News: Baffle lands $20M Series B to simplify data-centric encryption

• August 16, 2021
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California-based Baffle, a startup that aims to prevent data breaches by keeping data encrypted from production through processing, has raised $20 million in Series B funding. Baffle was founded in 2015 to help thwart the increasing threats to enterprise assets in public and private clouds. Unlike many solutions that only encrypt data in-transit and at-rest, Baffle’s

California-based Baffle, a startup that aims to prevent data breaches by keeping data encrypted from production through processing, has raised $20 million in Series B funding.

Baffle was founded in 2015 to help thwart the increasing threats to enterprise assets in public and private clouds. Unlike many solutions that only encrypt data in-transit and at-rest, Baffle’s solution keeps data encrypted while it’s being processed by databases and applications through a “security mesh” that de-identifies sensitive data that it claims offers no performance impact to customers.

The startup says its goal is to make data breaches “irrelevant” by efficiently encrypting data wherever it may be, so that even if there is a security breach, the data will be unavailable and unusable by hackers.

“Most encryption is misapplied, and quite frankly, doesn’t do anything to protect your data,” the startup claims. “The protection measures that are most commonly used do nothing to protect you against modern hacks and breaches.”

Baffle supports all major cloud platforms, including AWS, Google Cloud and Microsoft Azure, and it’s currently used to protect more than 100 billion records in financial services, healthcare, retail, industrial IoT, and government, according to the startup. The company claims it stores records belonging to the top 5 global financial services companies and five of the top 25 global companies.

“Securing IT infrastructure—networks, devices, databases, lakes and warehouses—is never complete. Constant change makes it impossible to adopt a zero trust security posture without protecting the data itself,” said Ameesh Divatia, co-founder and CEO of Baffle.

The startup’s Series B funding round, which comes more than three years after it secured closed $6M in Series A financing, was led by new investor Celesta Capital with contributions from National Grid Partners, Lytical Ventures and Nepenthe Capital, and brings the startup’s total funding to date to $36.5 million.

Baffle, which says it has seen threefold revenue growth over the past year, tells TechCrunch that the funds will be used to help it grow to meet market demand and to invest further in product development. It also plans to double its headcount from 25 to 50 employees over the next 12 months.

“With this investment, we can meet market demand for data-centric cloud data protection that enables responsible digital information sharing and breaks the cycle of continuous data and privacy breaches,” Divatia added.

Read more:

• Opaque raises $9.5M seed to secure sensitive data in the cloud
• Google will let enterprises store their Google Workspace encryption keys
• AWS has acquired encrypted messaging service Wickr

News: BrainQ raises $40M to transform stroke patient rehabilitation with its home therapy device

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If you injure your elbow, surgery can help. If you lose a leg, prostheses are available. But problems within the brain are more difficult to treat, and for stroke victims rehabilitation is largely left to the body’s own repair mechanisms. BrainQ aims to change that with a device that stimulates the damaged part of the

If you injure your elbow, surgery can help. If you lose a leg, prostheses are available. But problems within the brain are more difficult to treat, and for stroke victims rehabilitation is largely left to the body’s own repair mechanisms. BrainQ aims to change that with a device that stimulates the damaged part of the brain and promotes self-repair, showing enough improvement in studies to warrant a Breakthrough Device certification from the FDA — and the company has just raised $40M to take it to market.

It should be said at the outset that doubting the efficacy of some brainwave-emitting miracle device is natural. And in fact when I spoke with BrainQ’s founder Yotam Drechsler, he reminded me of the last time we’d talked — back in 2017, at which time I “expressed strong skepticism.”

No hard feelings — the tech was largely notional then, he admitted — but since that time the team has continued its work, raised some money, and what was a promising if not well supported thesis then has turned into one backed by firsthand data and clinical outcomes. The resulting system could be the biggest improvement to stroke therapy in decades or more.

Strokes can result in various obvious impairments, such as grip strength or coordination, but of course the injury is not to the hand or leg itself, it is to the networks in the brain that govern those parts. But medical science has no method for directly rebuilding those networks — the brain must do so on its own, in its own time.

To aid this, regular physical therapy and brain health checkups, sometimes for years on end, are used to in essence make sure the brain is still working on it and that the parts of the body don’t themselves fall into disrepair.

The most interesting improvements to this process in recent years have added tech into the loop to provide immediate feedback, such as that one’s balance is skewed to one side, and providing stimuli that aim to counteract that. But ultimately it’s still targeted physical therapy.

Drechsler and BrainQ see the problem a little differently. It’s not simply an injury but a disturbance to the brain’s carefully cultivated homeostasis, one which it has no means to counteract. He compared a stroke not to an analogous injury but to a baby born prematurely and whose body is not up to the task of heating itself. What do you do in such a case? You don’t attempt to “fix” the body so it can operate at lower temperatures, or supercharge the heat output — you just put the kid in an incubator, and everything proceeds as it should.

BrainQ’s device does something similar, making the brain operate better by changing its local environment.

“We map the channels of healthy brains and non-healthy brains and compare them. Once we find these, we use a low-intensity magnetic field therapy to resonate in the brain and facilitate its endogenous recovery mechanisms,” explained Drechsler.

It’s been shown in other contexts that this type of stimulation can produce improved neuroplasticity — the capability of the central nervous system to reprogram itself. By narrowly targeting stroke-affected areas, BrainQ’s device promotes neuroplasticity in them, leading to expedited recovery.

But it’s not simply a matter of saying “the stroke affected the ventral half of the right occipital lobe, aim the magnets there.” The brain is a complicated system, and strokes affect networks, not just a given cubic centimeter. BrainQ has deployed machine learning and a large collection of data to better understand how to target those networks.

Without diving too deeply into how the brain operates, let it suffice to say that certain networks operate locally at very specific spectral signatures or frequencies as detected by EEG readings. The left hand and left foot may occupy the same region of the motor cortex, but the hand might operate at 22 Hz, while the foot operates at 24 Hz, for example.

“The question is, how do you find these signatures?” asked Drechsler. As it’s somewhat difficult to explain, I asked him to put it in his own words after we spoke:

The novelty of BrainQ’s investigational treatment lies in the data-driven method we have deployed in order to inform the ELF-EMF frequency parameters. In choosing these parameters, our aim is to select frequencies that characterize motor-related neural networks in the CNS, and are related to the disability a person experiences following a stroke or other neurological trauma. To achieve this, we have analyzed a large-scale amount of healthy and non-healthy individuals’ brainwaves (electrophysiology data). Our technology uses explanatory machine learning algorithms to observe the natural spectral characteristics and derive unique therapeutic insights. These are used by BrainQ’s technology to target the recovery of impaired networks.

The device they’ve created to administer the treatment is unusual. Because it’s a whole-brain magnetic field generator, it has a rather bulky cylindrical headpiece , but the rest of it fits into a sort of back brace and hip pack. That’s because, unlike the more common magnetic brain imaging tech, MRI, the fields and currents involved are extremely small.

Image Credits: BrainQ

“We use very, very low intensity, about the same level as normal brain activity,” said Drechsler. “It’s not about creating an action potential or a jump in activity, it’s about creating the right conditions for the recovery mechanisms.”

The results of this stimulation were borne out in a small (25 patients) but decisive study due to be reviewed and published soon (preprint abstract here). Patients given the BrainQ treatment in addition to normal therapy saw hugely improved recovery evaluations, which look at metrics like improvements to balance and strength. 92 percent saw major improvements over just therapy and 80 percent achieved what could be called recovery (though this term is inexact).

Generally speaking the therapy would last for about an hour at a time, during which the patient would do various physical exercises while wearing the device, and they would need to be repeated five days a week for two months or so. The headset feeds the patient’s own patterns into BrainQ’s cloud-based service, which does the crunching and matching necessary to produce a tailored treatment pattern. It’s all run via tablet app, which can be operated by a caregiver (such as an outpatient nurse) or by using a built-in telemedicine platform.

Drechsler said that this approach was poorly received early on, and not just by this reporter.

“In 2017, we started to set the ground for a cloud-connected therapeutic device that can treat the patient wherever she or he is,” he said. “Back then no one was willing to even talk about treating patients outside the controlled environment of the hospital. Then in 2020 COVID came and everything changed.”

He noted that during the pandemic, many of those recovering from a stroke who would normally visit the hospital for regular care were (and some remain) unable to do so. A home-based therapy with low risk and potentially great outcomes would be of enormous benefit for thousands and thousands of people currently recovering from a stroke. And importantly, he notes, it doesn’t shift resources away from existing treatment plans, just improves their outcomes. (“We don’t move anybody’s cheese.”)

Here is where you would normally read something along the lines of “but it maybe five years before the FDA approves it for insurance and use.” But BrainQ recently received Breakthrough Device certification, an expedited approval process that, since just the beginning of this year, also confers qualification for coverage under Medicare. This means that conceivably, BrainQ could be shipping devices very soon — though still a year or two out.

Its next step, very prudently, is a larger scale study, towards which the company intends to devote a large portion of its recent fundraise, $40M led by Hanaco Ventures, with Dexcel Pharma and Peregrine Ventures participating.”

“The reason why we raised all this money is we are on the verge of a unique study with 12 sites,” Drechsler said. While he could not yet name the hospitals or research organizations they partnered with, he said they were basically the cream of the stroke rehabilitation crop and “really we couldn’t aspire for better than getting all these top sites in the same study. There’s this excitement that maybe something new is coming — in stroke recovery there has been almost no progress in the last two or three decades, and physical therapy has been the standard for two hundred years.”

