Author: TechBrunch

Firefly, Adobe's family of generative AI models, doesn't have a great reputation among creators. Firefly's image generation model, especially when compared to Midjourney, OpenAI's DALL-E 3, and other rivals, has been ridiculed as underwhelming and flawed, with a tendency to distort limbs and landscapes and miss the nuances of prompts. It has been. But Adobe is looking to turn things around this week with its third-generation model, Firefly Image 3, which will be released during the company's Max London conference. Now available in Photoshop (beta) and Adobe's Firefly web app, this model outperforms its predecessor (Image 2) and its predecessor…

Health insurance giant UnitedHealth Group has admitted that a ransomware attack on its health tech subsidiary Change Healthcare earlier this year stole large amounts of Americans' personal medical data. UnitedHealth said in a statement Monday that the ransomware gang has exfiltrated files containing personal data and protected health information and “may be targeting a significant portion of the population of the United States.” The health insurance giant did not say how many Americans would be affected, but said reviewing the data “could take months” before it began notifying individuals that their information was stolen in the cyberattack. “It's expensive.” Change…

Throughout hip-hop's long history, jewelry has served as an important means for artists to convey their ideas and richness, or simply to captivate viewers. Diamonds in particular are an important motif, with Drake's $400,000 diamond-encrusted iPhone case being famous. But not everyone is a millionaire rapper, and most people can't afford to wear a broken watch that's filled with ice. Still, there is certainly a market for such jewelry at lower prices, and venture capitalists seem to be aware of it. A direct-to-consumer diamond jewelry startup called Pascal has raised nearly $10 million in VC funding to date, $2.5 million…

A vulnerability in the smart access control system used in thousands of rental homes in the United States could allow anyone to remotely control any lock in an affected home. However, Chirp Systems, the company that manufactures this system, has ignored requests to fix this flaw. U.S. cybersecurity agency CISA said last week that a phone app developed by Chirp, which residents use in place of keys to access their homes, was “unauthorized'' with hard-coded credentials that could be used to control any of Chirp's remote controls. A security advisory was issued stating that the data is being stored properly.…

Pomelo, a startup that combines international money transfers and credit, has raised $35 million in a Series A round led by Dubai venture firm Vy Capital, TechCrunch has learned exclusively. Additionally, the company announced a $75 million expansion of its warehouse facilities. Founders Fund and A* Capital also participated in the financing, along with early investors Afore Capital and others. This transaction brings total funding raised to date to $55 million in equity and $125 million for warehouse facilities. TechCrunch highlighted $20 million in seed funding in 2022 led by Pomelo's Founders Fund. The new backer, Vy Capital, is a…

Last week, TechCrunch broke the news that workforce management software company Ripling was closing on a new $200 million funding round led by Coatue at a hefty $13.4 billion valuation. The round also includes another $670 million secondary element aimed at giving some of Rippling's investors a greater stake in the company, while Rippling The company also reported that its employees, some of whom joined the company when it was founded in 2016, have liquidated some of their stock into cash. . Rippling declined to comment at the time, but founder Parker Conrad confirmed our information in an interview Friday…

Last week, TechCrunch broke the news that workforce management software company Ripling was closing on a new $200 million funding round led by Coatue at a hefty $13.4 billion valuation. The round also includes another $670 million secondary element aimed at giving some of Rippling's investors a greater stake in the company, while Rippling The company also reported that its employees, some of whom joined the company when it was founded in 2016, have liquidated some of their stock into cash. . Rippling declined to comment at the time, but founder Parker Conrad confirmed our information in an interview Friday…

Many products benefit from tight integration, where companies design and sometimes build key components of the product in-house. Apple and its custom microprocessor and Tesla and its Supercharger are two notable examples. It's not an easy strategy to get right, but stealth startup General Galactic hopes this approach will lower the price of so-called e-fuels, which produce hydrocarbons from captured carbon dioxide. , the company exclusively told TechCrunch. The company grew out of co-founder and CEO Halen Mattison's SpaceX days. “I was working on a team focused on propellant generation for Starship. I started thinking, 'What are we going to…

Parenting a young child diagnosed with or suspected of having ADHD can be difficult. Some children with this condition may have difficulty completing school work or may become easily irritated and have tantrums. Parents who seek professional help may be shocked to learn that due to a national shortage of psychologists, it can take up to a year to receive a diagnosis and begin seeing a therapist. is common. And that's not even mentioning the high cost of out-of-network treatment, which can cost up to several thousand dollars a year. Clarity Pediatrics, a chronic care startup founded in 2021, cuts…

After a turbulent year, banking-as-a-service (BaaS) startup Synapse has filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy and its assets will be acquired by TabaPay, the companies said. The transaction is pending bankruptcy court approval. Founded in 2017, Mountain View-based TabaPay is an instant money transfer platform backed by SoftBank in a private funding round in 2022. It's not clear how much venture capital has been raised. San Francisco-based Synapse operates a platform that enables banks and fintech companies to develop financial services, and was founded in 2014 by Brian Keltner and Indian-born CEO Sankaet Pathak. Established in . In 2019, TechCrunch reported…