WhiteHat Jr founder departs a year after selling to Byju’s
Karan Bajaj, the founder and chief executive of WhiteHat Jr, is leaving the firm a year after selling the startup for $300 million to Indian edtech giant Byju's.
In an email to employees on Wednesday, Bajaj and Byju's founder and chief executive Byju Raveendran said the departure follows a
Vietnamese on-demand e-commerce platform Loship raises $12M at a valuation of $100M
Loship, the Vietnamese on-demand e-commerce platform that started as a reviews app, announced today it has raised $12 million in pre-Series C funding, bringing its valuation to $100 million. The round was co-led by BAce Capital, an Ant Group-backed venture firm, and the direct investment unit of Su
Brazilian digital auto marketplace InstaCarro revs up with $23M in funding
InstaCarro, a digital marketplace that connects used car sellers to dealers in Brazil, has raised $23 million in a Series B round of funding.
Notably, U.S.-based firms co-led the investment, including J Ventures, FJ Labs and Rise Capital. Spain's All Iron Ventures and Big Sur also participated
What Square's acquisition of Afterpay means for startups
On Sunday Square announced it was gobbling up Afterpay in a deal worth $29 billion at the time of announcement. Alex followed up yesterday with more details on why the deal made sense for Square and Afterpay over here, but we wanted to ask some notable VCs what it means for the startup market.
For
Gig companies take worker classification fight to Massachusetts through ballot initiative
A coalition of app-based ride-hailing and on-demand delivery companies including Lyft, Uber, Doordash and Instacart have filed a petition for a ballot initiative in Massachusetts that would keep gig economy workers classified as independent contractors as the industry takes a fight it won in Califo
WhatsApp photos and videos can now disappear after a single viewing
WhatsApp said that it would soon let users send disappearing photos and videos and this week the feature will be rolling out to everybody. Anyone using the Facebook-owned messaging app can share a photo or video in “view once” mode, allowing a single viewing before the media in question
Extra Crunch roundup: Square buys Afterpay, paid search basics, career advice for devs
Square paid around a quarter of its present-day value for Afterpay, Alex Wilhelm notes in The Exchange. That seems like a lot. But was it too much?
“Afterpay brings global revenues, global users and a more diverse merchant network to Square,” Alex notes. “It would have had to spend to derive
Daily Crunch: For $20/month, crime alert app Citizen will connect users with live ‘safety agents’
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Hello and welcome to Daily Crunch for August 3, 2021. Today we have a delightful mix of news for you, from Twitter product changes to VCs in trouble to megadeals
Discord now lets you customize your user profile on its apps
For mobile users, Discord is adding one new feature that you’d find on a more traditional social app. The company rolled out an option for users to customize their profiles across its iOS and Android apps Tuesday, following the feature’s release on the desktop version of Discord in late
Lyft reaches adjusted profitability milestone despite continuing net losses
Today after the bell, U.S. ride-hailing company Lyft reported its second quarter financial performance. In aggregate the company’s performance was a rebound from the year-ago second quarter, which was heavily impacted by the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic and resulting lockdowns in the United
Demand Curve: Tested tactics for growing newsletters
There are very few marketing channels as well rounded as email newsletters. They provide a direct, owned line of communication with your audience; nearly 40x return on investment (~$40 generated per every dollar spent), are infinitely scalable and virtually free.
But to unlock these benefits, you
Embodied AI, superintelligence and the master algorithm
Superintelligence, roughly defined as an AI algorithm that can solve all problems better than people, will be a watershed for humanity and tech.
Even the best human experts have trouble making predictions about highly probabilistic, wicked problems. And yet those wicked problems surround us. We are
India’s BharatPe valued at $2.85 billion in Tiger Global-led $370 million funding
Indian fintech startup BharatPe has raised $370 million in a new round of financing as it looks to aggressively scale its business in the next two years. It’s the nineteenth Indian startup to become a unicorn this year (up from 11 last year) as several high-profile global investors double dow
Security flaws found in popular EV chargers
U.K. cybersecurity company Pen Test Partners has identified several vulnerabilities in six home electric vehicle charging brands and a large public EV charging network. While the charger manufacturers resolved most of the issues, the findings are the latest example of the poorly regulated world of