We’re in the second day of the Google I/O developer conference in San Francisco, and I’ll be liveblogging today’s keynote. Yesterday we saw an amazing (if mostly for non-technical reasons) demo of Google Glass, the unveiling of Android 4.1 Jelly Bean, the new Nexus 7 tablet, and more. → Read More
We’ve heard previous reports that North Korea was building their own PCs, but a more recent report out of the South Korean Dong-a Ilbo newspaper suggests that a tablet may also be in the works.
It’s unclear whether or not the tablet was made in North Korea or in China, though previous reports of a North Korean tablet demoed at the Pyongyang International Trade Fair were said to be developed at the Korea Computer Center. Then again, the national media has also said their computers were “designed and developed purely using [their] own expertise,” though a little digging proved otherwise. → Read More
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CoFoundersLab, a matching-making service for startup founders along the same lines as FounderDating, but which previously served different markets, is expanding through the acquisition of two competitors. The company is announcing today that it has acquired the West Coast-based TechCofounder.com as well as the East Coast-based FounderMatchup.com.
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SendHub, the messaging startup that allows businesses to communicate with customers through SMS, is expanding its service today to now include support for voice calls and voicemail. These new features put SendHub in more direct competition with Google Voice, as users will now be able to use their SendHub phone number to both make and receive phones calls, while keeping their personal cell number private. Although the company only has an iPhone application and online service currently, these voice calls can be initiated and received on any device that supports messaging – even on feature phones.
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Video startup Blip has spent the last several years helping independent creators to distribute and monetize their videos across the web. But like YouTube, Netflix, Hulu, Amazon, and others, it sees a great opportunity to produce some original content of its own. With that in mind, it’s introducing Blip Studios, a production banner that will launch with three exclusive distribution deals.
Blip Studios will work directly with web video producers to help produce high-quality original series, which Blip will then distribute through various distribution platforms. The new studio venture will be focused specifically on helping its content partners increase the production value of their shows, and also provide them with assistance around audience development and distribution. In addition, the company is looking to increase monetization of these shows by interfacing with brands around sponsorships and branded content. → Read More
It’s been a surprisingly busy week for Android browser makers — a redesigned version of Firefox for Android graduated from beta, as did Google’s mobile version of Chrome, and now the folks behind Dolphin have just announced their new Dolphin Garage program to spur third-party development for the platform.
And how are they actually doing this? By opening up access to nearly 150 APIs that allow developers greater access to the browser’s UI as well as the URLs, browsing histories, and data from the website currently being viewed. → Read More
Amazon is said to be working on the next version of the Kindle Fire with more premium materials, including some type of metal casing. But perhaps even better (depending on your size preferences), the long-standing rumor that Amazon is allegedly working on a 10-inch tablet have resurfaced.
BGR reports that “Amazon is finally ready to move forward with the [10-inch] tablet.” General rumors include a quad-core processor and a higher quality screen than the original fire, along with the obvious size bump. But the original 7-inch Fire is also due for a revamp, and the same source reports a “chrome-look rib” in the brand new metal casing on the devices back (which will replace the plastic soft-touch shell on first-gen models), and a thinner profile. → Read More
Google Now, the smart personal search assistant announced yesterday at Google I/O, has now come online. Well, the landing page for the service has come online, that is. The new site introduces the key aspects to Google Now, which arrives in Google’s next mobile operating system, Android 4.1 (aka Jelly Bean), including its ability to track flights, keep an eye on traffic and your calendar, check sports scores and weather, see suggested places nearby, and more.
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The reinvigorated competition in the browser market over the last few years has definitely been a boon for users, but having a number of browsers with very high user numbers makes life a bit harder for developers who want to write extensions. Crossrider, which is coming out of beta today, aims to make things a bit easier for developers. The service offers a cross-platform development platform for Chrome, Firefox, Internet Explorer and Safari. → Read More
Extole is announcing a new version of its marketing platform today. The big new feature: “Social expressions” that integrate with the Facebook Open Graph.
Founder and CEO Brad Klaus says that the new stuff, in particular, taps into a larger marketing trend, where brands are finding new ways to communicate with consumers: “The landscape is shifting from brand-to-consumer to consumer-to-consumer.” That means that the most effective form of promotion isn’t traditional advertising or its online equivalent, but instead turning fans into advocates for the company. → Read More
Scott Cook started Intuit in 1983, and since then he and the company have overcome quite a few obstacles. He watched as mobile became a dominant channel in people’s lives, found ways to penetrate emerging markets, and leveraged Intuit’s excellent reputation to pick up the hot new kid on the block, Mint.com.
The acquisition went down in 2009, two years after Mint launched on the TechCrunch 40 stage. Cook says that by taking its rival and nurturing it under Intuit’s (much larger) wing, Mint has grown to be four times larger than it was at the time of acquisition. This is a classic case of two competitors coming together in a mutually beneficial way. Intuit provides an excellent distribution platform for Mint, and in turn, Mint pushes users into Intuit’s portfolio of various financial tools, including TurboTax. → Read More
AOL (also known as the company that signs TechCrunch’s paychecks) has announced this morning it has started a “Dutch auction” tender offer to buy back shares of its common stock, up to $400 million. The Dutch auction format means that shareholders will say how many shares they want to sell at what price. AOL will then determine the lowest price per share in that range and buy the amount it wants. Shareholders will be able to tender some or all of their shares at price within a $27 to $30 per share, the company says.
