Category: Tech news

 Senator Elizabeth Warren has some choice words for Uber, TaskRabbit, Alfred and all the other companies taking part in the “so-called gig economy,” as she put it in a speech Thursday for the New America Foundation’s annual conference. She isn’t against them by any means, but urged both the companies and lawmakers to make labor-friendly changes: “No worker should… Read More

 We’re hearing from multiple sources that there’s a new fund coming out of Betaworks, and Twitter is chipping money into it. Twitter is investing at least $10 million in the new fund, according to one source. We don’t know the total size of the venture. In the past, Betaworks has focused on smaller seed investments and has stayed away from outsized funds. Another previous… Read More

 There is no shortage of advice when it comes to which tools software companies should use to run their businesses. We’ve all come across numerous “Top 100 resources for startups”-type posts at least once as we Google our way to entrepreneurial success. But after reading just one of them, it’s not hard to go from “I have no idea what’s out there” to… Read More

 Ad-targeting startup Metadata announced it has raised $2 million in seed funding. Co-founder and CEO Gil Allouche said the company’s technology offers an effective way for businesses that sell to other businesses to find and target new potential customers through advertising. Companies connect their Salesforce and other CRM accounts, then Metadata uses third-party data to help them… Read More

 Ajay Agarwal leads the West Coast team for Bain Capital Ventures, which he joined 13 years ago. Because he he has seen some market zigs and zags, we met him for coffee this week to talk about what he’s seeing in the market right now. Our chat has been edited for length. TC: Bain Capital Ventures opened its first office in the Bay Area five years ago. Now you have an office in Palo… Read More

 Gillmor Gang – Robert Scoble, Keith Teare, Dan Farber, Kevin Marks, and Steve Gillmor. LIVE recording session today, May 20 2016, starting at 1pmPT/4pmET.
Our live chat stream during the show broadcast
Gillmor Gang’s Facebook page HERE
G3’s archive on ustream
G3’s Facebook page HERE Read More

 Motorola’s RAZR surely stands as one of the most recognizable phones of yesteryear (although myself I preferred the Samsung Trace) — and while the brand has been desultorily maintained by Verizon, a new video from Lenovo suggests a more serious throwback device is nearly at hand, so to speak. Read More

 In the wake of the passing of Title III of the JOBS Act, crowdfunding equity platform FlashFunders has relaunched its site with new features. The new features allow users to crowdfund investment under Form C, which allows for up to $1 million in a single Series from anyone, not just accredited investors. FlashFunders launched on the scene a little under one year ago, offering a web-only way… Read More

 Paul Bragiel, the venture capitalist who made an unsuccessful run at qualifying for the Sochi 2014 Winter Olympics as lone member of the Colombian cross-country ski team, is forming a new, San Francisco-based venture firm with his brother, Dan. According to an SEC filing, they are targeting $10 million for their debut effort. The outfit is called Bragiel Brothers. We’ve reached out… Read More

 It’s Friday, so you can probably spare a few minutes to watch a heartwarming little 360-degree animated film, the latest in Google’s “Spotlight Stories.” This one, entitled “Pearl,” takes place entirely inside a beat-up ’80s sedan, and traces the story of a girl and a guitar. Read More

 It’s been a little while since we’ve heard much about Project Ara, but Google wasn’t going to let an I/O go by without shedding a little more light on the much discussed (and formerly Moto-centric) modular smartphone platform. After highlighting the latest updates from Projects Soli and Jacquard, the company showed off an impressive working developer edition of the phone to… Read More

 Every year at I/O, Google’s ATAP division, which is responsible for turning some of the company’s crazier ideas into products, organizes its own small keynote. This year, the company offered updates on a number of projects, including Project Soli, its attempt at building a very small radar sensor that can translate hand movements into digital signals for building new user… Read More

 Orion Health is a New Zealand-founded (now global) provider of technology products developed for the health sector. Orion’s founder and CEO, Ian McCrae, argues that current approaches to patient information are akin to the Victorian era, when a surgeon’s blood-stained uniform was a source of great pride because it showed medical expertise. In McCrae’s view, today’s… Read More

 An accelerator called HAX held its eighth Demo Day for hardware startups in San Francisco yesterday. Best known for bringing companies in its portfolio to Shenzhen, China for about 15 weeks to get to know everything they can about manufacturing there, Hax is funded by SOS Ventures. The firm spins out accelerators to focus on different problems or technologies about every two years and is also… Read More

 The HAX hardware accelerator held its 8th Demo Day in San Francisco yesterday. While all fifteen companies in the latest batch hold promise, and encompass some very wild ambitions, these three stood out thanks to creative applications of advanced tech to sometimes overlooked, but truly massive potential markets. Rovenso Based in Lausanne, Switzerland, Rovenso is adapting technology created… Read More