Spain’s Glovo picks up $528M as the food deliver market continues to heat up

On the heels of Deliveroo raising more than $2 billion ahead of its debut on the London Stock Exchange this week, another hopeful in the food delivery sector has closed a super-sized round. Glovo, a startup out of Spain with 10 million users that delivers restaurant take-out, groceries and other items in partnership with brick-and-mortar […]
https://tcrn.ch/3m8bPUF

Celonis announces significant partnership with IBM to sell its process mining software

Before you can improve a workflow, you have to understand how work advances through a business, which is more complex than you might imagine inside a large enterprise. That’s where Celonis comes in. It uses software to identify how work moves through an organization and suggests more efficient ways of getting the same work done, […]
https://tcrn.ch/3rGc7TF

Datapeople announces $8M in raised capital as it works to make recruiting more equitable

This morning Datapeople, a startup that sells software designed to make recruiting more equitable, announced that it has raised $8 million across two funding events, including a $5 million round in mid-2020. The company, which counts Uncork Capital, NextView Ventures and First Round Capital as backers, does two things. Its initial product, what Datapeople calls […]
https://tcrn.ch/3magkxU

Otrium raises $120 million for its end-of-season fashion marketplace

Otrium has raised a $120 million round just a year after raising its $26 million Series B round. BOND and returning investor Index Ventures are leading the round. Existing investor Eight Roads Ventures is also participating. The concept behind Otrium is quite simple. When items reach the end-of-season status, brands can list those items on […]
https://tcrn.ch/3u7pYnz

Monk’s Hill Ventures and Glints on how Southeast Asian startups can cope with the region’s talent crunch

A lot has changed since Monk’s Hill Ventures released its first report on tech compensation in Southeast Asia five years ago, with base salaries and competition for top talent jumping dramatically. But one thing has remained the same since 2016: startup compensation data, including information about base pay, bonuses and stock options, is still hard […]
https://tcrn.ch/3sC7ueQ

Substack confirms $65M raise, promises to ‘rapidly’ expand its financial backing of newly independent writers

This afternoon Substack, a paid-newsletter startup, confirmed that it has raised $65 million, as initially reported by Axios. TechCrunch dug into the math behind the financing here. As anticipated, a16z led the new financing. What’s in store from the now Series B-backed company? Product work. The company wrote that it intends to “rapidly” expand its […]
https://tcrn.ch/3cAfuXT

Everli, the European marketplace for online grocery shopping, bags $100M Series C

Everli, the European marketplace for online grocery shopping that started in Italy but now also operates in Poland, Czech Republic and France, has raised a $100 million in Series C funding. The round is led by Verlinvest, with participation from new investors Luxor, DN Capital, C4 Ventures, and Convivialité Ventures. FITEC (part of Fondo Italiano […]
https://tcrn.ch/31Jm5tb

Testing platform Tricentis acquires performance testing service Neotys

If you develop software for a large enterprise company, chances are you’ve heard of Tricentis. If you don’t develop software for a large enterprise company, chances are you haven’t. The software testing company with a focus on modern cloud and enterprise applications was founded in Austria in 2007 and grew from a small consulting firm […]
https://tcrn.ch/2O3lsqS

NFTs are part of a larger economic development in finance capital

Before NFTs are written off as a flash in the pan, it might be worth considering that NFTs were never designed to be very useful in traditional investment frameworks.
https://tcrn.ch/39qM3FV

A Supreme Court ruling affirming Canada’s carbon tax opens the door for a startup explosion

Last week the Canadian Supreme Court ruled that the national government’s plan to tax carbon emissions was legal in a decision that could have significant implications for the nation’s climate-focused startup companies. The ruling put an end to roughly two years of legal challenges and could set the stage for a boom in funding and […]
https://tcrn.ch/3ddR1XN

Ajaib raises $65M Series A extension led by Ribbit Capital, increasing the round’s total to $90M

Ajaib, the Indonesian investment app, has added $65 million to its Series A, bringing the round’s new total to $90 million. The extension was led by Ribbit Capital, the fintech investor that also led Robinhood’s $3.4 billion funding last month. Ajaib is Ribbit Capital’s first investment in Southeast Asia. The extension will be used to […]
https://tcrn.ch/3syzvDN

To improve accountability, Norrsken VC ties partner compensation to its portfolio’s sustainable successes

With the close of its latest investment fund, Norrsken VC is is taking an unprecedented step in tying the compensation of its partners to the positive changes the firm’s portfolio companies have on the world — and not just their financial returns. The firm, which released its impact assessment for 2020 last week, has invested […]
https://tcrn.ch/3cuMYqM

