Author : zebethcontrol

Nigerian startup that stored its ‘day-to-day operational budget’ on FTX announces staff cuts • ZebethMedia

By zebethcontrolPosted on November 14, 2022Posted in Daily Crunch, Startups, Venture, venture capitalNo Comments

To get a roundup of ZebethMedia’s biggest and most important stories delivered to your inbox every day at 3 p.m. PDT, subscribe here. Hello, and welcome to the beginning of another week. As mentioned last Friday, Haje is off scuba diving, leaving the rest of us to pick up the Twitter and FTX pieces. No bother, we are here for you. Mary Ann starts us off by reporting on SoftBank writing down an almost $100 million investment into FTX. And with that, let’s dig in! — Christine The ZebethMedia Top 3 This FTX business has wide reach: Tage reports on what happens to a young company that held some assets in FTX and now can’t access them due to, well, you know. In this instance, African web3 startup Nestcoin said it had to lay off employees as a result of not having that access. A true comparison: Now people in Europe can know the joy and wonder that is the Klarna price comparison tool, which Paul writes may just be a “credible alternative to Google and Amazon.” Oops: Bird, a micromobility company, told the Securities and Exchange Commission that it had included unpaid customer rides in its revenue, thus having overstated that particular number for two years. Jaclyn has more. Startups and VC At this point, we all expect our data to move pretty quickly, but there is so much of it that it’s still a headache. This is where Quix comes in, Mike writes. The real-time data startup grabbed $12.9 million in Series A funding, not to do this with ksqlDB, Java-based solutions or any of those fancy schmancy SQL-based analytics solutions. Oh no, Quix is developing event-driven applications with Python. And we have five more for you: The show must go on: Just because FTX is having issues doesn’t mean other companies are shying away from association. Jacquelyn reports on the Joepegs NFT marketplace, which raised $5 million in a round co-led by FTX and Avalanche. “Adult friendships are fickle beasts”: Indeed they are, but have no fear, 222 will help you find that perfect friend who doesn’t care that you make more than they do or who “tends to be lazy,” if that’s what you’re into, Kyle writes. Singapore, get your exotic taste buds ready: Vow, an Australian-based cultured meat company, gobbled up $49.2 million in Series A funding to get its first cell-based meat product into Singapore restaurants, Christine writes. Spring into action: Electric vehicle startup Faraday Future signed a $350 million financing deal to hopefully get it out of its previous monetary challenges and to launch its first vehicle, Jaclyn reports. “The sun’s a ball of buttah”: Butter, now flush with $9 million in funding, led by Gradient Ventures, is helping smaller food distribution businesses comply with food safety rules, Catherine writes. Preparing for fintech’s second decade: 4 moves your firm must make now Image Credits: Emilija Manevska (opens in a new window) / Getty Images According to consultant Grant Easterbrook, fintech startups that hope to succeed over the next few years must be prepared to go up against: Major banks and financial service providers with loyalty programs and “super apps.” Emerging DeFi protocols “that can offer financial products that involve real-world assets.” Banking, invoicing, lending, payments, accounting packaged as “embedded financial products.” Multiple countries issuing their own Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC). “Your firm will need a very strong value proposition to compete with all four types of competitors,” writes Easterbrook, who shares his ideas for navigating the next decade of fintech in a TC+ guest post. Two more from the TC+ team: See, Mom? Layoffs can teach us something: The big tech layoffs have not been great, but Natasha M writes that even though we could see more, entrepreneur Nolan Church, who helped lead Carta’s 2020 layoffs as its chief people officer, has some perspective on Twitter’s recent layoffs. If VCs aren’t investing in you, who are they investing in?: That’s what Becca discusses in her latest piece that looks at all the dry powder in the VC world, and why it’s not yet being deployed. ZebethMedia+ is our membership program that helps founders and startup teams get ahead of the pack. You can sign up here. Use code “DC” for a 15% discount on an annual subscription! Big Tech Inc. And just like that, VLC’s download ban in India was lifted, Manish reports. Nine months ago, the country’s electronics and IT ministry instituted the ban on the popular media playback software, something VLC worked to try to reverse, stating that the ban had been “put into place without any prior notice” and didn’t allow VLC a chance for rebuttal. Natasha L has more on our favorite social media channel, this time writing that “Twitter is no longer fulfilling key obligations required for it to claim Ireland as its “so-called main establishment under the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation.” Can’t wait to see where this goes. And we have five more for you:

