Zoom doesn’t want you to stray far from its platform and has added new features, including email, assistant and calendar, so that it can go head-to-head with Slack, Calendly, Google and Microsoft, Ivan reports. That’s a lot of sparring. We hope Zoom is up to the task.
• RIP: Natasha L makes her case for why “Twitter is dying.” We won’t spoil it for you, but it involves a certain person taking it over. If you need any further evidence, only verified accounts will show up in the “For You” section starting April 15. Yes, the people who paid $8 for the blue check.
• More layoffs: Manish reports that GitHub laid off “virtually its entire engineering team in India as the Microsoft-owned firm cuts its expenses amid weakening global market conditions.”

Startups and VC

Gotta love some solid startup drama, and Brian covers it in his summary of Turntable and all its iterations over the years: Turntable LIVE raises $7 million ahead of public launch, after years of co-founder disagreements and music licensing challenges.

We’ve all seen “Jurassic Park,” so we conclude that there’s nothing that could possibly go wrong from taking mammoth DNA and vat-growing mammoth burger meat. That’s right, a cultured meat firm resurrects the woolly mammoth so you can get a whole new (well, old) sensory experience, Paul reports. Personally, we can’t wait for dino-burgers next. Next step: Triceratops tri-tip, Stegosaurus steak and Brachiosaurus burgers all around.

And we have five more stories for you, home grown in small artisanal batches by your friendly, local TechCrunch writers:

• Growing humans: Haje reports how Mate Fertility finds fertile ground with its seed funding round.
• Growing portfolios: Paul reports that under the “high conviction, low volume” investor thesis, Playfair launches a $70 million pre-seed fund for European startups.
• Growing communities: Substack opens up a $2 million community fundraising round, Aisha reports.
• Growth for cat food: Christine writes how fresh funding gives cat food brand Smalls an avenue into retail for the first time.
• Growth for women founders: Dominic-Madori reports how the Tory Burch Foundation launches a tool to help women founders find capital.

Q1 VC results tread water, but that’s cold comfort for SaaS unicorns

As Q1 2023 draws to a close, Alex Wilhelm reviewed early data from PitchBook to get a feel for key VC trend metrics like deal count and total capital invested.

“The picture forming from Q1 2023 venture data is one of measured decline compared to the end of 2022,” he found.

“And March brought with it something akin to a boomlet in domestic venture activity, which could become an even brighter spot if the last bits of first-quarter data further bolster the month’s totals.”

Three more from the TC+ team:

• More dollars for AI: Kyle writes how generative AI continues to be the hot thing and how it’s attracting stacks of VC dollars.
• More dollars for fusion: Tim reports that fusion startup Type One Energy gets $29 million seed round to fast-track its reactor designs.
• How many dollars for Turo?: Alex runs the thought experiment to find out what Turo is worth.

TechCrunch+ is our membership program that helps founders and startup teams get ahead of the pack. You can sign up here. Use code “DC” for a 15% discount on an annual subscription!

Big Tech Inc.

If you’re a fan of listening to music without words while you work, as Christine does, then Apple has a treat for you. Apple Music Classical is now available for download and includes over 5 million tracks, Ivan and Sarah report. Tweet at Christine and let her know your favorite piece. Hers is “Isle of the Dead, Op.29” composed by Sergei Rachmaninoff. It’s a delightful 19 minutes.

Also in today’s Apple headlines is the launch of Apple Pay Later, which enables users to split the cost of an Apple Pay purchase into four equal payments over six weeks without interest or late fees. Kyle has more.

Meanwhile, it’s time to take a walk on Amazon’s Sidewalk, a low-bandwidth, long-range network that the delivery giant opened to developers. Sidewalk can be used to connect Internet of Things (IoT) devices and “developers will be able to check their local signal strength on a map to get a better sense of whether their devices will be able to connect to the network before they start working on a product,” Frederic writes.

And we have five more for you:

• Breaking up is actually easy to do: E-commerce giant Alibaba is splitting into six business groups in what Rita writes is the company’s biggest overhaul in 24 years.
• Hits keep coming: Former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried has found himself in another kerfuffle. This time he is charged for allegedly bribing Chinese officials. Jacquelyn and Alex have more.
• In the dark: Meanwhile, Tesla also finds itself in a mess. Lorenzo reports that it was found that hackers could remotely turn off lights, honk, and even mess with Tesla’s infotainment system.
• Fighting back: Annie has the latest on Meta’s woes in Kenya, where the Facebook parent is disputing it can be sued there again.
• Buy local: India’s efforts to have more iPhones manufactured locally has paid off with shipments of the phones more than doubling, Jagmeet writes.

