TechCrunch Startup News

Varda Space Industries, a startup that wants to build in-space manufacturing facilities, will be sending its first spacecraft to orbit aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket in 2023. The actual spacecraft — the startup’s first to go to orbit. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Just days after Voodoo acquired Beach Bum, another French mobile gaming company has news to share. Homa Games is raising a $50 million Series A round led by Northzone. The company partners with indie game studios and acts as a publisher. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Alpha Paw offers pet products for dogs and cats like food and supplements that are customized with pet breed in mind. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

A number of high-profile investors are chasing to invest in Slice, a fintech startup that is attempting to expand the market for credit cards in India. Tiger Global is in advanced stages of talks to lead a round of over $100 million in the Bangalore-based startup, sources familiar with the matter told me. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Microsoft announced today that it has acquired Ally.io, a software service that helps companies measure their progress against OKRs or objectives and key results, a common way the management measures both individual and company progress. The two firms did not share the purchase price. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Making sure mental wellness is part of your routine can be difficult, especially if you are already busy and stressed. MindLabs wants to make it easier with a combination of on-demand or live video classes and community features. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Move over, precision agriculture — precision apiculture is what’s on the minds of all future-focused farmers. BeeHero has been growing fast since its debut and seed round last year. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Mauritius and U.K.-based investment company Juven went live today with plans to fund growth-stage technology and consumer companies in Africa. The one-year-old firm is looking to invest large checks in companies “that have proven business models, strong revenue traction and large addressable markets,” it said in a statement. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Both Anchor and Descript have made their names as being among the most significant Podcast creation platforms of recent times, but hoving into the rear-view mirror recently has been Podcastle, an all-in-one platform that can cover off recording, production and publishing, all on the one platform. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

It seems that a lot of startups are trying to help developers reduce the complexity involved in coding an app. Last week we covered the seed round for RunX, a company that helps developers code back-end cloud resources more quickly. Today, Y Combinator Winter 2021 graduate Wasp announced a $1.5 million seed round to help […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Life insurance has had a new lease on life in the era of insuretech, and today one of the companies building a business out of rethinking everything. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The Philippines is one of the most disaster-prone countries in the world, with geography that makes it vulnerable to typhoons, floods, volcanos, earthquakes and droughts. While working in IT, Felix Ayque began compiling cyclone reports and sending them as email alerts to communities. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Brands wanting to get into influencer marketing can use ProductWind's platform to set up campaigns with hundreds of influencers. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

One of the greatest challenges for farmers today is the increasing volatility in the climate, leading to unpredictable weather patterns, making growing conditions challenging. If farmers can’t grow crops, then our food security is as risk. Gradually, the field of agtech is attempting to address this issue. There are increasing numbers of FaaS (farming as […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit...

French startup Voodoo has made a significant acquisition in the casual mobile gaming market. The company is acquiring Beach Bum, a game studio based in Israel and specialized in tabletop and card games. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Spudsy is on track to save 1 million of these so-called flawed sweet potatoes by the end of 2021. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Satellite servicing company Starfish Space has closed $7 million in funding to accelerate the development of a space tug vehicle that can extend the life of spacecraft and get rid of orbital debris. Servicing satellites used to be nigh impossible, due to the extreme costs associated with going to orbit. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

When engineers are building software, they often run into issues around testing it without using actual customer data. Creating a meaningful test set can be time-consuming and challenging. Tonic.ai, a startup that helps engineers create synthetic data sets is trying to fix that, and today the company announced a $35 million Series B. Insight Partners […] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit pod...

Genomic data is considered to be the key to unlocking so-called “precision medicine”. Some estimates suggest that by 2025, 500 million human genomes will have been sequenced, but only a fraction of it is being utilized for drug discovery and precision medicine. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

For many financial institutions in Southeast Asia, verifying new customers takes a week or two, said the founders of Verihubs. The startup cuts that time down to as little as five seconds, using AI-based identity authentication technology and APIs that let companies continue verifying returning customers through SMS, WhatsApp or flash calls. Verihubs announced it […] Learn more about your ad choic...

Mobile spyware is one of the most invasive and targeted kinds of unregulated surveillance, since it can be used to track where you go, who you see and what you talk about. And because of its stealthy nature, mobile spyware can be nearly impossible to detect. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Ninja Van, a Singapore-based logistics startup, has closed a $578 million Series E round to support its operations infrastructure and technology systems growth. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Bay Area-based autonomous farming startup Iron Ox this week announced a $53 million round. The Series C, led by Breakthrough Energy Venture, brings the firm’s total funding up to $98 million. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Loyal is building an animal pharmaceutical company that is developing therapeutics aimed at extending both lifespan and healthspan for dogs. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

When founder Somdip Dey was a computer science masters student at the University of Manchester, his parents got in a terrible car accident. He sent all of his money back to his parents in India to help with their medical bills, but then he faced a problem familiar to too many. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices