Fast-growing launch provider Rocket Lab is launching its second orbital payload of the year late tonight by our reckoning, early in the evening at the launch site in New Zealand. It will carry three experimental satellites to low Earth orbit, and you can watch it live. The launch is Rocket Lab’s fifth orbital mission, and…
Way back in 2013, Apple spent a whopping $578 million on sapphire glass. The sum, spread out over four installments, was an advance to GT Advanced Technologies. Already in use on the company’s home buttons and camera, the plan was to implement the extremely hard material on a larger scale, replacing Gorilla Glass in the…
YouTube Chief Business Officer Robert Kyncl reaffirmed the company’s plans to take its Originals out from behind the paywall, making them free and ad-supported. Kyncl was speaking at YouTube’s annual Brandcast event, where the Google-owned company lays out its plans for advertisers (with lots of razzle dazzle provided by musicians and YouTube stars). Since last…
Bradley Tusk’s story is well-known by now. A political operative who managed Michael Bloomberg’s successful third mayoral campaign, Tusk soon turned a bonus from his powerful boss into an opportunity that most people can only dream about. He launched his own business to help clients navigate turbulent regulatory waters, and one of his first calls…
Extra Crunch offers members the opportunity to tune into conference calls led and moderated by the TechCrunch writers you read every day. This week, TechCrunch’s Josh Constine and Frederic Lardinois discuss major announcements that came out of Facebook’s F8 conference and dig into how Facebook is trying to redefine itself for the future. Though touted…
In the two years since GrainChain launched its distributed ledger-based transaction platform for bulk dry goods the company has brokered thousands of contracts on everything from corn, sorghum, wheat, and soybeans to even sand from its headquarters in McAllen, Tex. Now the company is expanding its services to Mexico, partnering with the government of Tamaulipas,…
LG was once a stalwart of the smartphone industry — remember its collaboration with Facebook back in the day? — but today the company is swiftly descending into irrelevance. The latest proof is LG’s Q1 financials, released this week, which show that its mobile division grossed just KRW 1.51 trillion ($1.34 billion) in sales for…
In Facebook’s dreams, it’s a clean and private place. People spend their time having thoughtful discussions in “meaningful” Groups, planning offline meetups with Events, or laughing together in a Facebook Watch party. In reality, Facebook is a cluttered mess of features that seem to constantly leak user data. People waste their time viewing inane News…
The 11th mission for Blue Origin’s New Shepard suborbital launch vehicle is slated for takeoff Tuesday morning. The craft will be carrying 38 (!) experimental payloads from NASA, students, and research organizations around the world. You’ll be able to watch the launch live tomorrow at about 6 AM Pacific time. New Shepard, though a very…
India’s trucking system has a big inefficiency problem that continues to drag the economy. BlackBuck, one of the handful logistics startups that is trying to overhaul this system, just raised $150 million in Series D round to further pursue its mission. The new round was led by Goldman Sachs Investment Partners and Accel at a…
