Why you probably won’t invest in the next unicorn

Value creation in enterprise tech is often driven by a cohort of exits, while value creation in consumer tech is generally driven by large, individual exits — a phenomenon I recently dug into. What the data revealed is that there is of late a trend of larger consumer exits, such as Facebook, Twitter and WhatsApp. If this trend continues, that’s very good news for… Read More

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Meet the five startups vying for Best App at the 10th Annual Crunchies Awards

 2016 sucked, if we’re being honest with ourselves. But the year wasn’t a total waste. The world of tech offered up a few shining stars in 2016, and in the era of apps, five stand-outs were nominated as finalists for The Best App of 2016 award. As the show grows nigh, we thought it might be helpful to let you get to know some of these startups. So without any further ado, here are… Read More

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Uru finds the best places to introduce ads in online videos

 New York City-based startup Uru is working on a new way for video publishers to make money. Imagine watching a normal-looking online video — except that on some of the surfaces (say, on the cabinet behind the stars of a cooking video), you’ll see logos or other art promoting a sponsor. Okay, that might actually sound a bit annoying, but Uru co-founder and CEO Bill Marino argued… Read More

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Fam lets you do group videochats directly within iMessage

 In my opinion, one of FaceTime’s major flaws is the lack of group video chat. Sure, apps like Skype, ooVoo and now Messenger let you do group video chats, but it’s just not as seamless as FaceTime. And while Houseparty has also recently entered the group video chat race, they are focused more on providing a shared space for all of your friends to pop in and out of a video chat.… Read More

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These are the 5 videos vying for Best Startup Video at the 10th Annual Crunchies

 The 10th Annual Crunchies Awards show is right around the corner, and this year’s event will be bigger and better than ever. As a part of that, we’re including a brand new category: Best Startup Video! You might have the coolest technology, service, or gadget in the world, but without a fun video to show it off, does it really count? Pics or it didn’t happen, amirite? That… Read More

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How viral open-source startups can build themselves into enterprise-IT powerhouses

 Hordes of new enterprise-IT upstarts have popped up in Silicon Valley, with some drawing lofty valuations from investors. They’re driven by new, more-advanced technologies in areas such as databases, software development, networking and cloud computing. And many are taking aim at incumbents like Dell, EMC, Oracle and IBM. But will these new companies ever be as valuable as those big names? Read More

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Four reasons you shouldn’t launch your crowdfunding campaign at CES

 It’s the Super Bowl for nerds — a place where the future is unveiled alongside a pile of the most useless crap humans can dream up. And if the legions we talk to in our work are to be believed, the event is a wonderful time to launch a crowdfunding campaign. Their line of reasoning scares the living shit out of us. Read More

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Oculus acquires eye-tracking startup The Eye Tribe

 The direction you look could one day control your VR or mobile experience thanks to Facebook and Oculus’ latest buy, The Eye Tribe. Oculus confirms to me that this is an official acquisition.The startup has developed a $99 eye tracking device developer kits for computers, and software that can bring gaze-based interfaces to smartphones and potentially virtual reality headsets. Basic… Read More

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Byte Foods raises $5.5 million for smart vending machines that serve local fare

 Apple juniper kombucha or a BBQ chopped salad may soon replace the can of soda and bag of chips in a vending machine at your office. A San Rafael-based startup called Byte Foods has raised $5.5 million in seed funding to popularize its smart vending machines and delivery service stocking them with nutritious food and drinks from local vendors. If the idea of the internet-connected vending… Read More

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How startups outside the Bay Area can fundraise in a big way

 Raising venture capital is tough for any startup. But it can be a little more difficult when you’re located outside of Silicon Valley. More difficult, but definitely not impossible. Read More

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Italian incubator H-Farm prepares for a new crop with a campus slated to open in 2018

 There’s a farm outside of Venice, Italy, that cultivates tech talent the way other farms grow crops. Read More

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Oculus engineer Dov Katz arrested in sting after allegedly soliciting sex from a 15-year-old girl

 Seattle Police arrested Oculus’ Head of Computer Vision Dov Katz on December 23rd in a sting operation in which a police officer posed as a 15-year-old girl. Katz allegedly arrived at an Embassy Suites in Tukwila, Washington with $600 after agreeing in texts messages to pay $300 for sex without a condom. Katz told police he was there to rescue the girl. GeekWire has screenshots from… Read More

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Now Snapchat has “Filter Games”

 Snapchat wants you to play with your face, not just take pictures of it. New Selfie Lens filter games are starting to appear to users, creating an addicting new Snapchat feature that also inspires competition between friends and could become a powerful ad revenue driver. Snapchat confirms this is the launch of a new, native games feature. Back in March, Snapchat tested a limited run of a… Read More

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Glu Mobile acquires QuizUp in deal valued at $7.5 million

 The developers of popular celeb-themed games including Kim Kardashian: Hollywood and Nicki Minaj: The Empire, Glu Mobile, acquired Plain Vanilla Corp., and its mobile social trivia game QuizUp this week, according to an SEC filing. The deal was valued at $7.5 million, including forgiven debt, according to sources familiar with the deal. This is undoubtedly a disappointing fate for the… Read More

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Automile raises $7.5 million for fleet vehicle management software

 Automile, a fleet logistics and management startup, has closed a $7.5 million Series A round led by SaaStr with participation from Salesforce Ventures, Atomico Ventures, Dawn Capital and Point Nine Capital. Automile provides customers with a box to install in under the vehicle’s dashboard to track mileage, trips and provide route tracking. Automile ships its tracking device to… Read More

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The Dodo is alive and well with 1 billion monthly video views

 Looks like people really do like animal videos. The team at The Dodo (an online publisher focused on those aforementioned animals) told me their videos were viewed 1 billion times in November. That’s an increase of more than a tenfold from January, when Dodo videos received a mere 80 million views. The Dodo follows a “distributed” media strategy, which means that the majority… Read More

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In 2017, Airbnb needs to grow into your full-fledged travel bookings hub

 Airbnb can find you a well-appointed place to crash during your next big trip, but it’d really prefer to hang out every step of the way. To that end, in 2017, we can expect Airbnb to expand its horizons considerably, moving well beyond the vacation rentals that it’s remained synonymous with since launching in 2008. As the company confirmed last month, its plans to expand… Read More

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This bed with built-in subwoofer, TV, lamp and power outlets may be your last purchase, ever

 Furlenco’s new “Pod” might just be the most outrageous product hitting the market this holiday season. The Bangalore, India based furniture rental startup has always had a penchant for targeting the millennial subset, but this is something else entirely — because as any 20-something knows, adding a bed to things makes them universally more practical. The Pod includes… Read More

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Pana’s travel companion app goes free, can automatically check you into flights

 Pana, a travel companion that organizes your plans and sends personalized trip alerts, is now making its app free to challenge rivals like TripIt, Google Trips and others. First launched two years ago, Pana had previously focused on its paid subscription service for individuals and companies needing a 24/7 travel concierge – a move that may have limited its potential market. The… Read More

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A $250 million office space is vying to be the future home for New York’s startup culture

 Three years might as well be 50 in startup land. It’s hard to say precisely where New York City’s tech community will be by the time 2020 rolls around, but living in the Big Apple certainly doesn’t look to be getting any easier for recent grads looking to make a name for itself. As Fast Company notes in a new profile on the upcoming 14th @ Irving workspace, the whole… Read More

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Xplenty raises another $4 million to help you integrate all your data

 The internet has changed a lot over the last two decades, but many companies are still using legacy technologies to extract, transform and load their data into warehouses. One new entrant, Xplenty, is hoping that its fresh approach, prioritizing cloud services, will provide a solid foothold in the massive market for data integration tools. Having grown to serve over 100 customers, Xplenty… Read More

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BitTorrent Live’s “cable-killer” P2P video app finally hits iOS

 Cable companies rule TV because they control the expensive wires and satellites to deliver low-latency live content at scale. Cable companies can then dictate how much per monthly paying subscriber they offer the channel owners for access because there are few alternatives for live distribution, and can charge consumer exorbitant prices because they’re sometimes the only game in town.… Read More

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Semantic Machines hopes to best Google in the conversational AI game

 I believe it was Sartre who wisely said hell is conversational AI. Despite the best intentions of engineers, today’s machine learning really is the savior and handicap of personal assistants. Berkeley based startup, Semantic Machines, might suffer the same Achilles’ heel, but its team of 18 artificial intelligence PhDs thinks it can get farther than the current state of the… Read More

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Everyone got into the tech M&A game in 2016

 Neither public markets nor tech giants offered any solace in 2016 for the ever-growing list of private unicorns. There are 180 tech companies circling the runway with valuations over $1 billion, the most in history. While interest in an all-expenses paid trip to the NYSE valuation guillotine was at an all-time low, non-traditional Fortune 500 companies did pluck a lucky few from the skies at… Read More

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GM taps 500 Startups to find early-stage investments in upcoming classes

 GM has made a number of big acquisitions and investments in the past few years. It picked up self-driving company Cruise earlier this year and dropped $500 million into Lyft, Uber’s biggest competitor. For the most part, GM acknowledges that it needs to figure out how to tap into new aspects of the automotive experience, CTO Jon Lauckner said. But all these companies start somewhere. And… Read More

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Backtrace, a debugging startup led by former AppNexus engineers, raises $5M

Debugging startup Backtrace I/O was launched to solve a real problem that its founders faced when they were engineers at ad-tech company AppNexus — at least according to Backtrace CEO and co-founder Abel Mathew. Mathew told me Backtrace aims to “solve the process of debugging,” something that most companies tackle by “cobbling together very old, outdated solutions”… Read More

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