Knock. Knock. “Who’s there?” CrunchWeek! OK, fine…it wasn’t funny. Welcome to another episode of CrunchWeek, TechCrunch’s weekly roundup show where we talk the biggest things in tech. This week we’re chatting about Theranos’ impending battle with the FDA, Square going for the IPO, Twitter laying off some staff and Ballmer becomes a fan (but not of… Read More
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Alibaba’s proposed $3.5 billion buy out of Youku Tudou, a deal that would take the New York Stock Exchange-listed Chinese video site private if accepted, is mainly about advertising with e-commerce sprinkled in, company executives explained today. Read More
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European car rental comparison startup — or self-styled metasearch engine — Happycar has raised a new $1.58 million round of funding. Notable backers include Global Founders Capital, the venture arm of German startup factory and e-commerce behometh Rocket Internet. Unusually, however, GFC isn’t leading the round. Read More
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Open source giant Red Hat is making another acquisition to build out its enterprise IT portfolio: today the company announced that it would buy Ansible, an IT automation solutions specialist that helps companies build and manage hybrid IT deployments across the cloud and on-premise solutions. The acquisition had been rumored to be in the works for a price of over $100 million. Officially,… Read More
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Klook, a Hong Kong-based company that sells travel activities across Asia, has announced a $5 million Series A round led by US-Sino investment fund Matrix Partners. China Growth Capital and Francis Leung, chairman of CVC Capital, also took part. Read More
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Alibaba, the New York-listed Chinese e-commerce giant, is getting into video in a major way, after it announced plans to buy out Youku Tudou, one of China’s top YouTube-like services, in an all cash deal. It previously invested $1.22 billion in the content firm, which claims to serve 580 million users each month. Read More
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Emergent VR, a startup that promises full video capture for virtual reality headsets like the Gear VR, has raised $2.2 million from Accel Partners, Rothenberg Ventures and Google Ventures. Emergent VR’s play is that it can build a simpler experience for users who want to capture video that can be viewed through VR devices. The three Emergent VR demos Wilkins showed me indicated that… Read More
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Kinnek, a New York-based marketplace for small businesses to find suppliers and manage purchasing, has just raised $20 million in Series B funding led by Thrive Capital.
It already looks like a smart bet.
The company currently has 20,000 businesses and 2,000 suppliers using its marketplace, and they’re striking millions of dollars worth of deals every week, says cofounder Karthik… Read More
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Wife and husband duo Victoria Ransom and Alain Chuard hit the jackpot on social. With every brand trying to figure out a Faceboook marketing strategy in 2008, the two built a startup called Wildfire that did it for them. Wildfire helped companies develop a presence, share content, run contests, and buy ads on social networks including Twitter and Pinterest. Google looking to barge into the… Read More
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It’s not easy being a solo entrepreneur. And if you’re a wedding photographer, wedding planner, interior designer, artisan pickle-maker, freelance web designer or developer, chances are you spend a significant amount of time simply managing the mundane tasks it takes to keep the business going. Think creating quotes for customers, keeping your books in order, and managing… Read More
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