Daily Crunch: Zoom’s new AI-powered features include whiteboard generation and meeting summaries by Christine Hall originally published on TechCrunch

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Happy Monday Crunch, our Crunch-a-licious friends!

Our favorite part of Lorenzo’s excellent piece on how the feds busted a cybercrime forum: “​​In a spectacular snafu on the hacker’s part . . . the second piece of evidence came from Pompompurin himself. . . . He said he noticed a data breach posted on the site did not include ‘one of my old emails,’ which he looked up on the legitimate data breach notification site Have I Been Pwned.”

Go get ’em. Or, if your business is more of avoiding than getting, go avoid ’em!

— Christine and Haje

The TechCrunch Top 3

• Come together: If you find yourself grumbling about using Microsoft Teams, this story might bring a smile to your face: Frederic reports that Microsoft rebuilt Teams from the ground up, promising some neat things, like 2x faster performance and only half the memory being used.
• Riding the WaveOne: If you’re having a “Silicon Valley” experience right now, you’re not alone. Apple acquired WaveOne, a startup using AI to compress videos, Kyle reports.
• Ahead of the game: A GitHub user named “FreeSpeechEnthusiast” wanted to get the drop on Elon Musk’s promise to open source all code used to recommend tweets on March 31 by creating a repository on GitHub that contained Twitter’s source code. Ivan explains what happened next.

Startups and VC

First Citizens Bank has agreed to buy $72 billion in deposits and loans from Silicon Valley Bridge Bank, the California lender formerly known as Silicon Valley Bank that was taken over by the FDIC two weeks ago, Manish reports.

Another handful to keep you ready for this week’s watercooler moments:

• Half a bil for biz: Christine writes that OpenView goes bigger with seventh fund, closing on $570 million to invest in business software startups.
• Recruiting the founders: Catherine reports that Recruiting marketplace Paraform gets backing from Primer Sazze and Twitch founders.
• F-ai-shon: Kyle explores how Deep Agency shows the perils of applying AI to the fashion industry.
• Excel plus snake: Neptyne is building a Python-powered spreadsheet for data scientists, Kyle reports.
• One-click checkout to outer space: Aria reports that ABL Space Systems scores $60 million for rapid response launch for defense customers.

Just starting out angel investing? Avoid these 7 mistakes.

Becoming an angel investor isn’t easy, and that’s on purpose.

Those who claim the title must satisfy a few requirements with regards to income and licensing. If not, just about anyone could schedule Zoom calls with founders to talk about making their dreams come true.

Business schools teach the basics, but Mysty Rusk, who’s reviewed around 4,500 deals over the last 20 years, says the most important lessons she learned were the result of mistakes she made along the way.

“There may be no way to foresee a global crisis, a stealth competitor, or other risks that are completely outside the startup’s control,” writes Rusk, “but some obstacles are avoidable with the right knowledge.”

Three more from the TC+ team:

• Crypto is the ticket: Ticketmaster sucks, Anna concludes, and wonders if blockchains can be the cure.
• The future of ’shrooms, man: Haje reports How Mindbloom’s CEO sees the future of psychedelic mental health.
• Go together!: Natasha M wonders if solo GPs are screwed.

TechCrunch+ is our membership program that helps founders and startup teams get ahead of the pack. You can sign up here. Use code “DC” for a 15% discount on an annual subscription!

Big Tech Inc.

It’s springtime, so we are guessing it was the right time for Alibaba founder Jack Ma to be seen again. Rita reports that Ma returned to China after a year of uncertainty that included China “trying to voice support for the private sector following a years-long crackdown on the tech industry, including shelving the IPO plans of Ant Group, the fintech affiliate of Alibaba. The movement prompted some founders to move abroad and seek to expand their businesses overseas.”

It seems Salesforce did a good job in convincing investors that it is on the right path. Activist investor Elliott Investment Management, which had probably been a thorn in Salesforce’s side for the better part of this month, said it was ditching its director nomination plans. Paul has more.

