EU gov’t and public health sites lousy with adtech, study finds

A study of tracking cookies running on government and public sector health websites in the European Union has found commercial adtech to be operating pervasively even in what should be core not-for-profit corners of the Internet. The researchers used searches including queries related to HIV, mental health, pregnancy, alcoholism and cancer to examine how frequently […]

View More EU gov’t and public health sites lousy with adtech, study finds

Meet eFounders’ next batch of startups that want to redefine the future of work

European startup studio eFounders has been relentlessly building new startups over the past few years. In 2019, the company plans to launch Bonjour, a demo tool for sales teams, Chilli, a recommandation service to help small and medium companies leverage modern software-as-a-service products, and Swan, a banking API to generate banking services on demand. If […]

View More Meet eFounders’ next batch of startups that want to redefine the future of work

KashFlow founder Duane Jackson has launched Staffology, a payroll SaaS and API

We already knew that serial entrepreneur Duane Jackson, who is best known for founding and exiting cloud accounting software KlashFlow, was working on his third venture after recently selling Supdate to Crowdcube. And today Staffology, which Jackson tells me he began developing just over a year ago, is launching publicly. Dubbed Staffology Payroll, the U.K. […]

View More KashFlow founder Duane Jackson has launched Staffology, a payroll SaaS and API

Big data AI startup Noble.AI raises a second seed round from a chemical giant

Noble.AI, an SF/French AI company that claims to accelerate decision making in R&D, has raised a new round of funding from Solvay Ventures, the VC arm of a large chemical company, Solvay SA. Although the round was undisclosed, TechCrunch understands it to be second seed round and we know the company has closed a total […]

View More Big data AI startup Noble.AI raises a second seed round from a chemical giant

Apple addresses Spotify’s claims, but not its demands

Two days after Spotify announced that it had filed a suit against Apple with the European Commission over anticompetitive practices, Apple today issued its own response of sorts. In a lengthy statement on its site called “Addressing Spotify’s Claims”, Apple walks through and dismantles some of the key parts of Spotify’s accusations about how the App Store […]

View More Apple addresses Spotify’s claims, but not its demands

This robot can park your car for you

French startup Stanley Robotics showed off its self-driving parking robot at Lyon-Saint-Exupéry airport today. While I couldn’t be there in person, the service is going live by the end of March 2019. And here’s what it looks like. The startup has been working on a robot called Stan. These giant robots can literally pick up […]

View More This robot can park your car for you

London proptech startup Nested has laid off 20% of its workforce citing ‘Brexit uncertainty’

Nested, the London-based “data-driven” estate agency that provides a cash advance to help you buy a new home before you’ve sold your old one, has laid off 20 percent of its workforce, TechCrunch has learned. According to sources, the more than 15 staff being let go were informed earlier today. The majority of departures are […]

View More London proptech startup Nested has laid off 20% of its workforce citing ‘Brexit uncertainty’

UK asks competition watchdog to put adtech market review top of its to-do list

The UK government has written to the country’s competition authority to ask the watchdog to respond to concerns about the lack of transparency in the digital advertising market and carry out a formal market study “as soon as possible”. In a letter to the Competition and Markets Authority, chancellor Philip Hammond writes that the online […]

View More UK asks competition watchdog to put adtech market review top of its to-do list

Telegram gets 3M new signups during Facebook apps’ outage

Messaging platform Telegram claims to have had a surge in signups during a period of downtime for Facebook’s rival messaging services. In a message sent to his Telegram channel, founder Pavel Durov’s just wrote: “I see 3 million new users signed up for Telegram within the last 24 hours.” It’s probably not a coincidence that […]

View More Telegram gets 3M new signups during Facebook apps’ outage

Rakuten TV expands to 42 European countries, gets direct button on Samsung, LG, Philips and Hisense remotes

Rakuten TV, the Japanese e-commerce giant’s effort to take on Netflix and Amazon in the world of video streaming, has been something of a minor player when it comes to market share for online entertainment. Today, it’s unveiling two key pieces of news that it hopes will help reverse that. The company is adding 30 […]

View More Rakuten TV expands to 42 European countries, gets direct button on Samsung, LG, Philips and Hisense remotes

Breedr raises £2M led by LocalGlobe for its livestock data and trading platform

Breedr, a U.K. startup that wants to help farmers make better use of their livestock data to improve profitability, has raised £2.2 million in funding. The seed round is led by London-based LocalGlobe, with participation from Mons Investment and a number of angel investors. They include Ian Hogarth, Darren Shapland, and Jonathan McKay. The company […]

View More Breedr raises £2M led by LocalGlobe for its livestock data and trading platform

Google has quietly added DuckDuckGo as a search engine option for Chrome users in ~60 markets

In an update to the chromium engine, which underpins Google’s popular Chrome browser, the search giant has quietly updated the lists of default search engines it offers per market — expanding the choice of search product users can pick from in markets around the world. Most notably it’s expanded search engine lists to include pro-privacy […]

View More Google has quietly added DuckDuckGo as a search engine option for Chrome users in ~60 markets