Everything you wanted to know about Google Fall Event 2022 (but were afraid to ask)

TechCrunch Newsletter

By Christine Hall and Haje Jan Kamps Thursday, October 06, 2022

Hi again! Wondering if you have a preference between "Friday Eve," "Pre-Friday" or just stick to Thursday? We are very gently leaning toward Little Friday, but tweet us your favorite post–hump day monikers! — Christine and Haje Image Credits: Google

The TechCrunch Top 3 Made by Google: Brian and a group of other consumer tech fans filed 14 stories (!) related to today's Google Fall Event, so head on down to the Big Tech Inc. section for more on that. Shining a light on business intelligence: Lightdash, which took in $8.4 million in new funding, built its business intelligence platform specifically for dbt, Paul reports. The cool parts? It is open source and both a front end and a back end. Hub-and-spoke: "Trade wars, military conflicts, the rise of e-commerce and sustainability concerns are driving changes to supply chain networks and trade flows," Kyle writes. This is where Altana comes in with its data-grabbing, AI-powered supply chain visibility platform that just secured $100 million in fresh capital.

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Startups and VC Online shopping and speedy delivery through services like Instacart and Amazon Prime are the height of modern conveniences, but for many consumers who care about sustainability and e-commerce's impact on the environment, every box and plastic bag deposited on their doorstep is also accompanied by a feeling of guilt. Sarah reports that a startup called The Rounds believes it has landed on a solution to make online commerce more efficient, more eco-friendly, and — as its newly announced $38 million Series A implies — potentially profitable, too. And we have five more for you: When in Roam: Rebecca reports that  Volocopter completes crewed eVTOL test flight out of Rome vertiport. GreenStars: Techstars unveils sustainability-focused acceleration program in Paris, Romain reports. Is it still called self-driving if it's being driven by someone else: Uber is getting back into the robotaxi game, only this time it's tapping a third party to handle the self-driving tech, showing off a plan over the next 10 years, reports Rebecca. Hot and slow in the kitchen: Typhur cooks up $20 million to channel your inner sous vide chef, by Christine. I know what you did last summer: Kyle reports that Revelio Labs raises cash to scrape the public web for HR insights.

Why your startup needs a prenup In the early days of forming a startup, everyone is on the same page. But by the time a company reaches maturity, there’s no way to know how well the founding team will get along. Starry-eyed newlyweds routinely sign prenuptial agreements without losing their sense of idealism, and startup founders should do the same, advises Yonaton Aronoff, a partner at litigation and employment law firm Harris St. Laurent & Wechsler. “Unfortunately, as too many co-founders and spouses come to realize, the best time to plan for negative outcomes is at the beginning of the relationship,” he writes. “Waiting until conflict develops can be devastating, and too often leads to intractable litigation with no clear winner.” Three more from the TC+ team: Not as bad as you think: The US venture capital slowdown doesn't look that bad, by Alex. You reap what you invest: 7 investors discuss how agtech can solve agriculture's biggest problems, by Harri. Let's talk about that market slide tho: Pitch Deck Teardown: Vori's $10M Series A deck, by Haje. 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! Read More Image Credits: skodonnell / Getty Images

Big Tech Inc. Don't worry, U.S. Twitter users, Sarah writes that your edit button is coming… As mentioned above, the Google Fall Event was today, and if you missed it, you can catch up on the reveal of the Pixel Watch and Pixel 7 here. Other popular stories, all from Brian, include: Google offers a better look at the Pixel Tablet Here's Google's Pixel 7 and Pixel 7 Pro, starting at $599 and $899 Google gets serious about wearables with the Pixel Watch And we have five more for you: Game on: Manish reports that Microsoft and Indian gaming platform Zupee seemed to be in talks in what might lead to a $100 million investment. Not big on waiting: Honda is putting its SUV electric vehicles into full gear and not waiting until 2024, Jaclyn writes. Verdict is in: Uber's former security chief was found guilty of covering up a 2016 data breach. Carly has more. Ads in space: A new study from Russian researchers is betting that satellites beaming billboards in the form of light would make money, Devin reports. All the food and drink you can stand: First it was Grubhub and Gopuff, and now DoorDash has unveiled a feature that lets you bundle food from one place and alcohol from another into a single order. Aisha has the 411 on both.

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Google will use private subsea cable to launch its first full-scale cloud region in Africa

TechCrunch Newsletter

By Christine Hall Wednesday, October 05, 2022

Happy Wednesday! Haje is enjoying a well-deserved day off, but I'm here to dive into some news with you. Let's join hands and jump in at the same time, shall we? — Christine Image Credits: Sean Gallup / Getty Images

The TechCrunch Top 3 Cloudy day: Google's first cloud region in Africa launched in South Africa. Annie and Tage write that this move "allows for the localization of applications and services" and for businesses to more quickly deploy capabilities — for example, artificial intelligence, machine learning and data analytics. Duck, duck, goose: French food tech startup Gourmey took in $48 million of new funding to cook up its slaughter-free and lab-grown foie gras. Romain has more. Show a little more, show a little less: Facebook is testing out a new feature with Reels to let users say how much or how little they want to see of certain things in their feed, Aisha reports.

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Startups and VC Headline included, I enjoyed Paul's story today on Whistleblower Software, an aptly named company that took in a $3 million seed round to continue developing its product aimed at making it easier for workers to report corporate wrongdoings. Enjoy five more: Breaker breaker one: Ron writes that Mvmnt, a freight technology startup, is bringing some sophistication to the way shipping brokers do business. And it's doing it with $20 million in new capital.  Supergraphs are super: GraphQL company Apollo has a new offering for enterprises to "allow businesses to integrate data from a wide variety of sources into a single supergraph that developers can then easily use in their applications," Frederic writes. Perfect model: IriusRisk took in $29 million to help companies automate threat modeling for apps, Kyle reports. It's our party — we can rebrand if we want to: Party Round is now Capital as the company looks to expand its offerings into how founders manage their finances, Natasha M writes. Turning green is not a bad thing here: Please enjoy my story on EcoCart, which grabbed $14.5 million of new funding to tell you how you can do more sustainable shopping.

Dear Sophie: Any tips for negotiating visa and green card sponsorship? Dear Sophie, I'm currently on an F-1 student visa. I'll receive my bachelor's degree in computer science in December and will apply for OPT. I'd like to stay and work in the U.S. Do you have any tips for negotiating visa and green card sponsorship? Anything else I should remember as I start contacting prospective employers? — Shy Student Three more from the TC+ team: Should he stay or should he go?: Tim evaluates if the time has come for Elon Musk to step down from one of his many jobs. Do as I say, not as I do: The path to profitability may not be what VCs look for after all, Becca writes. Lasso them tabs: Annie Saunders loves tabs — she even subscribes to newsletters about them — so here's her take on one tab startup that helped wrangle them for her, once and for all. 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! Read More Image Credits: Bryce Durbin/TechCrunch

Big Tech Inc. A cybersecurity incident disrupted business at U.S. hospital chain CommonSpirit Health, causing it to take some of its information technology systems offline, Carly reports. It is not yet known what kind of incident it was or what, if any, personal information was taken in the process. Here's five more for you: How we doing?: It's been one year since Google's $1 billion pledge of support to Africa's digital economy, and Tage and Annie do a little performance review. M&A action: Spotify acquires Kinzen, a content moderation tech company, in a move that Sarah writes will address platform safety issues. We take your sale and raise you one: Walmart is not letting Amazon's Prime Early Access Sale get the best of it and is countering with its own sale, Aisha reports. This is only the beginning: Just as Elon Musk announced he was moving forward with the Twitter deal, a judge was granting the social media giant time to do some digging. A lot of twists and turns indeed, as Taylor put it. Also, Alex weighs in on how expensive Elon's Twitter buy is. Fight, for your right, to partAI: The White House is proposing an AI Bill of Rights, which "mandates that AI systems be proven safe and effective through testing and consultation with stakeholders, in addition to continuous monitoring of the systems in production," Kyle writes.

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Blocking VLC player downloads violates Indian law, claims VideoLAN in legal challenge

TechCrunch Newsletter

By Christine Hall and Haje Jan Kamps Tuesday, October 04, 2022

Good to have you with us again, as the TechCrunch train continues to rumble along the tracks. It's gonna be a fun and busy week, so let's dive straight in with the news! — Christine and Haje Image Credits: Getty Images

The TechCrunch Top 3 Last to know: VideoLAN, maker of the popular media player VLC, sent a legal notice to some of India's ministries alleging that they banned its website without informing the company it was going to do so. Manish has more. "The next Mark Zuckerberg?": Two Stanford dropouts created Fizz, which Amanda describes as "the anonymous, college-only, Reddit-like social app" that helps you stay connected should your alternative pandemic communication options fail you. It's here, it's here!: The Google iOS 16 Lock Screen widgets are starting to roll out, enabling users to put widgets on the Lock Screen of their iPhone, Sarah writes.