Without making any promises, he suggested that this line of inquiry could move medicine towards not just mitigating but reversing some disabilities, a feat the value of which can hardly be enumerated.

“I was looking over my pitch decks from 2016,” Drechsler mused. “Early on as a CEO, you have big dreams. We heard a lot of skepticism early on in the process, but I was proud to see that many of those dreams have materialized.”

News: The Station: micromobility in North America, Joby Aviation makes its debut and a sidewalk bot invasion

• August 16, 2021
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Hello readers: Welcome to The Station, your central hub for all past, present and future means of moving people and packages from Point A to Point B. Two housekeeping slash teasers … Stay tuned this week for a series of articles on Nuro reported by investigative science and tech reporter Mark Harris with assistance from

Hello readers: Welcome to The Station, your central hub for all past, present and future means of moving people and packages from Point A to Point B.

Two housekeeping slash teasers …

Stay tuned this week for a series of articles on Nuro reported by investigative science and tech reporter Mark Harris with assistance from myself and our copy editorial team. This deep dive into Nuro is part of Extra Crunch’s flagship editorial offerings.

This so-called EC-1 series is designed to provide authoritative, deep analysis into a growth-stage company that not only offers a panoramic view of a specific business, but also teaches lessons learned from the veterans of these organizations, whether they be founders, sales leaders, product managers, software engineers, marketers or anyone else who contributed to the growth of a startup.

The goal, as EC-1 series editor Danny Crichton has written before, is to help TechCrunch readers understand the intricacies of building a company from as many angles as possible, while also getting situational intelligence on the best tech companies scaling up in the market today. The EC-1 takes its name from the Form S-1 filing that late-stage startups submit to the SEC as part of the IPO process.

Finally, I wasn’t able to attend Monterey Car Week this year (that’s me sighing deeply). Luckily, Tamara Warren was. Look out for her roundup of vehicles that stood out at this year’s event.

As always, you can email me at kirsten.korosec@techcrunch.com to share thoughts, criticisms, offer up opinions or tips. You can also send a direct message to me at Twitter — @kirstenkorosec.

Micromobbin’

The North American Rideshare and Scooter Association released its 2020 State of the Industry report, so I thought I’d share some of the findings that jumped out at me. Seeing as how 2020 will forever be known as the year of Covid, the report also quantifies the impact of the pandemic on shared micromobility and demonstrates the industry’s response.

An overview

In 2020, around 224 cities in the U.S., Canada and Mexico had at least one bikeshare or e-scooter system and 72 had both. This is 22% fewer than in 2019. All 129 e-scooter systems are dockless and electric, while the 167 city bikeshare systems have a mix of docked, dockless, and hybrid systems.

Other stats:

• 44% of cities with bikeshare systems have fleets that include e-bikes.
• Larger cities tend to have more vehicles per system and more per capita.
• Vehicle densities and utilization rates were higher in larger cities.

Stickin’ it to the car

• 36% of shared micromobility trips replace a car trip
• North Americans gained almost 12.2 million hours of additional physical activity through shared micromobility, by creating new trips and replacing motorized trips.
• Shared micromobility trips offset approximately 29 million pounds of CO2 emissions by replacing auto trips.

Money, money, moneyyyy

A recent study conducted by Emory University found that e-scooter programs increased unplanned spending at quick service restaurants and food and beverage stores. The study found:
• $921 per scooter of additional spending during the 6-month study period, and a 0.6% increase in total sales
• Scooter systems employ about 5,000 people. That’s 1 person for every 30 scooters.

Operators top program costs were: Rebalancing and recharging; Vehicle maintenance and repair; Overhead costs (e.g. insurance, fees, etc.). Their revenues came mostly from: Sponsorships (28%); Per ride fees (26%); Fixed fees (18%); Subsidies (10%)

Representation skews towards $$$

Rider representation improved in 2020, however it still skews towards white men and women in higher economic brackets. People with HHI of $50,000 and up were over-represented. The most over-represented group made between $50,000 and $75,000.

People aged 25 to 44 were massively overrepresented, as were white people and men. Black, Latinos and women to be underrepresented but again, apparently it was worse in 2019.

On the workforce end of things, it looks like there’s at least some conversations about diversity happening.
• 71% of operators stated that diversity is part of every hiring conversation.
• 69% reported that women and people of color are represented at all levels of their organization.
• 57% reported that staff is representative of the populations being served.
• 55% reported that their staff have completed cultural competency or diversity training

Becoming a part of the public transit ecosystem

• 50% of riders reported that they use shared micromobility to connect to transit.
• 16% of all shared micromobility trips were for the purpose of connecting to transit.
• 71% of all docked bikeshare stations are within one block of another public transportation mode.

Back to our scheduled programming

Indian ridehailing service Ola invested a ton of money last year into an e-scooter factory, and now those labors are coming to fruition. Ola is set to launch its electric scooter on August 15th. It comes with some fancy features like reverse mode, 10 new colors (many of which are pastels) and smarter charging that is fully automated to charge without the need for card or cash.

While we’re in India, the moped-sharing giant Bounce also has some news. The company said it has begun replacing its fleet of 30,000 petrol scooters with electric scooters. It’s partnering with startup Chara, which makes ‘switched-reluctance motors,’ so that it can make its own scooters in-house.

Finally, micromobility company Skip filed a petition for Chapter 7 bankruptcy last week, so it’s time to sell off its assets and pay its debts. Skip’s creditors are scheduled to meet on September 8 to go through the $10 to $50 million worth of liabilities and $50 to $100 million worth of assets. Helbiz, which is going public via SPAC this year, acquired Skip late last year as part of its own global expansion strategy. This is the first time (but maybe not the last) that we see a major scooter company file for bankruptcy.

— Rebecca Bellan

Deal of the week

The public filings they just keep on comin’ in 2021. The latest is Turo, the peer-to-peer car-sharing company.

The company initiated the confidential process of filing for an initial public offering with the U.S. Securities Exchange Commission. That means we don’t have that data dump that the S-1 provides. We will have to wait.

The number of shares to be offered in the IPO and the price range have not yet been determined, the company said in a statement.

Turo is 11 years old now; it’s not really a startup any more. Its marketplace, which lets car owners post an ad to rent out their vehicle on its app and website, is available in more than 5,500 cities across three countries. Turo was in Germany after taking over Daimler AG’s car-sharing subsidiary Croove alongside an investment deal. Notably, we learned that the company is no longer in Germany.

Turo’s last big funding round was in July 2019 when investors put $250 million into the company. That Series E round pushed the company into unicorn status and “past the billion-dollar valuation mark.” CEO Andre Haddad said in a blog post. Turo followed that up with a $30 million extension round the following February, bringing its total funding to date to over $500 million.

Speaking of publicly traded companies …. Joby Aviation made its public debut, 12 years after JoeBen Bevirt founded the company at his ranch in the Santa Cruz mountains. The air taxi developer began trading on the New York Stock Exchange on Wednesday under the ticker symbol “JOBY,” after completing a merger with special purpose acquisition company Reinvent Technology Partners. Aria Alamalhodaei interviewed Bevirt and Joby Executive Chairman Paul Sciarra about this moment and what’s coming next.

Other deals that got my attention this week …

Ambri, a battery tech startup based in Marlborough, Massachusetts, raised $144 million in funding led by strategic investors Reliance New Energy Solar, a wholly owned subsidiary of Reliance Industries Limited, Paulson & Co. Inc. Ambri’s largest shareholder, Bill Gates as well as new investors, Fortistar, Goehring & Rozencwajg Associates, Japan Energy Fund and others participated. The company said the money will be used to commercialize its technology and to build a domestic manufacturing facility.

Anchor Yacht Rentals, a Tampa, Florida startup that developed a platform to connect private yacht owners and licensed captains to riders, raised $2.5 million in seed financing led by Austin-based Silverton Partners. The company, founded in 2016, raised the capital to extend its presence across major U.S. and international travel markets.

ChargePoint made its second acquisition since going public in March, purchasing European electric fleet management company ViriCiti for €75 million ($88 million) in cash. The news comes just a few weeks after the EV charging network operator announced the purchase of European charging software company has·to·be.

Gopuff, the U.S. delivery app, acquired London-based on-demand grocery startup Dija, Sifted reported. The terms were not disclosed. Gopuff has made a couple of acquisitions over the past several months, including $115 million for fleet management startup rideOs and UK-based Fancy Delivery.

HopSkipRide raised $25 million in a Series C to help fund its growth and expand into 30 new markets over the next year and a half. The funding came from Energy Impact Partners, Keyframe Capital, FirstMark Capital and 1776 Ventures.

Jerry, the car ownership app, raised $75 million in a Series C round that values the company at $450 million. Te funding announcement comes just months after raising $28 million. Existing backer Goodwater Capital doubled down on its investment in Jerry, leading the “oversubscribed” round. Bow Capital, Kamerra, Highland Capital Partners and Park West Asset Management also participated in the financing, which brings Jerry’s total raised to $132 million since its 2017 inception.

Policy corner

Welcome back to policy corner.

I’m going to start this week’s column off with a little wet blanket reminder. The obvious news is that the $1.2 trillion infrastructure bill — the one that’s been in negotiations for months — passed. But, let’s not forget that it has passed the Senate and more work is required in the House before it can make it to President Joe Biden’s desk.

That’s not to take away from the historic passage, which was, as the New York Times notes, “uncommonly bipartisan.” But House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and progressive Democrats have said that they will not take up the bill unless and until both parts of Congress complete a budget reconciliation process that could earmark up to $3.5 trillion on a slew of domestic programs aimed at expanding the federal safety net, that would be funded in part by tax hikes on high-earners and corporations.

