Startups

On a September morning in 2024, two Jonathan Cohens — one from the Rockaways in Queens, the other from London — stood in an empty 15,000-square-foot parking garage near Hudson Yards in New York City. As they walked over chipped yellow lines, they explained how the space would help Joco, their shared e-bike startup for

Many startups and large tech companies are building AI agents or programs that can handle multi-step tasks without user supervision. Once available, these agents will need to collaborate with each other to complete complex jobs, such as booking and paying for flights, hotels, and excursions. /dev/agents, a new company started by former Google executives who

At this year’s TechCrunch Disrupt in San Francisco,  President and CEO of the Aerospace Corporation Steve Isakowitz and Agency Chief Technologist at NASA A.C. Charanya Charania took the stage to discuss a literal moonshot: how to build a thriving lunar ecosystem. Today on Equity, we’re taking you behind the scenes of TechCrunch Disrupt once again,

Beyond patriotism, there’s another huge reason to join a defense startup: it pays really, really well. Thanks to The Federal Funding Accountability and Transparency Act (FFATA), we can see the total compensation that defense tech startup Anduril, valued at $14 billion valuation, pays its top employees. The act requires the company to report the top

The rapidly growing social networking startup Bluesky, a Twitter/X alternative built on open web principles, revealed in a livestream on Monday how its approach to user account verification will differ from existing services, like Meta and X. While traditional social media has shifted to a pay-for-verification model, where users pay for the privilege of the

Volta, a new startup with a team split between two headquarters in Milan and Paris, has secured a €6 million pre-seed round ($6.3 million) to develop a new vertical software-as-a-service platform focused on B2B sales. In more practical terms, the Volta team pitches its product as an equivalent to Shopify but focused on B2B transactions.

Anthropic has raised an additional $4 billion from Amazon, and has agreed to train its flagship generative AI models primarily on Amazon Web Services (AWS), Amazon’s cloud computing division. The OpenAI rival also said it’s working with Annapurna Labs, AWS’ chipmaking division, to develop future generations of Trainium accelerators, AWS’ custom-built chips for training AI

The AI race is taking a detour as developers consider a new path to super-intelligent systems: test-time compute. Not sure what that means? Don’t worry, the Equity pod team breaks it down.  Today, on TechCrunch’s Equity podcast, hosts Kirsten Korosec, Devin Coldewey and Margaux MacColl dig into the week’s tech and startup news, including what

Welcome to Startups Weekly — your weekly recap of everything you can’t miss from the world of startups. If you’d like to receive this newsletter in your inbox every Friday, sign up here! The week before Thanksgiving is typically busy with announcements of all sorts, but this week has been particularly interesting. Money was flowing to big problems, like defense, cybersecurity, and

Beleaguered Swedish battery manufacturer Northvolt announced on Thursday that it was filing for bankruptcy in the U.S., striking a blow to Europe’s ambitions for homegrown lithium-ion batteries. The company reportedly chose Chapter 11 in an effort to right its finances. In the wake of the filing, co-founder and CEO Peter Carlsson resigned, though he’ll remain on

Teleo describes itself as a construction robotics startup, but its mission is bigger than automating heavy equipment like excavators and tractors. Today, Teleo’s retrofitted machinery allows its customers to operate their existing fleets semi-autonomously. In the future, the startup sees the data it collects as a key enabler for the robotics industry to reach its

Zepto has secured $350 million in new funding, its third round of financing in six months, as the Indian quick-commerce startup strengthens its position against its competitors ahead of a planned IPO next year. Indian family offices, wealthy individuals, and asset manager Motilal Oswal invested in the round, which maintains Zepto’s $5 billion valuation. Motilal

We have yet another sign of the boom in the travel industry: a major fundraise by one of the B2B startups serving the space. Lighthouse, a data analytics platform for hotels and others in the hospitality industry, has closed a Series C round of $370 million. The KKR-led round catapults Lighthouse to a valuation of

Arzooo, an Indian startup that sought to bring “the best of e-commerce” to physical stores, has sold its assets in a distressed sale to Moksha Group. The deal comes after Arzooo engaged with several startups, including Bengaluru-headquartered Udaan, exploring potential merger opportunities, according to people familiar with the matter. Arzooo provided a digital bridge to

Not every former top FTX executive is heading to prison. Gary Wang, former FTX chief technical officer, was spared prison time by U.S. District Judge Lewis Kaplan today. Judge Kaplan praised Wang’s cooperation with federal authorities. Wang testified against former FTX founder and CEO Sam Bankman-Fried at his trial last fall. Wang pleaded guilty to