Bird may not have enough funds to continue shared micromobility business • ZebethMedia

By zebethcontrolPosted on November 14, 2022Posted in bird, TransportationNo Comments

Just hours after Bird said it had overstated revenue for more than two years by recognizing unpaid customer rides, Bird dropped a growing concern warning. In a regulatory filing, the company said it might “need to scale back or discontinue certain or all of its operations in order to reduce costs or seek bankruptcy protection.” Bird closed out the third quarter with $38.5 million in free cash flow. Without additional funding, the company said it would be unable to meet its obligations over the next year. Bird points to “factors beyond its control” like current market volatility that could impact if and how Bird receives further equity or debt financing. “Accordingly, the Company plans to continue to closely monitor its operating forecast, reduce its operating expenses, and pursue additional sources of outside capital,” reads the filing. “Along with this global footprint realignment, the Company is targeting additional reductions in its operating expenses.” Bird has been battling since going public via special purpose acquisition merger in 2021. The young company’s dramas have only heightened over the past few months. Since May, Bird has dismantled its retail business, laid off 23% of staff, received a warning from the New York Stock Exchange for trading too low and exited Germany, Sweden, Norway and “several dozen” markets in the U.S. Additionally, Bird’s CEO Travis VanderZanden stepped down as president, and then as CEO, and was replaced in both roles by Shane Torchiana. Bird isn’t the only SPAC this year to issue a growing concern warning. Canoo and Arrival both also said they may not have enough funds to get their EVs to market, and Arrival also recently got a delisting warning from the Nasdaq. Bird’s stock tanked nearly 16% today and is currently trading at $0.36. The company has until next month to bring its stock price up above $1.00 per its warning from the NYSE. Bird’s Q3 financials In the third quarter, Bird said its revenue increased 19% to $72.9 million, compared to $61.1 million in the same quarter last year. Bird shared its revenue increase the same day it disclosed that it overstated revenue in the past and that the last two years’ worth of financial statements “should no longer be relied upon.” Bird had been counting preloaded wallet balances into its overall revenue, and is now in the process of analyzing balances that it doesn’t expect to redeem in the future, according to Ben Lu, Bird’s chief financial officer. Lu said Bird would finish this audit by the fourth quarter. “Upon completion, we expect to record on-going breakage revenue and anticipate booking a true-up that would increase our revenues next quarter,” said Lu in a statement. “As a result of these two accounting adjustments, we are withdrawing our previous fiscal year 2022 revenue guidance of $275 to $325 million.” Lu did not explain how Bird would square up the overstated revenue from the past, nor if Bird would issue new revenue guidance for the full year. Bird closed out the quarter with a $9.8 million net loss, compared to a net loss of $42.1 million in the year prior, which suggests that the company’s many cost cuts had an impact. Indeed Bird’s Q3 operating expenses were $29.4 million, which is down $10.6 million from Q3 2021. Without additional funds, however, Bird may be exiting more than just several dozen markets.

