Author: TechBrunch
A recurring theme in the European world of technology is that the region needs its own Google or Microsoft. Now, a new fund is being launched to support this initiative. Project Europe – a new fund for founders to “solve tough problems with technical solutions” — says it first put together $10 million from 128 different founders and technical executives from startups further afield in Europe and further afield. The list you can view here includes founders of Klarna, Mistral and Soundcloud. Successful recipients each get 200,000 euros (approximately $200,000) to build an idea. Companies need to start in Europe,…
Northvolt filed for bankruptcy in Sweden on Wednesday. This is the latest blow to Europe's attempts to create a battery-making juggernaut that could rival the Chinese giants. Swedish startups have raised over $14 billion, but have recently been in cash shortages. Northvolt filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in the United States in November. Since then, they have been struggling to stop bankruptcy, saving cash and raising new funds. Those efforts are lacking. “Northvolt has experienced a series of compounding challenges eroding its financial condition, including rising capital costs, geopolitical instability, subsequent disruption in the supply chain and changing market demand,”…
La Fourche is only seven years old, but it was a very roller coaster for a French startup. During this time, online grocery retailers experienced a global pandemic, followed by the rise of venture-backed quick commerce startups that promised to deliver food items within 15 minutes and promised to break down that vertically. Speaking to Nathan Labat, co-founder and CEO of La Fourche, he doesn't spend much time living in Flink, Getir, Gopuff, Gorillas and all Q-commerce startups around 2021. The startup is also VC back, but I took another pass. Most of La Fourche's stock is made up of…
The powerful and smart security operations team is at the heart of their cybersecurity strategy, and today startups building tools to keep their toes unveil their funds against a backdrop of growth. Pentera has built a system to launch testing software and simulations of network attacks to stress test human responses – has announced $60 million in funding. The funds will be used for M&A and to continue developing the product, CEO Amitai Ratzon said in an interview. Pentera is a play of the term “pente test,” short for penetration testing, a program designed to help train security teams on…
Elliot Wolf, the son of Dick Wolf, executive producer and creator of Law and Order, is taking part in a new venture aimed at attracting true crime fans. He is working with co-founders Andrew Adashek (CEO) and Noah Rosenberg (CTO) to develop Wolf Games, a new startup that uses AI to create everyday murder mystery games. The company also announced a $4 million seed funding round on Wednesday. Wolf Games' flagship title is called Public Eye and takes advantage of the growing interest among real crime enthusiasts who love to play detectives. Public Eye is set in a dystopian future…
Scimplify, an Indian startup that helps pharmaceutical and agricultural companies access a variety of specialized chemicals, has raised $40 million in a new co-led funding round to expand its footprint in the US by investments from Accel and Bertelsmann, and reach new markets. The Scimplify Series B round peg is rated at approximately $150 million in post money, the company said. As manufacturers of these chemicals are scattered around the world, specialty chemicals are essential to manufacturing in many industries, but access remains a problem. While companies rely primarily on Chinese suppliers to source such chemicals, geopolitical tensions are increasingly…
According to cybersecurity company Lookout, a group of hackers with links to the North Korean regime were able to upload Android Spyware to the Google Play App Store and trick some people into downloading it. In a report published Wednesday and shared only with TechCrunch, Lookout details a spy campaign that includes several different samples of Android Spyware called Kospy. At least one Spyware app has been downloaded more than 10 times at some point on Google Play, according to the cache snapshot of the app's page on the official Android App Store. Lookout included screenshots of the pages in…
VC's funding for AI tools for healthcare was projected to reach $11 billion last year. This is the headline figure that speaks to the broad belief that artificial intelligence is transformative in key sectors. Many startups applying AI in healthcare are trying to promote efficiency by automating some of the management that will get them on track and allow for patient care. Hamburg-based Elea fits widely into this type, but it starts with a pathology lab, a relatively unnoticed, underserved niche. We believe that it can scale workflow systems equipped with voice-based AI agents, accompanied by analyzing disease samples. Includes…
A ransomware group called Hunters International has released some of the data it claims to have been stolen from Tata Technologies just a month after an Indian company confirmed a ransomware attack that caused several services to halt. The leak data published on the gang's Dark Web leak site seen by TechCrunch includes personal information about current and former employees of Tata Technologies, as well as confidential information such as purchase orders and company contracts with clients in India and the US. According to the ransomware gang, the dataset contains over 730,000 documents, including Excel spreadsheets, PowerPoint presentations and PDF…
Spotify released its annual Loud & Clear report on Tuesday, detailing information on Music Streaming Service royalty payments. Spotify revealed earlier this year that it paid $10 billion to the music industry in 2024, but the new report provides detailed figures on payments to dispel reports that the company will not properly reward artists for their work. Artists who received one for every million Spotify streams are 10 times the same stream share would have been generated 10 years ago by the artists who generated an average of over $10,000 in 2024. Spotify advertises the amounts they pay to artists…