Author: TechBrunch
When the global pandemic confined people to their homes, small coffee shops that relied on foot traffic were forced to get back on their feet. At this time, many coffee shop owners turned to technology to assist with online ordering and payment. Start-ups were also keen to help these companies continue operating safely, and venture capital firms followed suit. For example, Joe Coffee raised money to help coffee shops with mobile ordering, and Odeko and his Cloosiv merged to integrate inventory and mobile ordering apps. As an integrated entity, Odeco subsequently raised tens of millions of dollars in venture-backed financing.…
Perplexity AI's latest big funding event could soon be superseded by another, even bigger chunk of funding, TechCrunch reports. Indeed, his $62.7 million, which the startup raised at a valuation of just over $1 billion, could quickly be trampled by a raise of up to $250 million at a valuation of ~2.5-3x. what happened? The company's revenue has reportedly grown rapidly, reaching approximately $20 million in annual recurring revenue. Granted, the $1 billion figure is a 50x revenue multiple, but if the company is growing at a fast enough pace, an investor paying up to 150x current ARR would be…
Eniac Ventures has closed two funds totaling $220 million in seed-stage companies to share exclusively with TechCrunch. New York-based Eniac raised $60 million in Select 1 and $160 million in Eniac VI, the company's vehicle for subsequent late-stage investments in portfolio companies. The firm has made 11 investments since Select 1, which were actually closed in 2021 but have not been made public until now. Co-founder and general partner Nihal Mehta said the firm plans to make its first investment from its sixth fund “soon.” Both funds plan to make approximately 40 investments in total. For new investments, Eniac's average…
Besides a focus on generative AI, what do AI startups like OpenAI, Anthropic, and Together AI have in common? They use Stainless, a platform created by former Stripe staffer Alex Rattray, to build API I am generating an SDK for. Mr. Rattray, who studied economics at the University of Pennsylvania, has been creating things for as long as he can remember, from an underground newspaper in high school to a bike-sharing program in college. Rattray learned programming on the side during his time at UPenn, which led to a job as an engineer on his team for Stripe's developer platform.…
President Biden signed a bill that would ban TikTok if its Chinese parent company ByteDance fails to sell it within a year. The bill, which includes aid to Ukraine and Israel, passed the U.S. Senate by a 79-18 vote late Tuesday, after overwhelmingly passing the House of Representatives over the weekend. The bill gives ByteDance nine months to sell TikTok, with a 90-day extension to complete the deal. If ByteDance does not sell TikTok, it will be illegal for app stores to distribute the app in the US. In a statement emailed to TechCrunch, TikTok said it would challenge the…
Sanlo, a fintech startup that helps gaming companies manage their finances, on Wednesday announced the release of a closed beta of its webshop tool, giving some game developers and studios a plug-and-play tool that works alongside their existing technology stack. We provided play solutions. Gaming companies will be able to join the waiting list starting today. With Google and Apple charging 30% fees on in-app purchases, it's harder than ever for small and medium-sized gaming companies to run a profitable business. Gaming giant Epic has complained in recent years about Apple's declining revenue and accused it of being predatory against…
As the concept of AI agents begins to take hold and more tasks can be completed without human involvement, new types of authentication will be needed to ensure that only agents with appropriate authorization can access specific resources. . Anon, an early-stage startup, helps developers add automatic authentication in a secure way. On Wednesday, the company announced a $6.5 million investment and said the product is now generally available to everyone. The founders came up with the idea for this company out of necessity. Their initial idea was actually to build an AI agent, but according to CEO Daniel Mason,…
Well, if you're a big fan of TikTok and live in the US, we have bad news for you. A bill has passed the Senate that would force the sale of TikTok or ban it in the United States. And the president is expected to sign it. The situation doesn't bode well for TikTok in the U.S., given that China has been vocal about not allowing the sale of the Singapore-based social media company owned by Chinese company ByteDance. But if that leaves you disappointed, don't worry. There is also a lot of very positive news to discuss. News such…
Nvidia is acquiring Run:ai, a Tel Aviv-based company that makes it easier for developers and operations teams to manage and optimize their AI hardware infrastructure, for an undisclosed amount. Ctech reported early this morning that the two companies are in “advanced negotiations” and that Nvidia could pay more than $1 billion for Run:ai. It appears that the negotiations went smoothly. Officials told TechCrunch that the exact price was $700 million. Nvidia says it will continue to offer Run:ai's products “with the same business model” and will invest in Run:ai's product roadmap as part of Nvidia's DGX Cloud AI platform. This…
Last week, when security researchers said they could easily obtain precise location information from any of the millions of users of a widely used phone tracking app, we saw it for ourselves. I needed to. Eric Daigle, a computer science and economics student at the University of British Columbia in Vancouver, discovered the vulnerability in the tracking app iSharing as part of his research into the security of location tracking apps. iSharing is one of the most popular location tracking apps and has over 35 million users so far. Daigle said the bug allowed anyone using the app to access…