Neumob, which recently raised a $8.5 million Series A round, helps developers speed up their apps with the help of a combination of a content delivery network and a number of network optimization techniques.As the company announced today, it has now hired Jim Roskind as its CTO.W … | Continue reading
Thanks to smartphones and the rise of apps like Snapchat and Periscope, vertical videos have gone from being an annoyance requiring a workaround to a popular and often preferred video file format. That shift has inspired a number of startups to focus on the medium, in an effort t … | Continue reading
One more chapter in the messy story of Powa Technologies, the payments startup that last raised money at a $2.7 billion valuation but rapidly sank into the deadpool on a flimsy raft of vaporware. Today, accounting firm Deloitte announced that it had secured two buyers for two par … | Continue reading
LinkedIn today open-sourced WhereHows, a meta data-centric tool the company has long used internally to make it easier for its employees to discover data the company generates and to track the lineage of its data sets as they move around its various internal tools and services. N … | Continue reading
Niniane Wang was watching the infamous “iPhone vs. Evo” video — a short animated film of two creatures poking fun at the iPhone — on YouTube and was thinking of all the ways a video like that could be more customizable and personalized. It also helped spark the idea for her to st … | Continue reading
J.J. Abrams, best known as the co-creator of TV series “Lost” and director of recent “Star Trek” movies as well as “Star Wars: The Force Awakens,” is now bringing his love for space exploration to a new documentary series called “Moon Shot” on YouTube. The series will feature the … | Continue reading
One of the problems with technology maturation frameworks like the Gartner hype cycle is that you never know where you stand. That is certainly the case with mobile apps today. Depending on whom you ask, the app economy is either poised for significant growth or about to take a s … | Continue reading
Consumers can expect to see more augmented reality used by other famous film franchises in the near future. ILMxLAB currently works with a number of filmmakers to help create more engaging theater experiences. Read More | Continue reading
Apple has expanded its presence on Twitter, adding an English-language general support channel — called simply @AppleSupport — which it says will be tweeting out tips and tricks, as well as offering to help users with any Apple-related questions they may have. Read More | Continue reading
Vimeo, the video network and underdog to the global behemoth that is YouTube, has given its iOS application a massive redesign today aimed at making it easier to upload, discover and play videos. A key part of the revamp involves new, cleaner navigation combined with an element o … | Continue reading
Citymaps, the curated mapmaking company, has updated its iOS and Android application to include a downloadable option so users can access maps offline. Read More | Continue reading
Alaska is home to one of the toughest endurance events in the world: the Iditarod — a 1000+ miles dog sled race across the vast wilderness that is the U.S.’s northernmost state. Most of us will never get to see this race in person (or participate in it), but you can now experienc … | Continue reading
A startup out of Malmo, Sweden called Mapillary is using crowdsourced photos to create an open source, B2B database to compete with Google’s Street View, and today the company announced a Series A round of funding from an impressive list of backers to help make that ambition a re … | Continue reading
Life is hard enough for teens, so Shots sidestepped bullies with a selfie sharing app that doesn’t allow commenting. Now the 6.6 million daily active user social network wants to boost kids’ spirits by refocusing around comedy. Today’s iOS and Android update lets users share any … | Continue reading
Amazon’s voice-operated command center Echo produces something close to modern-day magic within our homes: Get the latest news, order a pizza, turn off the lights or find out who killed Bruce Wayne’s parents in fewer than 1,200 milliseconds. Read More | Continue reading
StockRadars, a Thailand-based service providing mobile-based analytics and insight for trading, just followed Robinhood’s lead and enabled real-time stock trading inside its app for the first time. Read More | Continue reading
While Angie’s List continues to reject acquisition offers, the home services marketplace is taking a big step to boost its online audience, and hopefully the number of people using it to find their next carpenter or masseuse. Today, the company is announcing that it will drop its … | Continue reading
Everyone’s favorite retro backpack maker is heading into the 21st century. The Vancouver-based company has released something called the Lawson Backpack, a grand departure from their olde-timey design and materials.The Lawson uses a rip-stop material called Sealtech which can res … | Continue reading
Armed with $13.25 million in funding from Khosla Ventures, Ron Conway, Marc Benioff, Bain Capital and others, Roofstock is launching a marketplace for buying and selling already-rented homes. The idea is that if you buy a home that currently has tenants, you avoid the hassle of f … | Continue reading
Wrap Media has raised $4 million it will use to grow its business in Japan. The new funding comes from returning investor Dream Incubator, a Tokyo-based consulting and private equity firm that has also signed a strategic partnership with Wrap Media. The San Francisco-based startu … | Continue reading
Facebook-owned photo-sharing platform Instagram is flexing its platform muscle by shutting down deeplinking to other social media services. Previously Instagram users were able to include ‘add me’/’follow me’ links on their profile page, directly linking out to any other profiles … | Continue reading
Fresh from pulling in $83 million from European insurance giant AXA last month, Africa Internet Group (AIG) — the Rocket Internet-backed company behind e-commerce site Jumia — has announced that it has raised €300 million ($326 million) in fresh funding. Read More | Continue reading
RNTS, the Netherlands-based parent company of Fyber (formerly known as SponsorPay) and Heyzap, continues its run of ad tech acquisitions. Today the company announced that it has acquired Inneractive, an Israeli-based real-time bidding and mobile ad exchange, for $46 million in ca … | Continue reading
The Zika virus continues to spread across South America and beyond, but unlike with other pandemics, identifying and mapping the outbreak has proven hard. Google today announced that it is now working with UNICEF to build a platform that aims to bring together data from different … | Continue reading
