How’s this for a bit of regional synchronicity? This week, a pair of Chinese robotics firms secured $200 million rounds. It’s all part of a booming ecosystem that we get some insight into every so often. There are so many players in China’s robotics space it can be hard to keep track of some of […]
California Governor signs bill aimed at unsafe warehouse quotas
California Governor Gavin Newsom this week signed a bill aimed at protecting warehouse workers from unsafe quotas. The bill, which cites issues around bathroom breaks, rest periods and other safety laws, has been seen as a repudiation of longstanding complaints against workplace conditions at Amazon fulfillment centers. Introduced by Assembly Member Lorena Gonzalez in February, […]
Peloton’s CEO John Foley on the changing face of connected fitness
No one roots for a pandemic, but for companies like Peloton, the timing couldn’t have been better. People on the fence about buying a treadmill or stationary bike went for it as their options shrunk.
AeroFarms is supplying the hops for Goose Island’s latest IPA
The world of vertical farming has seen a massive uptick in interest over the past decade, as the world grapples with concerns over resource use, farmable area and exploding population growth. While promising, there are still plenty of question marks surrounding the technology, including the diversity of crops one can grow indoors at scale. Newark, […]
Mirror CEO exits company, following 2020 acquisition by Lululemon
Brynn Putnam has stepped down as CEO of Mirror. The news arrives via a leaked memo to staff also viewed by TechCrunch that notes her exit from the top spot at the connected fitness startup she founded back in 2016. Putnam will continue on as an advisor through next July. This comes a little over […]
EyeGage is building a database of eye scans for drug testing
LaVonda Brown developed an interest in eye-tracking during her time at Georgia Tech. The fascination with all the information that can be derived by scanning the so-called “windows to the soul” formed the foundation of EyeGage, one of the 20 companies competing at this year’s Disrupt Startup Battlefield. The startup’s entry into the TechCrunch competition […]
Verdi aims to give farmers granular control over crop irrigation
Verdi, which launched today at TechCrunch’s Startup Battlefield, refers to its smart valve clusters as “swarms.” The term denotes the kind of high-density implementation the company is looking to roll out in farms across North America. Retrofitted with existing irrigation technology, the aim of its system is to give farmers more control over the irrigation […]
Facebook adds a battery-powered smart screen to the Portal line
The Portal line has always been a kind of odd duck in the world of smart screens. Facebook’s most significant contribution to the category is almost certainly Smart Camera, which uses AI to track a subject and pan and zoom accordingly to keep them in frame. It was the first big line to bring the […]
Amazon’s Kindle Paperwhite returns with a bigger screen, USB-C and wireless charging
We’ve entered the throes of hardware season, with big events from all of the industry’s big names. Amazon has already announced a number of new Fire TVs, with plans for a big (likely Echo-focused) event a week from today. In the meantime, the retail giant just dropped a sizable surprise on our heads in the […]
WarnerMedia’s Andy Forssell will discuss HBO Max at Disrupt 2021
In May 2020, WarnerMedia launched HBO Max into a crowded streaming landscape. In spite of early struggles, the timing couldn’t have been better. When the world was stuck at home, struggling to find new sources of entertainment amid a global pandemic, HBO’s latest attempt at an app-based platform rose in the ranks alongside fellow newly […]