TechCrunch Startup News

It’s not an easy time to raise money for an electric vehicle startup, especially given how many have failed or are close to failing. But Los Angeles-based Harbinger has pulled it off by taking a hyper-focused approach to electrifying commercial trucking E-commerce giant eBay has announced plans to acquire Caramel, a startup that helps car sellers and buyers complete the final steps of the transact...

Nelly wants to become the biggest fintech startup in the healthcare industry. The Berlin-based startup is already working with more than 1,200 medical practices in a handful of European countries. But there are thousands more that could benefit from an upgrade for their administrative workflows. Float Financial, an expense management and corporate card startup focused on the Canadian market, has r...

In an announcement Tuesday, Amazon Web Services (AWS), Amazon’s cloud computing division, said it plans to invest $5 billion in Mexico over the next 15 years as a part of a “long-term commitment” in the region. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Alex Dewez, a partner at 20VC, just released its highly anticipated State of the French tech ecosystem report. This is a nice followup to Atomico’s State of European Tech report, with a more granular view on French startups in particular. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The world of fashion is moving at a faster pace each year. Most retailers introduce new styles each season, and fast-fashion companies like Shein, H&M and Zara update their collections continuously. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Decentralized social network organization Mastodon said Monday that it is planning to create a new non-profit organization in Europe and hand over ownership of entities responsible for key Mastodon ecosystem and platform components. This means one person won’t have control over the entire project. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Developers Max Brodeur-Urbas and Rahul Behal think that AI has the potential to automate lots of business-relevant tasks, but that many of the AI-powered automation tools on the market today are unreliable and costly. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Gaming startups, specifically those building casual mobile games, are very hot in Turkey right now, and today another one is announcing a sizable round. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Businesses dependent on the physical supply chain — the network of facilities and transportation systems used to move materials from one location to another — chain face a number of challenges, from staff shortages to increasing customer expectations. The pressures aren’t easing up. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

A startup hoping to provide a credible alternative to Amazon has picked up funding to double down on the gap in the market. PrettyDamnQuick (PDQ) provides tech to retailers to let them customize and test different shipping and checkout flows, and now it has picked up a deal of its own: a $25 million Series A to expand its business.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoi...

Xocean, an Irish marine robotics startup that provides ocean data to the energy and hydrography industries using uncrewed surface vessels (USVs), has raised €115 million ($119 million) as it looks to expand coverage to additional sectors. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The startup’s founder, Nik Shevchenko, started marketing this device on Kickstarter as “Friend,” but changed the device’s name after another San Francisco hardware maker launched his own Friend device and bought the domain name for $1.8 million. Shevchenko, a Thiel fellow with a history of eye-grabbing stunts, is taking a slightly different approach with Omi. Instead of seeing the device as a smar...

When Valeria Kogan started her PhD program in bioinformatics, the scientific field that uses computation and software to analyze biological data, in 2017, she imagined her career would always be within the fields of mathematics, medicine, or biology. But after the first AI boom in the late 2010s, she got an intriguing opportunity in a sector she hadn’t considered: agriculture. Learn more about you...

“These are the kind of jobs that we shouldn't need people to do anymore," founder Leo Ma said about dangerous factory jobs. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Social network and X competitor Bluesky’s massive growth slowed in December in the U.S., after having surged from 9+ million in September to north of 20 million users in November. The slowdown is based on an analysis of web traffic and mobile app daily active users by analytics firm Similarweb, which found that Bluesky grew less than 10% month-over-month in December 2024, compared with 189% growth...

This week at CES 2025, the company is showcasing a prototype version of its forthcoming SolidddVision glasses. The Brooklyn-based startup is specifically targeting people with macular degeneration. The degenerative eye disease affects roughly 13% of U.S. residents aged 40 and up, according to figures from the CDC; Elvie, a female-founded hardware startup, has unveiled a new app-controlled smart bo...

Hydrogen startups are widely seen as a promising way to eliminate fossil fuels from heavy industry and long-haul transportation. But they have been stuck in limbo for the last couple years, waiting for official guidance from the U.S. Treasury on lucrative tax credits. That was until last Friday. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Electra has raised $76.3 million to clean up the dirty ironmaking industry, TechCrunch has learned. The startup has developed a novel method of using electricity to coax pure iron out of low-grade ores, opening the door to cleaner steel. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

As 2025 dawns, it’s a good time to look at the trends that are likely to define the coming 12 months. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

French food delivery startup Epicery will cease operations Tuesday, after one last holiday season hurrah for its clients and the local food businesses that were using the platform during its nine years in business in exchange for a 25% commission. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

A business built around increasingly customized ready-to-eat meals has netted Middle Eastern startup Calo a sizeable funding injection as it looks to expand both what it can offer its time-strapped customers and where it delivers its growing range of just-heat-to-eat dishes. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

AI holds huge promise for healthcare, but not just on the medical side; many startups are convinced machine learning-based systems can do a lot of good on adjacent tasks such as appointment scheduling and confirmations. Brazilian startup Carecode is among these AI believers. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

If there was one phrase that captured the vibe and theme of 2024 — at least in the transportation sector — it was business whiplash. Legacy automakers changed direction on their all-EVs-or-bust strategy, startups pivoted, and some Silicon Valley VCs and executives adjusted their views to a changing political landscape Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

When you really probe venture capitalists about investing in AI startups, they’ll tell you that businesses are experimenting wildly but are very slow to add AI solutions into their ongoing business processes.  But there are some exceptions. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

On the first day of Y Combinator the founders of PearAI got “cancelled." They used the hate to launch a new product, raise $1 million. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices