Desktop Metal buys fellow 3D printing company EnvisionTEC for $300M

Desktop Metal this morning announced its intention to purchase fellow 3D printing company EnvisionTEC. Founded in Germany in 2002, EnvisionTEC specializes in photopolymer additive manufacturing, putting its technology in more direct competition with the likes of 3D printing darling Carbon than Desk

WhatsApp delays enforcement of privacy terms by 3 months, following backlash

WhatsApp said on Friday that it won’t enforce the planned update to its data-sharing policy until May 15, weeks after news about the new terms created confusion among its users, exposed the Facebook app to a potential lawsuit, triggered a nationwide investigation and drove tens of millions of

Twilio CEO Jeff Lawson says wisdom lies with your developers

Twilio CEO Jeff Lawson knows a thing or two about unleashing developers. His company has garnered a market cap of almost $60 billion by creating a set of tools to make it easy for programmers to insert a whole host of communications functionality into an application with a couple of lines of code.

Tracy Chou launches Block Party to combat online harassment and abuse

Block Party, an anti-harassment startup that aims to help folks feel safer on social media founded by Tracy Chou, launched today. Currently only available for Twitter, Block Party helps people filter out the content they don’t want to see and into what Block Party calls the Lockout Folder. Th

Fired GitHub employee who warned co-workers about Nazis is seeking legal counsel

On the day a violent mob of Trump supporters stormed the U.S. Capitol, a worried GitHub employee warned his co-workers in the D.C. area to be safe. After making a comment in Slack saying, “stay safe homies, Nazis are about,” a fellow employee took offense, saying that type of rhetoric wasn'

DOT evaluated 11 GPS replacements and found only one that worked across use cases

The United States' GPS system, which is operated by the Defense Department, offers every one of us critical infrastructure around what is known as positioning, navigation and timing (PNT). Positioning and navigation is obvious every time we open up a maps app, but timing is also a critical func

Bumble files to go public

The dating and networking service Bumble has filed to go public. The company, launched by a former co-founder of the IAC-owned Tinder, plans to list on the Nasdaq stock exchange, using the ticker symbol “BMBL.” Bumble’s planned IPO was first reported in December. Whitney Wolfe He

Corporate credit card platform Moss raises $25.5 million

German startup Moss has raised a $25.5 million (€21 million) funding round led by Valar Ventures. Existing investors Cherry Ventures and Global Founders Capital are also participating. Moss provides credit cards and a spending platform to small and medium businesses in Germany. The company has de

EMA warns over doctored COVID-19 vaccine data hacked and leaked online

The European Medicines Agency (EMA) has warned that information on COVID-19-related medicines and vaccines, which was stolen in a cyberattack last December and leaked online earlier this week, includes correspondence that’s been manipulated prior to publication “in a way which could und

Uber planning to spin out Postmates’ delivery robot arm

Another Uber spinout is in the works. Postmates X, the robotics division of the on-demand delivery startup that Uber acquired last year for $2.65 billion, is seeking investors in its bid to become a separate company, according to several people familiar with the plans. The startup i

Samsung's Galaxy Buds Pro are a solid AirPods alternative

I suspect it will be a while before I get excited over wireless earbuds. It's not for a lack of trying on the part of manufacturers. In fact, quite the contrary. The category actually matured quite quickly, compared to various other verticals in the consumer electronics space. The truth is, mos

Video game spending increased 27% in 2020

If you've been following the gaming space — or just the state of the world, generally — over the past 12 months, this shouldn't come as a major surprise. Spending saw big increases pretty much across the board in 2020 as a homebound populace sought comfort and distraction in gam

As home sales skyrocket and IPO looms, Diane Yu joins fintech Better.com as CTO

The pandemic might have wiped out whole swaths of the economy, but one area that is pulsating with activity is home sales. Driven by remote work and changing commute patterns, home sales skyrocketed last year, with the National Association of Realtors predicting that the total volume when fully cal

Everlywell raises $75M from HealthQuest Capital following its recent $175M Series D round

At-home health testing kit startup Everlywell has raised $75 million, following the close of the $175 million Series D it announced in December. The new funding comes from HealthQuest Capital, and sees the fund’s founder and managing partner Dr. Garheng Kong join the company’s board of