Announcing Jotform Sign: E-signatures meet automation! Sponsored by Jotform Jotform Sign reshapes how you collect and manage e-signatures, resulting in a flawless workflow. With field detection, an intuitive builder, and integrations with great automation tools, Jotform Sign is the most efficient way to collect e-signatures. Get Started Now

Startups and VC John Curtius, the prolific Tiger Global senior partner who has been at the center of some of the firm's biggest deals in the last several years, is leaving the firm, Ingrid writes. He will be leaving to start his own firm, which will concentrate investments from Series A to Series C. Curtius will stay with Tiger until June. In the broadest of strokes, the circular economy represents a colossal shift in how humanity makes and uses stuff. Instead of primarily harvesting raw materials to produce goods that wind up incinerated, or in oceans or landfills, the circular economy offers an alternative where stuff is deliberately reused, repaired and recycled over and over again. Harri reports that Google is spinning up a new, online-only startup accelerator centered around the elusive circular economy. The effort is Google's latest to help environmentally focused startups grow while potentially hooking them on its cloud products in the process. In other news: That'll be eight arms and five legs, please: Mary Ann reports that a new startup is attempting to answer the question of how much to pay your engineering resources. Drone reprieve for Crohn's relief: Rebecca reports that Zipline's drones are set to start delivering medicine in the Salt Lake City area. The fabled land of shares and options: Romain reports how Easop helps you grant equity to international employees. Solve for X, where: Tage reports that Egyptian venture capital firm Algebra Ventures hits its first close of a second, $100 million fund. That's a “no” from us, Kim: And finally, we loved Anita and Dominic-Madori‘s  plea for us to hold Kim Kardashian to task for shilling crypto.

Edtech's honeymoon might be over, but expect a second boom After the pandemic drove students at every level into remote learning, the edtech sector saw record levels of investment — until the public markets began to cool off several months ago. “That said, it's important to remember that publicly traded value represents a fraction of the overall edtech sector,” found Dealroom edtech analyst Carla Napoleão and Rhys Spence, head of research at Brighteye Ventures. In a detailed report that studies both the public and private markets, the duo looked at global deal flow, trends in subsectors like K–12 and corporate learning, and recent M&A activity. “Edtech still has deep and untapped opportunities. The markets may have slowed, but it won't be long until the momentum returns.” But wait, there's more! Space, the final wireless frontier: Tim reports on wireless power company Emrod beaming 550 watts across an Airbus warehouse to demonstrate space-based solar power. More value, more fast: Four ways cybersecurity startups can boost adoption and shorten time-to-value, by Ross Haleliuk. Well something is bubbling up: I will defend the $700 million fizzy water, by 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! Read More Image Credits: Daniel Grizelj / Getty Images

Big Tech Inc. Aren't you glad you came here? It's an Elon Musk day. The big story was Connie's report on Mr. Musk and how his opinion on a peace plan for the ongoing Ukraine-Russia war was not taken probably the way he thought it would. Then in a strange turn of events today, Amanda writes that Musk will now go through with the deal to buy Twitter at his initial offer of $54.20 per share. Representatives filed a notice with the SEC. That news sent shares of the company skyrocketing to over $47 from the open at nearly $43. Meanwhile, we enjoyed Brian's Q&A with new Kickstarter CEO Everette Taylor, who has been in the role for less than a week and is already hitting the ground running. Here's five more for ya: Just when you wanted the ads to go away: Meta made the decision to increase the number of ad slots on Instagram, Sarah reports. It's also testing what it calls "image carousel" ads. When I dip, you dip, we dip: Apple's App Store just announced the biggest revenue drop since it began tracking that kind of data, Ivan writes.  Going to court: The U.S. Supreme Court has agreed to evaluate Section 230 of the Communications Act, which basically shields tech platforms from liability when it comes to content posted by its users. Devin has more. Meanwhile, in Europe…: European Union lawmakers gave a thumbs-up to rebooted e-commerce regulations, Natasha L reports. Sold!: South Korean search giant Naver plans to acquire fashion marketplace Poshmark for $1.2 billion, Kyle writes. Meanwhile, Alex puts his TC+ spin in it with 3 takeaways from the deal.

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