How Monsieur Shook Up Disrupt SF With Its Bartending Robot
And we’re back with episode two of our Road To Disrupt video series, which shows the good, the bad, and the ugly moments startups go through when competing in the Disrupt Battlefield competition. After enduring a few too many run-ins with the slow service at Applebee’s, the founders of Monsieur set out to shake up the bartending industry. In case you missed our coverage of the… Read More-
Facebook’s $2 Billion Acquisition Of Oculus Closes, Now Official
Facebook now owns Oculus. The $2 billion acquisition deal of the virtual reality pioneer announced in March has been approved by regulators and today become official. The FCC’s anti-trust team greenlighted the deal in April. Now it has passed the California Department Of Corporations fairness hearing and will go into effect. The exact price of the acquisition came out to $2,001,985,000. Read More -
RadiumOne Issues Not-Quite-Apology For Ousting CEO Who Pled Guilty To Domestic Violence
Ad platform RadiumOne and its former CEO Gurbaksh Chahal have issued a joint statement that is intended to “bring an end to all disputes they have had.” RadiumOne removed Chahal in April following media criticism of his guilty plea for charges of misdemeanor domestic violence battery and battery. “The Board did not intend to hurt Gurbaksh,” the statement reads. The… Read More -
Australian Graphic Design Startup Canva Raises Additional $3.6M
Canva, a site that lets non-designers create graphics using drag-and-drop tools, has nabbed an additional $3.6 million in funding from Founders Fund and Shasta Ventures, as well as existing investors Matrix Partners, Blackbird Ventures, and Square Peg Capital. This brings its total raised so far to $7 million. Read More -
Dealflicks Raises $1.7 Million To Offer Movie Discounts Through An App
DealFlicks, which considers itself a kind of “Priceline for movie tickets,” is trying to get more people into movie theaters that by partnering with theater chains and offering discounted tickets and snacks at concessions stands. And it’s raised $1.7 million in seed funding to do so. Read More -
That Horrible Moment When You’re Stuck On The Bowl Without Toilet Paper
You’ve been there. At a friendly gathering, slowing removing yourself to take care of personal business in the restroom. Your mind wanders as you relieve yourself, only to notice but a shred of soft Charmin left on a cardboard roll. A hasty, anxious look in the cabinets and under the sink yields nothing, and creative problem solving takes over. Time is ticking. A knock at the door… Read More -
Knock Simulates An Incoming Call To Get Friends To Respond To Your Texts
Knock, a recently launched Android application, offers a new twist on mobile messaging. When you send a message using this app, Knock simulates an incoming call to get your friend’s attention. But the call screen your friend sees looks slightly different than usual. Instead of the standard accept and reject buttons, they’ll see your text message written on the screen which… Read More -
BitLit Partners With HarperCollins To Make Buying Digital Versions Of Books You Already Own Easier
The idea behind BitLit is pretty simple: scan the title page of a book you already own, write your name on the copyright page and scan that, too, and within a few seconds, you have access to the e-book version of your book. In an ideal world, this would work for any book. But the current state of digital publishing isn’t exactly perfect, so while the number of publishers that support… Read More -
Interlude’s Parallel Video Feature Gives You A Cool Way To Combine Clips, Channel Surfing Style
Hey, remember that interactive video for Bob Dylan’s “Like A Rolling Stone” that came out last fall? You know, the one that allowed you to switch between 16 faux TV channels on the fly, each of them lip syncing to what is arguably the greatest song of all-time? Well, Interlude, the startup that created the technology behind the Dylan video, is now making these… Read More -
London Startup Jinn Raises $200K Seed Round For Local On-Demand Delivery App
Four months after bootstrapping a London launch, which saw its co-founders initially jumping on a scooter to deliver customer orders themselves, local on-demand delivery app Jinn has raised a modest seed round of $200,000, to be used primarily for customer acquisition. Thus far the startup says it’s doing around 1,000 orders per month, with little to no money spent on marketing. Read More
-
Mamabear Raises $1.4 Million For A Parenting App That Monitors Children’s Social Media Use And More
While there are a number of family locator services to choose from today, ranging from those offered by the mobile operators to venture-backed startups, a nearly two-year old mobile application called Mamabear was created with a goal of doing more than simple location tracking – it’s a full-featured “parenting app” which allows parents – yes, mainly moms, by… Read More -
Forget Wristbands, FreeWavz Brings Fitness Monitoring To Your Earphones
Health and fitness monitoring is a popular function in many of today’s wristband wearables like the Fitbit or Jawbone UP, for example, but a new company called FreeWavz wants to bring those features and more to a different form factor: earphones. FreeWavz‘s bluetooth-connected earphones offer wireless connectivity to your streaming music, as well as a step counter, plus heart rate… Read More -
Swoon Editions Raises £4M Series A Led By Octopus Investments. Because More Furniture.
Furniture remains a hot space for venture capital right now. The UK designer furniture startup Swoon Editions, which offers one deal a day to members who effectively pre-order artisan items before they’ve left the workshop floor, has raised a £4 million Series A led by Octopus Investments. Read More -
Bigpoint Acquires Little Worlds Studio To Place Bigger Bet On Mobile Gaming
Bigpoint, the European free-to-play online gaming company, is placing a bigger bet on mobile gaming: It’s acquired France’s Little Worlds Studio, maker of mobile titles such as Color Cross Online and Mana Crusher, in a move that will see Bigpoint establish a dedicated mobile games studio in Lyon. Read More -
Startupbootcamp Names The Ten Startups In Its First London Fintech Program
Startupbootcamp has just announced the first cohort of ten startups that will participate in the 2014 program of its London-based fintech accelerator. The startups that have made the cut for the inaugural three-month mentoring program include teams from Europe, Africa and the US. Read More -
Sparta Lets Sales Managers Run Sales Competitions Without The Admin Burden
Gamification could be considered a slightly passé buzzword these days. However, if there’s one area where it’s still and has always been relevant, it’s sales. Why? As Sparta co-founder and CEO James Pember says, “Sales is already a game — each rep starts the month at 0, and must ‘level-up’ to reach their targets and goals.” Read More -
Ayannah Raises $1M To Serve The Philippines’ Rapidly Growing Remittance Market
Ayannah, a digital payments startup based in the Philippines, has raised $1 million in new funding from Japanese venture capital firms IMG Investment Partners and Beenos, the investment vehicle of Teruhide Sato, president and group CEO of netprice.com. Returning investors led by Siemer Ventures and Golden Gate Ventures also participated in the round. This brings the total Ayannah has raised so… Read More -
Blockchain Releases New Android Wallet App To Put Bitcoin Into Everyone’s Hands
Popular bitcoin wallet provider Blockchain.info is releasing a major new version of its Android app, allowing you to store, receive and send bitcoins directly from your Android phone. The key thinking behind the update is to make bitcoin more accessible. It hides the complexity of the protocol in order to encourage mainstream user adoption. Read More -
This Week On The TC Gadgets Podcast: Summer Doldrums
As you may expect, the summer can be a slow period for tech journalists. But since we’re obsessed with startups, there’s still plenty of new stuff to discuss this week on the TC Gadgets Podcast. Read More -
The Super-M Is A Pocket-Sized Speaker Begging For A Beach Trip
With an abundance of music constantly in the palm of our hand, so too comes an abundance of portable Bluetooth speakers. The NudeAudio Super-M is the latest to join the herd, and the most recent product out of the portable speaker company. Originally, Nude sold a basic Bluetooth speaker in three sizes: small, medium, and large. The M, the medium-sized version, was the best seller by far and so… Read More
No comments:
Post a Comment
Please leave a comment-- or suggestions, particularly of topics and places you'd like to see covered