The disconnect between Y Combinator Demo Day and due diligence

Within 48 hours, the startup world experienced two momentous events: Y Combinator’s largest Demo Day ever, and the early investor exodus of Dispo, a photo-sharing app. Both events, while seemingly unrelated, taught us a lot about the importance, and difficulty, of due diligence in our current world. For background, early investors in Dispo distanced from […]
https://tcrn.ch/39hSmLS

This Week in Apps: App Store bills gets ghosted, Dispo drama, Facebook’s Clubhouse clone

Welcome back to This Week in Apps, the weekly TechCrunch series that recaps the latest in mobile OS news, mobile applications and the overall app economy. The app industry is as hot as ever, with a record 218 billion downloads and $143 billion in global consumer spend in 2020. Consumers last year also spent 3.5 trillion minutes using apps on Android […]
https://tcrn.ch/3csHOM7

One of Canada’s top investors, John Ruffolo, is back from the brink with a new $500 million fund

John Ruffolo isn’t as famous as some investors, but he’s very well-known in Canadian business circles. The longtime head of Arthur Andersen’s tech, media, and telecommunications practice, he joined OMERS roughly a decade ago when a former colleague became CEO and brought him aboard the pension giant to create a venture fund. The idea was […]
https://tcrn.ch/3fkcocG

Woven Capital kicks off portfolio with investment in autonomous delivery company Nuro

Woven Capital, the investment arm of Toyota’s innovation-focused subsidiary Woven Planet, has announced an investment into Silicon Valley-based autonomous delivery vehicle company Nuro. This kicks off the new $800 million strategic fund, which will invest in growth-stage technology companies that could one day develop into partners or acquisitions to further a mission of building the […]
https://tcrn.ch/31mSTaX

Amid pandemic, Middle East adtech startups play essential role in business growth

There is tremendous potential in the Middle East for adtech startups and digital marketing agencies. Although consumers there used to prefer traditional advertising, the internet took over in 2020.
https://tcrn.ch/3fgSFu4

BBG Ventures just closed on $50 million to fund more women-led startups

BBG Ventures, an eight-year-old, New York-based seed- and early-stage venture firm that only backs founding teams which feature at least one woman, just locked down $50 million in capital for its third fund, a major leap over its first two funds, both sized at $10 million. One determining factor in the bigger fund is that […]
https://tcrn.ch/2NY6KSa

Investors and business leaders: It’s time to take coaching mainstream

Business leaders are led to believe that reaching out for support is a sign of weakness. That stigma is a huge part of the problem.
https://tcrn.ch/3vUq2sN

As more artists and musicians turn their attention to NFTs, so, likely, do money launderers

Outlets that follow the crypto industry have been observing a trend, which is that according to Google search data, the rise in interest in non-fungible tokens, or NFTs, now almost matches the level of interest in 2017 in initial coin offerings, or ICOs. Of course, ICOs largely disappeared from the scene after the SEC started […]
https://tcrn.ch/3f9Rlt6

H&M removed from Chinese apps over Xinjiang cotton boycott

H&M has been removed by major e-commerce and service apps in China after a Communist Party organization barraged it for a statement expressing “deep concern” over allegations of forced labor in Xinjiang’s cotton industry. On Thursday morning, a search for “H&M” yielded zero results on e-commerce platforms including Alibaba’s Taobao, JD.com and Pinduoduo, Meituan’s shop-listing […]
https://tcrn.ch/3ciGgE8

Twitter is exploring the use of Facebook-style emoji reactions

If you’re old enough to remember the outrage that followed Twitter’s decision to replace stars with hearts (aka likes instead of favorites), then you know that Twitter’s user base has strong feelings about how it wants to engage with tweets. Now, Twitter is considering another radical change on this front that could shake things up […]
https://tcrn.ch/3d3rr7x

Lime launches app-less rides and no fee reservations to get more people riding

Lime is rolling out several new features, including the ability to rent electric scooters without downloading the app, in an effort to attract more riders.  The micromobility company announced Wednesday a series of product features that aims to remove barriers to entry for new users, while increasing accessibility to its vehicles. The new features include […]
https://tcrn.ch/3sjGiBc

Our favorite companies from Y Combinator’s W21 Demo Day: Part 2

We've reached the end of Y Combinator's biggest Demo Day, which saw more than 300 companies pitching back-to-back over eight hours.
https://tcrn.ch/3f69Crj

Kargo unveils its new Fabrik publishing system

Digital advertising company Kargo is launching a new product and new business unit called Fabrik. Founder and CEO Harry Kargman explained that Fabrik is a content management system designed for publishers’ modern needs and integrated with Kargo’s advertising technology. Kargman suggested that he sees this as part of Kargo’s broader mission of “saving publishing.” That might […]
https://tcrn.ch/3cdqrOX