Bangalore is the setting for the latest showdown between Uber and its India-based rival Ola after both companies launched motorbike taxi on-demand services in the city. Read More | Continue reading
Online payment processing startup Dwolla has been hit with a $100,000 penalty by the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB). The CFPB, a government agency, said in a consent order that Dwolla misrepresented the safety of its data-security practices. Read More | Continue reading
In an effort to appeal to cord cutters, AT&T will launch three new services that allow users to stream DirecTV online without an annual contract, satellite dish, or set-top box. The plans—called DirecTV Now, DirecTV Mobile, and DirecTV Preview—will be available in the fourth quar … | Continue reading
If flying cars and personal assistants that live inside your light bulbs sound far-fetched, think again. The high-tech apps and devices that debuted at CES 2016 this year prove we’re living in the future. Let’s look at how these products are set to shape — or reshape — our worlds … | Continue reading
Eight, the startup formerly known as Luna, announced today that it has raised $6 million in Series A funding. The company makes a smart mattress cover that can track your sleep, change temperature (the temperature can even vary across different parts of the cover) and send data t … | Continue reading
Weebly isn’t just for building websites anymore — it recently launched Promote, a platform for building marketing emails. CEO David Rusenko said this is actually Weebly’s second big expansion, after adding an e-commerce platform. But at least e-commerce is, y’know, part of a webs … | Continue reading
If you’ve ever looked at meditation and thought “that stuff just sends me to sleep,” you may just be onto something. Mindfulness Everywhere recently released Sleepfulness, an app to help you pull the plug on yet another long and horrific day, and dispatch you off to the land of n … | Continue reading
Lending Club, the largest P2P lending platform in the U.S., has seen its share price drop by more than 50 percent since December 10; the price per share on the NASDAQ Stock Market dropped from $14 to less than $7 (current price per share will vary). So what is the reason for such … | Continue reading
HBO announced today it would be expanding its streaming footprint with the launch of standalone streaming services in Brazil and Argentina, which are set to go live before the end of 2016. These join the recently announced standalone service arriving in Spain, also before year-en … | Continue reading
Home furnishings site Dot & Bo is expanding into workplace design, with the launch of Dot & Bo for Business. The e-commerce startup will be offering a free styling service to other startups and businesses who are looking to find the right vibe for their offices. Read More | Continue reading
Another chance to participate in TechCrunch Include Office Hours is here. On March 18th, Santi Subotovsky and Alison Wagonfeld of Emergence Capital will join TechCrunch editors to provide advice and feedback to startups. Launched in 2014, Include is TechCrunch’s diversity program … | Continue reading
Slack was being cheeky when yesterday it said voice chat would start testing “very, very soon”. Today the new “Calls” feature starting rolling out on Slack for desktop. It lets you start a private Slack Call or launch a conference call in a channel that anyone can join with a cli … | Continue reading
WhatsApp, the Facebook-owned mobile messaging service that recently hit 1 billion users worldwide, is today rolling out a much-anticipated feature to its apps on iOS and Android devices: document sharing. Though the company hasn’t yet made an official announcement, a number of Wh … | Continue reading
Want to develop for Microsoft’s HoloLens mixed-reality platform but don’t want to pay $3,000 for the developer kit? Until now, it looked like you were out of luck, but as Microsoft announced today, you will soon be able to use a HoloLens emulator to write your applications even i … | Continue reading
Cisco continued its buying spree today as it announced its intention to acquire Israeli chip designer Leaba Semiconductor for $320 million. Cisco sees this acquisition as a way to advance its hardware catalog with highly advanced chip technology. “By combining Leaba’s semiconduct … | Continue reading
GoTenna, the device for people who want to stay connected when they don’t have cell signal, has found a natural launch partner — outdoor equipment retailer REI. Daniela Perdomo, goTenna’s CEO and co-founder, told me that REI has signed on to be the startup’s exclusive retail laun … | Continue reading
Plane is a new social app from Tim Allison, who previously founded Cupple, the relationship app acquired by YC alumni Pair (which since re-branded to Couple and was sold to Life360). Read More | Continue reading
Voice mail is so last century. The idea of phoning someone then leaving a rambling message when they don’t pick up seems decidedly antiquated in the age of instant connectivity, where friends, family, colleagues and others can be easily reached with a text. Voicemail is so over, … | Continue reading
Robin and Saul Klein are the ‘father and son’ VCs behind the new LocalGlobe seed fund (website, twitter, Medium). Just recently they led a £1.1 million investment in online mortgage advisor Trussle. It’s likely to be among the first of many. Saul has been actively involved foundi … | Continue reading
There has been a lot of hype around using drones to in precision agriculture, but for the time being, using regular planes outfitted with specialized cameras is still a more cost-effective way to cover wide swaths of land. YC-backed TerrAvion made an early bet on using planes for … | Continue reading
The open data that is being released by the Federal Government and particularly by the Department of Commerce is a key asset that is enabling both transparency and business opportunities across industries. Read More | Continue reading
Following its acquisition of Stitch last year, SugarCRM — a CRM and open source competitor to Salesforce — has picked up another startup to enhance the arsenal of intelligent sales tools that it provides to its customers. The company has acquired Contastic, a startup based out of … | Continue reading
Google is rolling out a pilot program today that introduces a new way to pay cashiers — and it involves leaving your phone in your pocket. It’s called Android Pay Hands Free, and it’s a way to basically connect your phone with a point of sales system using the sensors on your pho … | Continue reading
A possible tidbit of early sales data for one of 2016’s flagship virtual reality systems: the HTC-Valve Vive has apparently racked up more than 15,000 pre-orders in less than 10 minutes, according to a tweet by HTC VR dev Shen Ye. Read More | Continue reading