And we have five more for you:

• Can you hear it?: Darrell has your review of multiroom sound speakers Sonos Era 100 and Era 300.
• More layoffs indeed: Despite what you read above, it doesn’t look like Salesforce is completely out of the weeds yet in terms of layoffs, Ron writes.
• Take a bite out of this Apple: Aisha writes that Apple’s iOS 17 may include “several” requested features, while Brian tells you about some iPadOS 16.4’s Pencil hover features.
• Buckle up, it’s going to be a bumpy one: Binance and its CEO are being sued by the U.S. Commodity Futures and Trading Commission over trading and derivative violations, Jacquelyn reports.
• No spying: A new Biden executive order bans federal agencies from using commercial spyware that poses threats to human rights and national security, Zack writes.

Daily Crunch: Twitter tells GitHub to remove proprietary source code and help them ID who posted it by Christine Hall originally published on TechCrunch

To get a roundup of TechCrunch’s biggest and most important stories delivered to your inbox every day at 3 p.m. PDT, subscribe here.

Friday Crunch is here! Friday Crunch is here! We are ready to go sit by the proverbial pool with an umbrella-ed drink in it. (Realistically, it’ll be the TV and a beer, while embodying fancy cocktails and a pool. The mind is powerful like that.) For now, on with the news! — Christine and Haje

The TechCrunch Top 3

• Probably nothing to see here: For a few moments there, cryptocurrency giant Binance had to temporarily suspend spot trading, deposits and withdrawals, Manish reports. Everything was back to normal as of this morning.
• Gone: Google removed hundreds of Kenya-focused loan apps from its Play Store following a new policy that digital lenders needed to provide proof of license, Annie writes. We watched something similar play out with the Indian government and lending apps in February.
• Huge investment in EV: Ford is stepping on the accelerator when it comes to electric vehicles and will manufacture a next-generation electric truck at its $5.6 billion factory in Tennessee in 2025, Kirsten reports.

Startups and VC

Zigazoo, the startup known for its TikTok-style video-sharing app for kids, is launching a separate app targeted at Gen Z users, Lauren reports. The new app will take the flagship name and is meant for ages 13 and older, whereas the original kid-focused app is for Generation Alpha (ages 3–12) and has been rebranded to “Zigazoo Kids.” Previous users in the younger age range will be automatically migrated to Zigazoo Kids.

WebAssembly (Wasm for short) is an open standard that enables browser-based applications to run with near-native performance, Frederic reports. It has also expanded to support non-browser environments, which is what is driving a lot of the recent hype around it. But like any emerging technology, it needs a stronger tooling ecosystem to realize its full potential, and Dylibso raises $6.6 million to help developers take the tech to production.

And here are six more, as we are spinning our wheels getting ready for the weekend:

• The circular laptop: Circular economy means to make laptops repairable, and Devin reports that Framework refines its laptops and adds a cute way to reuse old parts.
• The circular hoops: We wouldn’t dunk on cool tech like this — Ingrid reports that Huupe, a “smart” basketball hoop startup, starts a full-court press with $11 million in new funding.
• The circle of checks: Well, it was fun while it lasted! Rebecca reports that Twitter will kill “legacy” blue checks on April 1, while Ivan reports that new Twitter accounts now have to wait only 30 days for Twitter Blue.
• The circle of seaweed: Harri talks to a startup that believes there’s value in seaweed, saying that the seaweed blobbing toward Florida has a silver lining.
• The circle of life: What if the bacteria already within us could help cure cancer? Devin reports that Pragma Bio is searching for cancer remedies hidden in our microbiome.
• Just going in circles: It’s a bold goal to take on Google Maps at its own game, but Hivemapper is 1 million kilometers closer to that goal, reports Rebecca.

Pitch Deck Teardown: Prelaunch.com’s $1.5M Seed deck

Earlier this week, Haje Jan Kamps interviewed Prelaunch.com CEO Narek Vardanyan to get his perspective on how hardware startups can validate products before going to market.

In a follow-up, he analyzed the pitch deck for Prelaunch.com’s $1.5 million seed round, which showed investors how the company monetizes its product forecasts:

• Cover slide
• Summary slide
• Market context slide
• Problem slide
• Solution slide
• Problem with the existing solution slide
• Product slide 1
• Results slide
• Product slide 2
• Product slide 3
• Product slide 4
• Vision slide
• Value prop slide
• Traction and metrics slide
• Business model and pricing slide
• Market trends slide
• Why now slide
• Team slide
• The Ask slide
• Contact us slide

Three more from the TC+ team:

• How to feed your investors the data they want: Investors want best-of-the-best ESG data. Here’s how to give it to them, T. Alexander Puutio advises.
• Time for a bit of sleuthing: Becca teaches how you can use the secondary market to find clues about who will IPO first.
• A cryptic future: Coinbase execs weigh in on the crypto’s future in US amid regulatory scrutiny, writes Jacquelyn.

TechCrunch+ is our membership program that helps founders and startup teams get ahead of the pack. You can sign up here. Use code “DC” for a 15% discount on an annual subscription!

Big Tech Inc.

Remember yesterday when we discussed that Terraform Labs’ CEO Do Kwon was reportedly taken into custody? Well, Kate has an update, and it seems like Kwon was quite naughty, among other things, trying to flee to Dubai with falsified documents. Both the U.S. and South Korea seek Do Kwon’s extradition so he can face multiple charges. It’s not known yet where he will end up.

Now let’s round out our TikTok coverage from yesterday. It looks like CEO Shou Zi Chew did not impress the Congressional audience. We did learn some new things, though: Sarah reports that the social media giant scans public videos to determine users’ ages. Chew also denied that there was spying going on when ByteDance employees surveilled journalists. Taylor has more on that.

And we have five more for you:

• On the other side of the pond: Natasha L has a pair of overseas government news items. The United Kingdom’s antitrust watchdog said new evidence “provisionally alleviates” concerns in relation to the supply of video game consoles in the U.K. related to the antitrust probe of the Microsoft–Activision deal. And the French parliament voted for biometric surveillance at Paris Olympics.
• Up, up, but not away: Blue Origin released a report on the launch anomaly that happened six months ago and vows to fly again “soon,” Devin writes.
• Cancel anytime: The Federal Trade Commission proposes a new rule to make it easier to cancel free trials and subscriptions. Aisha has more.
• Testing, testing 1, 2, 3: Battery swapping provider Gogoro plans to scale in new markets via B2B partners, like Foodpanda in Singapore, Rebecca reports.
• 800,000 problems and AI is not one: The Allen Institute for AI created a database of 3D models of everyday objects for its AI to play around with — 800,000 virtual props to be exact, Devin writes.

Daily Crunch: Binance reopens after bug forces platform to suspend spot trading, deposits and withdrawals by Christine Hall originally published on TechCrunch

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Welcome to Humpday Crunch!

Today we’re sad that Aloria passed away on Sunday, as Lorenzo reported. She was a veteran of the cybersecurity community, especially the one in New York, her home for many years. The Twitter account of the New York City security conference Summercon announced her death on Monday, prompting a seemingly endless list of people to publicly mourn her loss and pay tribute to her life.

— Christine and Haje

The TechCrunch Top 3

• X marks the spot: GitHub launched its Copilot X initiative today, which Frederic reports is an extension of its work on its popular Copilot code completion tool, originally launched into preview all the way back in 2021. The tool also adds a chat mode and more.
• Should you return an investment?: If you’re a struggling founder who took in some venture capital but couldn’t quite find that product market fit, is there “a graceful way out”? That’s the question that Connie takes to investor Gokul Rajaram, who discusses the idea of closing up shop and returning some funding.
• A night at the AI Opera: Opera gets in on the AI excitement with ChatGPT and AI summarization features that let you generate AI prompts by highlighting text on a website or typing it in. Ivan has more.

Startups and VC

Good Meat, the cultivated meat unit of Eat Just, completed the U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s pre-market consultation for its production method, and the agency concluded this week that it had “no questions,” Christine reports.

Early-stage founders need mentorship and support to build a successful startup, and conventional wisdom says, “Get thee to an incubator or an accelerator!” However, the two programs are not interchangeable — they serve very different purposes — and there are roughly 500 accelerators and 1,400 incubators in the U.S. alone. At our Early Stage event in Boston on April 20, we’ll be going deep on that topic and many others. Come join us!

And we have five more for you:

• Brex expands into travel: Mary Ann reports that Brex takes a swipe at Concur with an expansion into travel.
• AI spins cash: The top 10 AI mobile apps have already pulled in over $14 million this year, reports Sarah.
• Keeping it in the family: The Family Fund puts its investment spin on consumer brands with its new $25 million fund, Christine writes.
• Retro cool makes a comeback: Retro camera app Hipstamatic makes its return as an anti-Instagram social network, Sarah reports.
• Moar European capital: Romain reports that Emblem is the latest European seed fund in new wave of VC funds.

3 tips for crypto startups preparing for continued compliance

Most startups can avoid getting into the weeds on legal matters before launching, but crypto companies are in a different boat. Facing a tangle of state and federal legislation, inadequate compliance can quickly generate regulatory hassles and undermine customer confidence.

In a TC+ post written by three lawyers from law firm Norton Rose Fulbright US LLP, the authors share basic information relevant for any crypto startups that operate in the U.S.

“By establishing a robust, risk-based compliance function … and staying abreast of the latest regulatory guidance, cryptocurrency companies can better position themselves to weather the crypto winter,” they write.

Three more from the TC+ team:

• I’ll have another, please: Haje talks to the Fellow team to find out how it bootstrapped for 8 years to build a coffee empire.
• Going to America: We ask Sophie Alcorn, Which visas will allow U.S. expansion of startups?
• The value of human resources: When the tech IPO market reopens, keep an eye on HR unicorns, suggests Alex.

TechCrunch+ is our membership program that helps founders and startup teams get ahead of the pack. You can sign up here. Use code “DC” for a 15% discount on an annual subscription!

Big Tech Inc.

Zack is following what’s going on with a security flaw in Fortra’s GoAnywhere software and continues to hear from organizations that have been hacked. The Russia-based Clop group claiming to be behind this has said some 130 organizations are said to be victims, but less than half have been disclosed. So stay tuned for more developments.

Meanwhile, payment processing service Checkout.com is letting customers have some fun: It has launched virtual and physical cards that they can customize. Romain writes that this new feature, called Issuing, “represents a business opportunity for fintech companies. When someone pays with a card, the card transaction fees are split between the merchant’s bank, the card scheme (Visa or Mastercard, for example) and the card issuer (Checkout.com in this case).”

And we have five more for you:

• Palm pay: Panera Bread said it is the first restaurant to accept Amazon’s palm-reading payment tech, Sarah reports. Speaking of Amazon, she also has a story on the expansion of the Fire TV lineup.
• Repair affair: Natasha L updates us on the European Commission’s Circular Economy Action Plan that lays out “right to repair” rules for faulty products in an effort to keep them out of landfills.
• Ghostwriter: Gaming developer Ubisoft is now using a new AI tool that automatically generates dialogue for non-playable game characters. Aisha has more.
• Growth from cuts: After cutting some 4,000 jobs over the past year, video game publisher Tencent is now showing a profit, Rita reports.
• In case you’re not tired of AI yet: Mozilla has a new startup focused on “trustworthy” AI. Kyle has the deets.

Actually, we have one more! Here is a late-breaking story: Indeed, the job listing platform, announced the layoff of 2,200 employees, Amanda reports.

Daily Crunch: GitHub CEO says new code completion tool ‘brings the fun back to programming’ by Christine Hall originally published on TechCrunch

To get a roundup of TechCrunch’s biggest and most important stories delivered to your inbox every day at 3 p.m. PDT, subscribe here.

Happy Tuesday Crunch, you beautiful, strong, and smart people. So glad to have you with us! Let’s get to it! — Christine and Haje

The TechCrunch Top 3

• Image prompts: Microsoft is enabling Bing users to tap into their most creative selves — through AI, of course, via the use of OpenAI’s DALL-E image creator, Frederic reports. Frederic also writes about two additional features, Visual Stories and Knowledge Cards. “Best I can tell, Microsoft has been testing these quite a bit in recent weeks since they’ve been popping up in my searches with some frequency.”
• Look who’s getting into generative AI: Firefly is Adobe’s approach to generative AI and “will be made up of multiple AI models ‘working across a variety of different use cases,’” Kyle writes. More Adobe news in Big Tech.
• Get in line: Speaking of generative AI (because that’s really all we’ve been talking about for weeks now), Google opens early access to Bard, its AI chatbot. You can join the waitlist. Romain has more.

Startups and VC

The worlds of technology and medicine are making big bets on AI playing a central role in the delivery of healthcare in the future. Today, a startup out of Durham, North Carolina, called Bionic Health — built by two early movers in the commercializing of AI — is throwing its hat into that ring to build out its approach, Ingrid reports. It raised $3 million for its AI health clinic.

Last week, the FBI arrested a man alleged to be “Pompompurin,” the administrator of the infamous and popular BreachForums, Lorenzo reports. Days after the arrest, the cybercrime website’s new administrator announced that they are shutting down the forum for good.