The Amazonification of Uber • ZebethMedia

By zebethcontrolPosted on November 14, 2022Posted in Apps, ride hail, Transportation, UberNo Comments

It’s been six months since Uber hosted Go, Get, a global smorgasbord of product reveals and features that covered everything from booking party buses and voice ordering for Uber Eats to linking travel plans to Gmail and skipping the food lines at sports stadiums. The product reveals aren’t just about creating new revenue streams or attracting users — although these are certainly goals. Uber has a bigger end game: create a closed business loop with each product feeding customers back into other Uber channels. And that loop is growing. On Monday, heartened by a strong momentum in user engagement and girded for the upcoming holiday season, Uber released another slew of product updates and new features. This time the products were released under the marketing banner of Go, get, give. Now, Uber customers can do things like book with OpenTable and Viator through Uber’s app, search across merchants for the right bottle of booze to be delivered and even schedule Uber gift cards to send on Christmas day. Amazonification Uber was founded on a strategy of scaling at all costs. As Uber struggled to crack the elusive profitability nut through ride-hailing, it added its food delivery pillar Uber Eats. Now, Uber appears to have taken a page out of the Amazon book of customer stickiness to attract new users and get existing customers to spend more money on the platform. Just as Alexa, Amazon’s voice assistant, drives secondary revenue to Amazon every time a customer says, ‘Alexa, buy more shampoo and conditioner,” so, too, does Uber increase its ride revenue when a customer books an event via Uber’s partnership with Viator and then books an Uber to get them there. Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi touched on this during the company’s third-quarter earnings call held November 1. “We are actively cross-selling food delivery consumers into grocery, grocery consumers into alcohol, and actually back now to mobility,” said Khosrowshahi. “All of the cross-sell that we have across the platform continues to increase, drive new customers and drive retention, as well.” There’s evidence to suggest that, at least in the short term, there are fruits to these labors. In the third quarter, Uber’s gross bookings reached $29 billion, a 26% increase from the year prior. The company’s monthly active platform consumers (MAPC) grew 14% year-over-year from 109 million quarterly users to 124 million. If gross bookings grew at a rate faster than MAPC, we can infer that each customer is spending more on the platform than they would have. “As far as the consumers go – high frequency, low frequency consumers – it’s absolutely true that if we can move our consumer use from lower frequency to higher frequency, we will see very significant growth,” said Khosrowshahi during Uber’s Q3 earnings call. It’s not beyond the realm of possibility that Uber will extend beyond the mobility space and into other revenue channels. The company recently launched a new advertising division that oversees in-app ads during rides. To grow that business out, we might one day see Uber hiring creatives and using its vast amounts of data on riders to provide external marketing services for brands. Who knows? While short-term reports show that Uber’s depth of products might have customer stickiness, the company should be wary of biting off more than it can chew. Uber made revenue gains in the third quarter, yet it still lost $1.2 billion, almost half of which can be attributed to operating losses. Tech giants and hotshot upstarts alike are in the midst of cutting costs — measures that include slashing jobs — as growth becomes more difficult amid the current economy. Even Amazon is not immune. There are rumblings that Amazon is planning to lay off 10,000 people this week and there is speculation that the company’s devices group, which includes Echo, Fire tablets and Kindles, could be on the list to get cuts. At an operating loss of $5 billion a year, it’s not hard to see why.

Long live the vibe capitalist! • ZebethMedia

By zebethcontrolPosted on November 14, 2022Posted in Crypto, diversity, EC Cryptocurrency, EC News Analysis, EC venture capital, FTX Bankruptcy, Sam Bankman-Fried, Startups, VentureNo Comments