When Brandon Contino and co-founder Dan Chi were developing Four Growers’ produce-harvesting robots, they practically lived in a greenhouse for an entire year. They coded at a small desk tucked in the back corner and discovered that fertilizer bags can be comfortable beds. “We actually started just running everything off a laptop, and I would

Formal is a security startup coming out of stealth on Tuesday with a nice list of investors and an interesting product positioning. The company has designed a reverse-proxy for data stores and APIs so that security teams can more easily secure access to sensitive data. In more practical terms, Formal is a proxy that you

Italian energy giant Enel is placing a bet on small modular nuclear reactors through a partnership with Ansaldo, another Italian energy company, and Leonardo, a defense contractor. The new company is expected to be announced in the coming days. Enel already has a deal with small modular reactor startup Newcleo to develop so-called fourth-generation nuclear

Nuro is rolling out test fleet of its its driverless, passenger-less R3 vehicles across the Bay Area and Houston, two months after the the autonomous vehicle technology startup changed its business strategy to license its AV tech to automakers and mobility providers. The large-scale demo, which will expand the domain where Nuro currently tests, is designed to

As college tuition increases and the student loan debt crisis continues, three former executives from language learning app Duolingo are building a new startup aimed at making college education more affordable and accessible. The company, tentatively named Outsmart Education (the name is not final yet), is headed by co-founders Daniel Falabella (CPO), former senior director

Google is committing $20 million in cash and $2 million in cloud credits to a new funding initiative designed to help scientists and researchers unearth the next great scientific breakthroughs using artificial intelligence (AI). The announcement, made by Google DeepMind co-founder and CEO Demis Hassabis during a fireside chat at the closed-door AI for Science

The wide availability of tools to build generative AI has led to a Cambrian explosion of startups in the space. Plentiful capital hasn’t hurt, either — nor has the declining cost of the requisite technical infrastructure. In fact, one of the flashiest applications of generative AI, generative video, risks becoming oversaturated. Labs such as Genmo,

Significant changes are coming to ABL Space Systems. The leader of the 7-year-old startup took to social media last night to make a big announcement: The company will no longer be focusing on the commercial launch market but will be turning instead to missile defense.  ABL had been developing a small launch vehicle called RS1

Last summer, a twin-propeller plane touched down on the gray-cratered terrain of Nuuk, the capital of Greenland. A 28-year-old deboarded, ready to march into the Nordic parliament building with a bold proposition: “I went to Greenland to try to buy it,” Praxis founder Dryden Brown wrote in a viral tweet later.  On the phone with

As the influencer economy grows, startups like Passionfroot, Agentio, and One Impression, along with social platforms like Instagram, YouTube, and TikTok are trying to build marketplaces to connect brands with creators. Miami-based startup Influur is banking on two unique aspects of its platform: quick response from creators and financial tools to ensure they are paid

Global travel continues to gain ground, with the World Travel and Tourism Council predicting the industry will cross $11 trillion in revenues this year. Consumers are evolving from the so-called “revenge travel” of the post-COVID-19 years, dedicating a growing share of their budget to a wider array of experiences away from home. Add AI to

Pony AI is inching closer to its initial public offering in the U.S., but as it does so, it continues to drop its minimum target for what it hopes to raise in the transaction.   Pony operates a fleet of 190 “robotrucks” in Beijing and Guangzhou and more than 250 robotaxis in Beijing, Guangzhou, Shenzhen, and

To stay competitive, some companies are scrambling to adopt AI, but they are sometimes unsure of the best way to integrate AI into their business. Illiya Valchanvov, co-founder and CEO of Team-GPT, thinks he has an answer to their worries.  In 2023, Valchanvov and Ilko Kacharvo, Yavor Belakov, Katya Vaptsarova, and Maria Valchanova launched Team-GPT

Starfish Space has closed a new tranche of funding led by a major defense tech investor as it looks to launch three full-size satellite servicing and inspection spacecraft in 2026.  The Washington-based startup’s Otter spacecraft is designed for two primary missions: extending the operational life of expensive satellites in geostationary orbit (GEO) and disposing of

Carl Madi spent a chunk of the last decade working for Uber and Handy, an online marketplace for cleaners. “I spent a lot of time convincing drivers, handyman and cleaners, to join the gig economy,” he told TechCrunch. But when the pandemic struck, he saw many people lose their jobs overnight. He noticed that there