Another handful of stories worth mentioning:

• Baby owl, doo do doo do do doo: Natasha M reports that Duolingo is working on a music app.
• Fund-ception: Roundtable raises funding round on Roundtable, Romain reports.
• Data-peepin’: Kyle reports that Sifflet raises cash to expand its data observability platform.
• Yeah, but did they patent the technology: IPRally is a patent search engine powered by explainable AI. Today, Paul reports that it raised $10.8 million.
• Seeing red: eToro secures $250 million at a $3.5 billion valuation after scrapping SPAC and seeing slower growth, Mary Ann reports.
• Come fly with me: Mapping drone startup Wingtra is charting a new future after landing $22 million, Catherine reports.

SaaS is still open for business, but it’s going to take longer to buy and sell

More than 225,000 tech workers have been laid off in the last year, which is having a direct effect on SaaS renewal and purchase cycles.

SaaS customers that reduced headcount are buying fewer seat licenses, and sales cycles are taking a little longer than they used to, says Ryan Neu, CEO and co-founder of SaaS-buying platform Vendr.

“Over the last three years, our data has shown a steady decline in multi-year deals,” he writes. “Yet we have also seen a significant increase in [average contract value] from purchase to renewal in mission-critical and sticky software categories, like CRM or email.”

Three more from the TC+ team:

• Losing steam, still: Even the hottest startup categories are not immune from the venture slowdown, report Alex and Anna.
• Learn from others’ mistakes: Jonathan Martinez suggests that, when it comes to early-stage growth marketing, it’s often better to imitate than innovate.
• Web100M: Web3 gaming will onboard up to 100 million gamers in the next 2 years, Polygon and Immutable presidents predict, Jacquelyn writes.

TechCrunch+ is our membership program that helps founders and startup teams get ahead of the pack. You can sign up here. Use code “DC” for a 15% discount on an annual subscription!

Big Tech Inc.

Well, this is an interesting turn of events in the age of credit: DoorDash is adding support for cash. Sarah writes that it’s only being rolled out as a DoorDash Drive feature, but that when it was tested, about 20% of U.S. customers ordering pizza paid with cash. She notes that the cash option has helped attract customers who aren’t a fan of handing over their payment information.

Meanwhile, Devin wants to have some words with Amazon, which he reports is shutting down DPReview, “the best camera review site on the web.” He writes that the company’s team was let go as part of Amazon’s latest round of layoffs and that “DPReview is hardly the first media property to get the axe during these turbulent times, but it is surely one of the oldest and most unique. Here’s hoping the talented and knowledgeable team lands on their feet, and Amazon comes to regret its decision.”

And we have five more for you:

• Control, I like to have a lot: And a lot you shall have. A new WhatsApp feature gives admins an easier way to control who can join a group, Aisha reports.
• Over at Adobe: There is much to unpack. Ivan writes about Adobe Express’ enterprise tier, while Frederic has a look at the Experience Cloud. And Kyle writes that there are some new generative AI tools aimed at marketers, and Ron reports on artist compensation for works used to train Adobe’s generative AI product.
• Car talk: Ford unveiled its €45,000 Explorer EV for the European market, Matt writes. And Ferrari says a ransomware attack exposed customers’ personal data. Carly has more.
• Poised in the face of adversity: Before speaking in front of Congress, TikTok’s CEO Shou Zi Chew shared that the streaming giant has 150 million active users in the U.S., Ivan reports. Meanwhile, Aisha writes that TikTok overhauls its community guidelines, adding some new policies on AI and climate misinformation.
• Priorities: Some goods and services might be more expensive amid inflation, but a new Counterpoint study shows consumers are still splurging on premium smartphones. Ivan has more.

Daily Crunch: Bing allows users to generate images using ‘very latest DALL-E models’ by Christine Hall originally published on TechCrunch

To get a roundup of TechCrunch’s biggest and most important stories delivered to your inbox every day at 3 p.m. PDT, subscribe here.

Trucking is a vital industry and yet the majority of operations are operating on outdated platforms. AtoB thinks it has the solution and its co-founder says the company is essentially Stripe for transportation. If you wanna learn more, dial in to our TechCrunch Live episode on Wednesday at 12 p.m. PDT / 3 p.m. EDT.

Happy equinox. May your spring blossom with a million flowers and infinite prosperity.