Crypto social network BitClout arrives with a bevy of high profile investors, and skeptics

While much of the recent wave of relentless hype around NFTs — or non-fungible tokens — has been most visibly manifested in high-dollar art auctions or digital trading cards sales, there’s also been a relentless string of chatter among bullish investors who see a future that ties the tokens to the future of social media […]
https://tcrn.ch/3tLtWlF

Indian beauty e-commerce Purplle raises $45 million

Purplle, an e-commerce platform for beauty products in India, said on Monday it has raised $45 million in a new financing round as it looks to expand its presence in the world’s second largest internet market. The new round, a Series D, was financed by Sequoia Capital India and existing investors Verlinvest, Blume Ventures, and […]
https://tcrn.ch/2OYQMrl

Where is the e-commerce app ecosystem headed in 2021?

The closest match to the growing e-commerce stack is the marketing automation stack, making it worthwhile to compare and contrast the growth of these ecosystems and what drives consolidation.
https://tcrn.ch/3rcTSFk

Next Billion Users head Caesar Sengupta is leaving Google

Caesar Sengupta, the long-time head of Google’s Next Billion Users initiative, is leaving the company next month, he said Monday. Sengupta, who additionally also led the company’s payments business in the past three years, is leaving the firm after nearly 15 years. A regular fixture at Google’s events in India, Brazil, and Indonesia, Sengupta (pictured […]
https://tcrn.ch/3c7djuF

Aldea Ventures creates ‘hybrid’ European €100M fund to invest both in Micro VCs, plus follow-on

The historical trajectory of venture capital has been to move to earlier and earlier finding rounds in order to capture the greatest potential multiple on exit. In the US, we’ve seen an explosion of Pre-series A funds, and similarly in Europe. But there’s been an opportunity to tie a lot of that activity together and […]
https://tcrn.ch/318sg9u

Sivo, a young “Stripe for debt” led by a veteran operator, seems to have investors clamoring

Kate Hiscox is having a moment. Her company, Sivo, founded eight months ago, has already raised $5 million from investors at a post-money valuation of $100 million, and she is in active talks with others who would like her to consider accepting Series A funding from them. Partly, the attention owes to the fact that […]
https://tcrn.ch/38ZeHxC

Tech companies predict the (economic) future

Welcome back to The TechCrunch Exchange, a weekly startups-and-markets newsletter. It’s broadly based on the daily column that appears on Extra Crunch, but free, and made for your weekend reading. Want it in your inbox every Saturday morning? Sign up here. Earnings season is coming to a close, with public tech companies wrapping up their Q4 and […]
https://tcrn.ch/3tDzbE4

Startups, Supreme, and soft-circling your way to an investment

In an Extra Crunch Live this past week, Cleo Capital founding partner Sarah Kunst broke down what founders can learn from Supreme, a sought-after streetwear brand. She argued that founders, similar to Supreme, should build a brand around themselves that is so well-respected and has clout that whenever they start something new, investors will line […]
https://tcrn.ch/3siB88s

This Week in Apps: Google Play slashes commissions, Apple sued over scammy apps, YouTube launches a TikTok clone in the US

Welcome back to This Week in Apps, the weekly TechCrunch series that recaps the latest in mobile OS news, mobile applications and the overall app economy. The app industry is as hot as ever, with a record 218 billion downloads and $143 billion in global consumer spend in 2020. Consumers last year also spent 3.5 trillion minutes using apps on Android devices […]
https://tcrn.ch/39078XC

5 trends in the boardrooms of high-growth private companies

Just as countless aspects of corporate life have been reshaped over the course of the last year, boards of directors are undergoing significant and lasting transformation.
https://tcrn.ch/2QcA3Rx

Timing your bootstrap with Calendly’s Tope Awotona and OpenView’s Blake Bartlett at TC Early Stage

Once the path less traveled, bootstrapping today has become a much more viable and common approach to building a startup. By not taking venture capital dollars early, bootstrapping can force founders to remain disciplined in serving their paying customers well. It’s also a pretty compelling way to minimize dilution for founders and early employees. No […]
https://tcrn.ch/38U6Q4f

AI fintech products are operating at scale and investor interest is maturing

Per a new dataset I spent this morning chewing on, VCs are firing cannons of capital into the AI startup world while exits reach new records.
https://tcrn.ch/390FEBc

Rivian to install more than 10,000 EV chargers by end of 2023

Rivian, the EV startup backed by Amazon, Cox Automotive and T. Rowe Price, plans to install more than 10,000 chargers by the end of 2023. The network will have a dual purpose: quickly power its electric vehicle models with fast chargers installed along highways and provide Level 2 chargers at further afield locations next to […]
https://tcrn.ch/3vFNnOD

