Startups

Bob W, a marketplace for premium short-term apartment rentals, has raised €40 million ($43 million) in a Series B round of funding. Founded out of Finland in 2018, Bob W touts itself as a “tech-enabled hospitality operator,” with some 3,000 “aparthotels” offered for rent i

Venture capital firm Homebrew is targeting $50 million for a new fund, according to a new filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission. The filing comes as a bit of a surprise considering that Homebrew nearly two years ago said it was pursuing a more stage-agnostic evergreen model that w

Only 7% of founders have a pitch deck with a reasonably good go-to-market (GTM) narrative. Given that a lot of founders are raising money to acquire new customers, allow me to put words to what that means: It's an absolute embarrassment. The vast majority of slide decks barely qualify to be cal

Get ready for an exciting lineup at technewss Early Stage — happening on April 25 in the lively city of Boston, Massachusetts. We’ve gone through a bunch of applications from experienced founders and experts in the startup world, all hoping to shine in our Audience Choice segment. Don̵

There is a new dating app just in time for Valentine’s Day, but there’s a catch: You must have at least a 675 credit score to use it. Launched today by financial platform Neon Money Club, Score is a dating app for people with good to excellent credit, and it seeks to help raise awarenes

After recent launches in the United Kingdom and Ireland, workforce management platform Rippling is continuing its ambitious international expansion with the opening of its Asia-Pacific headquarters in Sydney, Australia today. The company, which already has 15,000 customers and is valued at $11.25 b

Travel startup Layla — backed by firstminute capital, M13, Booking.com co-founder Andy Phillipps, Skyscanner co-founder Barry Smith and Paris Hilton — said today that it has acquired AI-powered itinerary building bot Roam Around. Layla didn’t disclose the valuation of the deal. Roam Aroun

Ilara Health, a Kenya-based health tech enabling private clinics to access diagnostic devices and pharmaceutical products, has secured $4.2 million debt-equity in a pre-Series A round. The funds will be used to scale operations in the East African country, and to deepen healthcare access to the mas

If you’re looking at the current seed funding climate and thinking it’s rough out there, you’re not alone. The last few years have been a roller coaster for startups. First came the uncertainty in the early days of the pandemic, then came the exuberance mid to late in the pandemic

W elcome to the technewss Exchange, a weekly startups-and-markets newsletter. It's inspired by the daily technewss+ column where it gets its name. Want it in your inbox every Saturday? Sign up here. Tech’s ability to reinvent the wheel has its downsides: It can mean ignoring blatant tru

Kai Kloepfer started biometric “smart” gun startup Biofire as a science fair project after the Aurora, Colorado, mass shooting in 2012 brought the U.S.'s gun violence problem close to home. Kloepfer began thinking of ways to solve the problem using what he knows: technology. Twelve

Welcome to Startups Weekly — your weekly recap of everything you can't miss from the world of startups. Sign up here to get it in your inbox every Friday. Holy hell, how is it Friday again? I feel like I wrote one of these newsletters just yesterday. There's been a ton of exciting movemen

Some people watch the Super Bowl for the actual football game being played. Many watch the event for the halftime show or as an excuse to eat wings and other game day snacks. Some watch it to look for better software solutions for their company — maybe? Papaya Global hopes so. The late-stage glo

When I was a student in the U.K., I remember that renting appliances like washing machines and televisions was the norm for some people, especially students living in short-term accommodations. Israeli startup Xyte (pronounced “excite”) has just raised $30 million, as it sees a return to this s