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Last week, Facebook staked out its claim as a prime destination for people looking for this summer’s Olympics coverage online. Today, the BBC threw its hat into the social media ring, too — it’s putting its sports coverage into a new Timeline app. The app, which is only accessible by UK users, is in beta form (pictured here) and live already: people can currently access streams of Wimbledon. That will get ramped up in coming weeks for Olympics coverage, when it will offer some of the most comprehensive coverage yet seen on the social network — 24 streams in all — and marks the first time that the BBC will stream live events using Facebook.
The move comes at a time when the BBC is ramping up its digital activities in long-view bid that this will need to become a much stronger part of its business as more traditional revenue streams continue to decline.
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MuckerLab, the up and coming L.A.-based startup accelerator program, today announced that it is partnering with Mozilla’s WebFWD accelerator to create a joint acceleration program for open source entrepreneurs. The new six-month program will include three months at MuckerLabs and access to Mozilla’s global network, infrastructure and other resources. The program is especially looking for L.A.-based entrepreneurs and hopes to give a boost to L.A.’s tech ecosystem. The joint MuckerLab-Mozilla program is especially looking for projects and companies which extend the Web and its “openness.” Given Mozilla’s involvement, there will also be a focus on web-based apps and services. → Read More
It was 40 years ago yesterday that Atari’s Nolan Bushnell taught the world to play. Bushnell, an engineer and game programmer, built and sold Atari in the late 1970s, ushering in the era of the video game and changing the way kids spent nice summer days. Atari is 40 years old this month and there have been a number of interviews and encomiums with Bushnell.
Bushnell installed his first game, Pong, at Andy Capp’s bar in Silicon Valley where drinkers lined up to drop quarters into the first bit of video entertainment. The company roared through the 1970s and then petered out in the early 80s as competitors created more interesting and visually complex systems and games.
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Finding potential job candidates through existing employees and their networks is probably as old as the labor market itself, but in the age of social networking, the process can be made much more efficient. Add in a little gamification and other incentives, and things get really interesting.
To that end, social recruiting startup, Zao, has raised its first funding round: $1.3 million led by Oren Zeev, Founding Partner at Orens Capital and former General Partner at Apax Partners. Zeev, who will take a seat on Zao’s Board, was also one of the original investors in Audible, which exited to Amazon for $300m. Other notable investments include Infolinks, Duda Mobile, and Houzz. → Read More
“To be honest, it was awful”, says ShareMyPlaylists founder Kieron Donoghue on the company’s previous Android effort, which today gets a much needed reboot.
The new app brings many of the Spotify community site’s best features to Google’s platform, such as its editorally-picked ‘Featured Playlists’ as well as the ‘Top 50 Playlist Charts’. Although be warned: Android users need a premium Spotify account to join the fun.
Launched in 2009, ShareMyPlaylists.com claims to be the largest and oldest Spotify community site (it certainly feels like I’ve been covering the company for a very long time) and has published over 95,000 playlists for its users worldwide, while the site generates 15,000 playlists plays per-day and has over 300 new playlists uploaded daily. → Read More
Practice Fusion is the frontrunner in the fevered race to become the electronic medical record platform, and today it finished raising a $34 million Series C led by hedge fund Artis Ventures to make sure it wins and lead it towards an IPO. Practice Fusion’s valuation is now around a half a billion dollars, it tells me. Startups trying to compete? “We’re squashing them” founder and CEO Ryan Howard tells me. It now hosts 40 million patient records of its 150,000 doctor clients, up from 25 million records and 130,000 doctors seven months ago.
The money will fund a patient acquisition strategy, the build-out of its app platform, hires, and attracting more docs to ditch pen and paper for more efficient, accessible electronic records. Howard beams ”We’re excited to light it up. The company’s on fire, growth is maddening. The problem needs to be solved.” → Read More
Eric van der Kleij is to depart his post as CEO of the UK’s Tech City Investment Organisation (TCIO) after his two year contract comes to an end this Summer. The TCIO was set up by the UK government to promote East London’s pre-existing cluster of technology startups and is just one of hundreds of similar initiatives around the world where a city is promoted as a ‘tech city’. It’s a natural course to take, given that tech is one of the few economic areas growing during a downturn in developed economies. Even tech-obsessed San Francisco itself is thinking that way.
A TCIO spokesperson told us it plans to advertise the positions “in the next couple of weeks”. Mr. van der Kleij will go part-time from the end of July and steps down formally in September. In a statement he said: “The TCIO work has been some of the most exciting I have ever done, and I promise to let you know what I am up to as soon as I can.”
TCIO now plans to split his role into two, a CEO and a Deputy CEO. Both positions have yet to be filled. The CEO will be external-facing, promoting the East London hub, while their Deputy will organise events and promote the tech community on the ground in London. Sources told us Mr. van der Kleij had been too stretched trying to fulfil both roles. → Read More
DogVacay launched in March this year as an Airbnb for dogs — offering owners an alternative to soul-less kennels and expensive dog sitting services for when they need to leave town and leave their pooches behind. Since then, the service has picked up some traction with users tripling every month since launch, and to continue its growth, it’s adding another VC to its list of backers. Andreessen Horowitz, which also backs Airbnb, has signed on to DogVacay’s seed round at an undisclosed amount, joining existing investors First Round Capital, Science, Baroda, and Quest, which had put $1 million into the company.
Although the service first started as a basic dog-boarding alternative, with much of its use developing by word-of-mouth, over the last couple of months, Aaron Hirschhorn, co-founder and CEO of DogVacay, says that it’s also been offering an ad-hoc concierge service covering a lot of other functions, including dog walking and daycare for people who work all day. Part of the funding will be used to make that into a more formal offering, as well as being some proper marketing for the service as DogVacay rolls out nationally — or “spreading the woof,” as Hirschhorn likes to say, to those 72.9 million households in the U.S. that own a pet.
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