TikTok rolls out new commenting features aimed at preventing bullying

On the heels of last week’s launch of a new Q&A format for creators responding to viewer questions, TikTok today announced it’s rolling out new commenting features. Creators will now be able to control which comments can be posted on their content, before those comments go live. Ano

Tetrate, the company born out of Istio’s open-source app networking project, raises $40 million

Tetrate, the company commercializing an open-source networking project that allows for easier data sharing across different applications, has raised $40 million. The round, led by Sapphire Ventures, underscores the importance of the Istio project and just how critical services that facilitate cross

Join Sarah Kunst and Julia Collins for a live Q&A today at noon PT/3pm ET

Julia Collins is the first Black woman to co-found a unicorn, in the form of Zume, a robotics company that cooked pizzas and delivered them at the same time. The company attracted investment from SoftBank and was valued at a reported $2.25 billion in 2019, but ultimately didn’t live up to exp

Russia is trying to throttle Twitter

In its latest strike against online content it doesn’t control Russia is throttling Twitter. State agency Roskomnadzor said today it was taking the action in response to the social media not removing banned content, claiming it had identified more than 3,000 unlawful posts that have not been

LatAm corporate spend-management startup Clara raises $3.5M, comes out of stealth

This morning Clara, a corporate spend-management startup focused on the Latin American market, announced its product launch and a $3.5 million pre-seed round led by General Catalyst. The company’s funding caught technewss’s eye as there has been a flurry of funding for related companie

Optibus picks up $107M for an AI-based planning and operations platform aimed at mass transportation

Mass transportation is a critical part of how metropolitan areas keep moving, and today a startup that has built an AI-based platform to help mass transportation work more efficiently is announcing a huge round of funding to grow its business and tackle a new set of opportunities and challenges in

Cheese raises $3.6M for its digital bank aimed at the Asian-American community

Many things have accelerated in the world of fintech over the past year, not the least of which is the trend of digital banks aimed at specific communities in the U.S. In the past few months alone, a number of neobanks targeting the Black and Latinx communities have emerged. Most recently, we cover

Facebook targets emerging markets with the launch of Instagram Lite, an Android app that takes up just 2MB, in 170 countries

Growth for Facebook is coming from the developing world, and so the social network today made another key move to cater better to consumers in those countries. After nearly three years in the planning, Facebook is taking the plunge today and officially launching Instagram Lite, a less data- and sto

Savannah Fund launches $25M fund to invest in African startups at seed and Series A

Savannah Fund, a pan-African venture capital firm, today announced a $25 million fund as it looks to back more early-stage startups on the continent. Since launching in 2012, Savannah Fund — led by Mbwana Alliy and Paul Bragiel — has backed more than 30 startups. Some of its well-known investme

Cloud cybersecurity startup Lumu raises a $7.5 million Series A

Miami-based cybersecurity startup Lumu today announced the closing of its $7.5 million Series A. The round was co-led by SoftBank Group Corp.'s SB Opportunity Fund and Panoramic Ventures. Lumu, co-founded and headed by Colombian native Ricardo Villadiego, offers a cloud-based service that helps

Aqua Security raises $135M at a $1B valuation for its cloud native security platform

Aqua Security, a Boston- and Tel Aviv-based security startup that focuses squarely on securing cloud-native services, today announced that it has raised a $135 million Series E funding round at a $1 billion valuation. The round was led by ION Crossover Partners. Existing investors M12 Ventures, Lig

Sources: Web Summit will spin out its virtual conference software as a full-blown startup

Sources say Web Summit, the giant tech conference company that specialized in very large gatherings in cities like Lisbon, is poised to spin out its Hopin-like proprietary conference software as an independent startup. Although it's put out a statement today that it will be licensing its softwa

Via buys mapping startup Remix for $100 million

Remix, the startup that developed mapping software used by cities for transportation planning and street design, was born out of a hackathon during a Code for America fellowship. Nearly seven years later, the San Francisco-based startup is being acquired by Via for $100 million in cash and equity.

Fleex lets you allocate a monthly budget for work from home equipment

Meet Fleex, a French startup that was formally named Flexlab. The company wants to make it easier to give some cash to your employees so that they can spend it on a desk, an external monitor, some computer peripherals, a nice chair, etc. Essentially, Fleex wants to make it easier to turn remote wor