TechCrunch Startup News

By TechCrunchNews Technology Tech News

TechCrunch Startup News episodes

January 27, 2025 Some shareholders of a16z-backed Divvy Homes may not see a dime from $1B sale
The $1 billion acquisition of rent-to-own startup Divvy Homes, which was announced Wednesday, is expected to leave some shareholders without a payout, according to sources familiar with the deal. The terms — and Divvy’s journey from buzzy startup to acquisition target — reflects the rollercoaster ride the proptech industry has endured over the past decade.

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5 min
January 24, 2025 Neko, the body-scanning startup co-founded by Spotify’s Daniel Ek, snaps up $260M at a $1.8B valuation
Stockholm startup Neko Health has made a big bet on consumers wanting to learn about their state of health and how to prevent things going wrong. Now, investors are making a big bet on Neko. The startup has raised a fresh $260 million in funding, a Series B that values Neko at $1.8 billion post-money

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8 min
January 24, 2025 Sales knowledge automation platform 1up gets a third of its customer leads from memes
When George Avetisov was the founder and CEO of cybersecurity startup HYPR, he spent a lot of time in the trenches with the company’s sales team. He quickly realized that regardless of how good his sales team was, they were consistently pulling in other departments to answer customer questions or fill out technical questionnaires.

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5 min
January 23, 2025 Vertice raises $50M for its AI-powered SaaS spend platform
London startup Vertice has made a name for itself over the years in the very crowded world of expense management with a focus on applying AI to optimize a single area where businesses, collectively, are currently sinking hundreds of billions of dollars in IT budgets that are exceeding $5 trillion annually.

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6 min
January 23, 2025 US safety regulators expand Ford hands-free driving tech investigation
A U.S. federal safety regulator has “upgraded” its investigation into Ford’s hands-free advanced driver assistance system known as BlueCruise — a required step before a recall can be issued. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s Office of Defects Investigation launched a probe into Ford BlueCruise last April after the agency confirmed the system was active.

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4 min
January 22, 2025 At the Microsoft Excel World Championship, selfies and a ‘hype’ tunnel, plus Anthropic plans to release a ‘two-way’ voice mode for Claude and IMDb's founder steps down
An arena. A hype tunnel, the kind through which NBA players typically streak. A competitor dressed in a jersey patterned with a six-pack abs. In a new piece, the New York Times takes readers to an event that organizers call the Microsoft Excel World Championship, a 40-minute, Las Vegas-based competition featuring 12 contestants; Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei says that the company plans to release a “two-way” voice mode for its chatbot, Claude, as well as a memory feature that lets Claude remember more about users and past conversations; IMDb founder steps down as CEO after 35 years

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5 min
January 22, 2025 Teal Health raises $10M to create at-home cervical cancer screenings
The process of getting screened for cervical cancer is quite intimidating. It’s the once-a-year, sometimes life-changing treatment that involves the bright lights of a doctor’s office and an uncomfortable insertion that always seems to last too long.

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4 min
January 21, 2025 Mark Cuban is ready to fund a TikTok alternative built on Bluesky’s AT Protocol
Entrepreneur and investor Mark Cuban is ready to fund a TikTok alternative built on Bluesky’s AT Protocol, he shared in a TikTok video posted on Wednesday. In anticipation of the coming U.S. TikTok ban, which will go through on Sunday unless paused by the Supreme Court, users have been fleeing to other video platforms

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4 min
January 21, 2025 Dub.co is an open-source URL shortener and link attribution engine packed into one
In the last few weeks, PayPal-owned Honey, which claims to find you the best coupon codes for a deal, has been at the center of controversy. Allegedly, the tool sneakily earned affiliate money by changing attributes of product links creators posted on their videos.

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5 min
January 20, 2025 Chinese AI company MiniMax releases new models it claims are competitive with the industry’s best
Chinese firms continue to release AI models that rival the capabilities of systems developed by OpenAI and other U.S.-based AI companies. This week, MiniMax, an Alibaba- and Tencent-backed startup that has raised around $850 million in venture capital and is valued at more than $2.5 billion, debuted three new models:

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7 min