Amazon begins testing its Rivian electric delivery vans in San Francisco

Amazon is expanding customer deliveries via electric cargo vehicle to San Francisco, making the Bay Area the second of 16 total cities the company expects to bring its Rivian-sourced EVs to in 2021.  San Francisco’s unique terrain and climate were a couple of the reasons Amazon said it chose the city for its second round […]
https://tcrn.ch/2QlJf6j

Startups, get your bug bounty crash course at Early Stage 2021

In cybersecurity, nothing is “unhackable.” Security bugs are an unavoidable consequence of an online world, but how companies receive and respond to hackers can make or break them. Get it right, and you build bonds with the security and hacker community and improve your security by fixing flaws before malicious actors do. Get it wrong […]
https://tcrn.ch/2OJF2sw

Lucid Motors sees a second life for its EV batteries in energy storage

Lucid Motors has designed the battery packs in its luxury electric vehicle for two lives. The company, which is already experimenting with energy storage systems for commercial and residential customers, is also eyeing ways to repurpose batteries from its electric vehicles. While Lucid is still years from having to contend with a large number of […]
https://tcrn.ch/3vBXvYU

Olo prices IPO sharply above its target, valuing company as high as $4.6B

We're checking in on the price investors paid for a block of Olo shares before it began trading and will look into the latest numbers in Coinbase's new S-1/A filing
https://tcrn.ch/3bS3elj

Apple Maps updated with Covid-19 vaccination locations in the U.S.

Google earlier this year announced an update to Google Maps to help people find Covid-19 vaccination sites nearby, and now Apple is doing the same. Apple device owners can either ask Siri or search within Apple Maps to find nearby Covid-19 vaccine providers within the U.S., the company says. These results will include key information, […]
https://tcrn.ch/2QeQOf4

Trading platform eToro to go public via SPAC merger in $10B deal

Multi-asset investing and trading platform and Robinhood competitor eToro announced Tuesday it will go public via a merger with SPAC FinTech Acquisition Corp. V in a massive $10.4 billion deal. Once the transaction closes sometime in the third quarter, the combined company will operate as eToro Group Ltd. and is expected to be listed on […]
https://tcrn.ch/3eNmZMP

Ford expands robotics research into $75 million U-M facility

Ford Motor Company will be embedding 100 of its researchers and engineers in a new $75 million robotics and mobility facility on the University of Michigan’s Ann Arbor campus. This is not the first collaboration between the automaker and the university. Ford is UM’s single largest corporate donor and the two entities have previously teamed […]
https://tcrn.ch/2P0i4xj

Startup founded by ‘Survivor’ champ debuts airless bike tires based on NASA rover tech

As NASA is quick to remind people, the investments it funnels towards space exploration often winds up improving life on Earth – and it’s now in the business of speeding up some of that work through startups. SMART, a startup founded in 2020, has a partnership with NASA through the Space Act Agreement and is […]
https://tcrn.ch/30SErXS

InBalance Research forecasts demand for energy suppliers to ensure they optimize distribution

From distributed homes in Cambridge, Mass. and Cambridge, England, inBalance Research is joining Y Combinator as it looks to accelerate its business as the oracle for independent energy providers, utilities and market makers. Selling a service it calls Delphi, the very early-stage startup is hoping to provide analysis for power producers and utilities on the […]
https://tcrn.ch/2Ose3lp

Relativity Space lands first Department of Defense launch contract

Relativity Space already has a significant volume of launch contracts on the books – more pre-sales for its Terran 1 rocket than any other launch vehicle in history, in fact, according to CEO and co-founder Tim Ellis. But its latest customer is a key one: The U.S. Department of Defense, which has contracted Relativity Space […]
https://tcrn.ch/2OTqCGe

Stripe’s epic new valuation and the value-capture gap between public and private markets

Let's examine the company's newly-shared growth results, compare them to what we knew previously, and see if we can suss out why Stripe could be worth $95 billion today, and presumably more when it does float.
https://tcrn.ch/3rPipBu

Stripe closes $600M round at a $95B valuation

On the heels of reports that Stripe was raising yet more money, the payments giant has now confirmed the details. The company has closed in on another $600 million, at a valuation of $95 billion. Stripe said it will use the funding to expand its business in Europe, with a focus on its European HQ, […]
https://tcrn.ch/2Op7lwu

SpaceX flies Falcon 9 rocket booster for a record 9th time, delivers 3rd batch of Starlink satellites in two weeks

SpaceX has delivered another 60 Starlink satellites to orbit — meaning it has sent 180 in total to join its 1,000+ strong constellation in the past two weeks alone. Today’s launch also set a record for SpaceX for its Falcon 9 rocket reusability program, since it was the ninth flight and ninth landing for this […]
https://tcrn.ch/3qJckVH