Author: TechBrunch
Perplexity, an AI-powered search engine, has launched a type of “agent” called Perplexity Assistant. Perplexity says the assistant uses reasoning, search, and apps to help with daily tasks. Perplexity Assistant will be available in the Perplexity app on Android devices starting Thursday, and the company says it can perform “multi-app actions” such as hailing a ride or searching for a song. Perplexity's search engine is functional, allowing Perplexity Assistant to access the web. Perplexity says this allows the assistant to do things like find the right date and time or create a calendar entry to remind you of an event.…
The tech layoff wave continued through 2024. Following significant workforce reductions in 2022 and 2023, 2024 saw more than 150,000 job cuts across 542 companies, according to independent layoffs tracker Layoffs.fyi. Large companies like Tesla, Amazon, Google, TikTok, Snap, and Microsoft conducted sizable layoffs in 2024, while smaller-sized startups also experienced cuts, and in some cases, shut down operations altogether. We’re continuing to track the industry’s layoffs into 2025 so you can see the trajectory of the cutbacks. Later this year, we will break out our 2024 and 2025 lists in order to make the trends easier to parse. By…
Brave Search announced Thursday that it is adding a new feature called “Rerank,” which allows users to adjust search results by upvoting or downvoting specific websites. This feature is available to all users and appears at the top right of the search results page. When a user opens the panel, they can “pull” or “drop” a domain by clicking the thumbs up or thumbs down sign. Brave then fine-tunes your search by prioritizing results from sites you've upvoted and ignoring results from sites you've downvoted. Brave says its AI-powered answers feature will also record changes you make and provide some…
Password managers are common these days. However, businesses often have different needs than consumers. After all, teams often need to share credentials to access resources, but IT and security teams need a way to control who has access to them. Passbolt, which announced an $8 million seed round on Thursday, aims to become the de facto password manager for small and medium-sized businesses, with long-term ambitions to serve enterprise customers. The Passvolt team, led by French-born CEO Kevin Muller, argues that most organizations are not working well with tools that are more consumer-oriented, like Bitwarden and 1Password. “If you look…
What do AI voice agents and self-driving cars have in common? Brooke Hopkins, former head of technology at Waymo, argues that their performance can be evaluated similarly. Coval, a new Hopkins startup, is trying to do just that. “When I left Waymo, I realized that many of the problems we were having at Waymo were exactly what the rest of the AI industry was facing,” Hopkins (pictured above, center) told TechCrunch. . “But everyone was saying this is a new paradigm and we have to come up with testing methods from first principles and basically everyone has to re-write everything.…
For fintech app developers, integrating repayment, balance transfer, and bill payment functionality can be difficult. Developers often have to deal with a patchwork of vulnerable screen scraping APIs to extract data from users' financial institutions. To make matters worse, you also have to deal with tools to process piles of checks and documents. Three friends and entrepreneurs Jose Besancourt, Marco del Carmen, and Mitt Shah told TechCrunch that inhibitors can be deal-breakers, especially for small fintech teams. spoke. In an effort to overcome those and help others do the same, the trio launched Method, a platform that powers debt and…
Snap announced Thursday that it is introducing a new “Challenge Tag” rewards program that allows AR developers to submit lenses and win cash prizes. The company also announced the launch of educational pricing and student discounts for Spectacles, AR glasses for developers. The theme for the first challenge tag is humor, and submissions are open until January 31st. The first-place Lens developer will receive $2,500, while second and third place will receive $1,500 and $1,000, respectively. Twenty honorable mentions will receive $250. To participate, developers must register for each challenge, build a lens in Snap's Lens Studio, and apply a…
Back in 2023, Ashi Dissanayake, co-founder of space fueling startup Spaceium, became so desperate that he stuck his foot inside a clothes dryer, using its surface as a desk. I did. Her computer sat next to a Tide pod, she was surrounded by disembodied robotic arms, and she and co-founder Reza Fetanat worked late into the night. At the time, the two were working out of a small apartment in Ottawa. They've since moved into an office with a real desk, went through Y Combinator, and today announced an oversubscribed $6.3 million seed round led by Initialized Capital. The company…
Many nonprofits are tied to outdated, expensive, and limited technology that hinders their mission and ability to fund their causes. Most companies consider technology adoption a priority, but face many obstacles, including siled data and integration issues. Peter Burns, co-founder of Fundraise Up, a Brooklyn-based fundraising platform for nonprofits, says the result is often low donor satisfaction. “The message of nonprofits is to influence change, to make a difference, to be a hero,” Burns said in an interview with TechCrunch. “But when potential donors arrive at the donation form, the experience takes a complete 180. They don't feel empowered and…
Global supply chains are under strain, in part because of a lack of visibility into how cargo is being transported around the world. In one recent study, nearly half of the organizations surveyed reported having little or no visibility into their upstream supply chain. Looking for a solution, Klenner Komoni, who spent years helping his father-in-law track truck fleets, founded Tive, a startup that develops technology to accurately identify cargo shipments in real time. Tive sells disposable tracking devices that can be linked to its cloud platform to help companies in industries such as life sciences and food and beverage…