And the budget proposal? It has zero support from Republicans, suggesting a long and arduous road ahead for both the infrastructure bill and the national budget.

“What we’re doing here isn’t easy,” Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) said Wednesday. “We’ve labored for months and months to reach this point, and we have no illusions: maybe the hardest work is yet to come, but we are united in our desire to get it done.”

While the infrastructure bill did pass the Senate, it is very much a compromise, especially on the provisions related to transportation electrification. That’s why some House Democrats are eyeing the budget proposal as an alternative way to slip in some provisions that didn’t make it into the infrastructure bill. Rep. Debbie Dingell (D-Mich.), along with 27 other Democrats, sent a letter to Pelosi urging that the budget proposal include $85 billion for building out a national EV charging network. (The infrastructure bill earmarks $7.5 billion for EV charging.)

In other news, it looks like President Biden is contemplating setting a 2050 target for airlines to switch 100% to sustainable aviation fuel (SAF), hand-in-hand with possible incentives to help the industry make the transition. Commercial aviation is a notoriously difficult sector to decarbonize because, with today’s battery technology and energy density limits, the amount of batteries needed to get a Boeing 737 off the ground and across the Atlantic would far exceed the weight limits of the aircraft.

That leaves zero-emissions jet fuels. Some current aircraft models can accept a 50/50 blend of SAF and conventional fuel, but new aircrafts will need to be developed that can accept 100% SAF. Given that fuel is one of the highest costs for airlines, industry will likely lobby for substantial government support before endorsing a zero-emission mandate, even one that is non-binding.

— Aria Alamalhodaei

Notable news and other tidbits

Welp, earnings dominated this week, but there was other news too. Let’s dive in.

Autonomous vehicles

Einride and Bridgestone partnered partnership that should be viewed as a data collaboration. Einride will collect new layers of safety and efficiency-related data from Bridgestone’s smart-sensing tires. Meanwhile, Bridgestone will use that data from Einride’s testing and operations to integrate its advanced mobility technologies into Einride’s onboard vehicle platforms.

Kiwibot, the robotic sidewalk delivery startup, partnered with food services and facilities management giant Sodexo to bring its robots to U.S. college campuses. Starting this month, students and faculty at New Mexico State University, Loyola Marymount University and Gonzaga University are expected to have the option to order meals via robots from Sodexo-serviced locations on campuses.

Motional, the autonomous vehicle company born out of a $4 billion joint venture with Aptiv and Hyundai, said it is expanding its presence in California by opening a new operations facility in Los Angeles to support testing on public roads, hiring more engineers and adding an office in Silicon Valley.

The investment into the area follows a hiring spree that has pushed Motional’s total headcount to more than 1,000 people, an expansion into Seoul and its announcement last December to launch fully driverless robotaxi services in major U.S. cities in 2023 using the Lyft ride-hailing network.

Starship Technologies, an autonomous delivery services company that, like Kiwibot, uses sidewalk robots, announced it will begin delivery service on four additional college campuses this fall, adding to the 20 campuses on which it already operates.

Earnings time!

Arrival, the UK-based electric vehicle company, still has no revenue yet to speak of and its earnings report reflects the expenses associated with bringing a new vehicle to market. Arrival reported an EBITDA loss of €29 million ($34 million). Its adjusted EBITDA loss was €35 million ($41 million) which widened from the first quarter’s loss of €27 million ($31 million).

Capex came to €65 million ($76 million), primarily due to the costs of staff working on product development and other costs related to factory equipment. The company anticipates spending between €175 million to €225 million ($205 million to $264 million) on capex in the remainder of the year, an increase caused by expenses from the Bicester, U.K. microfactory and planned openings of other factories in South Carolina and one-off tooling costs.

Notably, the company said it was on track to meet planned product launch dates, but much will depend on whether or not the company can fulfill orders and turn letters of intent into sales — especially a crucial van order with UPS, which could bring in upwards of $1 billion in revenue.

Hyzon Motors, the hydrogen-powered heavy-duty truck company, is another pre-revenue company that went public via a SPAC. The company reported a net loss for the second quarter of $9.4 million, including $3.5 million in R&D expenses. It had a negative adjusted EBITDA of $9.1 million. The company has $517 million in cash on hand, enough to reach free cash flow by 2024 without having to sell additional equity.

The company, which is banking on the $500 million injection of capital from the transaction and growing customer orders to take it to positive cash flow, said it is preparing to start its first customer trials in the United States.

Lordstown Motors reported a net loss of $108 million, a 13.7% improvement from the first quarter loss of $125 million. Its net losses are more than tenfold higher than the -$7.9 million it reported in the same period last year.

The company cut research and development spending by 17% from the previous quarter to $76.5 million and increased its capital expenditures to $121 million from $53 million in the first quarter. Lordstown also increased its capital expenditure guidance for the year, from $250 million to $275 million to a $375 million to $400 million range, a spike related to its need to prepay for equipment.

Executives at the beleaguered EV startup said they’re on track to begin production of its flagship electric truck Endurance, but only select customers will begin to receive vehicles early next year.

Luminar, the lidar company, reported $6.3 million in revenue, a 19% increase compared to the prior quarter. The company reported a net loss of $36.8 million up from the $25.4 million in same period last year.  The newly public company did raise its full-year 2021 revenue guidance to $30 million to $33 million versus prior guidance of $25 to $30 million. a quick scan of their second-quarter earnings shows a company trying to grow — as its expanding operating losses illustrate.

Vroom, the online car marketplace, reported a net loss of $65.8 million, which included $22.6 million in one-time, IPO-related costs, Automotive News reported. Vroom went public in June 2020. Vroom did report higher revenue and vehicles sales.

Electric vehicles

Elon Musk publicly complained via tweet that Renesas and Bosch, two of the world’s biggest auto-chip suppliers, are hurting the Tesla’s production, Bloomberg reported.

Polestar released pricing and other details on two new versions of its Polestar 2 electric vehicle, Car and Driver reported. A single-motor version will start at $47,200, and a dual-motor version will have a base price of $51,200, which is cheaper than  last year’s Launch Edition model. (I’m looking forward to trying these new variants out.)

Flight

Amazon’s $1.5 billion air cargo hub in Northern Kentucky opened this past week, marking the latest effort by the e-commerce giant to connect a network of 40 sites and control all aspects of delivery as demand for speed and convenience accelerates.

The Amazon Air Hub operations, located at the Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport, will be the center of its U.S. cargo network. Amazon said the U.S. hub will eventually operate a dozen flights per day and process millions of packages every week.

Archer Aviation is seeking $1 billion in damages from Wisk Aero, according to court filings, escalating the ongoing legal battle between the two air taxi rivals.

Wisk “deployed a knowingly false extra-judicial smear campaign that projected stand-alone defamatory statements about Archer to the world,” the filing says. On this basis, Archer claims that this “smear campaign” has negatively impacted its ability to access capital and has impaired business relationships, resulting in damages “likely to exceed $1 billion.”

Misc. mobility

BlackBerry has partnered with Car IQ to bring a secure vehicle-based payment platform to the BlackBerry/AWS IVY ecosystem. The system helps create a “digital fingerprint” for the vehicle, according to the company and will connect to a bank’s payment network, validate, and pay for services such as fuel, tolls, parking, maintenance, along with other “wallet” capabilities.

Michigan’s Office of Future Mobility and Electrification and the Michigan Department of Transportation have partnered to provide grants to companies focused on mobility and electrification that are looking to deploy their technology in the state.

Grants are focused on “sustainable futures” aka electric vehicle adoption and charging infrastructure, “equitable futures,” which means affordable and reliable transportation options, and multimodal transportation. Check out the process here.

News: Indian bike taxi service Rapido raises $52 million

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Rapido, a bike taxi aggregator in India, said on Monday it has raised $52 million in a new financing round as the six-year-old startup looks to find space in a category dominated by Ola and Uber in the South Asian market. The six-year-old startup’s new funding — Series C — was financed by Shell Ventures,

Rapido, a bike taxi aggregator in India, said on Monday it has raised $52 million in a new financing round as the six-year-old startup looks to find space in a category dominated by Ola and Uber in the South Asian market.

The six-year-old startup’s new funding — Series C — was financed by Shell Ventures, Yamaha, Kunal Shah of CRED, Amarjit Singh Batra of Spotify India, and Positive Moves Consulting. Existing investors Pawan Munjal of Hero Group, Westbridge, Nexus Venture Partners and Everblue Management also participated in the round, which brings its to-date raise to over $130 million.

Rapido offers its two-wheeler service in about 100 Indian cities. The startup says it has amassed over 15 million customers and 1.5 million driver-partners who it calls captains. In recent years, the startup has also expanded in three-wheeler space, which it says recorded a growth of 4X since last year in 26 cities where it is operational, and hyperlocal delivery.

In a statement, the startup said its platform, which was hit by the coronavirus pandemic that prompted India to enforce lockdown in several states, has already seen an 85% recovery. The startup attributed growth in part to the growing e-commerce and hyperlocal delivery opportunities in India.

“Even though our product and business model are lucrative and have the potential to churn out an exceptional revenue, this fundraising indicates more of the investors’ confidence in us than the need for capital,” said Aravind Sanka, co-founder of Rapido, in a statement.

He said the startup hopes to expand to serve 50 million customers in the next 18 months. The startup plans to also deploy capital to broaden its technology stack — it’s looking to make strategic investments — and hire more people

The growth of Rapido follows a shift in India’s mobility market, where Uber and Ola flooded more than a million cabs in the past decade. In urban cities, two-wheelers and three-wheelers have proven more effective because they can zip through much faster in traffic and are more affordable.

