Prince Andrew, The Duke of York, is to completely step down from his role as head of the Pitch@Palace initiative he set up at Buckingham Palace to showcase entrepreneurs, and the operation will be relaunched as ‘Pitch’ without any royal involvement, according to a well-placed source. Despite indications on Thursday that the Duke had decided…
Netgear has released the first updated Canvas digital art from from Meural since acquiring the company last September, and the next-generation connected frame comes with some decent quality-of-life improvements as well as a new, additional size. It’s not a dramatic change from the original Meural Canvas, but it means that a product that was already…
Prolific startup accelerator Y Combinator has abandoned plans to establish a branch of the program in China. The company cites a general change in strategy, but a deafening silence on the complexity and controversy of working with China right now suggests there’s more at play. In a short blog post, YC leadership explained that “as…
Tim Hsia & Neil Devani Contributor More posts by this contributor The first hires are the hardest Getting press for your startup: the true role of communications Welcome to this edition of The Operators, a recurring Extra Crunch column, podcast, and YouTube show that brings you insights and information from inside top tech companies. Our…
We’re excited to announce a new Extra Crunch community perk from Aircall. Starting today, annual and two-year Extra Crunch members that are new to Aircall and located within the U.S. or Canada can receive two months of free service on an annual Aircall contract. Aircall is a cloud-based phone system that can help satisfy the…
The Daily Crunch is TechCrunch’s roundup of our biggest and most important stories. If you’d like to get this delivered to your inbox every day at around 9am Pacific, you can subscribe here. 1. Spotify’s free music service will now stream on Alexa devices, plus Bose and Sonos smart speakers Spotify has worked with Amazon…
Sonos revealed during its quarterly earnings report that it has acquired voice assistant startup Snips in a $37 million cash deal, Variety reported on Wednesday. Snips, which had been developing dedicated smart device assistants that can operate primarily locally, instead of relying on consistently round-tripping voice data to the cloud, could help Sonos set up…
After a year of testing out environmental technologies for a private company, co-founder Patricia Ayma developed a process for bioplastic production using bacteria. The system turns organic matter, such as food waste, into a product that can be used as a biodegradable alternative to single-use plastics. “I realized that it was a simple technology for…
We’re ramping up the number of guest posts we publish on Extra Crunch so we can expand our coverage of fundraising, growth, hiring and emerging technology trends. This change is a direct response to our readers; many subscribers have been requesting additional how-to articles, and we hear you. We also want to help recurring columnists…
Volkswagen revealed Tuesday evening a new concept vehicle called the ID Space Vizzion, and despite the crazy Frank Zappaesque name, this one might actually make it into production in Europe and North America. The ID Space Vizzion is the seventh concept that VW has introduced since 2016 that uses its MEB platform, a flexible modular system —…
