Tech

A major shift in the U.S. app economy has just taken place. In the second quarter of this year, U.S. consumer spending in non-game mobile apps surpassed spending in mobile games for the first time in May 2022 and the trend continued in June. This drove the total revenue generated by non-game apps higher for

Systemiq Capital, a backer of early-stage climate tech startups, says it has secured $70 million to kick off its second fund. The London-based VC aims to raise as much as $130 million more; that would mark quite a step up for the firm, which says it has funneled $30 million into 19 startups since 2018.

Hivery, a startup that bills itself as an “optimization platform” for retailers, today announced that it raised $30 million in a Series B round led by Tiger Global, the embattled private equity firm, with participation from Blackbird Ventures, AS1 Growth Partners and OneVentures. CEO Jason Hosking told TechCrunch via email that the proceeds will fuel

After flagging concerns over the financial risks associated with non-fungible tokens, some of China’s authorities are putting forward guidance on how to best make use of the novel technology. The government of Shanghai says it supports “leading companies to explore building NFT exchanges,” according to the city’s 14th Five Year Plan on the digital economy

Biofuels are the sirens of renewable energy, luring startups with enchanting promises of enormous markets, from aviation to trucking and shipping. Companies just can’t help throwing themselves at the problem, and more than a few have been dashed to pieces in the process. One new startup, though, hopes it’s Ulysses in this tale, able to

Knowing how much and which kind of inventory your brand needs involves a complex web of data that companies often keep up with via spreadsheets or legacy systems that don’t provide a full picture of the business. Syrup Tech, now armed with $6.3 million in new funding, is feeding all that data, like transactions, marketing

Global venture capital firm Cathay Innovation has announced its third fund, targeting €1 billion ($1.05 billion) at a broad gamut of companies and technologies around the world. With Fund III, Cathay Innovation launches what will surely be one of the largest multi-stage VC funds to emerge from Europe once it closes, encompassing series A, B, and

Indian fitness platform, Ultrahuman, is expanding its wearable portfolio by launching a smart ring to boost its ability to provide tech loving ‘biohackers’ — and, it hopes, health-concerned Boomers — with more insightful metabolic insights. Sensors embedded in the forthcoming Ultrahuman Ring include temperature, heart rate and movement monitors, which enable the device to track

Neji Tawo, the founder of boutique software development company Wiscount Corporation, says he was inspired by his dad to become an engineer. When Tawo was a kid, his dad tasked him with coming up with a formula to calculate the gas in the fuel tanks at his family’s station. Tawo then created an app for

Mental health startup Intellect’s ambitious goal is to be available across the Asia-Pacific, but ensure localized, culturally-competent care in each of the many markets it serves. Today it announced it has added $10 million to its war chest in a Series A extension led by Tiger Global, bringing the round’s total to $20 million. The

Hello and welcome back to Equity, a podcast about the business of startups, where we unpack the numbers and nuance behind the headlines. Alex and Grace are back to cover the biggest, boldest and baddest technology news. After some holiday weeks, we are back on an actual Monday! What a treat. Here’s what we got into: Equity

Quiltt is wrapping its warm low-code fintech infrastructure blanket around startups and small businesses that want to create financial services for their customers, but don’t have the budget resources for a big engineering team. Ruben Izmailyan and Mark Bechhofer came up with the idea for Dallas-based Quiltt about five years ago while working together on

Investors are used to using their acumen and financial heft to find companies that might disrupt markets. But it turns out their views and investments might disrupt public opinion, too. A massive survey of Facebook users from around the world shows a vast group of people who are neither convinced that climate change is the

It is worth beginning with a note that I am terribly risk averse, and therefore … not a ton of fun. When Ford micromobility subsidiary Spin first launched a fleet of electric scooters in my hometown of Pittsburgh last summer, my immediate instinct was very old-man-yells-at-cloud. Youths took over the streets and sidewalks, racing around downtown

One of the stunning facts that’s emerged over the last few years – especially as VCs and startups have turned their attention towards the climate crisis – is that our cities produce an enormous amount of CO2: in fact, buildings are responsible for around 40% of global CO2 emissions. But of course, the problem is