Both Ola and Uber have also expanded to two-wheeler and three-wheeler categories in recent years, inking partnerships with firms such as Vogo and Yulu. Ola has additionally expanded into manufacturing of electric vehicles. On Sunday, it launched its first electric scooter, called Ola S1, that is priced at 99,999 Indian rupees, or $1,350. The electric scooter offers a range of 121 kilometers (75 miles) on a complete charge.

News: My big jump: Sukhinder Singh Cassidy’s CEO journey

• August 15, 2021
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No choice we make will be perfect, and all the frameworks in the world won’t eliminate risk entirely. But we don’t need perfection or freedom from risk. We just need to take the next step.

After listening to others pitch me a few different job opportunities while still at Google in 2008, it became clear to me that I would make a better decision if I could fully explore the larger landscape of new companies emerging in Silicon Valley.

I had spent the last several years focusing on Google’s business outside the U.S., and I honestly felt out of touch with the startup world. Beyond my goal of becoming a CEO of my own company, I had two other ambitions: I wanted to help build a great consumer service that would delight people (potentially in e-commerce) and I wanted to build further wealth for myself and my family.

To better evaluate my options, I made the decision to quit Google first and find a way to study the wider ecosystem of companies before choosing where to go. Resolved to give myself a “blank slate” before making a final choice, I left Google when I was three months pregnant and joined Accel Partners, a top Silicon Valley venture capital firm and an investor in my previous startup, in a temporary role as CEO-in-residence.

In the months that followed, I helped Accel evaluate investment opportunities across a wide variety of digital sectors, with a particular focus on e-commerce, taking the opportunity to study those companies I might join or think of starting from scratch.

On Thursday, August 19 at 2 p.m. PDT/5 p.m. EDT/9 p.m. UTC

Managing Editor Danny Crichton will interview Sukhinder Singh Cassidy, author of “Choose Possibility,” on Twitter Spaces.

One of Accel’s key partners, Theresia Gouw, helped me brainstorm, joining my cadre of professional priests. We had known one another for over a decade (I originally met her as a young founder at Yodlee) and were at similar stages of our careers, so I knew she could identify personally with my career quandaries. Like me, Theresia was pregnant with her next child and at a similar life stage — yet another commonality.

Image Credits: Sukhinder Singh Cassidy

While at Accel, I spent a disproportionate amount of time testing my macro thesis that online shopping was about to explode in new ways. I had seen the rise of e-tailers at Google (many of these companies, such as eBay and Amazon, were Google’s largest advertisers at the time), but many of the leading e-commerce sites like Amazon and Zappos still had a utilitarian feel to them.

Meanwhile, new fashion and décor e-commerce sites such as Rent the Runway, Gilt, Houzz, Wayfair and One Kings Lane were popping up everywhere and growing rapidly. These sites sought to tap into a more aspirational and entertainment-oriented kind of shopping experience and move it online.

Expert investors like Accel and others were funding them, and my own observations suggested that this area would yield another big wave of online consumer growth. These lifestyle categories of shopping also appealed to me personally; I was the target customer for many of them.

I started to work on an idea for a new e-commerce service, a luxury version of eBay, while listening to the pitches of every e-commerce company that was looking for funding and talking to several that needed early-stage CEOs. I continued to listen to non-e-commerce pitches as well, simply to give myself a point of reference for evaluating online shopping opportunities.

At Yodlee and Google, I had been lucky enough to work with incredibly smart and talented people who shared my values, and I wanted to do the same at my next venture.

I wanted to work with great investors, too, and fortunately I had the ability either to work with Accel-funded companies, start my own or leverage other investor relationships I’d developed. I spent time with multiple company founders to try to discern who they were as leaders, in addition to what they were working on.

By this point in my career, I had a pretty clear idea of my own superpowers and values, so I looked to find companies that could make the most of my unique gifts and whose founders or senior leaders had strengths complementary to mine.

Specifically, I hoped to join a company with a very strong engineering and product management culture that needed a CEO with strategy, vision, business development, fundraising and team-building expertise. Applying these criteria, I turned down several opportunities at companies whose founders had skill sets too similar to mine, reasoning that this overlap might lead to conflict if I ever became CEO.

Finally, I used my time at Accel to think long and hard about the risks I would take in becoming a startup CEO and whether I could afford to fail. My biggest risk by far was ego- and reputation-related. Mindful of how precarious early-stage startups are, I feared that I would leave a successful role as a global executive only to suffer a very large and visible failure. But the more I thought about this, I faced this ego risk head-on and concluded that my reputation as an executive from Google would hopefully be strong enough to survive one failure if it came to that.

The personal risks of taking on a startup CEO role felt different but not greater than those associated with my job at Google. While I knew that serving as a first-time CEO while having another newborn at home (my son Kieran) would be immensely stressful, I would likely benefit from no longer traveling around the world for days and weeks on end and working across multiple time zones, as I had previously.

Last, I evaluated the financial risks of potential moves. Although my startup equity would have uncertain value for a long time, I judged this a risk worth taking, given how excited I’d feel to have more impact and responsibility as CEO. While I lost a large financial package in choosing to leave Google and switching to a startup salary, I could pay the bills at home while digging into my savings only slightly. Under these conditions, I was prepared to make the leap.

In early 2010, almost a year after I left Google, I finally found the right opportunity and decided to join fashion technology startup Polyvore as its full-time CEO. A precursor to Pinterest, Polyvore was based on the idea that women could “clip” online images to create fashion and décor idea boards digitally that were instantly “shoppable.”

Millions of young women (including influencers) were already using the service and loved it. The founding team was led by a rock star engineer, Pasha Sadri, along with three other product and technology folks he recruited from the likes of Yahoo and Google.

Pasha was known for his intelligence, and we had connected informally over the years for coffee, each time having great discussions about business strategy. In fact, Polyvore twice before had tried to recruit me to become its CEO, once when I was at Google and again when I departed that company in 2008. Back then, I’d spent a productive afternoon with the founding team, helping them think through their business model. I also knew Peter Fenton, one of Silicon Valley’s most successful investors and a leading funder of the company. Peter was the one who first introduced me to Polyvore and who continued afterward to passively court me.

Having spent so much time exploring my options from multiple angles, I was now poised to make a great decision. I felt convinced that e-commerce was starting its next wave of growth, and felt excited to be part of it.

Within that vision, Polyvore was among the companies best positioned to succeed, and I knew I could contribute in significant ways to building a service that would delight millions. I was impressed with the strengths of Polyvore’s founder and investors and anticipated that I would be able to complement their efforts nicely. Recognizing that my success as a startup CEO hinged on my relationships with the founder and board, I had also invested time to get to know them.

Meanwhile, I had faced my fear demons, taking financial risk but negotiating my offer aggressively to account for downside scenarios I imagined, and coming to grips with my ego risk. With all this work in place, I finally jumped.

After managing a multibillion-dollar profit and loss and leading a 2,000-person team at Google, I became the newly minted CEO of a 10-person fashion startup in February 2010.

As we tee up the bigger choices in our careers, we all face critical moments of decision. No choice we make will be perfect, and all the frameworks in the world won’t eliminate risk entirely. But we don’t need perfection or freedom from risk. We just need to take the next step.

By choosing thoughtfully, using all the tools at our disposal to maximize our upside and anticipate our downside, we can grasp the opportunities available to us while equipping ourselves to handle whatever challenges reality throws our way.

Excerpted from “Choose Possibility: Take Risks and Thrive (Even When You Fail)’ by Sukhinder Singh Cassidy. Copyright © 2021 by Sukhinder Singh Cassidy. Published and reprinted by permission of Mariner Books/Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. All rights reserved.

News: Takeovers and Twitter headaches

• August 15, 2021
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Whether or not you’ve ever dabbled with Unity, you’ve almost certainly interacted with something built with Unity. It’s the 2D/3D engine that powers so, so many of the video games out there, regardless of what console or platform we’re talking about. Studios use it to make animated movies. Automakers use it to help design cars.

Hello friends!

Lucas is still out for a few more days, so I’m filling in for him again on this week’s Week In Review. To recap: I’m Greg. I started at TC back when deciding who to put in your MySpace Top 8 was a very serious matter and being able to summon an Uber with a button press made people think you were a wizard from the future.

Before we dive into the news you might’ve missed this week, a heads up! Brian Heater’s much-loved robotics recap is becoming a weekly newsletter and getting a fancy new name: Actuator. The official launch date is still kind of up in the air, but you can already sign up for it right here.

And now, the news you might’ve missed this week.

The Big Thing

Whether or not you’ve ever dabbled with Unity, you’ve almost certainly interacted with something built with Unity. It’s the 2D/3D engine that powers so, so many of the video games out there, regardless of what console or platform we’re talking about. Studios use it to make animated movies. Automakers use it to help design cars.

This week Unity announced its intent to make a big acquisition — its biggest to date, in fact — with the $320M purchase of Parsec. And while one company buying another is hardly rare news around these parts, a Unity Senior Vice President suggests that it could be the beginning of a bigger shift for the co.

So what’s a Parsec? Besides a unit of measurement that Star Wars fans love to argue about.

Parsec started its life as a way to stream games from your powerful PC to your less powerful devices — or to your far away friends, allowing for long-distance multiplayer in games that otherwise didn’t support it. And it still works for that!

When the pandemic booted everyone out of the office, though, the company found that many of the features it had built for playing games remotely (like low latency streaming, support for input devices beyond keyboard/mouse, etc.) were also super important to the folks building games remotely. They embraced that newfound audience hard, quickly rolling out plans and features just for creative teams. The shift worked out well for them; the company went from raising $25M to being acquired for nearly 13x that in less than a year.

According to Unity SVP Marc Whitten, this is the beginning of Unity diving deeper into the cloud.

“I think you’re gonna see that Parsec is a great foundational block for a broad sort of cloud ambition that we have as a company,” he says. “You’re going to see a lot more from us in that particular regards.”

Even only considering what Parsec immediately brings to the table, there’s multiple potential paths to the cloud here. They could use Parsec to help Unity developers more easily add multiplayer to their games; they could use it to build a Stadia/Amazon Luna-style game streaming service that showcases Unity-powered games sans downloads; they could use it to offer up beefier hardware-in-the-cloud rentals to help smaller studios iterate more quickly or test on a wider range of devices.

Oh, and if you’re one of those aforementioned people using Parsec to game with friends from afar, don’t stress: The company says its free app isn’t going anywhere.

If you’re an Extra Crunch member, check out Eric Peckham’s deep dive on the rise of Unity here.

Other Things

Ariana Grande takes over Fortnite

The book written about the evolution of Fortnite will be a wild one. It began its life as a moderately popular tower defense game. When it shifted gears into a free-to-play Battle Royale game, it exploded into one of the biggest games the world has ever seen. Now it’s a remarkable example of how a game can be a place, and what can be when a developer has absolute control over their game engine and might-as-well-be-endless money to throw into content creation. Example #2,138,413: this in-game Ariana Grande “concert” in which players dogfight a demon, ride rainbows, and dance alongside a skyscraper-sized Ariana. The YouTube replay alone has already been seen by millions.

Twitter’s redesign

Twitter overhauled its website this week… and, as it tends to go when you change the look/feel of a popular thing, there was some user backlash. This time it went beyond the usual “I don’t like the radius of the rounded corners” complaints, though, with some users complaining that the new font Twitter chose gave them headaches.

Apple moves to clarify how its new child safety features work

Last week Apple announced that it would be rolling out a set of features meant to keep kids safe: One alerting parents if a minor is sending or receiving explicit images over iMessage, and another that would automatically compare generated hashes of iCloud Photos to detect and flag users who were storing known child abuse images. While protecting kids is undeniably and universally a good thing, security researchers have raised concerns about the potential for misuse by governments to scan for things beyond abuse imagery. It’s said to have caused a bit of a dustup within Apple, with “more than 800 messages” of back-and-forth posted by employees on the company’s internal Slack. The company has spent the last few days trying to clarify how the features will work, with Apple’s Craig Federighi admitting that it “got jumbled pretty badly in terms of how things were understood”. Read our interview with Apple’s head of Privacy here.

Xiaomi’s Robodog

Boston Dynamics’ Spot is no longer the only creepy dystopian robot dog in town. This week Xiaomi announced CyberDog, a four-legged bot meant to flex the company’s robo knowledge and serve as a platform for developers to build upon. Xiaomi says they’ll be selling them for around $1,500, with a catch: they’re only making a thousand of these, initially, and they’re only selling them to select “Xiaomi fans, engineers, and robotics enthusiasts.”

Lowercarbon raises $800M to “keep unf*cking the planet”

Lowercarbon Capital, the climate-focused fund run by Chris and Crystal Sacca, raised $800M to pour into companies that are taking on the climate crisis. “It turns out that raising for a climate fund in the context of an unprecedented heatwave and from behind the thick clouds of fire smoke probably didn’t hurt,” writes Sacca. Can tech save the planet? TBD. But continuing to do nothing definitely won’t.

FEMA tests the U.S. emergency alert system

If your phone was shouting about a test of the National Wireless Emergency System earlier this week, don’t panic: It was, in fact, just a test. Didn’t get it? Don’t panic about that, either — the test system is opt-in. If there’s an actual test, everyone will get it. Hopefully.

Image Credits: Xiaomi

Extra Things

More companies should shift to a work-from-home model

Is your company trying to drag everyone back into the office sooner than you’d like? Maybe send’em this article from Insightly COO Karl Laughton, outlining some of the findings and data-driven upsides the company has seen since going remote.

Dear Sophie: Can I hire an engineer whose green card is being sponsored by another company?

You’ve found the perfect job candidate and want to make an offer, but there’s a catch: they need an EB-2 green card, and another company has already started the sponsoring process. Can you make it work? It depends. In the latest edition of Dear Sophie, Immigration attorney Sophie Alcorn breaks down the EB-2 process and potential snags.

News: Silicon Valley should fight its stigma against military work

• August 15, 2021
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The military is rightly described as a cross-section of the United States, and supporting those who serve is a Silicon Valley tradition, good business practice and the right thing to do.

Political debate at work was not encouraged when I was training to be a doctor at the LAC+USC Medical Center in the early 2000s.

On the 13th-floor jail ward, we had a professional duty to care for drunk drivers and thieves just like any other patient and leave any opinions about criminal justice policy for their appropriate venues.

Medicine is not unique in this respect — we’re all better off when lawyers, soldiers and other public service providers place their duty to society over individual opinions.

Technology companies often aspire to fill similarly critical roles in society, but few have internalized the separation between professional duty and personal opinion. I have seen this firsthand as the founder of a tech company that serves a wide range of organizations, including amateur to collegiate and professional sports, occupational health and a growing roster of military commands.

During the last presidential administration, a handful of colleagues questioned whether serving the military was consistent with our mission of helping the world move better. Over the past few years, this stigma toward military work has roiled some of the largest companies in Silicon Valley, sometimes leading to contract cancelations, non-renewal pledges and a noticeable chilling effect toward work involving the United States military.

Partnerships between technology companies and the military are nothing new, but rarely have they attracted as much controversy as they do today. These partnerships were the norm throughout the 20th century, yielding war-winning technologies — like microwave radar, GPS and ARPANET — that pulled double-duty in peacetime as the building blocks of our modern connected world.

Military contracts have been traditionally viewed in Silicon Valley as a win-win — for the nation’s military superiority and for a company’s bottom line. Moonshot projects backed by the federal government’s financial resources also represented some of the most interesting workarounds for product-minded technologists.

That relationship has been knocked off its bearings over the past several years, with employees at Microsoft, Google and Amazon, among other companies, seeking to distance themselves from all federal projects due to the revulsion of the previous administration’s policies. But with new leadership in Washington, companies and tech workers need to determine if the stigma against military work will become permanently ingrained or limited to one chapter in an evolving relationship.

Before looking forward, one common misconception is worth correcting from the previous administration about the tension between employees and the military. Recent research challenges the notion that anti-military views are universal among the tech workforce.

In a survey conducted between late 2019 and early 2020, Georgetown University’s Center for Security and Emerging Technology found that less than a quarter of AI professionals view Pentagon work in a negative light, and 78% consider it a positive or neutral.

Companies that are open to pursuing opportunities with the Department of Defense should consider several advantages and differences between commercial and government clients.

Federal contracts are generally distinguished by large dollar amounts, low profit margins and long periods of performance. This can appeal to VC-backed companies that are valued based on revenue, and the unique structure of government contracts brings a welcome complement to the lucrative but highly volatile work in B2B and B2C markets. Blending the two extremes produces a stronger whole, not unlike mutual funds that balance stocks and bonds.

Many founders fail to explore DOD opportunities because they do not want to be seen as engaging in the business of war. We encountered a version of this at Sparta Science with colleagues who conflated our work to support federal employees with a full endorsement of all government policy.

Reality is more nuanced. The DOD has an annual budget of more than half a trillion dollars and a workforce of 2.8 million. Only a portion of these individuals are directly engaged in warfighting, and they rely on great numbers of administrators and knowledge professionals to accomplish each mission.

The DOD has approximately 1.3 million active contracts at any given moment, spanning fields as diverse as healthcare, apparel, logistics and software licensing. The military is rightly described as a cross-section of the United States, and supporting those who serve is a Silicon Valley tradition, good business practice and the right thing to do.

News: Gillmor Gang: Who’s On First

• August 14, 2021
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On this edition of the Gillmor Gang, Brent Leary shows off his new wireless adaptor for his live streaming studio. The result is a captivating view of his console as he switches between closeups and incoming feed from the rest of the Gang, all captured in a widescreen cinematic view. The underlying message is that

On this edition of the Gillmor Gang, Brent Leary shows off his new wireless adaptor for his live streaming studio. The result is a captivating view of his console as he switches between closeups and incoming feed from the rest of the Gang, all captured in a widescreen cinematic view. The underlying message is that live realtime video production has become accessible to virtually anyone as streaming becomes ubiquitous at the so-called citizen level.

Trailblazers like Brent and his CRMPlayaz partner in crime Paul Greenberg have been way out on the bleeding edge of this stuff; now we’re seeing something similar to what’s going on in the creator boom. Newsletters are becoming a baked in feature of the major social platforms, as is live audio streaming a la Clubhouse and Twitter Spaces. This week, Salesforce announced its Salesforce+ streaming network, and celebrated its completion of the Slack acquisition with several new enterprise spins on live audio (Huddles) and cross-company collaboration via Slack Connect.

Roll this up with the first wave of work from anywhere efforts to get back to school and the office, streaming as a service may be a key feature of the ongoing hybrid approach to fighting off the pandemic. The political struggle with vaccinations and masking seems destined for the long haul. How the tech community responds should be a more hopeful sign of progress.At the professional level, Disney and Scarlet Johannsen are trading lawsuit threats as month-old contracts are ripped up. Newsletter deals are chasing a dwindling population of hit authors as the New York Times puts most of their star-driven publications behind the paywall. The more things transform, the more familiar they seem.

Even the Gang newsletter sports a link to Om Malik’s post on Nam June Paik, the experimental video pioneer. I was his TA at California Institute of the Arts, and “borrowed” his associate Abe’s 3 Sony black and white portapacks to film a Firesign Theatre writing session. Civilization ho.

from the Gillmor Gang Newsletter

__________________

The Gillmor Gang — Frank Radice, Michael Markman, Keith Teare, Denis Pombriant, Brent Leary and Steve Gillmor. Recorded live Friday, July 23, 2021.

Produced and directed by Tina Chase Gillmor @tinagillmor

@fradice, @mickeleh, @denispombriant, @kteare, @brentleary, @stevegillmor, @gillmorgang

Subscribe to the new Gillmor Gang Newsletter and join the backchannel here on Telegram.

The Gillmor Gang on Facebook … and here’s our sister show G3 on Facebook.

News: Edtech’s next mission: Go everywhere

• August 14, 2021
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Thanks for reading Startups Weekly. Want the weekly digest in your inbox every Saturday? Sign up here.  This past week, edtech entrepreneurs, investors and analysts congregated at ASU+GSV, a yearly global edtech conference, to reflect on the sector’s newfound spotlight after the massive jolt of COVID-19. Beyond masked excitement to finally meet Twitter friends in

Thanks for reading Startups Weekly. Want the weekly digest in your inbox every Saturday? Sign up here. 

This past week, edtech entrepreneurs, investors and analysts congregated at ASU+GSV, a yearly global edtech conference, to reflect on the sector’s newfound spotlight after the massive jolt of COVID-19. Beyond masked excitement to finally meet Twitter friends in real life, signs of bullishness were everywhere.

A digital-first talent development platform for interns that once didn’t have product-market fit won the startup cup. My panels were all with newly minted startup unicorns. And everyone didn’t know everyone, a feat that shows how the conference went from a niche industry meetup to a broader event for a new generation of founders.

My takeaway from the entire week, though, was more than edtech is booming (which, it is). Instead, I felt like the general sentiment at the conference — even with polite disagreement — was that the sector getting spotlighted means it finally has the buy-in to go everywhere.

In other words, edtech is at a point where it doesn’t need to just rely on itself to accomplish its goals. It can operate outside of a silo, which feels like the needed follow-up to the sector’s 2020.

For example, if a platform brings fun UX to instruction online but doesn’t take into account how that move impacts childcare, mental health and the digital divide, the impact of its savvy solution will be immediately limited. Consolidation, which will continue to play out due to freshly minted unicorns, won’t just be edtech scooping up edtech, but you may see companies begin to launch products that take into account the full human experience.

BetterUp, a reskilling and coaching platform for employees before and beyond the C-suite, is signaling that it’s already happening. The edtech company announced that it is diving more into behavioral health with new products.

Operating beyond edtech insiders is the difference between creating products that reinforce the status quo and inventing ones that question the status quo on its head. Fiveable, a virtual space for high schoolers to study and express themselves, has turned dozens of its users into interns. The feedback loop there is brutal — high schoolers are harsh — but means that the people making decisions for them finally aren’t adults talking to adults.

Of course, the lack of training wheels means that it’s easier for startups to go rogue. As the pandemic unevenly plays out, remote school may become the normal once again. Companies have to be massively focused, and humble, about their reach. Reflection will be important in what distinguishes a Course Hero from a Codecademy to a Coursera — and when it makes sense to leave their own lane.

It was a refreshing, surreal week talking to the people behind the dollars and ideas of our future educational landscape. The jolt of the pandemic highlighted the inequities and work left to be done. Now, the spotlight will be part cheerleader, part accountability coach in helping edtech reflect its way to a better end product.

The relevancy of venture capital

Image Credits: Bryce Durbin / TechCrunch

As nontraditional investors get into private startups, a growing debate in Silicon Valley is if traditional venture capitalists can evolve into the new landscape. When Tigers eat your lunch, where do you look for competitive advantage and relevancy?

Here’s what to know: Some think venture capital is dead. Others think it’s more nuanced than that. Everyone agrees that the asset class needs to rethink how and when it invests capital.

Dollars and deals don’t begin to describe it:

• Austin transplant Geoff Lewis wants to pop Silicon Valley’s ‘self-referential’ bubble
• ‘The tortoise and the hare’ story is playing out right now in VC
• What happens when Wall Street falls out of love with your sector?
• 3 lies VCs tell ourselves about startup valuation

“Regulatory fabric can add or subtract from a company’s wealth”

Image Credits: Rosmarie Wirz (opens in a new window) / Getty Images

Regulations have the power to lift or limit a startup. In an op-ed this week, Plug & Play Ventures’ Noorjit Sidhu argued that regulatory fabric — even when complicated — can help founders navigate if getting into a gray area of innovation is even worth it.

Here’s what to know: While regulations matter, it’s ironic that Uber only had the chance to become iconic because it ignored regulations during its early launch days. Disruption has a way of ignoring the rules.

Red tape goes green:

• Don’t give your weed dealer all your data 
• How to hire and structure a growth team 

When was the last time you thought about maps?

Image via Getty Images / iam-Citrus

You know what no one talks about? Maps. The medium is a powerful tool for consumers and companies to visually express space and relevancy. At the same time, the complexity of maps — from the curvature of land to how space takes up space — has limited how easy it is to just spin one up.

Here’s what to know: Felt, which just left stealth this week, wants to make maps mainstream. Its mapping software has raised $4.5 million to date and is a case study in how climate change can bring new energy to old products.

Climate change-makers:

• Chris Sacca’s Lowercarbon Capital has raised $800 million to “keep unf*cking the planet”
• 44.01 secures $5M to turn billions of tons of carbon dioxide to stone
• UN’s IPCC report on climate change sounds ‘code red’ for planet

Around TC

• Affordable student passes available for TC Sessions: SaaS 2021
• Announcing the agenda for the Disrupt Stage in September 
• Don’t miss these special breakout sessions at TechCrunch Disrupt 2021
• Seth Rogen is coming to TechCrunch Disrupt to talk about the weed business

Across the week

Seen on TechCrunch

• Pushing for an ‘apolitical’ workplace is immoral (and unrealistic)
• Carta says it just used its own product to establish a new — and far higher — valuation for itself
• Felt raised $4.5 million to get you to ‘think in maps’
• Pave gets Y Combinator to back better startup compensation tools, again

Seen on Extra Crunch

• More companies should shift to a work-from-home model
• New York City’s enterprise tech startups could be heading for a superheated exit wave
• No-code is code
• Early-stage brands should also unlock the power of influencers 
• The gray revolution: Fundraising within the older adult space

News: This Week in Apps: Google, TikTok add protections for minors, app store bill proposes big changes, what’s new with Samsung

• August 14, 2021
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Welcome back to This Week in Apps, the weekly TechCrunch series that recaps the latest in mobile OS news, mobile applications and the overall app economy. The app industry continues to grow, with a record 218 billion downloads and $143 billion in global consumer spend in 2020. Consumers last year also spent 3.5 trillion minutes using apps on Android devices alone.

Welcome back to This Week in Apps, the weekly TechCrunch series that recaps the latest in mobile OS news, mobile applications and the overall app economy.

The app industry continues to grow, with a record 218 billion downloads and $143 billion in global consumer spend in 2020. Consumers last year also spent 3.5 trillion minutes using apps on Android devices alone. And in the U.S., app usage surged ahead of the time spent watching live TV. Currently, the average American watches 3.7 hours of live TV per day, but now spends four hours per day on their mobile devices.

Apps aren’t just a way to pass idle hours — they’re also a big business. In 2019, mobile-first companies had a combined $544 billion valuation, 6.5x higher than those without a mobile focus. In 2020, investors poured $73 billion in capital into mobile companies — a figure that’s up 27% year-over-year.

This Week in Apps offers a way to keep up with this fast-moving industry in one place with the latest from the world of apps, including news, updates, startup fundings, mergers and acquisitions, and suggestions about new apps and games to try, too.

Do you want This Week in Apps in your inbox every Saturday? Sign up here: techcrunch.com/newsletters

Top Stories

A new Senate bill could put an end to app stores’ dominance

Image Credits: TechCrunch

A bipartisan group of three U.S. senators — Richard Blumenthal (D-CT), Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) and Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) — introduced a new piece of legislation called the Open Markets Act, could change the way mobile software is distributed. The bill would give developers the right to tell their customers about lower prices outside the app stores (without fear of punishment), and permit alternative payment mechanisms, sideloading and third-party app stores where developers could avoid platform fees. It would also bar platform makers like Apple and Google from using non-public information they collect via app stores to build out competing products, or rank those products more favorably.

The bill is being applauded by Apple critics, including the Coalition for App Fairness and its members, Epic Games, Spotify, Tile and others, who are now urging Congress to swiftly pass the legislation to level the playing field.

As regulatory pressure on platform makers has intensified, the companies looked for ways to better cater to smaller developers with drops in commission rates, as well as increased privacy and security measures — the latter which could help boost their arguments that the app store model is favorable to consumer interests.

Such a bill is a notable first step toward some sort of market changes, but it’s still too early to know if or when the bill will gain traction, much less be passed into law.

Tech giants Google, YouTube and TikTok follow Instagram with increased protections for minors

Google and YouTube (as well as TikTok) this week rolled out a series of changes to their products and services to increase the privacy and security of accounts belonging to teenaged users under the age of 18. The specific changes vary a bit from service to service, but are largely focused on making younger people’s accounts more private by default, ensuring they’re making an intentional choice when shifting accounts or content to become public, and limiting to what extent advertisers can target them. TikTok went a bit further to restrict push notifications after “bedtime” hours for its teen users, while YouTube chose to turn on its “take a break” and “bedtime” reminders by default instead.

Image Credits: TikTok

The changes follow similar moves announced just weeks ago by Instagram, and follow increased pressure from the U.S. Congress to do more to protect younger users from the harmful impacts of using technology.

One piece of legislation, which tech companies may be trying to get ahead of, is an update to COPPA that would expand some protections to children under the age of 18, instead of just under 13. What’s missing from all these initiatives, however, is any plan to more strictly verify children’s ages on an app. Since many kids already know to lie about their birth year at sign-up, it’s unclear how effective these measures will be in the long term.

Samsung Unpacked Wrap-Up

Image Credits: Brian Heater

Samsung this week hosted its Unpacked event, where it debuted the company’s latest mobile products. This time, the smartphone maker showed off a new crop of foldables, including the Galaxy Z Fold 3 and Galaxy Z Flip 3 (clamshell, woo!), which will give app makers even more device styles and formats to consider when designing their apps. Well, if these foldables ever gain market traction that is, instead of existing in consumers’ minds as a gimmick. (For what it’s worth, Microsoft hopped on the bandwagon.)

Samsung also introduced a new smartwatch powered by Google’s WearOS (if you can’t beat ’em…), the Galaxy Watch 4, and entry-level wireless earbuds, the Galaxy Buds 2.

Weekly News

Platforms: Apple

• Apple released the fifth betas of iOS 15 and iPadOS 15 to developers, which offer some more minor tweaks and stability improvements as the platforms head toward a fall release. New additions include an updated weather icon, shading around the tab interface in Safari on iPad, an option to use larger icons on iPad, a new warning pop-up that reminds you the iPhone is still findable when off, new splash screens for Apple’s apps, the integration of TestFlight info in the App Store and more.
• Apple released a new developer tool that allows app makers to test how their app behaves when the device is connected to 5G instead of Wi-Fi. The tool is necessary because iOS 15/iPadOS 15 devices can automatically prioritize 5G over Wi-Fi when the latter’s performance is slow.
• Apple settled a 2019 lawsuit with Corellium, a company that builds virtual iOS devices used by security researchers. Apple had said Corellium was infringing on its copyright, selling its product indiscriminately and compromising platform security. A judge dismissed Apple’s claims as “puzzling,” noting Corellium established “fair use.” The settlement terms were not disclosed.
• Apple’s Find My app in iOS 15 will use Bluetooth technology to precisely locate AirPods (Pro and Max) devices, and will tie AirPods to users’ Apple ID.

Platforms: Google

Image Credits: Google

• Google launched Android 12 beta 4, whose biggest new feature is that the platform has now reached stability. Developers can now test apps before the public release, without having to worry about future breaking changes. Android 12 offers a big redesign, with a more personalized “Material You” design language and increased privacy protections.
• Google banned the location data firm SafeGraph, funded by a former head of Saudi intelligence, which was paying developers to include their data collection tools in their apps so they could resell the data to other companies or government agencies. Any apps working with SafeGraph will have to remove the code.

E-commerce

• DoorDash recently held talks to buy Instacart, according to a report from The Information. The $40 billion-$50 billion deal would have combined two top food delivery apps — one for restaurants, the other for groceries — but talks fell through.
• Weedmaps added in-app cannabis purchasing for iPhone users. Thanks to looser App Store restrictions, Weedmaps users can now browse, select and purchase cannabis and have it delivered or set for pickup directly within the app.
• Instagram is testing ads in its Shop tab, which allow brands to feature either an image or image carousel. The ads will launch with an auction-based model and will only appear on mobile devices.

Augmented Reality

• Snap hired a Facebook AR executive, Joe Darko, The Information reported. The new AR leader, who previously launched the Spark AR Partner Network at Facebook, will now oversee Snap’s AR Developer Relations.

Fintech

Image Credits: Venmo

• Venmo announced it would allow its credit card holders to automatically buy cryptocurrency with their card’s cashback, through a new feature called Cash Back to Crypto. Cardholders can select between Bitcoin, Ethereum, Litecoin and Bitcoin Cash, which will be purchased monthly with no transaction fees.

Social

• Some Snap creators have left for other platforms as the company’s creator bonuses dried up, CNBC found. Snap had been paying $1 million per day in prize money for creators posting to its TikTok competitor, Spotlight. Now, it’s paying “millions” per month — and creators are chasing bigger bonuses elsewhere.
• Instagram’s TikTok competitor, Reels, added a new feature that allows users to search for audio to include in their short-form videos, and the pages for the tracks will show the other videos that used them — like TikTok offers.
• A report circulating this week claims TikTok surpassed Facebook’s downloads in 2020, which um, we already knew many months ago? But yeah, it did.
• Instagram rolled out new anti-abuse features after high-profile incidents of racism took place on its platform following the Euro 2020 final, where angry fans attacked players. New tools include Limits, which lets you restrict certain groups from DM’ing and commenting for a period of time; plus an expansion of Hidden Words to include new strings of emoji; and a more aggressive “Hide More Comments” feature.
• Instagram took down a website, LikeUp.Me, selling fake likes and followers. The site, which was served a C&D from Facebook, had earned around $100K in the past year.
• Reddit is rolling out a TikTok-like video feed button on its iOS app. The feature has reached “most” iOS users and drops them into a full screen experience where users can upvote, downvote, comment on, gift an award or share the video. You can also swipe up to see more videos, also like TikTok. Surprisingly, the company claims its acquired Dubsmash IP was not a part of this project.

Messaging

Image Credits: WhatsApp

• WhatsApp will gain the ability to transfer chat history between mobile operating systems. The feature is coming to Samsung devices first, followed by a broader Android rollout, then iOS. Samsung customers can use the company’s transfer tool, Smart Switch, which already copies other personal data between devices, to also now move their encrypted WhatsApp chat history, including voice notes, photos and conversations.
• Google is pushing mobile Hangouts users to switch to Google Chat through an in-app message that reminds users that Hangouts will be discontinued. Disgruntled users took to Google Play to express their anger with dozens of one-star reviews. How’s that mess of a messaging app strategy looking now, Google?
• Messenger delves into the design of its recently launched “Soundmojis,” which pair an emoji and sound together to create a new form of expression that would be universally understood and surprising.
• Facebook is bringing end-to-end encryption to Messenger calls, noting that E2E was the industry standard and what people now expect. The company said also it would begin testing E2E for group chats and calls in Messenger and Instagram DMs.

Photos

• Apple’s next iPhones will reportedly allow users to take “video portraits,” Bloomberg reported. Other additions will offer the ability to record video in the higher-quality format called ProRes and a new filters system to improve the look of photos.
• As Instagram’s photography community is getting increasingly frustrated by the app’s shift to video, a new app called Glass launched into beta to serve photographers of all sizes. As reported by Om Malik, who has been testing the app for nearly six months, subscription-based Glass is beautiful and fresh, and reminiscent of early Instagram, with support for comments and followers, but differentiates itself by not chasing clout though public likes.

Image Credits: Glass

Dating

• Facebook Dating is gaining an “audio chat” feature, which will allow matches to have voice chats to get to know one another. It’s also adding a Lucky Pick, to suggest daters outside someone’s typical preferences, and Match Anywhere, which allows users to consider locations outside their current city.
• A Match beta test is targeting users’ most common dating app complaints, like too much swiping and ghosting. Now, Match will offer weekly “Matched by Us” recommendations and will prompt users to unmatch or respond, instead of leaving conversations hanging. The company also hinted that it may roll out a human-led matchmaking feature in the future, as well.
• Tinder’s interactive feature, “Swipe Night,” is coming back after a 20 million user turnout from its “season 1.” The new version won’t be a choose-your-own-adventure, but rather a “Gen Z whodunit,” the company said, and will use the quick chat feature that allows users to chat without having first matched.

Streaming & Entertainment

• HBO Max added free episodes to its platform, including its app for mobile devices. Users can sample 13 episodes from top shows and originals without paying, including “Euphoria,” “Game of Thrones,” “Lovecraft Country,” “The Flight Attendant,” “Veneno,” “Warrior” and more, as well as browse the catalog to see what else is offered with a paid subscription.
• A Spotify representative told users in the company’s forum that its work to add support for the nearly 3-year-old AirPlay 2 technology was being abandoned for the time being, citing “driver compatibility issues.” The post gained a lot of attention from disgruntled users and press, leading Spotify to clarify that it “will support AirPlay 2,” without offering a time frame. The company, a staunch Apple critic, has been hesitant to support other Apple products, including HomePod speakers, where native support isn’t available.
• YouTube’s Android app is trying out a new gesture that will allow users to navigate its video “Chapters” by double-tapping with two fingers.
• A new U.S. streaming report by Penthera found that 71% of viewers stream video on 2 devices per day, on average, including a connected TV device and mobile. And 80% said they watch videos at home. But now 92% (up from 88% last year) now say re-buffering is the biggest problem they face while streaming.

