Author: TechBrunch

Governments in Australia, Canada, Cyprus, Denmark, Israel and Singapore are likely customers of Israeli spyware manufacturer Paragon Solutions, according to a new technical report from the well-known Digital Security Lab. On Wednesday, Citizen Lab, a group of academics and security researchers who were housed at the University of Toronto, has been investigating the spyware industry for over a decade, released a report on surveillance startups set up in Israel, identifying six governments as “suspected paragon deployment.” At the end of January, WhatsApp notified about 90 users that it believed the company was targeting Paragon Spyware, prompting a scandal in Italy,…

Prezent is a starzent that allows customers to build slide decks using generated AI, raising $20 million to further develop and refine AI models for a variety of use cases and expand into new markets. AI has a wide variety of applications. One of these is generating decks for business presentations. Ready-made models tend to be less good at this as they don't understand industry-specific languages ​​and terminology. That's where Prezent's technology comes into play. Based in Los Altos, a subsidiary in Bengaluru, Prezent was founded in 2021 by Rajat Mishra. Rajat Mishra previously worked for companies such as Cisco…

Aletiq raised a 6 million euro funding round led by Point 9 several months ago (approximately $6.5 million at current exchange rates). The French startup today announced its establishment round. ALETIQ develops product lifecycle management (PLM) software for manufacturing industrial companies working in aerospace, automotive, electronics, luxury and more. When you think about aerospace companies, it's a chance to think of giants like Airbus and Boeing. However, these major industrial companies work with galaxies of small and large suppliers working on components, parts and specialized processes. The same can also be said for automobiles, medical device manufacturers and other industries.…

Factorial, a Barcelona-based “unicorn” startup, offers an all-in-one HR platform in the cloud for small businesses, earning $120 million undiluted (no equity) from common catalysts. The company initially went viral and cut its teeth in the HR services boom along with social distancing during the Covid-19 pandemic via a “free” version of the product that has gained over 60,000 users. There was only a payment soon after, and CEO and co-founder Jordi Romero told TechCrunch in an interview that last year, its clients and revenues rose six times, reaching 13,000 paying companies. The factor uses modern cash injections to take…

Spending time in college inevitably you will come across someone who has a plan to save the world, or at least someone who will make a small part of it better. It might just be young optimism, but sometimes they are actually working on something. Key venture partners bet that young founders, fresh from the university, can solve some of the world's most challenging issues, including climate change, healthcare and economic opportunities. The company was founded by a trio of recent graduates from the University of Pennsylvania. “We are young people, we are young people, we are investing in other…

Spending time in college inevitably you will come across someone who has a plan to save the world, or at least someone who will make a small part of it better. It might just be young optimism, but sometimes they are actually working on something. Key venture partners bet that young founders, fresh from the university, can solve some of the world's most challenging issues, including climate change, healthcare and economic opportunities. The company was founded by a trio of recent graduates from the University of Pennsylvania. “We are young people, we are young people, we are investing in other…

There's a huge qualifier on Tuesday in the big news that Google is getting its security startup Wiz for a record $32 billion. Google says it will position Wiz as a provider of “Multicloud.” This means that Wiz is not a Google-only shop. In reality, Google had no choice but to do this. A closer look at the reasons behind the decision also highlights Google's weaknesses over the coming months. Customer retention Wiz brings Google a large list of customers. As of today, the startup has already reached an annual return of $700 million. Before the news broke on Tuesday,…

Maju Kuruvilla, who resigned from the role of CEO of the controversial One-Click Checkout Startup Bolt last year, is back. He launches his own startup and focuses on another issue with online shoppers. He calls it “check-in.” Clicking on an ad like a T-shirt can make the experience afterwards feel a little clunky. The website you land may not even have the product you first clicked on. It bouncing off many shoppers and hurting conversion rates, Kurbila told TechCrunch. Kurubila wants to change that with AI. His new startup, Spangle AI, creates custom landing pages for shoppers based on what…

They say imitation is a sincere form of flattery, and Google seems to agree. On Tuesday, the company added functionality to its AI-powered Gemini chatbot. Similar concepts to OpenAI's identically named canvas tool for CHATGPT and Anthropic artifacts provide Gemini users with an interactive space to create, refine and share writing and coding projects. “Canvas is designed for seamless collaboration with Gemini,” writes Dave Citron, Gemini's product director, in a blog post shared with TechCrunch. “These new features make Gemini more effective collaborators and help you realize your ideas.” Workspaces such as Gemini Canvas, ChatGpt Canvas and Artifact are the…

The US government's cybersecurity agency oversees contacting more than 130 former employees after the Trump administration ruled that workers who were fired “illegally” must be recovered. US District Judge James Bleder last week ordered the Trump administration to revive the leisurely fired by many U.S. government agencies, including the Department of Homeland Security, which oversees the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA). The ruling focuses on federal probation employees, including workers who have been employed or promoted within the past three years. The CISA fired 130 probation employees in February as part of the Trump administration's broad push to cut…