Author: TechBrunch
Long time no see It's been a year since Salesforce helped transform the technology world by claiming to be the end of software. That model of selling access to managed services hosted on the cloud (what we commonly refer to today as software-as-a-service (SaaS)) didn't end software, of course. , took the world away from purchasing software. box. The trade-off was easy. Software offered as a service has a lower initial cost, but can become more expensive over time. In return, the vendor promised regular updates and there would never be an out-of-date version. Regardless of how you feel about…
collapse of the amazon The proposed deal to acquire iRobot highlights just how important this year's IPO market is. A key outlet for startups could be closed in the short term as the government tightens its grip on Big Tech companies trying to buy smaller companies. Exchange explores startups, markets, and money. Read it every morning on TechCrunch+ or get The Exchange newsletter every Saturday. If mergers and acquisitions become more difficult, especially for Big Tech companies that prefer to buy new technology rather than build it, unicorns and other late-stage startups will have less liquidity available than going public.…
it's a story All the time: A startup founder raises a lot of sweet money from VCs. Next, you must look for product-market fit. It's easy? Just put all that money into sales and marketing and they're off to the races. It's not that fast. Anyone can draw an upward growth curve by investing enough money in advertising. But the important thing is right It's a way to grow, but it's very difficult. Matt Lerner spent 11 years in marketing at PayPal, then four years at 500 startups, so he's seen companies of all sizes struggle to find customers. In…
just you It was thought that the hype about room temperature superconductors was over, but that's not the case. Swiss quantum algorithm startup Terra Quantum and its lab at Brazil's State University of Campinas (Unicamp) claim to have discovered a type of graphite that is superconducting at ambient temperature and pressure. Terra Quantum is no small operation. The company raised $60 million for its quantum platform as a service in early 2022. However, there is no need to get your hopes up. If discovered and independently confirmed, room-temperature superconductors could revolutionize everything from power transmission to computing, electric cars, MRI…
WWelcome to TechCrunch Exchange, a weekly newsletter about startups and markets. Inspired by his daily TechCrunch+ column from which it takes its name. Want it delivered to your inbox every Saturday? Sign up here. This week some Thoughts on the aesthetics of AI, the uninsured problem, and how to market your biotech startup to non-experts. — anna It's too good to be true Most tools that claim to detect AI-generated text fail spectacularly, my colleague Kyle Wiggers reported. That's contradictory. I'm just a human, but many of the suggestions written by AI still don't pass the sniff test. I find…
When HPE announced This came as a bit of a shock after the company had planned to acquire Juniper Networks for $14 billion in cash earlier this month. Indeed, HP had already acquired Aruba in 2015 for about $3 billion. Acquiring another network company would likely just add another layer to its business. Of course, complications always arise when integrating one large organization into another. HP hasn't had the best record of being a smooth operator in this regard over the years. But surprisingly, neither company positioned this conscious combination as pure network play. In fact, Juniper CEO Rami Rahim…
The dismissal of an engineer is Data shows it's accelerating. The surge in layoffs comes after human capital reductions slowed significantly in the second half of 2023, with us writing that “technical layoffs are largely a thing of the past.” At the time, the number of reported layoffs had been on the decline for months, reaching a low so low that it seemed like no big deal. How has the situation changed? At the time, we saw technology concerns being alleviated to some extent by rising valuations for tech companies, making large-scale layoffs seem to have lost their luster compared…
Allianz Direct, Digital First The insurance giant's German subsidiary has acquired the French home insurance business of struggling insurance technology company Luco for 4.3 million euros (about $4.65 million). This was both expected and unexpected. The companies had hoped to greenlight the deal in November. But that didn't happen, and Luko's parent company was instead subject to judicial reorganization, a process that meant it needed to quickly find a buyer that met the court's demands. For a while now, many options are back on the table, including some not-so-great ones, until this week. Some kind of happy ending? Not completely.…
Solana Labs co-founder hints at possibility of third mobile device Jacqueline Melinek 2 weeks Last month, Solana Mobile's flagship Web3 smartphone “Saga'' is sold out. Last week, the Solana Labs subsidiary launched his second phone, and in less than a week he had more than 40,000 pre-orders. However, the company's momentum is not slowing down anytime soon. “After Saga sold out, we felt there was an opportunity and we felt the market timing was right,” Anatoly Yakovenko, co-founder of Solana Labs, said on TechCrunch's “Chain Reaction” podcast. “timing [for the new phone] It worked in that moment. ” And if…
Welcome to TechCrunch Crypto, formerly known as Chain Reaction. Get a roundup of TechCrunch's biggest and most important crypto articles delivered to your inbox every Thursday at 12pm PT. Subscribe here. Hello. Welcome to the second edition of the new and improved TechCrunch Crypto newsletter. As mentioned above, we plan to add some fresh regular segments and features in addition to our regularly scheduled news. If you like what you see (or don't like), let us know at jacquelyn@techcrunch.com. Thankfully, that wasn't the case with the cryptocurrency world. too much This week has been chaotic, but let's take a look…