Gaming

Image Credits: App Annie

• App Annie released its 2021 gaming report, which estimates mobile gaming will reach $120 billion in consumer spending by year-end, or 3.1x more than consoles. Other highlights include:
  • 4 of the top 10 most downloaded subgenres across all games are in the hypercasual category. 
  • “Happy Glass” is the fastest ever hypercasual game to break 100 million downloads.
  • The pandemic pushed gaming to new levels. Weekly game downloads topped 1 billion in March 2020, and have stayed there ever since.
  • In H1 2021, there were over 810 games surpassing $1 million in consumer spending per month, up 25% from 2019.
  • In H1 2021, per week there were over 1 billion downloads, $1.7 billion spent and 5 billion hours spent on mobile games globally.
  • The U.S. topped the mobile games market by App Store consumer spending. 
  • AppLovin topped the charts for worldwide downloads, while Tencent dominated consumer spend.
  • U.S. mobile game usage skews female (64% of gamers are female). That’s not the same in other markets, where more mobile gamers are men — like Japan (56% male) and South Korea (53% male). 
• U.S. mobile tabletop game spending rose by 40% to $704 million over the past 12 months, a Sensor Tower report found. The top grossing game was Solitaire Grand Harvest from Supertreat, followed by Solitaire TriPeaks from GSN, then Yahtzee with Buddies Dice from Scopely. Downloads, however, declined by 12% YoY, with 202.7 million installs over the past 12 months, versus 230.7 million in the year-ago period.
• Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney discovered a surprise in a set of recently unsealed court documents in the Epic Games v. Google antitrust case. He learned that Google had once mulled acquiring his company at some point — which Sweeney said was related to Epic’s decision to compete with Google Play. The documents also refer to the “frankly abysmal” sideloading experience on Android.

Food

• Google-owned navigation app Waze announced a partnership with Too Good To Go, an organization that works with small businesses and organizations to decrease food waste. The partnership will highlight independent restaurants and grocery stores in select U.S. cities that are taking steps to reduce food waste by showcasing them on the Waze map. These businesses also sell “surprise” bags of food that contain three times more food than the cost of the bag at the end of the day. The food is perfectly good, but can’t be sold the second day, so would otherwise be thrown out.
• OpenTable’s app added a new Direct Messaging feature that lets diners and restaurants communicate directly after a reservation is made, instead of having to place a phone call. The feature can be used to clarify a diner’s requests, or other changes, or even message after the reservation has ended in case of items that were left behind, or other needs.

Image Credits: OpenTable

Adtech

• Tapjoy launched MobileVoice, a market research solution for surveying mobile-first consumers where researchers bid for each response. Higher bids will give users more virtual currency for their game, which motivates consumers to share their opinions.

Government & Policy

• WhatsApp, Facebook, Instagram, Messenger and Twitter were restricted in Zambia amidst ongoing general elections on Thursday, polling day, through Sunday, when votes counts are expected to have ended.
• Facebook’s acquisition of GIF database Giphy has come under fire from U.K. regulator, the Competition and Markets Authority, which announced a preliminary finding that the deal “will harm competition.”
• India’s government says Twitter is now in compliance with the country’s new IT laws, which required the company to appoint a chief compliance officer, a nodal contact person and a resident grievance officer in the country.

Security & Privacy

• Recommended Reading: TechCrunch Editor-in-Chief Matthew Panzarino interviewed Apple Privacy head Erik Neuenschwander about the company’s plans to detect CSAM and Apple’s new Messages app safety features. Apple’s announcement stirred controversy in the security community because of how the company is implementing the technology, which some have argued could leave the door open for other governments or agencies to compromise for their own ends. Neuenschwander explains the system’s protections that make it less useful for doing so — meaning that its technology itself, and not just Apple’s word, could prevent this type of abuse. And in terms of user privacy, there is an opt-out — you just turn off iCloud Photos.

Funding and M&A

Privacy-oriented search app Xayn raised $12 million in Series A funding led by Japanese investors Global Brain and KDDI (a Japanese telecommunications operator) for its app that fuses together search, a discovery feed and a mobile browser. The app will focus on Asian markets and Europe.

Social banking app Kroo raised $24.5 million in Series A funding led by Rudy Karsan, a high-net-worth tech entrepreneur and founder of Karlani Capital. The London-based fintech offers a prepaid card service but is moving toward offering expanded banking services in its mobile app.

Pokémon GO developer Niantic acquired the iPhone and iPad app Scaniverse for an undisclosed sum. The Scaniverse app allows users to scan objects and environments into high-res 3D, and will remain live on the App Store, and the founder will join Niantic’s AR team.

Car ownership “super app” Jerry raised $75 million in Series C funding led by existing backer Goodwater Capital, valuing its business at $450 million. The app uses automation to give consumers customized quotes from more than 45 insurance carriers, but is expanding into areas like financing, repair, warranties, parking, maintenance and more.

Mobile field service startup Youreka Labs raised $8.5 million in Series A funding co-led by  Boulder Ventures and Grotech Ventures. The company simplifies development of mobile service applications with a no-code authoring studio and one-click deployment to Apple, Android and Windows.

Reddit confirmed it has raised $410 million of a planned $700 million Series F funding round, led by Fidelity, valuing the business at $10 billion. The funds will be used to further build out community and advertising efforts, as well as increase headcount.

  U.S. grocery delivery service Gopuff acquired U.K. competitor Dija, which was only eight months old, to expand into Europe. Gopuff had previously acquired a similar startup, Fancy, just three months ago.

India’s VerSe Innovation, makers of Dailyhunt and Josh apps, raised over $450 million in a Series I funding round led by Siguler Guff, Baillie Gifford, affiliates of Carlyle Asia Partners Growth II and others. The company’s new valuation is now “nearing $3 billion.” Dailyhunt now has over 300 million MAUs and Josh has 115 million MAUs.

Social calendar app Saturn raised $35 million led by General Catalyst, Insight Partners and Coatue, bringing its total raise to date to $44 million. The app allows high school students to manage their schedule, track assignments, chat with friends and more across web and mobile devices.

  Fintech Robinhood acquired Say Technologies, a company offering a communications platform that allows smaller shareholders to pose questions to companies in which they invest. The $140 million all-cash deal is Robinhood’s first major purchase since going public in late July.

  Medal.tv, a short-form video clipping service and social network for gamers, entered the livestreaming market with the acquisition of Rawa.tv, a Twitch rival based in Dubai. Deal terms were not revealed, but the deal was in the seven figures.

Turkey’s Trendyol, an e-commerce website and app serving over 30 million shoppers, raised $1.5 billion in a round that valued the company at $16.5 billion. General Atlantic, SoftBank Vision Fund 2, Princeville Capital and sovereign wealth funds, ADQ (UAE) and Qatar Investment Authority, co-led.

Argentine fintech Ualá raised $350 million in Series D funding, valuing its business at $2.45 billion. The company offers a Mastercard and app, where users can access bill pay solutions, investment products, personal loans, BNPL installments and insurance. To date, the startup has issued more than 3.5 million cards in Mexico and Argentina.

Fintech Chime Financial raised $750 million in a round that values the business at $25 billion, ahead of a planned IPO next year. The round was led by new investor Sequoia Capital Global Equities. Chime today offers credit cards and no-fees banking services through a mobile app.

Mexico’s Orchata, a mobile app for getting groceries delivered via micro-fulfillment centers, raised $4 million in seed funding from investors including Y Combinator, JAM Fund, FJ Labs, Venture Friends, Investo and Foundation Capital, and angel investors Ross Lipson, Mike Hennessey, Brian Requarth and Javier Mata.

Public Markets

Krafton, the South Korean maker of PUBG, closed 9% down on its first day of trading on Tuesday after first debuting at $432 per share. Analysts said the company tried to go out with a valuation that was too high. At closing, the valuation was $19.32 billion. To date, PUBG Mobile has generated $6.3 billion in player spending across the app stores.

Crypto app Coinbase’s stock jumped 7% on Wednesday after better-than-expected earnings, where the company reported $1.6 billion in net profit for the quarter (earnings per share of $3.45), beating analyst estimates. Coinbase trading volumes were also up 38% to $462 billion in Q2.

TikTok owner ByteDance is considering a Hong Kong IPO, The FT reported. The Beijing-based tech company may list in either Q4 2021 or early 2022. As of its last fundraise of $5 billion in December 2020, the company was valued at $180 billion.

Mobile marketer and game provider AppLovin’s stock jumped 4.2% in after-hours trading Wednesday after the company reported 123% revenue growth to $669 million year-over-year from $299 million, beating analyst estimates. EPS was 4 cents versus a loss of 10 cents in the year-ago period.

The Disney+ streaming service beat analyst expectations to reach 116 million subscribers in Disney’s fiscal Q3. Disney now has nearly 174 million subscribers across Disney+, Hulu and ESPN+.

Downloads

Reelgood (update)

Streaming guide Reelgood has historically offered a great service for discovering new things to watch, and keeping track of where you’ve left off with favorite shows. Now, the company is introducing a new feature called Search Party, which makes it easier for two or more people to find something to watch that they all agree on. Using a familiar swipe left or right mechanism, users try to find a “match.” The feature also lets you set other filters, like release year, IMDb rating, genre and more, to narrow its suggestions. When one or more matches is detected, Reelgood notifies the group and displays the matches in a new tab where they’re organized by the total number of “Likes.” Reelgood is a free download on iOS and Android.

PairPlay

PairPlay is a clever new app from Jonathan Wegener, previously co-founder of Timehop and product designer at Snap, which turns a pair of AirPods into a two-person adventure game. You and one other player will split the pair, with one person taking the left AirPod and the other taking the right, to start the audio challenge. The players will hear different sides of the audio adventure story at the same time, which they can then play out together. Storylines may have you playing as secret agents, ghost hunters, robots and more. The game is family-friendly and can be played with kids as young as 7, though arguably some adults will have fun with this one, too. The app is a free download and requires AirPods.