After a 17-hour marathon through nearly 200 startup pitches, the Equity team was fired up to get back on Twitter and chat through some early trends and favorites from the first day of Y Combinator’s demo party. We’ll be back on the air tomorrow, so make sure you’re following the show on Twitter so you…
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Sanas aims to convert one accent to another in real time for smoother customer service calls
In the customer service industry, your accent dictates many aspects of your job. It shouldn’t be the case that there’s a “better” or “worse” accent, but in today’s global economy (though who knows about tomorrow’s) it’s valuable to sound American or British. While many undergo accent neutralization training, Sanas is a startup with another approach…
Read MoreOlsam raises $165M to buy up and scale consumer and B2B Amazon Marketplace sellers
On the heels of Heroes announcing a $200 million raise earlier today, to double down on buying and scaling third-party Amazon Marketplace sellers, another startup out of London aiming to do the same is announcing some significant funding of its own. Olsam, a roll-up play that is buying up both consumer and B2B merchants selling…
Read MoreOur favorite startups from YC’s Summer 21 Demo Day, Part 1
Y Combinator kicked off its fourth-ever virtual Demo Day today, revealing the first half of its nearly 400-company batch. The presentation, YC’s biggest yet, offers a snapshot into where innovation is heading, from not-so-simple seaweed to a Clearco for creators. The TechCrunch team stuck to its tradition of covering every single company live (but, you…
Read MoreTribe and Arkam back Jar app to help millions in India start their savings journey
Even as hundreds of millions of people in India have a bank account, only a tiny fraction of this population invests in any financial instrument. Fewer than 30 million people invest in mutual funds or stocks, for instance. In recent years, a handful of startups have made it easier for users — especially the millennials…
Read MoreHere are all the companies from Y Combinator’s Summer 2021 Demo Day, Part 1
Today Y Combinator kicked off the Demo Day cycle for its Summer 2021 cohort. The collection of early-stage startups on day one-of-two alone numbered in the hundreds, meaning that we had to assemble a team here at TechCrunch just to cover it all. But before we get into notes on each company that presented, a…
Read MoreDaily Crunch: Databricks reaches $38B billion valuation with $1.6B Series H
To get a roundup of TechCrunch’s biggest and most important stories delivered to your inbox every day at 3 p.m. PDT, subscribe here. Hello and welcome to Daily Crunch for August 31, 2021. Today the TechCrunch machine was busy covering the first day of Y Combinator’s Demo Day event, so expect to see all sorts…
Read MoreYandex buys out Uber’s stake in Yandex Self-Driving Group, Eats, Lavka and Delivery for $1B
Russian internet and ride-hail giant Yandex has acquired Uber’s stake in its Self-Driving Group (SDG), as well as Uber’s indirect interest in Yandex.Eats, Yandex.Lavka and Yandex.Delivery. The total cost of the deal came to $1 billion, giving the Russian company 100% ownership over all four businesses. Yandex SDG is an autonomous technology spinout from MLU…
Read MoreCryptoPunks creator inks representation deal with major Hollywood talent agency
One of Hollywood’s biggest talent agencies is getting into the NFT game. Larva Labs, the creator of CryptoPunks, just signed with United Talent Agency (UTA) in a representation deal that will bring one of the earliest and most iconic NFT projects into the entertainment and branding worlds. “I would say that it is one of…
Read MoreLinkedIn is scrapping its Stories feature to work on short-form video
What do LinkedIn and Twitter have in common? They both introduced ephemeral story features that were pretty fleeting. LinkedIn announced today that it will suspend its Stories feature on September 30 and begin working on a different way to add short-form videos to the platform. LinkedIn announced the upcoming change to warn advertisers who might…
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