Wednesday, December 12, 2012

Y! Alert: TechCrunch

Yahoo! Alerts
My Alerts

The latest from TechCrunch

City's Hottest Startups To Compete At The TechCrunch Barcelona Meetup Top
lloguerespais_ptbn_tcm85-90130Tomorrow we'll throw a TechCrunch Mini Meetup in Barcelona, one of the most internationally-minded cities in Europe. Below you'll find out schedule, agenda and here you can grab a free ticket to the party] as the main free event is now full. It's because of its diversity that the city has managed to attract a burgeoning number of startup entrepreneurs wooed by the ability of the city to attract talent, in part because of the climate and lifestyle. When you can live just about anywhere and create an Internet company, you may as well do it in a fun place to live. It's a trend we've seen even San Francisco succumb to, as startups move back form the rather bland campuses of the Valley to the vibrancy of the SF's city living. And Europe's flexible corporate laws now allow startups to be based almost anywhere.
 
British Government Boards The P2P Lending Train: Plans To Loan £30M Through Funding Circle, Zopa Top
displaymedia.ashxDespite bailing them out (and practically owning some of them), the UK government seems unable to force high street banks to begin lending to small businesses again and this is causing a big problem for the economy -- the wheels of capitalism won't grease themselves. The latest solution coming out of the Department for Business Innovation & Skills is to board the P2P lending train. The UK government has pledged £110 million of tax payer's money to lend to SMEs through 'alternative finance' schemes and today we've learned that two P2P lending sites, Funding Circle and Zopa, stand to benefit, with each receiving £20m and £10m respectively.
 
Mobile-Controlled Camera Stand Swivl Returns, With Two New Products On Kickstarter Top
swivl testAround this time last year, the Swivl iPhone dock launched, allowing users to record videos of themselves with a motion-tracking camera stand. The device, which was created by a startup called Satarii and originally backed through a crowdfunding campaign on Indiegogo, is now getting an upgrade. There are now two new versions of the Swivl available for users to check out.
 
Movie Purchasing And Renting Come To 42 New Regional iTunes Stores As Apple Presses Its Media Advantage Top
whatis_play_heroApple has opened up movie purchase and rental options in a number of stores today, including a large number of countries in the EMEA region, as well as in Asia and Latin America. The new movie availability covers 42 new localized stores in total, smaller than the 56 markets where it officially opened new stores on Dec. 4, but nonetheless an impressive push to bring its media marketplace to new regions, which is a key element of its continued success in mobile.
 
Yahoo! Makes Its Second Major Upgrade In Two Days: Flickr For iOS Overhauled, Major Update For Web Top
8255940378_ab063a0162_zAs soon as Marissa Mayer was named Yahoo’s CEO, people were extremely loud about “saving” Flickr. What’s left of the passionate photo community have been waiting for innovation, something that they can get behind and feel good about when they’re spending their time using the site. Today, the company has released a completely overhauled version of Flickr for iOS, its first update since Dec 21, 2011. You read that right, the app hasn’t had an update since last December. For some of us, we’ve moved on to other photo hosting and sharing services, and companies like Facebook and Google have taken a major bite out of Flickr’s powerful photographic stronghold. I’ve personally let my Flickr Pro account lapse, because there just wasn’t enough value in continuing to go back to it. The site itself felt outdated, the features just weren’t up to par with other services, and there was a bit of uneasiness on what the direction of Flickr was. The company hopes that this will change at least some of those fears. It makes sense, since the iPhone has been the most popular “camera” on Flickr for the past seven years. Twitter Cards support? Have no fear. Nothing will be cut off, cropped or flat out not displayed. Flickr VP, Brett Wayn says: Our view on that is simple, the creator who is creating content has clear sharing intent, that’s their decision. We want to make the photo look as good as it can to take advantage of all platforms. Flickr, the way it should be on mobile The one thing that’s quite obvious with Flickr’s iOS overhaul, as well as the web updates that were pushed today, the company is going for consistency, everywhere. When users are on a mobile device, they should have a comfortable and familiar experience similar to what they’ve experienced on the web, and vice versa. To date, Flickr has simply not cashed in on that promise, but today’s update certainly pushes Yahoo in that direction. It was quite clear with Mail’s upgrade yesterday that this is an important mission for Yahoo! The new navigation on desktop, complete with focus on Groups and broken out Upload link: Have a look at the before and after of Flickr for iOS (last year’s on the left): Let’s be completely honest here, the app you see on the left, the one from last year, is a piece
 
