Author: TechBrunch
While many startups struggle to raise capital and stay afloat, Kandji, an Apple device management platform, is an exception. Founded in 2019, Kandji has blazed through funding rounds like a precocious child, raising more than $188 million to date. Today, the company added to that total by raising an additional $100 million from General Catalyst, half of which is additional equity and the other half is debt securities. Today's round brings the company's total funding, including debt, to more than $288 million. It also increased its valuation from $800 million to $850 million since its last round in 2021. The…
Will generative AI replace the social graph? California-based local experience discovery startup Bigfoot hopes that adding a conversational interface to its weekend planner website (in the form of an AI chatbot it branded Littlefoot, which launched last week) will create a more personalized feel while also making it easier for people to find relevant activities in their neighborhood. Co-founder Alex Ward explains the idea is to recreate the feeling of chatting with a “knowledgeable friend.” This feature allows users to interact with Bigfoot's curated local events, activity spots, and nightlife options through text conversations, easily directing and guiding the AI…
Tinder revealed last year that it was testing a photo selection feature that would use AI to help users choose the best photos for their dating profiles. The feature, now named “Photo Selector,” was officially launched on the Match-owned dating app on Wednesday. It's currently available to all users in the U.S., and will be rolling out to international markets later this summer. Tinder's AI photo selector leverages face detection technology and works as you'd expect: when a user uploads a selfie to the Tinder app, a unique face geometry is created from the photo, allowing the AI to identify…
South Korean prosecutors said Wednesday they had requested an arrest warrant for Brian Kim, founder of South Korean internet giant Kakao, as part of an investigation into suspected stock market manipulation linked to a high-profile 2023 takeover battle for SM Entertainment, one of South Korea's biggest music labels. The warrant was issued a week after Seoul prosecutors began investigating Kim's involvement in alleged stock price manipulation at SM Entertainment. Kakao did not respond to a request for comment before publication. In March 2023, Kakao and Kakao subsidiary Kakao Entertainment won a bidding war for a 39.9% stake in K-pop label…
Instagram announced on Tuesday that it will now allow users globally to add multiple audio tracks to Reels. According to the company, users can add up to 20 tracks to a single reel. To add a new track to your video, click the[ミックスに追加]Tap the option. Once you've added a track, you can trim it to include only the portion of audio you want. “The launch of multi-track audio in Reels gives creators the ability to visually align audio with elements like text, stickers and clips, expanding their creative flexibility and enabling them to express their creativity in a way that…
More than 3 billion people worldwide rely on wild or farmed seafood for their protein intake. According to a report released last week, global aquaculture production has reached an all-time high, with 89% of aquatic animal production being used directly for human consumption. This indicates that global consumption of seafood is continuously increasing. As a result, aquaculture industry startups are using AI technology to help farmers improve productivity and sustainability. Among them is Canada-based startup Wittaya Aqua. Its data-driven platform enables aquaculture farmers to integrate existing data points across the seafood supply chain to increase profitability, sustainability and efficiency. The…
Marc Andreessen, co-founder of one of Silicon Valley's most prominent venture capital firms, said he has been a Democrat for most of his life, supporting and voting for Bill Clinton, Al Gore, John Kerry, Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton. But he says he's no longer allegiance to the Democratic Party. He plans to support and vote for former President Donald Trump in the 2024 presidential election. His reasons for choosing Trump over President Joe Biden mainly boil down to one big issue: He believes Trump's policies are far more favorable to the technology, and especially the startup, ecosystem. Andreessen explained…
We're halfway through 2024, but this year has already seen some of the largest and most damaging data breaches in recent history. And just when you thought these hacks couldn't get any worse, they do. From untold amounts of personal customer information being scraped, stolen and posted online to the mass theft of medical data for most people in the United States, the worst data breaches to date in 2024 have already seen at least a billion records stolen and counting. These breaches not only impact the individuals whose data has been irretrievably compromised, but they also embolden criminals who…
Andrei Karpathy, a former head of AI at Tesla and a researcher at OpenAI, is launching Eureka Labs, an “AI-native” education platform. In tech terms, that usually means built from the ground up with AI at its core. While Eureka Labs' ambitions for AI are lofty, the company is starting with a more traditional education approach. San Francisco-based Eureka Labs, which Karpathy registered as a limited liability company in Delaware on June 21, aims to leverage recent advances in generative AI to develop AI teaching assistants that can guide students through course material. According to Karpathy, who posted the news…
Apple originally added the new flashlight UI in the third developer beta of iOS 18, but now that iOS 18 is available as a public beta, you can try out one of iPhone's most underrated additions right now. The company has already introduced a new way to control the True Tone flashlight on the iPhone 14 Pro and 15 Pro models. Unlike the previous on/off and four brightness levels, the new controls include a way to adjust brightness and the width of the beam. The first beta controls were just vertical and horizontal lines, which took some time for users…