TechCrunch Industry News

Acorns, which helps millions of people invest their spare change in the stock market, has laid off between 50 to 70 people, TechCrunch has learned from multiple sources. The Irvine, Calif.-based company would not confirm the total number of people laid off, but did confirm that there were cuts at the company as a result […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

More dismal numbers confirm what we already knew: Q1 2020 was real rough for an already struggling smartphone category. Gartner’s latest report puts the global market at a 20.2% slide versus the same time last year, thanks in large part to fallout from the COVID-19 pandemic. Every single one of the global top-five manufactures saw […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adch...

Uber is bringing a new feature to the U.S. that lets users book rides for $50 an hour and make multiple stops as the ride-hailing company tries to respond to changing consumer needs during the COVID-19 pandemic. The hourly booking feature, which is already available in a handful of international cities in Australia, Africa, Europe, […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adc...

Pax today is announcing a new app for its cannabis vaporizers. The service offers access to device controls, cannabis strain information, and safety features. The company previously launched an Android and iPhone app with similar features, but Apple later removed the version on the App Store, stripping iPhone users of features and information. Pax is […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit pod...

Several months into this pandemic, you can no doubt already eyeball six feet/two meters with the best of them. But if you’re still having trouble — and happen to have an Android device handy — Google’s got you covered, I guess. The latest project out of the company’s Experiments With Google collection, Sodar is a […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The greatest comedy in television history became a part of the Disney family when the mega-corporation gobbled up Fox last year, like so many forbidden donuts. Beyond having to make nice with the cartoon mouse American’s family had so openly antagonized over the decades, the deal meant that The Simpsons would have a permanent home […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adch...

Why’s this on TechCrunch? We hear that occasionally when posting things outside of our general programming. Generally, there’s a tech hook; there isn’t here with this $100,000 2020 Lotus Evora GT. The Lotus Evora GT is supersized go-kart with nary an advanced technical feature. And I love it. While most cars are coming equipped with […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/ad...

The Raspberry Pi Foundation has released a new version of its flagship model, the Raspberry Pi 4. In addition to the models that come with 2GB and 4GB of RAM, there’s a new 8GB model. This model costs $75, which makes it the most expensive Raspberry Pi out there. As always, you get a single-board […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

You don’t need a green thumb and a big backyard to grow baskets of fresh produce. In fact, according to Chicago-based Rise Gardens, you probably just need a bookshelf’s worth of space in your living room and an app. Rise Gardens, an indoor hydroponic gardening system, has raised $2.6 million in seed funding for home-grown […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Browser developers love to add small Easter Eggs to their apps to help you while away the hours when your Interent is down, for example. Chrome has long had the Dino game, that you can start from the ‘No internet’ error screen, for example. With its surf game, Microsoft’s Edge team built something similar into […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

New numbers from Gartner show a sizable — if not unexpected — decline in device shipments for 2020. According to the analyst firm, the category (including phones, tablets and PCs) is currently on track to decline 13.6% for the year. An already struggling smartphone market takes a big hit from COVID-19 COVID-19 is, naturally, largely […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/ad...

Security researchers have found a major vulnerability in almost every version of Android, which lets malware imitate legitimate apps to steal app passwords and other sensitive data. The vulnerability, dubbed Strandhogg 2.0 (named after the Norse term for a hostile takeover) affects all devices running Android 9.0 and earlier. It’s the “evil twin” to an earlier […] Learn more about your ad choices...

IBM confirmed reports from over night that it is conducting layoffs, but wouldn’t provide details related to location, departments or number of employees involved. The company framed it in terms of replacing people with more needed skills as it tries to regroup under new CEO Arvind Krishna. “IBM’s work in a highly competitive marketplace requires […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcast...

In the days and weeks after Tesla CEO Elon Musk revealed the cybertruck — a post-apocalyptic inspired vehicle made of cold-rolled steel — there was a lot of speculation about whether it would be smaller once it actually made it to market. Production of the Cybertruck is still a long ways off. There isn’t even […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Tuca & Bertie was wonderful. It was a hilarious and heartfelt examination of adult relationships, coupled with whimsical animated visuals. And like most good things in this world, it was simple too beautiful to live. The Netflix series, which starred comedians Tiffany Haddish and Ali Wong and two mismatched bird best friends was canceled after […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastcho...

Magic Leap has reportedly received a $350 million lifeline, a month after slashing 1,000 jobs and dropping its consumer business. Noted by Business Insider and confirmed by The Information, CEO Rony Abovitz sent a note to staff announcing the funding, courtesy of unnamed current and new investors. The who — and more importantly, why — […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/...

Fast-growing fintech behemoth Brex is raising big money as its customer base itself — high-growth and spendy startups — is struggling. The company, which sells a credit card tailored for startups, today announced that it has raised $150 million in a Series C extension from a group of existing investors, including DST Global and Lone […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/ad...

Over the years I’ve seen hundreds, probably thousands, of data breach notifications warning that a company’s data was lost, stolen or left online for anyone to grab. Most of them look largely the same. It’s my job to decode what they actually mean for the victims whose information is put at risk. Data breach notifications […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Twitter today acknowledged that it’s begun testing a new setting that let users limit who can reply to tweets. The setting was first noted earlier this year. Similar to Facebook’s post view settings, the current implementation features a small glove icon in the corner. Tapping on it brings up a “Who Can Reply?” window. From […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Polestar’s first U.S. retail stores will open in Los Angeles, New York City and two locations in San Francisco later this year — the latest milestone for the automaker as it gets closer to bringing its all-electric vehicle to market. Polestar, which is jointly owned by Volvo Car Group and Zhejiang Geely Holding of China, […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

When he was still running Microsoft, Steve Ballmer caused quite the stir in the tech world by screaming “Developers! Developers! Developers!” Since the executive retired to spend more time with his basketball team, however, the tech giant’s current CEO is decidedly more…subtle in his approach. In the kickoff keynote to the first all-virtual build conference, […] Learn more about your ad choices. V...

Samsung’s in-house incubator C-Lab has produced some of the more fascinating hardware devices in recent memory. Previous graduates have run the gamut from smart belts to augmented reality. The Samsung staff’s pet projects are not always the most practical, but they’re never not interesting. Per usual, the latest batch of graduates from the 9.5-year-old incubator […] Learn more about your ad choice...

It would be one of the greatest startup investments of all time. Masayoshi Son, riding high in the klieg lights of the 1990s dot-com bubble, invested $20 million dollars into a fledgling Hong Kong-based startup called Alibaba. That $20 million investment into the Chinese ecommerce business would go on to be worth about $120 billion […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adc...

Chris and Alex Naoumidis came to hypnotherapy through dresses. As The New York Times reported last year, the two brothers initially started their careers as startup entrepreneurs with a peer-to-peer dress-sharing app for women. The Australian natives, overcome with doubt, about their ability to succeed in startupland and when apps didn’t work, their father suggested […] Learn more about your ad ch...

Back in March, Headspace announced that it would offer free content to all COVID-19 frontline responders. Now the meditation app is expanding the offer to include all unemployed people in the U.S. You can go here to sign up, by entering information on your most recent job, including the employer’s name and the date you […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices