Venture investments in new manufacturing technologies could reshape American industry
A wave of venture investment into new manufacturing startups looks set to transform American manufacturing. While the foundations for these companies may have been laid in cities like Boston, New York and San Francisco, the startups that are driving this next industrial revolution hail from more unlikely hubs of technology innovation in the smaller urban centers of the Sun Belt and the Southeast. Read MoreShopping Quizzes is a quiz-based recommendation engine for e-commerce sites
A key tenet of e-commerce is the recommendation engine. If implemented correctly, it can be a major sales driver for online retailers. However, most sites normally just implement a basic engine that guesses what shoppers want, without any input from the shoppers themselves. Shopping Quizzes has created a recommendation engine that actually asks shoppers what they’re looking… Read MoreTastemates helps you find people who like what you like
If you’ve ever forged a connection with someone because you had the same favorite movie or TV show or book, a new startup called Tastemates has built a social network around that experience. Or as CEO Jon Vlassopulos put it, “We’re trying to codify serendipity” — those surprising moments of, “Oh my God, I can’t believe anyone else likes that as much as… Read MoreShyp rolls out its new packaging pricing model to all customers
Shyp has finished rolling out a new packaging pricing model to all its customers that includes variable shipment pricing based on the packaging that the company provides. Shyp is still playing around with its business model and, to be sure, over time these tweaks will add up. The unit economics of on-demand services aren’t quite as simple as a $5 fee (plus postage) and require a… Read MoreUber is facing a nationwide class-action lawsuit
Less than a month after Uber settled two class-action lawsuits in California and Massachusetts, another one has popped up. This time, the suit pertains to all current and former Uber drivers in the United States, except for those in California and Massachusetts. The suit, filed yesterday in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, Chicago division, asks the court… Read MoreEasilyDo’s speedy new mail app puts a smart assistant in your inbox
Productivity app maker EasilyDo is best known for its smart assistant for iPhone that lets you do things like organize your travel plans, track shipments, update your contacts, create personalized email alerts, and more. Now the company is taking some of its best features to a just-launched email application that has this assistant feature built in. In addition, the new EasilyDo Mail app… Read More- CRUNCH NETWORK
Here’s why we only did three deals last year
There has been a huge disconnect between private and public company valuations over the last few years. This isn’t the first time I’ve said it. It probably won’t be the last. During this period of froth, companies were able to raise capital at increasingly ludicrous valuations, and entrepreneurs turned fundraising into a sport. Deals closed peaked in 2014, but all-time… Read More - CRUNCH NETWORK
Why image recognition is about to transform business
From programs that help the visually impaired and safety features in cars that detect large animals to auto-organizing untagged photo collections and extracting business insights from socially shared pictures, the benefits of image recognition, or computer vision, are only just beginning to make their way into the world — but they’re doing so with increasing frequency and depth. Read More - CRUNCH NETWORK
New initiatives emerge to help refugees
Prompted by the ongoing refugee crisis affecting much of the western world, new initiatives have emerged to provide solutions to the many challenges facing the beleaguered masses. In a sea of clueless government bureaucrats and fearful citizens, these new startups want to tap into the potential of the newcomers. Privately funded initiatives may one day become the norm in helping tackle… Read More
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Startups need to do due diligence, too
I hear a lot of horror stories about investors. Many are misunderstandings. Some are just outright false. Then there are those that are true. Sadly, there are a lot of those. This kills companies. I’ve watched great entrepreneurs with brilliant ideas sink because they’ve been fucked around and because they made poor choices. I wanted to write something that will help people. Here… Read More Digital magazine company Issuu is now a collaboration platform, too
Digital media company Issuu has been trying to offer a better way to present content online. Now it’s a promising a better way for teams to work together on creating that content too, with the launch of a new product called Collaborate. Issuu, for those of you who don’t know, allows publishers to create digital publications. They may resemble glossy magazines, except freed from… Read MoreKentucky Derby attendees can now order food, place bets from their seats
Getting around, drinking and dining at the Kentucky Derby this year should prove a lot easier for fans and employees. According to Churchill Downs’ General Manager Ryan Jordan, the famed horse racing venue on Friday launched a Churchill Downs Racetrack app, powered by VenueNext, to give attendees a better experience on-site. The new app, available for iOS and Android devices, will let… Read MoreHome Chef raises $10M for meal kits and “taste algorithms”
Home Chef, one of several startups delivering recipes and ingredients to take some of the hassle out of home cooking, is announcing that it has raised $10 million in Series A funding. Founder and CEO Pat Vihtelic told me that Home Chef stands out from similar-sounding companies in a couple of ways. The big one is flexibility — customers get to choose their meals from 10 overall choices… Read More- CRUNCH NETWORK
Tall poppy syndrome and the Canadian opportunity
There’s an epidemic in Canada. That epidemic is a mentality that leaves top talent with no option but to leave the nation’s borders and with them, everything they learned. It undervalues breakthroughs developed and paid for by Canadian taxpayers. It’s a mindset that resents the success of others. It’s a bad case of tall poppy syndrome. Read More John Borthwick, Naveen Selvadurai, and Heather Hartnett to school us on startup studios at TC Disrupt NY
Some of the most influential and successful companies in the game have come out of startup studios. Just look at Giphy, Reserve, and Operator. But what makes a startup studio successful? At Disrupt NY in May, we aim to find out. Betaworks’ John Borthwick, Expa’s Naveen Selvadurai, and Human Ventures’ Heather Hartnett will be joining us for a panel called “How A… Read MoreWith Sqreen, web developers can seamlessly find and avoid security threats
French startup Sqreen wants you to rethink how you deal with security for your web-based apps. With little effort, Sqreen can inspect, track and fix security holes, acting like a shield. You won’t have to change your workflow as Sqreen plugs to your existing app. Read MoreGametime now lets users “snap and sell” printed tickets
Mobile ticket sellers Gametime added a new feature to their app this week that could draw a larger supply of concert and sports tickets to their marketplace. Designed to make it easier for users to sell old-school printed tickets via mobile, the “snap and sell” feature in Gametime feels something like check scanning in mobile banking apps. A user who clicks the… Read MoreThe League launches a rebuilt, event-centric dating app
The League, the dating startup that’s maybe-maybe-not elitist, is launching version 2.0 in a new city — Los Angeles. Founder and CEO Amanda Bradford said The League has already rolled out the updated app to users in its existing markets, New York and San Francisco, without much fanfare. Today, however, marks the official launch, as well as the addition of its first city in nearly… Read MoreTwitter co-founder Biz Stone relaunches Jelly as a human-powered search engine
Calling it an “un-pivot,” Biz Stone is bringing back Jelly, the Q&A app he created in 2013. Launching today, the new and improved Jelly remains close to its roots, but with an added twist. This time, everything is anonymous so you can ask what you really want to know. Referring to the new Jelly an “on-demand search engine,” Stone said that one lesson he learned… Read More- CRUNCH NETWORK
About those Mexican sharks
You know entrepreneurship has gone mainstream when a local Shark Tank hits cable TV. I was approached by the Shark Tank production team in Mexico to recommend startups for the show. I sent some names of candidates that had not yet received institutional capital nor angel investment and could benefit from the exposure — at their own risk. As entrepreneurship and reality TV collide in… Read More
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