Author: TechBrunch

The airline industry is on track to hit a record $996 billion in revenue this year, driven by a surge in travel demand, but profit margins remain razor-thin: Total airline costs are expected to hit $936 billion, according to industry group IATA, and revenue per passenger is expected to be about $6.14 — roughly the price of a latte in New York. Looking to boost profits, more airlines are turning to controversial dynamic pricing techniques, which vary fares and amenity prices based on travelers' willingness to pay. Despite a lukewarm response from consumers, 258 airlines now use some form of…

No-code CRM and workflow automation platform Creatio announced Wednesday that it has raised $200 million in funding led by Sapphire Ventures, with participation from StepStone Group and current investors Volition Capital and Horizon Capital. “The problem we're trying to solve is serving the needs of knowledge workers,” said Catherine Kostereva, co-founder and CEO of Creatio, “and we're talking about 1.7 billion people around the world. [who we want to help] Automate your workflows with the power of no-code. Image credit: Creatio Demand for software continues to grow, but the number of developers hasn't kept up, she noted. Of course, Creatio…

Activity tracking platform and community Strava is shutting down Fatmap, the Europe-based 3D mapping platform it acquired last January. In an email sent to users this week along with an online support page, Fatmap said its website and app will be shut down on October 1, 2024, and that in the meantime, users will have the option to transfer their Fatmap routes to Strava. The company says it's “bringing Fatmap's 3D mapping and other features to Strava,” but digging into the details makes it clear that a number of features will be omitted in the move. “Google Maps for the…

More than a year and a half after its spin-off from PhonePee, Indian e-commerce giant Flipkart has quietly started rolling out its own payments app, called Super Money, as it expands its fintech ambitions. The Walmart-owned company's new app, currently in beta on the Play Store, allows users to make mobile payments via UPI, an interoperable network that is the most common way Indians conduct online transactions. To lure customers, Super.money promises “real cashback,” not “useless rewards,” for paying, sending and receiving money via the app, the Android app description says. The Flipkart Group-owned company also plans to expand its…

An increasing number of elderly people are choosing to spend their retirement years at home rather than in a nursing home. A survey by the American Association of Retired Persons (AARP) found that about 90% of people over the age of 65 want to continue living in their own homes as they age, meaning there's plenty of work for home care agencies that care for seniors primarily during the day, and sometimes just a few hours a day or week. Sensi.AI claims that the technology it has developed will help home care agencies virtually monitor the health of elderly people…

With new generative AI startups like Eleven Labs, you might think that translation services are the hottest market. But speech translation predates another market that startups have been targeting for a while now: content translation. This remains a big market, as companies with international operations need to translate content around the world. The $106 million raised to date by companies like Portugal's Unbabel (which recently raised $60 million) is proof of that. Content translation specialist EasyTranslate has been around since 2010, using machine learning models to identify the best freelance translators to translate specific types of content. But now the…

Opera today announced that it is releasing the second version of Opera One into developer beta, with new multimedia controls, split tabs, new AI capabilities and more. The company is introducing new themes and design elements to give Opera One R2 a fresh look. The company has traditionally placed multimedia controls in the sidebar, but the new version lets you put the controls in their own floating window, similar to a picture-in-picture video module. Opera says it's made the resizable floating control match your preferred browser theme. Depending on the size, the multimedia player displays controls such as play/pause, next,…

Apple has finally added support for Rich Communications Services (RCS) to its Messages app, with the feature appearing as part of iOS 18's second developer beta earlier this week. RCS is a messaging protocol that allows you to send and receive files and high-resolution images over the Internet, see typing indicators, get read receipts, and start group chats. Previously, iPhone users could only send SMS or MMS messages from the Messages app to people who didn't have Apple devices. They could only share media, get read receipts, and use other features with other Apple device users via iMessage. With this…

There aren't many growth funds in Europe, but one of them now has new capital to invest in larger companies. German investment management firm DTCP has held the final close of its third growth fund and the initial close of Incharge Capital, a new early-stage fund in a joint venture with Porsche focused on mobility startups, for a total of $450 million. DTCP is now independent and is an acronym for “Digital Transformation Capital Partners,” but the DT in DTCP once stood for Deutsche Telecom, which is once again an anchor investor in DTCP Growth. Despite those connections, DTCP was…

Accel, one of India's most active e-commerce and marketplace investors, is making a contrarian move by shifting its focus to smaller towns and villages in search of future unicorns. Venture companies on Wednesday argued that these regions, which they call “Bharat,” are important markets rife with opportunity for entrepreneurs, even as many startups struggle to make inroads in the region. “There's a perception that rural areas are poor, but if you look at how much the top 20 to 30 percent of people are spending in rural areas, it's a significant amount. We estimate it's over $250 billion,” Anand Daniel,…