— Christine and Haje

The TechCrunch Top 3

• A surprising turn of events: Paul has the latest on Amazon, which confirmed another round of layoffs, this time impacting 9,000 people in AWS (see below), Twitch (see Big Tech) and other units. This comes just a couple months after Amazon revealed 18,000 layoffs. The AWS part had some colleagues scratching their heads, with Paul writing, “[C]ompanies are looking to cut costs due to the economic downturn, which translates into fewer dollars spent on things like cloud computing — even though AWS remains a hugely profitable entity for Amazon.”
• Like looking into a crystal ball of startup exits: PitchBook has a new tool that uses AI to predict which startups will successfully exit, Kyle writes. The tool assigns an “opportunity score” out of 100 and even shows through which method the exit might happen.
• OMG AWS: As you read above, AWS took a hit in the latest round of Amazon layoffs, and Ron provides more insight on what went down.

Startups and VC

Banking stocks are whipsawing this morning in the wake of the UBS–Credit Suisse deal and First Republic’s continued woes — and much more, on this morning’s utterly excellent episode of our Equity podcast.

Apropos podcasts: Maximum Fun’s owner is selling the podcast company that he founded almost 20 years ago. Rather than surrendering the network to a Big Tech company or media conglomerate, he is selling it to its workers, as a worker-owned co-op, Amanda reports.

You want more? Y’all are hella greedy. But we are nothing if not kind, so fine — here’s an omakase menu of yumminess:

• Rawr?: Harri reports on Green Li-ion’s $20.5 million round to scale its recycling tech.
• Foiled again: Hydrofoiling ferries coming to an urban basin near you soon, as Haje reports that Candela raises another $20 million.
• Can’t (re-)touch this: Natasha L reports that Glaze protects art from prying AIs.
• Lights, camera, AI-ction: Filmustage leverages AI to break down film scripts, create shooting schedules and more, Lauren reports.
• Going to America: Consumer electronics reseller Reebelo adds to Series A as it lays down roots in US, Christine reports.

The cloud backlash has begun: Why big data is pulling compute back on premises

For most of the Information Age, companies that wanted to scale invested in server farms and hired massive operations teams to keep them running.

The relatively recent shift to cloud computing promised to lower costs and boost productivity, but “cloud-first strategies may be hitting the limits of their efficacy, and in many cases, ROIs are diminishing,” writes Thomas Robinson, COO of Domino Data Lab.

Because “the great repatriation” now taking place among public companies also has direct implications for startup DevOps teams, Robinson shares suggestions for “a few things that can be done to ensure future flexibility for where workloads are created.”

Three more from the magnificently magnificent TC+ team:

• Dude, where’s my IPOs?: To Alex’s infinite chagrin, we’re probably not getting tech IPOs until later this year. Poor Alex.
• De-risking hardware: Haje talks with a market research expert to collect 10 tips for de-risking hardware products.
• Succession: Natasha M invites us to talk about succession plans.

TechCrunch+ is our membership program that helps founders and startup teams get ahead of the pack. You can sign up here. Use code “DC” for a 15% discount on an annual subscription!

Big Tech Inc.

Microsoft is getting in on the mobile games craze with its own app store. Ivan writes that the software giant is going where Apple and Google have gone before, even banking on some new regulations in the European Union to help its cause, noting that “Microsoft has had a difficult time creating the user experience it wants with its Cloud Gaming app on Apple devices because the iPhone maker required users to download each game available to play on Microsoft’s cloud offering, including Fortnite. So Microsoft now asks people to sign in through Safari and follow instructions, which are not as easy as downloading an app from the App Store.”

It’s Monday, so as a special treat, we have six more for you:

• The layoffs keep coming: Taylor is following the developing story over at Twitch, which is laying off 400 employees.
• Asset allocation: Flagstar Bank agreed to buy some Signature Bank assets, but not crypto operations, Romain reports.
• Let’s see some identification: Sarah writes that some new Twitter features show the social media giant may be testing government ID–based verification.
• Game on: Netflix is not playing around. It plans to release 40 more games this year, including Monument Valley in 2024. Aisha has more.
• ICYMI: The Biden administration’s pressure on TikTok is growing by the day. The Justice Department is now investigating TikTok over a journalist spying incident, Taylor reports.
• We’re feeling it: Devin writes that Monarch may be the next big thing in Braille.

Daily Crunch: Amazon CEO says laying off 9,000 more workers ‘is best for the company long-term’ by Christine Hall originally published on TechCrunch