Last week, many investors were left with egg on their faces after FTX’s valuation went from $32 billion to zero in a New York minute. VCs were left wondering, “What the hell happened?” And they’re still wondering, “Wait — did I do something wrong? Is it me?” Why yes, actually, it is you. People are led to believe that, for the most part, investors are clear-eyed, data-driven people who carefully explore the financial underpinnings of the companies they invest in. There is little room for emotions like jealousy or the fear of missing out (FOMO). Of course not. And these people investing billions of dollars surely have their eye on the ball, right? Well, not exactly. In a surprisingly honest tweet today, former SoftBank COO Marcelo Claure, who stepped down in late January after a reported battle over pay, had this to say about the FTX fiasco: I have been reflecting personally on the whole FTX fiasco and it taught me one more time that we should NEVER invest because of FOMO and we should always 100% understand what we are investing in. I totally failed here on both. — Marcelo Claure (@marceloclaure) November 12, 2022 This is from the same guy whose former firm also invested significant money in WeWork, another spectacular example of poor judgment on the part of investors. Steve Jobs once said, “Everything around you that you call life was made up by people that were no smarter than you.” At the time, Jobs was talking about building products, but evidently, this also applies to the people funding the startup ecosystem. While it’s good that Claure was so open, honest and reflective, perhaps we should all remember that investors are not any smarter than anyone else. They’re human after all, and their classic lack of self-awareness combined with venture enthusiasts’ myopia is perhaps the problem. Most investors and the founders in whom they invest are white men, and you get double points if you went to Stanford, Harvard, or MIT. These folks are handed the mantle of genius in all that they do and touch. The next Warren Buffet is rarely if ever, predicted to be a Black man.

The Epic Games-Apple antitrust battle resumes today in appeals court • ZebethMedia

By zebethcontrolPosted on November 14, 2022Posted in antitrust, Apple, Apps, Epic Games, law, lawsuitNo Comments

Apple’s antitrust battle against Fortnite maker Epic Games is returning to the courtroom after both sides appealed last year’s ruling in a precedent-setting case over Apple’s alleged anti-competitive behavior. Last year, a U.S. District Court judge had largely favored Apple when ruling the tech giant was not acting as a monopolist with regard to its App Store practices. Epic Games was unhappy with that decision, of course, as it had wanted the court to force Apple to support third-party payments which would have allowed Fortnite to maximize its revenues. Meanwhile, Apple didn’t want to agree to the court’s order that said it would hae to permit apps that provide links to alternative payments. Oral arguments will kick off this afternoon at the U.S. Court of Appeal for the Ninth Circuit, in what will be an even higher-stakes trial for determining Apple’s future in the app market and its ability to set its own rules around payments and commissions. While the original case was already one of the more high-profile examples of Apple’s market power being challenged through the justice system, the appeals case will bring additional scrutiny as now, the U.S. Department of Justice and the State of California have been granted time to present their own arguments to help explain the proper legal framework for evaluating the antitrust claims against Apple. Although the Justice Department’s arguments won’t technically support either side, it’s in the early stages of filing an antitrust suit against Apple — and the appeals court’s decision on the Epic Games case could ultimately shape its own ability to effectively prosecute Apple further down the road. The DoJ’s filing explained it had concerns over how the lower court had too narrowly interpreted parts of U.S. antitrust law — the Sherman Act — as well as other issues related to the lower court’s misunderstanding of the market and Apple’s monopoly power with regard to pricing, among other things. The appeals court docket is also filled with numerous amicus briefs disputing the original ruling. These include filings by noted Apple critics like Tile, Match, Basecamp, and the lobbying group the Coalition for App Fairness, as well as from other tech companies and game store operators, like Roblox and Microsoft, various consumer advocacy groups like the Electronic Frontier Foundation Consumer Federation of America, and others. In addition, 35 U.S. state attorneys-general have filed in support of Epic Games. Epic Games had originally sued Apple in 2020 after Apple banned the company’s Fortnite app for its implementation of a new payment mechanism that allowed it to bypass Apple’s in-app purchase framework. This laid the groundwork for the antitrust case — a fight that had been brewing for years. Despite the judge’s declaration that Apple was not acting as a monopolist, the Cupertino-based tech giant appealed the ruling because it lost ground in a key area regarding what sort of rules it can make for its App Store. In the original decision, a federal judge ruled that Apple could no longer prohibit developers from pointing to other means of payment outside of Apple’s own payment system. Apple was later granted a stay on the injunction that would have forced it to comply by December 9, 2021 by updating its App Store policies, due to the case being under appeal. Epic Games had also appealed the original ruling, having wanted a decision that would have allowed the company an alternative means of serving its iOS user base, like a third-party app store, sideloading or third-party payment systems. In the months since, Apple has been crusading against the dangers of sideloading, with top execs like CEO Tim Cook and head of software engineering Craig Federighi highlighting the security compromises that sideloading entails. (This is not only due to the pressure from Epic Games, however, but also because the EU’s Digital Markets Act could mandate the method.) Epic’s lawyer Tom Goldstein will kick off today’s proceedings with his oral arguments in the appeals case presented before judges Sidney R. Thomas, Milan D. Smith Jr. and Michael J. McShane, beginning at 2 PM PT/5 PM ET. The hearing will be live-streamed on YouTube.

