Author: TechBrunch

New York City-based Betauruks has closed its $66 million Fund III. It focuses on investing in early stage AI companies. Betaworks has invested in AI since at least 2016 and supports companies like Huggingface and Granola through its investment program camp. Jordan Crook, a partner at the company (and former TechCrunch employee), said the new fund will focus on agents, native AI interfaces and application layer AI. “Around these themes, we will continue our straight seed investment and bettawalk camp,” Crook said. Fund III will invest in investments in at least 25 pre-seed investments and invest in at least 50…

The founder of a spyware company that was banned from the surveillance industry following a previous data breaches is now trying to revoke the ban, according to the Federal Trade Commission. In a notice Friday, federal observers said Scott Zuckerman had attempted to withdraw or change the 2021 ban imposed by the FTC on his company Support King and its subsidiaries. The ban included a provision that required Zuckerman to maintain certain cybersecurity practices and undergo frequent audits of any of his business after the spyware subsidiary Spyfone leaked thousands of private phone data, including photos, messages and location data,…

Researchers and news reports show that the hackers behind the first attacks of attacks that exploit zero-day on Microsoft SharePoint servers have so far been primarily targeting government organizations. Over the weekend, the US cybersecurity agency CISA issued an alert warning that hackers were exploiting what previously known as an unknown bug (zero-day) in Microsoft's enterprise data management product SharePoint. It's still too early to draw a definitive conclusion, but the hackers who first began abuse the flaws appeared to have targeted government organizations, according to Silas Cutler, a leading researcher at Censys, cybersecurity company that monitors hacking activities on…

When Figma announced its first desired price range ($25-$28) on Monday, it also revealed an extraordinary decision on the highly anticipated IPO. This allows existing shareholders to sell more shares than the company plans to sell. The company is planning to provide approximately 12.5 million shares. However, he said existing shareholders will be allowed to cash in nearly 24.7 million shares. Furthermore, if this IPO is as hot as anyone thinks it will, existing shareholders will get the option to collectively sell up to 5.5 million shares. Figma founder CEO Dylan Field has revealed that he plans to sell 2.35…

On Monday, Google announced that it will introduce a new feature that will allow iOS users to easily switch between Chrome jobs and personal Google accounts. Previously, iOS users had to sign out of their Google account completely, then log in to another account, and repeat this process every time they accessed another account. “In many cases, people use their mobile devices for both work and personal tasks, so they need to sign in and out with various Google accounts,” the company wrote in a blog post. “To simplify this experience while enhancing security, Chrome on iOS offers seamless account…

“My life has prepared me for this moment,” Ben Sanders said when asked why he launched emergency response startup Hyper. The company announced on Monday its $6.3 million seed round led by ENIAC ventures and an official emergence from stealth. As a child, he wanted to be a police officer, so he sewed his mother yellow stripes into Navy sweatpants. He wore it in the rain hat of an officer all year round. When he grew up, he worked at the intersection of technology and government, and once ran for the federal government. About a year ago, he read a…

“My life has prepared me for this moment,” Ben Sanders said when asked why he launched emergency response startup Hyper. The company announced on Monday its $6.3 million seed round led by ENIAC ventures and an official emergence from stealth. As a child, he wanted to be a police officer, so he sewed his mother yellow stripes into Navy sweatpants. He wore it in the rain hat of an officer all year round. When he grew up, he worked at the intersection of technology and government, and once ran for the federal government. About a year ago, he read a…

Grok's grumpy, unfiltered AI buddies may often make headlines for their indifference, but that's the Grok 4, the latest model from Xai that drives the latest revenue for the app. Elon Musk's Xai launched Grok 4 late July 9, and by Friday, July 11, Grok's total revenue for iOS had risen by a whopping 325% to 325%, from $99,000 the day before the release of the Grok 4 to $419,000, according to App Intelligence Firm Appfigures. Image credits: AppFigures Grok continued to raise higher revenues for days after the launch of new models, and days after the launch of new…

Developers of Unite, an app that provides customized web app management on Macs, released a new app called Quip, a clipboard app for the Apple ecosystem on Monday. The app includes features to organize text clips, support for shortcuts to trigger text snippets, duplicate prevention, code formatting and more. The goal is to provide users with more control and customization compared to traditional clipboards, making it a more productive alternative. QUIP is out of the way – On Macs, it has a special keyboard that resides in the menu bar and maintains a universal clipboard with the history of everything…

Over 10,000 founders, investors and tech insiders will convene for the TechCrunch Surpurte 2025 in Moscone West, San Francisco, October 27-29. With over 250 technology leaders on stage, don't miss this standout panel in the Builders stage of two Builders, two of the most respected early investors in the venture. Their sessions will be split into one of the toughest moments of their startup journey. All you have is to raise the first round when it's just vision. Why join this conversation on the builder stage? This honest, tactical conversation covers what's really important when raising the first institutional check,…