Category: Tech news

 Last March, TechCrunch covered one of the World Startup Report’s first releases. Now the organization is back with an ambitious project that gathers insight from 150 companies in 50 countries with the idea of guiding aspiring entrepreneurs in different markets. Read More

 eBay’s focus on international expansion continues: yesterday its PayPal division announced PassPort, aimed at attracting more international sales, and today eBay is announcing the acquisition of machine translation technology from a company called AppTek. From our understanding, eBay is acquiring the talent and the IP from Virginia-headquartered AppTek, but another division of its… Read More

Tile is small, square-ish device that can be placed in, or affixed to, any item you want to keep tabs on.

Counter-top rice cookers range from around $20 to over $500. The more expensive models offer all sorts of luxurious niceties, but how many of those do you need if you’re, like, just cooking rice?

 Oculus VR today confirmed that it has hired Jason Rubin to lead first-party game development. This comes less than a week after the company announced that it has poached Jason Holtman from Valve to lead the creation of a platform for selling virtual-reality experiences. Best known for his work as co-founder at Naughty Dog, Rubin served as director on every title in both the Crash Bandicoot and… Read More

 Index Ventures has announced a new early-stage, €400 million ($550 million) fund aimed at tech startups in Europe, US and Israel. This is its seventh early-stage fund and part of a total €3 billion ($4 billion) raised by Index since its inception. The fund will invest from seed and early stage, scaling up to €15 million depending on the requirements of the company. And it’s… Read More

 Welcome back to Cribs, the TechCrunch TV show that goes behind the doors of tech companies to see what it’s like inside for the lucky ducks who work there. Today’s episode brings us to the New York City headquarters of FiftyThree. FiftyThree, which is behind the Paper app for the iPad, is known for making beautifully designed mobile products — and as you can see in the… Read More

 Austin investors may not be keeping the city weird, but they’re sure keeping its startup scene humming. Like the rest of the country, venture capitalists in the Capital City are riding a wave of exits to big new numbers in startups financed and capital committed over the past few quarters. With the TechCrunch Meetup circus in town, there’s no better time to take a look at how… Read More

 The President took to Tumblr today, answering users’ questions on topics relating to education. It was another example of the President using alternative mediums to attract the attention of young Americans. Notably, and infamously to some, the President answered questions on “Between Two Ferns” with Zach Galifianakis to promote Healthcare.gov. That effort led to a spike… Read More

 “Oh jeez, another Q&A app.”
That was my kneejerk reaction when I heard about a new startup called Pyne, which has created what it says is an app that allows users to “poll the world.” But then co-founder Tony Peccatiello gave me a demo, and I have to admit that it was appealingly quick, simple, and fun. Read More

 Lowercase Capital is raising another $25 million, we’re hearing. This is notable for a couple of reasons: Due to its Uber investment, Lowercase Capital’s very first fund — a modest $8.5 million raised in 2010 — has seen its value increase by more than 100x , which is perhaps historic in early-stage seed funds. Lowercase’s second fund, “Spur,” has also… Read More

 Investments in food-related startups, from delivery services to new restaurant chains to new types of foods and additives, have raised unprecedented amounts of cash in the most recent quarter, as investors dug in to the food business.
Food companies raised $89 million in the second quarter of this year alone and have raised nearly $350 million since the second quarter of 2013, the strongest… Read More

 If you haven’t gotten around to playing through VVVVVV in all of its wonderfully frustrating indie puzzler glory, first of all: shame! Second: You’ll be able to play it on your phone soon, so now you have no excuse. Read More

 Cars need to have their oil changed every 3,000 miles or so. Fact. But it’s a hassle. CarHero wants to make it less of a hassle by performing the routine service wherever the car is parked at home or the office. The company just launched in the Dallas area with the hope of scaling nationwide. Read More

 Max Levchin is one of the founders of PayPal, a company that made it easier for consumers to transfer funds to one another and provided an easy-to-install payment processor for businesses. Now he’s seeking to once again reinvent consumer finance as CEO of his new company Affirm. Affirm was founded out of Levchin’s company building investment vehicle HVF, and over the past two years… Read More