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Zin Boats reinvents the electric speedboat in a bid to become the Tesla of the sea
Square says it is testing a short-term loan feature, giving between $20 and $200, repayable over a month, with around 1,000 users
TikTok found to have tracked Android users’ MAC addresses until late last year
Google launches new tools to make developing Android apps on Chrome OS easier, including a new ChromeOS.dev resource website and a native Android Emulator
Court dismisses Genius lawsuit over lyrics-scraping by Google
LinkedIn says it has sold presentation-sharing service SlideShare to Scribd, which will take over its operation on September 24
Arevo, a 3D printing tech startup led by Sonny Vu, founder of wearable startup Misfit, raises $25M Series B co-led by Defy Partners and GGV Capital
Pattern, a Utah-based reseller that offers brands a way to optimize their sales on marketplaces like Amazon, has raised $52M from Ainge Advisory and KSV Global
Twitter says it is now letting anyone limit who can reply to their tweets to just those that follow the author or just the accounts that are tagged in the tweet
OpenCV AI Kit aims to do for computer vision what Raspberry Pi did for hobbyist hardware
Amazon says that 1M+ Prime subscribers in India shopped from SMBs in the 14 days leading up to Prime Day
Techmeme · 2 days ago
Reddit CEO defends allowing Trump ads ahead of presidential election
Skillshare, a subscription marketplace for online courses, raises $66M led by OMERS Growth Equity and says it has 12M registered members
Mux, an API-based video streaming and analytics service, raises $37M Series C led by a16z, following its $20M Series B in 2019
Google has partnered with India's state of Maharashtra to offer its education offerings to 23M students and teachers for free
Trump signs orders banning US business with TikTok and WeChat parent Tencent
PandaDoc, which provides a fully digital sales document workflow, raises a $30M Series B extension, bringing the total raised in the round to $50M
Google discontinues the Pixel 4, nine months after release
Telemedicine provider Teladoc Health signs a $18.5B deal to buy Livongo, maker of connected devices for managing diabetes and other chronic conditions
YouTube says it took down 2,596 accounts from China in Q2 for engaging in "coordinated influence operations" on political issues, up from 277 accounts in Q1
Internet connected device search engine Censys raises $15.5M Series A led by GV and Decibel
Indian online learning giant Byju's acquires 18-month-old edtech startup WhiteHat Jr. for $300M in cash, making it India's fastest exit story at this size
Anthony Levandowski, ex-Uber self-driving head, was sentenced to 18 months in prison as Levandowski files a new lawsuit against Waymo and Uber
Facebook updates its Messenger Chat Plugin, enabling businesses to chat with customers via the business' website, even if not logged into Facebook
Levandowski sentenced to 18 months prison as new $4B lawsuit against Uber filed
Disney says Disney+ has grown to 60.5M subscribers, up from 54M in May, says it has 100M+ paid subs for streaming services including Disney+, Hulu, and ESPN+
UK government commits to "redesigning" its visa streaming application algorithm, after it was accused of racism and faced a legal challenge in court
Qualified, which helps website owners create lead-generating chatbots that engage visitors, raises $12M Series A led by Norwest Venture Partners
Trump says he is fine with the idea of Microsoft buying TikTok in US, but the US government should be paid a "substantial amount of money" as part of the deal
Snap says it's working on a feature that will let users set their Snaps to music, similar to TikTok's app, coming to English-language markets this fall
Google announces partnerships with six more banks to offer digital checking and savings accounts to Google Pay users in the US, starting next year
Social video app Triller sues TikTok and Bytedance, claims they infringe on patent covering a way "for creating music videos synchronized with an audio track"
Berlin-based Everphone, which sells a "mobile as a service" device rental package to businesses, raises ~$40M Series B led by Signals Venture Capital
ByteDance and Microsoft offer deal to allow TikTok to remain in the U.S., per report
Facebook confirms it will begin rolling out official music videos across its platform in the US, and introduce a new Music destination within Facebook Watch
Amazon says police demands for customer data have gone up
Reddit · 2 weeks ago
Rakuten confirms it is shutting its US online retail store, originally known as Buy.com, over the next two months; Rakuten bought Buy.com for $250M in 2010
Study: U.S. adults who mostly rely on social media for news are less informed, exposed to more conspiracies
Instrumental, which uses vision-powered AI to detect manufacturing anomalies, raises $20M Series B led by Canaan Partners
Connecticut-based Sema4, which uses aggregate patient data to help doctors improve care, raises $121M from BlackRock and others, valuing the company at $1.1B
Toppr, an e-learning service in India covering 17 subjects and preparing students for five dozen competitive exams, raises $46M led by Foundation Holdings
Profile of Imint, a Swedish company that makes deep learning software for phone manufacturers like Huawei, Vivo, and Oppo to stabilize videos in real time
Gaming platform Roblox says it has 150M+ MAUs, up from 115M in February, and its developer community is on pace to earn $250M+ in 2020, up from $110M in 2019
Indonesia-based online travel service Traveloka raises $250M to weather the pandemic, bringing its total raised to ~$1.2B
True Link Financial, a startup offering financial services tailored for elderly and disabled consumers, raises $35M Series B led by Khosla Ventures
Walmart Marketplace says it added 3,000 sellers in June, up from 2,290 in April; Walmart announced a partnership with Shopify to onboard SMB sellers in mid-June
Techmeme · 2 weeks ago
Garmin says a ransomware attack occurred on July 23 but there's "no indication" customer data was stolen, expects to return to normal operation in a few days
Alexa app gets revamped, adding more personalization options and replacing 3rd-party skill suggestions on the main screen with frequently used actions
Techmeme · 2 weeks ago