Delightree raises $3M to help franchise business owners simplify their operations

Owning one brick-and-mortar business seems complicated enough. But running multiple locations? For many owners, that’s a constant juggling act of phone calls, check lists and driving back and forth from store to store. In the middle of a pandemic, it gets all the more complex. Delightree, a company out of the previous Alchemist Accelerator class, […]
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Opportunities (and challenges) in church tech

Americans are rapidly becoming less religious, but now might be the perfect time for church tech to thrive.
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Twitter says ‘phone spear phishing attack’ used to gain network access in crypto scam breach

Twitter has revealed a little more detail about the security breach it suffered earlier this month when a number of high profile accounts were hacked to spread a cryptocurrency scam — writing in a blog post that a “phone spear phishing attack” was used to target a small number of its employees. Once the attackers […]
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Apple smashes Q3 revenue expectations despite pandemic

COVID-19 isn’t keeping Apple down. The company smashed Wall Street expectations, delivering Q3 revenue of $59.69 billion, beating down the $52.25 billion analysts had expected. The company also announced earnings per share of $2.58 compared to Wall Street expectation of $2.04 EPS. Despite the coronavirus pandemic, Apple’s overall revenue was up nearly 11% year-over-year, reflecting […]
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Watch NASA’s Mars Perseverance rover launch live

NASA is set to launch its newest rover to Mars later this morning. The liftoff is set for 7:50 AM EDT (4:50 AM PDT), with a broadcast beginning at 7:00 AM EDT (4:00 AM PDT). This mission will launch a ULA Atlas V rocket to carry the Perseverance rover to Mars with a trip that […]
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Samsung’s second-quarter profit grew 23% year-over-year, thanks to strong chip demand

Samsung Electronics sounded a cautiously optimistic note in its earnings report today. The company is continuing to deal with the fallout of the COVID-19 pandemic, but its memory business was fortified by demand for DRAM chips as data centers adapted to an increase in remote work and education. Samsung Electronics will launch new models of […]
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LA’s consumer goods rental service, Joymode, sells to the NYC retail investment firm, XRC Labs

After raising $15 million in financing from one of technology’s most successful global investment firms, the Los Angeles-based consumer goods rental company Joymode is selling itself to an early-stage retail investment firm out of New York, XRC Labs. Joymode’s founder Joe Fernandez will continue on as an advisor to Joymode as the company moves to […]
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With Robinhood’s UK launch delayed, eToro to bring out UK debit card following acquisition

Investment app eToro is to launch a debit card, following its acquisition of Marq Millions Ltd, the UK based e-money business. Marq Millions will now trade as eToro Money and will be the issuer for eToro’s card. The acquisition was for an undisclosed amount, and the Marq Millions management team stays on. The card will […]
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Toppr raises $46 million to scale its online learning platform in India

Toppr, one of the largest online learning startups in India, has secured $46 million in a new financing round as it looks to scale its platform including a new product. Dubai-headquartered investment firm Foundation Holdings led the Mumbai-based seven-year-old startup’s Series D round. Kaizen Private Equity, an existing investor, also participated in the new round, […]
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GoPro launches a line of bags, water bottles and a hat because why the hell not

GoPro is now in the merch game with a new line of gear that prominently features GoPro’s logo. From bags to hats, this gear is priced attractively and has the standard affair of features. But in the end, it’s about the GoPro brand. GoPro, even while struggling to remain relevant as sales drop, cultivated a […]
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SpaceX offers an inside look at how it created its futuristic Dragon space suits

When SpaceX set out to fly humans on board its spacecraft, it decided to create its own spacesuit in-house. That’s a very different approach from most spacesuit projects, including those at NASA, which typically involve tapping in outside specialist contractors with a long history of experience to help with the work. In a new video, […]
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Hong Kong-based EMQ raises $20 million for its cross-border financial settlement tech

Cross-border financial transactions are a major headache for individuals and large companies alike, who often have to deal with long wait times and high fees in order to send money to recipients in other countries. EMQ, a Hong Kong-based startup that develops network infrastructure to make international payments faster, announced today that it has raised […]
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‘Tenet’ will get an international release before hitting US screens in September

“Tenet” has long been expected to be a bellwether for filmgoers’ readiness to return to theaters. Director Christopher Nolan is a blockbuster machine, and if anyone can get butts in seats amid the worst pandemic in modern memory, it’s probably him. And to be fair, the film really has served as a kind of litmus […]
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Ford to use Boston Dynamics’ dog-like robots to map their manufacturing facilities

Ford is going to employ two of Boston Dynamics’ ‘Spot’ robots, which are four-legged, dog-like walking robots that weigh roughly 70 lbs each, to help them update the original engineering plans for one of the transmission manufacturing plans. The plants, Ford explains, have undergone any number of changes since their original construction, and it’s difficult […]
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India bans 47 apps cloning restricted Chinese services

India, which blocked 59 apps developed by Chinese firms late last month on the grounds that they pose a threat to nation’s security, today banned an additional 47 apps. The nation’s Ministry of Electronics and IT’s new ban is aimed at those apps that were facilitating access to previously banned services such as TikTok and […]
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SAP will spin out its $8B spin-in Qualtrics acquisition

Well, this isn’t a story you see every day. Less than two years after German software giant SAP snatched experience management platform Qualtrics for $8 billion days before the startup’s IPO debut, it has now decided to spin out the company in a brand new IPO. https://techcrunch.com/2018/11/11/sap-agrees-to-buy-qualtrics-for-8b-in-cash-just-before-the-survey-software-companys-ipo/ In a press statement released Sunday, SAP said […]
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Imint: the Swedish firm that gives Chinese smartphones an edge in video production

If your phone takes amazing photos, chances are its camera has been augmented by artificial intelligence embedded in the operating system. Now videos are getting the same treatment. In recent years, smartphone makers have been gradually transforming their cameras into devices that capture data for AI processing beyond what the lens and sensor pick up […]
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Startups Weekly: What education do you need to build a great tech company?

The easy startup ideas have all been done — the ones that just required some homebrew hardware hacking or PHP dorm-room coding to get off the ground. These days, you might need multiple advanced technical degrees to accomplish something significant. At least that's what Danny Crichton muses grimly this week, in an essay entitled "The two PhD problem of startups today." Here's one newsy example:
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The TechCrunch Exchange: What’s an IPO to a SPAC?

Welcome to The TechCrunch Exchange! I’m incredibly excited that this newsletter is finally in your hands. There’s so much to chat about, dissect and grok. We’re going to be very busy.
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SaaS startup Swoop raises $3.2M to modernize mom-and-pop transportation companies

Chauffeured group transportation — the vehicles used for corporate outings, special events and even weddings — is a fragmented industry, with hundreds of small operators that rely on analog systems to book customers. Now in this era of COVID-19, these operators are being squeezed as travel and tourism have dwindled and companies have opted to […]
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Instacart blames reused passwords for account hacks, but customers are still without basic two-factor security

Online shopping service Instacart says reused passwords are to blame for a recent spate of account breaches, which saw personal data belonging to hundreds of thousands of Instacart customers stolen and put up for sale on the dark web. The company published a statement late on Thursday saying its investigation showed that Instacart “was not […]
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Apple begins assembling iPhone 11 in India

Apple’s contract manufacturing partner Foxconn has started to assemble the current generation of iPhone units — the iPhone 11 lineup — in its plant near southern city of Chennai, a source familiar with the matter told TechCrunch. A small batch of locally manufactured iPhone 11 units has already shipped to retail stores, but the production […]
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New York legislature votes to halt facial recognition tech in schools for two years

The state of New York voted this week to pause any implementation of facial recognition technology in schools for two years. The moratorium, approved by the New York Assembly and Senate Wednesday, comes after an upstate school district adopted the technology earlier this year, prompting a lawsuit in June from the New York Civil Liberties […]
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After ad revenue drop, Twitter tells investors it’s eyeing subscription options

After reporting Q2 earnings that showed a marked dip in ad revenue, Twitter has said its exploring alternatives — dangling the possibility of a subscription option. Earlier today the social media giant reported ad revenues of $562M, down almost a quarter (23%) on a year ago — saying that the pandemic and “civil unrest” leading […]
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China’s first Mars rover is en route to the Red Planet after successful launch of Tianwen-1

China successfully launched a combination Mars orbiter and rover early this morning, using a Long March 5 rocket that took off from Wenchang Satellite Launch Center on Hainan Island at 12:41 AM EDT. The Tianwen-1 payload it carries represents China’s first full-scale Mars exploration mission, after a prior partial attempt with a orbital Mars satellite […]
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Tesla picks Austin for its next US factory to build Cybertruck, Semi truck, Model Y

Tesla has picked a site near Austin for its next U.S. factory, a four to five-million-square foot $1.1 billion plant that will assemble the automaker’s futuristic Cybertruck, the Tesla Semi and the Model Y and Model 3 for sales to customers on the East Coast.  The decision announced Wednesday during the Tesla second-quarter earnings call […]
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Reflect wants to help you automate web testing without writing code

Reflect, a member of the Y Combinator Summer 2020 class, is building a tool to automate website and web application testing, making it faster to get your site up and running without waiting for engineers to write testing code, or for human testers to run the site through its paces. Company CEO and co-founder Fitz […]
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Rakuten will not renew its contract with WeWork, says report

Japanese e-commerce giant Rakuten has decided not to renew its contract with WeWork when it expires next month, according to a report in the Japan Times. Rakuten had leased about 700 desks in Tokyo, but is now planning to move employees from its fintech division into its own new offices. Both WeWork and Rakuten declined […]
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Nielsen is revamping the way it measures digital audiences

Audience measurement company Nielsen announced today that it plans to change the methodology behind its digital products, including Digital Content Ratings, Total Content Ratings, Digital in TV Ratings, Digital Ad Ratings and Total Ad Ratings. The company plans to start rolling out the new methodology in phases in 2021. It isn’t sharing the full details […]
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Combining social shopping rewards and personal finance apps, ex-Snap product gurus launch Meemo

After Wisam Dakka and André Madeira left Snap in 2018 the two longtime product developers and coders cast about for a new app to build.  Looking around they realized there was no financial product that spoke to the generation of consumers they’d spent the last bit of their professional lives working to build for, so […]
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Robinhood, the stock trading app, postpones UK launch ‘indefinitely’

Robinhood, the U.S.-based stock trading app, is postponing its U.K. launch “indefinitely,” more than a year and a half after the company begun executing on plans to cross the pond. It now intends to refocus its efforts on its home market. In November last year, a U.K. waitlist was opened up, garnering 250,000 signups. That’s […]
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Zuckerberg says there’s ‘no deal of any kind’ between Facebook and Trump

In an interview with Axios, Mark Zuckerberg shot down suspicions that Facebook is giving President Trump lenient treatment on the platform as part of a closed-door agreement. “I’ve heard this speculation, too, so let me be clear: There’s no deal of any kind,” Zuckerberg told Axios. “Actually, the whole idea of a deal is pretty […]
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Singapore-based marketing SaaS startup Insider gets $32 million to enter the US

Insider, a Singapore-based startup that develops software to help clients make marketing decisions, plans to launch in the United States after raising a $32 million Series C. The round was led by Riverwood Capital, with participation from Sequoia India, Wamda and Endeavor Catalyst. Founded in 2012, the company says its SaaS for multichannel marketing and […]
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eBay reportedly getting close to selling its classified-ads unit to Adevinta

eBay is reportedly getting close to a deal to sell its classified-ads business to Adevinta, a Norwegian company that runs online marketplaces across Europe and Latin America. According to a Wall Street Journal report, if the negotiations are successful, a cash and stock deal could be announced as soon as Monday. The transaction is expected […]
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Gedmatch investigating after users’ DNA profile data made available to police

Gedmatch, the DNA analysis site that police used to catch the so-called Golden State Killer, was pulled briefly offline on Sunday while its parent company investigated how its users’ DNA profile data apparently became available to law enforcement searches. The site, which lets users upload their DNA profile data to trace their family tree and […]
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The dual PhD problem of today’s startups

One of the upsides of this job is that you get to see everything going on out there in the startup world. One of the downsides of this job is seeing just how many ideas out there aren’t all that original. Every week in my inbox, there is another no-code startup. Another fintech play for […]
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Original Content podcast: ‘The Old Guard’ is extremely dumb fun

Even though we did a lot of arguing about Netflix’s new action movie “The Old Guard,” we’re mostly in agreement: The movie is both reasonably entertaining and astonishingly stupid. We didn’t take issue with the basic concept, which sees Charlize Theron leading a small group of immortal mercenaries. But the plotting feels arbitrary and lazy […]
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It’s time to build against pandemics

Beyond the role software can play in helping enable better data sharing and contact tracing, there are many other problems in which software can play a critical role in resolving.
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Investing in the hidden generation

While it’s no secret U.S. Hispanics represent unparalleled growth opportunities for the U.S. economy, most startups don’t realize this Hispanic youth means an abundance of prime spending years.
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‘Animal Crossing: New Horizons’ and the limits of today’s game economies

The shift to games as economic platforms will be neither swift nor cinematic. But like all true change, it will be profound.
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FedEx is utilizing robotic arms to sort packages at a Memphis facility

FedEx has flirted with robotic technologies before, most notably in the case of Roxo. The delivery robot made its debut in New York City last year, only to get the boot from Mayor Bill de Blasio. These days, however, the prospect of increased automation seems all the more pressing, as COVID-19 has left many reconsidering […]
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Former Atomico and SoftBank VC Carolina Brochado has joined EQT to help build its new growth fund

Carolina Brochado, the former Atomico partner and most recently a partner at SoftBank Vision Fund’s London office, has joined EQT to help launch a new fund dedicated to growth-stage investments, TechCrunch has learned. According to multiple sources, Brochado is part of a new growth fund team at EQT that will sit between its existing earlier-stage […]
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Federal court rules WhatsApp and Facebook’s malware exploit case against NSO Group can proceed

A U.S. federal court judge ruled on Thursday that WhatsApp and parent company Facebook’s lawsuit against Israeli mobile surveillance software company NSO Group can go forward. Phyllis Hamilton, Chief Judge of the United Stated District Court of the Northern District of California, denied most of the arguments NSO Group made when it filed a motion […]
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Twitter won’t say if hackers accessed user DMs after breach

Twitter has said that there is “no evidence” that attackers obtained user account passwords after its security breach on Wednesday, which forced the company to lock down user accounts to prevent verified users from tweeting. In a series of tweets on Thursday — almost exactly a day after the mass account hijacking started — the […]
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Nextdoor launches Sell for Good for easy donations to local nonprofits

Nextdoor is launching a new feature called Sell for Good, allowing uses to sell items on the neighborhood-focused social network and donate the proceeds to local nonprofits. CEO Sarah Friar said that since the pandemic started, conversations about donations have increased 7x on Nextdoor . “Communities are hurting,” Friar said. “People are looking to go […]
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VC Brad Feld has a new book — and some advice — for startups trying to deal with the unknowable

Brad Feld, the longtime investor and founder of both Foundry Group in Boulder, Colorado, and Techstars, the now-global accelerator program, has a new book coming out next week called “The Startup Community Way: Evolving an Entrepreneurial Ecosystem.” In it, he and co-author Ian Hathaway offer some advice about how to make burgeoning startup communities as […]
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Generative algorithms are redefining the intersection of software and music

What if you could mix and match different tracks from your favorite artists, or create new ones on your own with their voices? This could become a reality sooner than later, as AI models similar to the ones used to create computer-generated art images and embed deepfakes in videos are being increasingly applied to music. […]
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Sumeru Equity Partners buys majority stake in SocialChorus with $100M investment

SocialChorus, a startup that helps distribute communications internally in a similar way marketers reach customers externally, announced a $100 million investment today led by Sumeru Equity Partners. With this investment, the firm has bought a majority stake in the company. As part of today’s deal, Sumeru will be adding three members to the SocialChorus board. […]
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VidMob rethinks video production in the pandemic era

VidMob, which started out as a marketplace connecting marketers and video editors, now bills itself as a “creative technology platform.” Now there’s a “creator network” that’s part of a broader suite of tools for managing video production and turning those videos into online ads. And the company has continued to evolve during the COVID-19 pandemic. […]
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Decrypted: As tech giants rally against Hong Kong security law, Apple holds out

It’s not often Silicon Valley gets behind a single cause. Supporting net neutrality was one, reforming government surveillance another. Last week, Big Tech took up its latest: halting any cooperation with Hong Kong police. Facebook, Google, Microsoft, Twitter, and even China-headquartered TikTok said last week they would no longer respond to demands for user data […]
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COVID-19 fails to stop the march of the unicorns

We’re digging into Q2 2020 venture capital results this week. Today we are exploring U.S.-specific results after taking a broader perspective yesterday. As with every quarter, our goal is to understand how strong, or not, the domestic and global VC markets are so that we can better follow the pace of startup dealmaking. The Exchange […]
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