Amazon will allow U.S. Prime members to send gifts using only an email or phone number

In preparation for the holiday shopping season, Amazon today convenient a new way to send gifts through its mobile app. Instead of entering in the recipient’s mailing address — a piece of information people often don’t know in today’s age of digital communications — Prime members can now send a gift to a friend via their […]

Al Gore puts $600M into UK Green energy-tech startup Octopus Energy Group

Former Vice President Al Gore has invested $600 million of equity into UK energy startup Octopus Energy Group via his Generation Investment Management vehicle, taking a stake of approximately 13% in the business. The investment means Octopus has attained a valuation of around $4.6 billion. Octopus has made a name for itself in energy circles […]

PSPDFkit raises $116M, its first outside money; now nearly 1B people use apps powered by its collaboration, signing and markup tools

An under-the-radar, bootstrapped startup from Vienna, Austria — a hit with developers for technology that underpins user experience for some of the world’s most popular apps — is doubling down on momentum and announcing its first outside investment, in the form of a large growth round of funding. PSPDFkit — which provides APIs and an […]

TikTok’s new ad products invite users to interact with taps, swipes, likes and more

TikTok this week presented its new plan to ramp up advertiser investment in its video platform with the expansion of e-commerce, a new promise of “brand safety” and the launch of several new and interactive ad formats, ranging from clickable stickers to “Choose Your Own Adventure”-type ads to “super likes” and more. The additions, the […]

Sinch acquires Pathwire, the company behind Mailgun and Mailjet, for $1.9B to add email into its API-based communications platform

Sinch, the Swedish company that competes with Twilio and others in the world of messaging and other communication APIs is making another big M&A play to build out its platform. It has signed a definitive deal to acquire Pathwire, the cloud-based email provider behind Mailgun, Mailjet and Email on Acid. Sinch said it would pay […]

TikTok Shopping expands with more partnerships, LIVE Shopping, new ads and more

TikTok is expanding its investment in e-commerce. Earlier this year, the video platform began piloting TikTok Shopping in the U.S., U.K., and Canada, in partnership with Shopify. The deal allowed Shopify merchants with a TikTok For Business account to add a Shopping tab to their TikTok profiles and sync their product catalogs to the app […]

Google Search update will provide more context about websites, including descriptions and what others say

Google is making a change to its search results with the goal of improving the media literacy of online users. The company is expanding the capabilities of its “About this Result” feature, launched earlier this year, to also now include information about the source itself, including its description from Wikipedia and what the site says […]