TechCrunch Industry News

After nearly a decade selling gaming and console peripherals to gamers looking to spice up their systems, Atlanta-based KontrolFreek has been acquired by the international peripherals retailer, SteelSeries. Terms of the acquisition were undisclosed, but KontrolFreek has shipped over 2 million units of its flagship product, which is available in over 9,000 retailers in 60 […] Learn more about your...

Given all of the…feedback Amazon has received, it’s hard to believe the Halo wasn’t widely available until today. Announced in late-August, the product has been offered in “early access” to invited users. That changes today, however, as the product opens to everyone in the U.S. The band runs $100, a price that includes six months […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adcho...

If you’ve ever had a Father’s Day ad offering great deals for your dead dad sail into your inbox, you know that online advertising can be disturbing sometimes. Children’s gifts for people struggling to get pregnant, pet toys for your deceased doggo, the list goes on. Google is taking a small but helpful step to […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

It’s official. Boston Dynamics is becoming part of the Hyundai family (pending regulatory approval, naturally). The Waltham, Massachusetts-based robot maker confirmed that the South Korean technology company is acquiring controlling interest in a press release today. The deal, which values the company at $1.1 billion, gives Hyundai Motor Group an 80% stake, with SoftBank controlling […] Learn more...

I’ve had Apple’s AirPod Max headphones for less than 24 hours, so there is no way I would attempt to write a review of any sort. But I do have some of those oh so popular these days “first impressions” to share. Mostly on build quality, but I’ll throw a few first listen thoughts at […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Consumers will have downloaded 130 billion apps in 2020 across iOS and Google Play, up 10% year-over-year, according to mobile data and analytics firm App Annie’s year-end forecast. Consumer spending across the two app stores will also grow by 25% year-over-year to reach $112 billion by year end, the firm also predicts. Typically, much of […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices....

Haters gonna hate, IPOs gonna pop. That’s the story today as richly valued DoorDash and C3.ai, two American technology unicorns, saw their values skyrocket after they began trading today. DoorDash shares are up just under 83% to $186.51. The company priced its IPO at $102 per share last night, ahead of its raised IPO range […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Twitter’s timeline is currently overrun with ads for some users, in what appears to be a glitch involving the distribution of Promoted Tweets. Typically, a Promoted Tweet — which is just a regular tweet an advertiser has paid to promote more broadly — will appear just once at the top of a user’s timeline, then […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The AirPods Max are joining the AirPods and AirPods Pro in Apple’s audio accessory lineup. As you can see on the photo, Apple is releasing its first over-ear headphones under the AirPods brand. The wireless headphones feature active noise cancellation and cost $549. With this product, Apple competes directly with Sony’s and Bose’s wireless headphones […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit pod...

French startup Luko has raised a $60 million Series B funding round (€50 million). The round is led by EQT Ventures, with existing investors Accel, Founders Fund and Speedinvest also participating. Some angel investors with a background in insurance and technology are also investing in the startup, such as Assaf Wand, the co-founder of Hippo […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoic...

With one fell swoop, WarnerMedia eradicated the status quo in Hollywood, turning its 2021 feature film schedule on its head. Well, not quite. By moving 2021’s theatrical releases to both physical and digital theaters, the AT&T affiliate gave us a reason to sign up for its HBOMax streaming service. With a simultaneous window of one […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adch...

Apple is reportedly developing a number of Apple Silicon chip variants with significantly higher core counts relative to the M1 chips that it uses in today’s MacBook Air, MacBook Pro and Mac mini computers based on its own ARM processor designs. According to Bloomberg, the new chips include designs that have 16 power cores and […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoice...

Google is almost running out of AR/VR projects to kill off. The company announced today in an email to Poly users that they will be shutting 3D-object creation and library platform “forever” next year. The service will shut down on June 30, 2021 and users won’t be able to upload 3D models to the site […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

An Executive Order was just issued from the White House regarding “the Use of Trustworthy Artificial Intelligence in Government.” Leaving aside the meritless presumption of the government’s own trustworthiness and that it is the software that has trust issues, the order is almost entirely hot air. The EO is like others in that it is […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/ad...

Twitter is shutting down its experimental app twttr, which the company had used publicly prototype new features back in 2019. The app was first introduced at the Consumer Electronics Show in January 2019, then launched to testers that March. Its primary focus had been on trying out new designs for threaded conversations, including things like […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoi...

Today after the bell, Salesforce reported its third-quarter earnings for its fiscal 2021, a period that ended October 31, 2020. The CRM giant reported top-line revenue of $5.42 billion, up 20% from the year-ago period. Salesforce also had net income of $1.08 billion and earnings per share of $1.15. Analysts had expected the company to […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/...

The UK’s medicines regulator has approved the BioNTech/Pfizer vaccine against COVID-19 for emergency use, the companies said today. The UK is the first country to approve the vaccine for widespread use — paving the way for some of the most “high risk” citizens, such as elderly care home residents, to get the jab before the end […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoic...

Whether it’s a fun day hike, a car camping excursion or a multi-day backcountry backpacking trip, there’s plenty of great camping and hiking gear that can make life easier for the outdoors person (without going overboard). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Canadian electric truck and bus manufacturer The Lion Electric Company said Monday it plans to become a publicly traded company via a merger with special-purpose acquisition company Northern Genesis Acquisition Corp. The combined company, which will be listed on the New York Stock Exchange, will have a valuation of $1.9 billion. The companies raised $200 […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit...

The Raspberry Pi Foundation has released a new product today. It’s a tiny $5 fan combined with a small heatsink for the Raspberry Pi 4. It works with the official case, below the top cover. That accessory should prevent the Raspberry Pi from overheating. If you’re not familiar with the Raspberry Pi, it’s a cheap, […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Drugmaker Moderna has completed its initial efficacy analysis of its COVID-19 vaccine from the drug’s Phase 3 clinical study, and determined that it was 94.1% effective in preventing people from contracting COVID-19 across 196 confirmed cases from among 30,000 participants in the study. Moderna also found that it was 100% effective in preventing severe cases […] Learn more about your ad choices. V...

Amazon Web Services is currently having an outage, taking a chunk of the internet down with it. Several AWS services were experiencing problems as of early Wednesday, according to its status page. That means any app, site or service that relies on AWS might also be down, too. (As I found out the hard way […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Reset yer counters: Facebook has had to ‘fess up to yet another major ad reporting fail. This one looks like it could be costly for the tech giant to put right — not least because it’s another dent in its reputation for self reporting. (For past Facebook ad metric errors check out our reports from […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This holiday season the next generation of gamers, bless their hearts, will be hoping to receive the next generation of gaming consoles. But confusing branding by the console makers — not to mention a major shortage of consoles — could lead to disappointment during the unwrapping process. Before making any big promises this year, you’ll […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.co...

France is going forward with its plan to tax big tech companies. The government has sent out notices to tech giants, as reported by the Financial Times, Reuters and AFP. There could be retaliation tariffs on French goods in the U.S. For the past couple of years, France’s Economy Minister Bruno Le Maire has been […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices