Impact investors FMO and BlueOrchard back Ghana's digital lender Fido in $30M Series B round

Digital lending platforms have become an easy and swift alternative source of credit for microenterprises and individuals overlooked by traditional banking institutions. These platforms have turned into a lifeline for millions of underbanked and demand will keep growing, pushing the value of the di

PharmEasy still 92% below its peak $5.6B valuation, investor estimates

Indian online pharmacy startup PharmEasy, once valued at a lofty $5.6 billion, is still about 92% below its peak valuation, according to new estimates by its investor Janus Henderson. The British American global asset firm disclosed the information in a securities filing. Based on the adjusted val

From their experiences at Uber and PayPal, Palm founders want to make moving cash easier for big companies

At Uber, Gurjit Pannu remembers moving billions in cash across bank accounts globally, realizing almost immediately the importance of effective cash flow management.  Christian Sobkowski, meanwhile, recalls his days working in financial services, most notably at PayPal, where he helped expand

Canva has increased prices for its Teams product

Canva, the design platform, is increasing prices steeply for some customers. And it’s blaming the move in part on generative AI. In the U.S., some Canva Teams subscribers on older pricing plans are seeing the sticker price for a five-person plan jump from $119.99 per year to $500 per year (w

Snapchat to test a ‘simplified’ app, CEO says

Snap is testing a “simplified version of Snapchat,” CEO Evan Spiegel wrote in a verbose letter to employees published on Snap’s website Tuesday. The CEO says the simplified version aims to improve the platform’s accessibility and usability. For those who remember Snapchat

Neko Health, the body-scanning AI health startup from Spotify’s Daniel Ek, opens in London

Prevention is better than cure, as the saying goes. Today, a splashy startup that has taken that concept to heart — literally and figuratively — is expanding. Neko Health was co-founded by Spotify's Daniel Ek and Hjalmar Nilsonne with a mission to improve preventative healthcare with annua

Learn startup best practices with MongoDB, InterSystems and others at Disrupt 2024

From idea to IPO, Disrupt charts startups at every stage on the roadmap to their next breakthrough. technewss will gather some of the startup world's leading companies — but our partners provide more than just financial support. Their presence at Disrupt gives new and prospective founders th

Android’s latest update improves text-to-speech, Circle to Search, earthquake alerts and more

Android introduced five updates on Tuesday as part of its latest release of the mobile operating system. Available for smartphones, tablets and Wear OS watches, the new features include audio descriptions of images, text-to-speech technology for web pages in Chrome, and the ability to look up songs

Android 15 will be available on supported Pixel devices in the coming weeks

Google announced on Tuesday it’s releasing Android 15 and making its source code available ahead of the coming consumer launch, which will bring the new mobile operating system to supported Pixel devices in the coming weeks. The company also revealed that Android 15 will launch on select devi

Bluesky continues to soar, adding 2M more new users in a matter of days

Social networking startup Bluesky continues to benefit from X’s shutdown in Brazil, having now added more than 2 million new users over the past four days, up from just half a million as of Friday. This rapid growth led some users to encounter the occasional error that would state there were

The flat-rate real estate startup that’s got big players worried and BNPL's turning a corner

Welcome to technewss Fintech! This week, we're looking at a new real estate startup that's making big waves with its offering, Klarna and Affirm's financials, a neobank focused on immigrants that's growing fast, and more! To get a roundup of technewss's biggest and most impor

As more Instagram users engage with Stories, the app adds a comments feature

Instagram's latest feature aims to boost user interaction within Stories. The social media platform now allows followers to comment on each other’s Stories, making the experience more community-focused, akin to livestreaming where users can engage in larger discussions. A few users have

Spotter launches AI tools to help YouTubers brainstorm video ideas, thumbnails and more

Spotter, the startup that provides financial solutions to content creators, announced Tuesday the launch of its new AI-powered creative suite. Dubbed Spotter Studio, the solution aims to support YouTubers throughout the creative process, such as helping them brainstorm video concepts, generate

Former Citi, Battery VC has new $378M fund to back financial services and enterprise startups

PruVen Capital, a fintech and insurance tech venture fund founded by former Battery Ventures and Citi Ventures VC Ramneek Gupta, has closed a new $378.5 million Fund II to invest in financial services and enterprise-focused startups. This second fund is significant because Gupta expanded it beyond