Over the weekend, Tesla showed off its latest gadget: a solar trailer, featuring extendable panels, a satellite internet terminal and even a lick of matte-black paint. Tesla may have designed the trailer to add some range to electric vehicles—or, to advertise Starlink’s new $25-per-month “portability” feature, which SpaceX announced in May. Whatever it’s for, you

Welcome back to This Week in Apps, the weekly TechCrunch series that recaps the latest in mobile OS news, mobile applications and the overall app economy. The app industry continues to grow, with a record number of downloads and consumer spending across both the iOS and Google Play stores combined in 2021, according to the

To get a roundup of TechCrunch’s biggest and most important stories delivered to your inbox every day at 3 p.m. PDT (except today because of the breaking Musk news!), subscribe here. Jet-lagged and post-COVID-fatigued, Haje is back, joining Christine to bring you fine morsels of tech news in this very newsletter. Also, hearsay (and the

Hello and welcome back to Equity, a podcast about the business of startups, where we unpack the numbers and nuance behind the headlines. It doesn’t feel like a short week, does it? Alex, Natasha and Mary Ann got on the mic to bring an especially packed episode full of big news, fire transitions and even a

An executive order signed by President Biden places the White House’s weight firmly behind states where access to abortion is guaranteed, urging the FTC and other executive entities to examine and reinforce data protection policies. Without a digital trail to follow, attempts to criminalize private medical activity across borders may prove far more difficult. The

Five and a half years on (well, really 5.69), Tesla’s solar roofs are looking less like a revelation and more like a hobby. Though Elon Must set a goal of 1,000 solar roof installations per week, the company’s latest averages are reportedly a tiny fraction of that figure. Citing an anonymous source, Electrek reports that

The investment firm Sequoia Capital has no shortage of internal programs for the founders it backs. The idea is to help its startups not merely by sheer dint of their affiliation with Sequoia but by helping them at the outset with everything from storytelling to recruiting strategies in order to give them an edge over

The wheels of privacy enforcement are slowly turning against Facebook in Europe — where its lead data protection regulator, Ireland’s Data Protection Commission (DPC), has taken a key procedural step on a data transfers complaint whose substance dates back almost a decade at this point. The DPC confirmed today that a draft decision on the

If you’ve ever searched on YouTube for a review of the latest iPhone or electric car, then you’ve probably encountered Marques Brownlee. Since he started his channel MKBHD as a teenager in 2009, Brownlee has amassed 15.8 million subscribers for his in-depth, yet approachable tech videos. He’s even scored interviews with Elon Musk, Mark Zuckerberg,

Nothing, the consumer tech company started by OnePlus co-founder Carl Pei and known for its aggressive marketing, unveils a non-fungible token project called Black Dot. Its fans are skeptical. Black Dot is a video clip featuring a rotating, transparent cube with a black dot bouncing off the walls inside and making a crispy, metallic sound.

Build stronger brands and reduce reliance on social Simon Wu 7 hours Simon Wu Contributor Simon is a partner with Cathay Innovation, a global venture capital firm investing across North America, Europe, Asia and Africa. He focuses on software, fintech, digital health and consumer investments. More posts by this contributor From startups to Starbucks: The

If your service-based business is still collecting paper checks and only knows clients by their first name, Finli has an app for you. After building mobile technology for fintechs and payment companies for the past 20 years, Lori Shao, CEO of Finli, started the mobile-first payment management company nearly 3 years ago when she noticed

Last month, at the same time that the London-based venture firm Felix Capital was announcing that it has closed its fourth and newest fund with $600 million in capital commitments, we had a separate chat with Felix’s founder, Frederic Court, about how competition in Europe has changed, given that so many U.S. venture firms have

My work in early-stage startups focused on operations, so I used Wikipedia to find the formula for calculating a company’s post-money valuation: PMV = N x P N = number of shares the company has post-investment P = price per share at which the investment was made So, if a company offers a round with

Twitter has sued the Indian government to challenge some of New Delhi’s takedown orders, a source familiar with the matter told TechCrunch, further escalating the tension between the American social giant and New Delhi. The lawsuit follows a rough year and a half for Twitter in India, a key overseas market for the firm, where