Category: Tech news

 It’s easier to slide into an existing behavior than invent an entirely new one. So when Evan Tana went off to spin up his own mobile company while in residence at Greylock Partners, he tapped into a very familiar behavior. We make memes and use gifs to express feelings in ways that words alone can’t capture. Sparks, the new startup he co-founded with Daniel Hammond and Joao… Read More

 The long road to making markets work starts with marketplaces. It’s no surprise therefore that simple classified advertising sites have been hits in emerging markets like Africa. From Howzit, to N-Soko, to even Craigslist Kenya, classified platforms have proliferated across Africa and Asia as basic internet access has spread. Most sites have grown organically, while others were created… Read More

 Simple, the online banking service acquired by BBVA earlier this year, had an overall goal of addressing the various pain points found at traditional banks, like minimum balance requirements, fees, overdraft charges, and more. Today, the company is making another improvement as it’s introducing a way to speed up bank transfers between Simple and accounts you hold at other banks.
If… Read More

 Greycroft Partners has closed on a new $200 million growth fund for making late-stage investments. Before now, Greycroft had focused primarily on Series A or Series B rounds, but the new fund will give it the flexibility to make investments of $5 to $10 million per round in more mature companies. Greycroft was an early investor in a number of companies that have recently seen exits,… Read More

 This morning, Microsoft promised to meet the stipulations of the CTIA’s Smartphone Anti-Theft Voluntary Commitment before the goal-date of July 2015.
Specifically, Microsoft will bring remote-wipe; bricking of lost handsets; reactivation protection for stolen handsets; and the ability to undo phone “inoperability” if the handset in question is recovered. Read More

About the size of a bento box, the Sherpa 100 can recharge phones and tablets, but it’s also powerful enough to charge up your laptop.

 Microsoft is gearing up to begin shipping its Surface Pro 3 tablet, and many have already had a chance to test out the latest in tablet/laptop hybrids. One early tester is Penny Arcade’s Mike Krahulik (aka Gabe) who was a huge fan of the Surface Pro 2 because with the stylus, it was an awesome digital artist tool for hand-drawn creations. Gabe wasn’t so impressed with the Surface… Read More

 If the writing was not on the wall already that the use of proximity-aware beacons was the future of retail, now we have some data to back it up. According to a study by inMarket, the use of beacons (Apple brands these as iBeacons, and has already shipped millions of capable devices) in retail stores caused a 19x increase in interactions with advertised products, a 16.5x increase in app… Read More

 You can say a whole lot with just a few emoji. If you have 400 hours to dig through page after page of icons instead of just typing a message with words like a human, the possibilities are endless!
But if you want to flip someone the bird? That you can’t do. For now. But you might be able to soon! Read More

 The Motorola G is a helluva a deal, and it just got better. The budget phone is now available in the U.S. with 4G for just $219. Unlocked and not tied to a carrier contract. And that’s awesome. You should buy five. Read More

 With an overwhelming number of millennials still out of work despite a slowly recovering U.S. economy, venture capital firms are rushing in to back new recruiting and human resources tools to make the job hunt a bit easier. The unemployment rate in the U.S. is hovering around 6.3 percent, according to a June 6 report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, but for the millennial generation… Read More

 It might not seem like artistic pursuits have much of a place in multi-billion dollar software businesses. But as you can see in this week’s episode of Inside Jobs, creating art is a full-time job for Dropbox’s Alice Lee. As an illustrator and product designer, Lee spends her days designing, doodling, and drawing, helping create the visual images that represent Dropbox and all… Read More

 One of the most notable court cases of the year for startups was officially revealed last week, and there was nary a peep from much of the tech press. Last week, a California judge struck down the state’s teacher tenure laws, arguing that tenure disproportionately harms the education of students from poor and minority school districts, and is thus unconstitutional. The case was brought… Read More

 Reservation holders for the Tesla Model X received notice today that the electric SUV will hit the production lines early next year. Best of all, Tesla confirms in this email that the gull-wing doors will make the production model and all models will feature all-wheel drive and there will be an option for a third row of seating. These are big updates, but they shouldn’t come as a surprise. Read More

 It looks like 2014 is the year of the “Uber for things that aren’t rides” in Silicon Valley. While the market for similar services — like shipping packages or grocery shopping — is already starting to develop, the concept is starting to move onto totally unrelated markets. Bannerman, for example, is a startup in the Y Combinator Summer 2014 class that sounds a… Read More