Google to pay $391.5 million in location-tracking settlement with 40 states • ZebethMedia

By zebethcontrolPosted on November 14, 2022Posted in Google, Government & Policy, lawsuit, Privacy, settlementNo Comments

Google has agreed to a $391.5 million settlement with 40 state attorneys general over its location tracking practices. The settlement outlines that Google misled its users into thinking they had turned off location tracking even as the company continued to collect their location information. The investigation, which marks the largest attorney general-led consumer privacy settlement ever, was co-led by Oregon and Washington. “For years Google has prioritized profit over their users’ privacy,” said Oregon Attorney General Ellen Rosenblum in a news release. “They have been crafty and deceptive. Consumers thought they had turned off their location tracking features on Google, but the company continued to secretly record their movements and use that information for advertisers.” Google said in a statement that it has already addressed and corrected some of the location tracking practices detailed in the settlement. “Consistent with improvements we’ve made in recent years, we have settled this investigation which was based on outdated product policies that we changed years ago,” a spokesperson for Google told ZebethMedia in an email. As part of the settlement, Google has agreed to improve its location tracking disclosures and user controls starting next year. The settlement requires Google to show additional information to users whenever they turn a location-related account setting on or off. Key information about location tracking must also not be hidden going forward. In a blog post, Google outlined it will “provide a new control that allows users to easily turn off their Location History and Web & App Activity settings and delete their past data in one simple flow.” The company also plans to add additional disclosures to its Activity controls and Data & Privacy pages. Alongside these changes, Google is going to create a comprehensive information hub that highlights key location settings. In addition, Google plans to give users who are setting up new accounts a more detailed explanation of what Web & App Activity is and what information it includes. The company said it will continue deleting location history data for users who have not recently contributed new location history data to their account. “Until we have comprehensive privacy laws, companies will continue to compile large amounts of our personal data for marketing purposes with few controls,” Rosenblum said in the news release. The attorneys general opened the Google investigation after a 2018 Associated Press report found that the company recorded users’ movements even when they explicitly told it not to. The investigation found that Google violated state consumer protection laws by misleading consumers about its location tracking practices since at least 2014. Last month, Google agreed to pay the state of Arizona $85 million to settle a separate lawsuit that alleged the search giant deceived users by collecting location data without their consent. Google is also currently facing a lawsuit from Washington, DC, Texas, Washington state and Indiana. The lawsuit alleges that Google deceived users by collecting their location data even when they believed that kind of tracking was disabled.

Is Elon Musk’s Twitter about to fall out of the GDPR’s one-stop shop? • ZebethMedia

By zebethcontrolPosted on November 14, 2022Posted in Elon Musk, GDPR, Government & Policy, Privacy, Social, TwitterNo Comments

Helmed by erratic new owner Elon Musk, Twitter is no longer fulfilling key obligations required for it to claim Ireland as its so-called “main establishment” under the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), a source familiar with the matter has told ZebethMedia. Our source, who is well placed, requested and was granted anonymity owing to the sensitivity of the issue — which could have major ramifications for Twitter and for Musk. Like many major tech firms with customers across the European Union, Twitter currently avails itself of a mechanism in the GDPR known as the one-stop shop (OSS). This is beneficial because it allows the company to streamline regulatory administration by being able to engage exclusively with a lead data supervisor in the EU Member State where it is ‘main established’ (in Twitter’s case Ireland), rather than having to accept inbound from data protection authorities across the bloc. However, under Musk’s chaotic reign — which has already seen a fast and deep downsizing of Twitter’s headcount, kicking off with layoffs of 50% of staff earlier this month — questions are being asked over whether its main establishment status in Ireland for the GDPR still holds or not. The resignation late last week of key senior personnel responsible for ensuring security and privacy compliance looks like a canary in the coal-mine when it comes to Twitter’s regulatory situation — with CISO Lea Kissner; chief privacy officer Damien Kieran; and chief compliance officer Marianne Fogarty all walking out the door en masse. It’s not clear whether any adequately qualified individuals will be willing to step into these critical compliance roles for privacy and security at Twitter given the current Musk-driven craziness — since anyone signing up for that level of responsibility risks opening themselves up to personal liability should regulatory requirements be breached on their watch. As we reported Friday, Musk’s attorney and now head of legal at Twitter, Alex Spiro — who has reportedly been given a key role in the overhaul of the platform — emailing all staff on behalf of “Elon” to claim they face no personal liability will surely sound alarm bells at regulators over Twitter’s direction of travel. Last week, The Verge also reported on turmoil inside Twitter’s privacy and security function as standard review procedures were dispensed with and engineers were asked to “self certify” compliance with FTC rules. Its report also cited an unnamed company lawyer who it said had Slacked employees to warn them that changes to how Twitter operates is piling personal, professional and legal risk onto engineers instructed to implement Musk’s will regardless of consequences. Under the EU’s GDPR, meanwhile, Twitter is obliged — in just one very basic requirement — to have a data protection officer (DPO) to provide a contact point for regulators. Hence the departure of Kieran, its first and only DPO since the role was created at the company in 2018, has not gone unnoticed by its data protection watchdog in Ireland — as we also reported Friday. But the Irish Data Protection Commission (DPC)’s concerns are already spiralling wider than Twitter’s compliance with notifications about core personnel: Last week, the authority — currently Twitter’s lead EU DPA under the GDPR’s OSS — put the social media firm on watch by signalling public concern when it said it would be putting questions to the company about the status of its main establishment in Ireland at a meeting scheduled for early this week, to discuss all the recent privacy changes since the Musk takeover. Twitter has not commented publicly on the DPC’s warning nor on the departures of senior regulator-facing staffers. Indeed, since Musk took over, its communications department appears to have been dismantled and the company no longer responds to press requests for comment — so it was not possible to obtain an official statement from Twitter about these departures or on the substance of our report. (We’re happy to add a response if Twitter or Musk wants to send us one.) For Twitter’s business itself, there are a number of potential consequences in play if its ability to meet regulatory requirements falls. If the DPC assesses (or is informed by Musk) that it no longer has its main establishment in Ireland the company will crash out of the OSS — opening it up to being regulated by data protection authority across the bloc’s 27 Member States which would become competent to oversee its business. In practice, that means any EU data protection authority would be able to act directly on concerns it has that local users’ data is at risk — with the power to instigate their own investigations and take enforcement actions. So Ireland’s more business friendly regulator would no longer be leading the handling of any GDPR concerns about Twitter; probes could be simultaneously opened up all over the EU — including in Member States like France and Germany where data protection authorities have a reputation for being quicker to the punch (and/or more aggressive) in responding to complaints compared to Ireland. If Twitter loses its ability to claim main establishment in Ireland it would therefore drastically amp up the complexity, cost and risk of achieving GDPR compliance. (Reminder: Penalties under the regulation can scale up to 4% of annual global turnover — so these are not rules a normal CEO would ignore.) The GDPR does not set out specific criteria for assessing main establishment. But, in Twitter’s case — in order for it to be able to fulfil the regulation’s requirement of “effective and real exercise of management activities determining the main decisions as to the purposes and means of processing through stable arrangements” actually taking place locally, in Ireland, despite Twitter product development being led out of the US — we understand that the company devised a careful legal framework which was designed to empower an Irish entity to be the data controller for EU users by ensuring that this Ireland-located Twitter company, which has its own board of directors subject to

Amazon launches ‘Sports Talk’ on Prime Video to give sports fans 12 hours of live daily content • ZebethMedia

By zebethcontrolPosted on November 14, 2022Posted in Amazon Prime Video, Live Sports, Media & Entertainment, prime video, streaming serviceNo Comments

Today, Amazon Prime Video announced the launch of “Sports Talk,” a live daily programming block dedicated to 12 hours of sports-talk content. Broadcasting Monday through Friday from 8 a.m.-8 p.m. ET on Prime Video, viewers in the U.S. can access seven new shows on Sports Talk without a Prime membership. It will also be available on Amazon’s free, ad-supported streaming TV service, Freevee, and Amazon’s live radio app, Amp. Amazon partnered with production company Embassy Row to bring a programming block that can be an “‘always on’ sports destination for customers,” the company wrote in its announcement. The new shows include “Bonjour Sports Talk,” which is hosted by sports broadcasters Madelyn Burke and Ben Lyons, plus a guest host that rotates weekly; “The Cari Champion Show,” with former ESPN anchor Cari Champion; “Game Breakers,” with writers and comedians Eitan Levine and Drexton Clemons; “From the Desk of Master T,” with Bleacher Report’s Master Tesfatsion; and “The Power Hour,” with commentator and former tennis player Rennae Stubbs. There will also be “The Greatest Hour of All Time,” a re-airing of the best hour of the programming from the day, and “The Backup Plan,” with hosts Hana Ostapchuk and Jason Spells catching viewers up to speed with the highlights. The entire 12-hour programming block will re-air every day from 8 p.m. to 8 a.m. ET. Episodes from the previous week will air throughout the weekend. As Amazon tries to position itself as the go-to source for streaming live sports, the new shows will join the thousands of live sports events that air annually on Prime Video, including “Thursday Night Football,” which premiered its first exclusive game in September with 15.3 million viewers. The streaming service also introduced a new interface in July that included a dedicated sports tab for live sports, replays and highlights.

Meeting camera startup Owl Labs lands $25M and partnership with HP • ZebethMedia

By zebethcontrolPosted on November 14, 2022Posted in Enterprise, funding, HP, Matrix Partners, playground global, Robotics & AI, Spark Capital, startup, StartupsNo Comments

Owl Labs, a startup developing a linuep AI-powered meeting hardware, today announced that it raised $25 million in a Series C round led by HP Tech Ventures (HP’s venture capital arm) with participation from Sourcenext, Matrix Partners, Spark Capital and Playground Global. The closing of the tranche marks the start of a strategic partnership with HP, Owl Labs CEO Frank Weishaupt says, which will see HP invest in Owl Labs’ various product offerings while providing sales coverage and outreach with enterprise customers. HP, notably, recently acquired Poly, which developed a range of video and voice devices and software for virtual conferencing. Weishaupt sees no conflict, arguing that Poly’s products are complementary with Owl Labs’ and show “HP’s commitment to transforming the workplace to a hybrid model.” “The funding will allow Owl Labs to continue its accelerated growth … Owl Labs will use the investment to support product development and increase global adoption of the company’s products, including the [Owl Labs’] product line,” Weishaupt told ZebethMedia in an email interview. “The funding will also be used to expand Owl Labs’ global footprint and deepen go-to-market partnerships starting with a commercial agreement between Owl Labs and HP France, where HP will sell Owl Labs’ products through their local sales team.” Owl Labs was founded by Mark Schnittman and Max Makeev in 2014, who sought to develop a better videoconferencing experience than cameras at the time could achieve. (Weishaupt, a former CarGurus exec, joined Owl Labs as CEO in early 2019.) Drawing on their work at iRobot, the Schnittman and Schnittman created Owl Labs’ first product, the auto-swiveling Meeting Owl Pro, after testing the concept by putting a laptop on a spinning stool. Today, Owl Labs sells several products, including a dedicated whiteboard camera, meeting room control console and its latest-generation meeting camera, the Meeting Owl 3. The Meeting Owl 3 features a mic and speaker array paired with a 360-degree camera, which zooms in on whoever’s speaking. There’s countless “intelligent” meeting cameras on the market, including from heavy hitters like Microsoft and Google. But Weishaupt makes the case that Owl Labs’ software is a differentiator. Called the Owl Intelligence System, it allows customers to connect up to two Meeting Owls to expand their video and audio range and add facial recognition including for masked faces. “Meeting Owl 3 is the only 360-degree videoconferencing device on the market that can be connected to others to expand reach in larger spaces,” Weishaupt said. ” Owl Labs’ technology learns the space to create a more seamless experience, getting smarter over time.” Owl Labs got caught in a negative press cycle earlier this year when a security firm, Modzero, uncovered vulnerabilities in several models of the Meeting Owl and whiteboard camera that attackers could’ve exploit to obtain sensitive data. Owl Labs patched the exploit, which doesn’t appear to have majorly dented sales — Weishaupt says that over 130,000 organizations are using Owl Labs products including 84 Fortune 100 companies. “We can share that we’ve had a solid growth trajectory with more than 3x revenue growth year-over-year and 7x revenue growth since the pandemic began,” Weishaupt said, declining to share more precise revenue figures. “Owl Labs became the first company to build AI-powered, 360-degree video conferencing solutions for hybrid organizations. Owl Labs as a company was hybrid pre-pandemic and are experts at using technology to bridge the gap between remote and in-person work environments.” To date, Boston-based, over-100-employee Owl Labs has raised $47 million in funding.

Binance’s CEO isn’t sweating the FTX implosion • ZebethMedia

By zebethcontrolPosted on November 14, 2022Posted in Binance, Crypto, EC Cryptocurrency, EC News Analysis, FTX Bankruptcy, ftx binance, StartupsNo Comments

The crypto market is trying to pick up the pieces after it was thrown into massive disarray last week when the previously third-largest crypto exchange, FTX, imploded and filed for bankruptcy. “It’s obvious that people are jittery, interested and somewhat nervous about what’s happening in the industry,” Changpeng ‘CZ’ Zhao, CEO of the largest crypto exchange Binance, said during a Twitter Space on Monday. “I want to say, short-term it is painful. But, I think this is good for the industry long-term.” Zhao acknowledged that a lot of people lost money recently and many still have money stuck with FTX, so “there will be pain.” But he hinted that market conditions should improve down the line. “The industry is not going away and the other strong industry players are now even stronger,” he said. Last week, a number of crypto exchanges, including Binance, Crypto.com, KuCoin and OKX said they would begin publishing proof-of-reserves in an effort to reassure customers and investors that their funds are safe in the wake of the FTX debacle. Last week, Zhao emphasized the importance of transparency, tweeting, “All crypto exchanges should do merkle-tree proof-of-reserves.” Proof-of-reserves (PoR) are independent audits by third parties that aim to provide transparency and evidence that a custodian holds the assets it claims to own on behalf of its clients. These exchanges join other crypto businesses like Gemini, BitGo, and Paxos, to name a few, which have used PoR for many years to prove billions of dollars in value, Sergey Nazarov, co-founder of Chainlink, told ZebethMedia on Friday. “Now we’re increasing transparency in the industry, we’re increasing security in the industry, and we’re increasing communications with regulators all around the world,” Zhao said today. “I think five years later, when we look back at this, the industry will be stronger.”