Expect Labs Taps Nuance's Voice Recognition Tech In A Bid For Better Conversation Analysis Top
logo-expectlabs-stackedSan Francisco-based Expect Labs has been keeping awfully quiet since it announced that it raised $2.4 million in funding from Google Ventures and Greylock Partners back in October, but that silent streak ends today. The team has just shed a little more light on how its vaunted Anticipatory Computing Engine will work -- Expect Labs has tapped Nuance and its impressive voice recognition technology to help them in their mission to analyze your conversations and surface relevant information in real-time.
 
Koozoo Raises $2.5M Seed Round Led By NEA And Tugboat To Cover The World With 24-Hour Mobile Video Top
koozooSan Francisco-based Koozoo today announced a seed funding round of $2.5 million, led by New Enterprise Associates and Tugboat Ventures. The round also includes Salesforce co-founder Dave Moellenhoff and TMG Partners CEO Michael Covarrubias, and will be used to help Koozoo hire engineers to build out its vision of a world where crowdsourced, 24-hour mobile video provides a window on the world to anyone who wants to watch.
 
The Android Ecosystem Is Two-Faced: YotaPhone Has LCD On One Side, Electronic Paper Display On The Other Top
YotaPhoneFragmentation in the Android ecosystem can be a nightmare for developers -- but despite all the variations between devices and operating system versions, it can remain a struggle for handset makers to produce smartphones that look distinctive from the rest of the pack. Now an enterprising Russian hardware maker is hoping its newest creation will be original and appealing enough to make some headway in the market. Yota Devices, a part of the same company that owns Russian LTE carrier Yota Mobile, has launched YotaPhone, a new Android handset that combines a full-colour touchscreen on one side, with an e-reader-style black-and-white electronic paper display on the other.
 
Costanoa Venture Capital: A $100M Fund For Startups That Develop Cloud Services For Business And Consumer Markets Top
logo-costanoaSutter Hill Ventures Greg Sands has launched a $100 million fund to invest in early stage, cloud services for businesses and consumers that leverage data and analytics. 
 
Pope Takes First Cautious Step On Twitter — Sends 'Hello World' Tweet (From An iPad) Top
Screen Shot 2012-12-12 at 11.37.46The Pope has sent his first ever tweet, after joining the social network earlier this month. The tweet references the connectedness offered by social media -- noting that he is "pleased to get in touch" and thanking his (Twitter) followers for their "generous response" -- presumably to his arrival (as @Pontifex) on the social network.
 
UK Startup Loccit Sells 8k Facebook 'Memory Books' In 48 Hours, Wants To Turn Your Digital Media Footprint Into Physical Stuff Top
Logo loccitThere's a cottage industry of startups that want to sell your social networking content back to you in a new form. Loccit, a UK-based ecommerce startup is the latest example. And its latest product -- launched last Friday -- is a personalised diary populated with photos and updates from Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn. The startup says it sold 8,000 of these diaries in the first 48 hours of sale.
 
Samwer's Rocket Internet Picks Up Its First Luxury Goods Investor: PPR Puts $13M Into Lamoda And Dafiti's Holding Company Top
lamoda.ruAnother new chapter is opening up for Rocket Internet, the incubator started and run by the Samwer Brothers in Germany. The company is today announcing that PPR, luxury and sport & lifestyle group, is taking a €10 million investment in Bigfoot I, the Rocket holding company that controls Russian fashion commerce site Lamoda, South American fashion site Dafiti and also has a stake in Namshi, the Samwer's fashion effort in the Middle East. It's the first strategic investment made in a Rocket e-commerce startup by a fashion operation.
 
With A Focus On Growth, GlassesDirect Owner Prescription Eyewear Raises $19.3M, Uses The Bulk To Buy Contact Lens Specialist LensOn Top
lenson refresh your eyes!Some "focus" and consolidation afoot in the world of online eyewear sales. Prescription Eyewear, the parent company of GlassesDirect.com, high-end myOptique.com and SunglassesShop.com, has acquired LensOn.com, a Northern European leader in selling contact lenses online.
 
Food Discovery App Burpple Savors $500K In Seed Funding Top
Burpple LogoBurpple, a mobile app that seeks to connect food lovers around the world, today announced that it has received $500,000 in seed funding from Neoteny Labs and QuestVC. The Singapore-based company was also named one of the top 10 startups in Asia at Open Web Asia 2012, held in Haikou, China.
 
ZenDeals Launches With $1M+ From Eric Schmidt, Facebook & Zynga Execs To Bring Transparency To Digital Coupons Top
Screen shot 2012-12-11 at 6.12.57 PMEveryone loves a coupon, especially around the holidays. As one would expect, over the last few years, the growth of eCommerce and the growing penetration of mobile devices has led to staggering growth in digital couponing. A study conducted by eMarketer last year, for example, found that over 88 million people in the U.S. used or claimed online coupons in 2011.
 
You've Got 30,000 Days To Live… Reverse Engineer Your Life To Make Them Count Top
Sir Ray AveryNew Zealand's Sir Ray Avery has a simple method for getting the most out of his life. The 65-year old Kiwi scientist and inventor accomplishes what he does by keeping tabs on the days he has left to live, and by setting and tracking daily goals to best take advantage of them.
 
With Nearly 7M Reviews Of 100K Sites, Trustpilot Raises $13M From Index And More To Build Out A Yelp For The World Of E-Commerce Top
trustpilot logoTrustpilot, the online customer reviews service with nearly 7 million reviews on its platform covering 100,000 merchants to date -- and a partner in Google's Adwords business -- is today announcing another €10 million ($13 million) in funding. The investment is led by new investor Index Ventures, with participation also from existing backers SEED Capital Denmark and Northzone, the Scandinavian VC that is also an investor in Spotify.
 
Moxie Software Taps The Facebook Social Graph To Connect Brands With Customers When The Time Is Right Top
social-chatmoxieMoxie Software has announced the ability for customers to tap into the Facebook social graph to determine the best time to engage with people on a brand's Facebook page. Moxie is a knowledge engine that defines profiles and business rules. It is a crowdsourcing platform that the company refers to as "social knowledge" that it markets to customers for better engagement on brand web sites and now Facebook.
 
Another $50M Richer, 23andMe Drops Its Price To $99 Permanently. But Will The Average Dude Buy In? Top
disease-diabetes-04Genetics service 23andMe announced some new cash in the bank today with a $50 million raise from Yuri Milner, 23andMe CEO Anne Wojcicki, Google's Sergey Brin (who also happens to be Wojcicki's husband), New Enterprise Associates, MPM Capital, and Google Ventures. With today's new funding also comes the reduction of the price of its genome analysis service to 99 smackers. This isn't special holiday pricing (as 23andMe has run repeatedly in the past) the company tells me, but rather what its normal pricing will be from now on.
 
Founders Fund Partner Bruce Gibney Has Left The Firm Top
Founders Fund Bruce GibneyBruce Gibney, the Founders Fund partner who criss-crossed the country raising its fourth fund of $625 million, has left the firm, multiple industry sources confirm. Details of why he departed are unavailable at this time, but we understand he'll be going to work at a holding company or a portfolio company. Gibney championed the Founders Fund philosophy that startups should change the world, not just build a business.
 

CREATE MORE ALERTS:

Auctions - Find out when new auctions are posted

Horoscopes - Receive your daily horoscope

Music - Get the newest Album Releases, Playlists and more

News - Only the news you want, delivered!

Stocks - Stay connected to the market with price quotes and more

Weather - Get today's weather conditions




You received this email because you subscribed to Yahoo! Alerts. Use this link to unsubscribe from this alert. To change your communications preferences for other Yahoo! business lines, please visit your Marketing Preferences. To learn more about Yahoo!'s use of personal information, including the use of web beacons in HTML-based email, please read our Privacy Policy. Yahoo! is located at 701 First Avenue, Sunnyvale, CA 94089.
Posted by at

No comments:

Post a Comment

Subscribe to: Post Comments (Atom)