Fintech leader cuts internal valuation by 28%

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Oh hey, and welcome to Thursday! It has been another intense day with a lot of news happening. We have picked the cream for you. Oh! And if you want to be a part of Disrupt with your startup, don’t forget to apply for Startup Battlefield 200!

On July 21, we have an incredible selection for our TC Robotics event – and something is wrong with people who work with marketing, because they decided to make the event free. Get your ticket today in case they change their minds … – Christine and Haje

TechCrunch Top 3

• In the air tonight: Brian gives us an insight into the new Apple MacBook Air M2. Let the pros and cons begin!

• Lose a few stripes: Anita, Natasha M and Mary Ann joined forces to tackle Stripe’s news that it is the latest that has cut its internal valuation. For those who are like “What?” they explain that this means that the pricing of preference shares sold is chosen by a third party versus startups or venture capital investors. It is also interesting that this is unusual for a company to do.

• Into the glass: We enjoyed Dominic-Madoriits deep dive into TechCrunch + in some predictions of what Black VCs and founders can expect from the investment community in the second half of this year.

  

  Photo credit: Yuichiro Chino / Getty Images

Startups and VC

“We could have taken money from cryptocurrencies, but it’s stronger to take it from the gaming industry and believers,” said Raz Friedman, co-founder of UnCaged. Jacquelyn in a $ 24 million company fundraising interview. “We are primarily a gaming company that uses and brings web3 into gaming, rather than being a web3-first company.”

“We envision You.com becoming a search platform that is open and allows others to build on top of all the search technology we have created,” said Richard Socher Kyle for his $ 25 million story about You’s fundraiser. “Data transparency, customization, summary, privacy and state-of-the-art search are the foundation of our platform, and we beat Google in the long run by giving the world the opportunity to build the next search experience together.”

The story continues

🎶 More, more, give me more (for a fantastic melody).

• And how does it make you feel, | * FNAME * |: Therapist chatbots continue to grow in popularity, and Wysa raised $ 20 million to expand its services further, as Jagmeet reports.

• A star, would buy for mortal enemy: Customer reviews are a well-known and powerful way to influence customers. Okendo wants to turn your customers into buyers by leveraging them, Christine reports.

• AI caramba: AssemblyAI expands its AI-as-a-service business, raising $ 30 million in a Series B round, reports Kyle.

• Is this seat occupied?: The world is turning to hybrid work, and offices are scratching their heads to figure out how to allocate office space to reflect that. Robin raised $ 30 million for the office reservation software to find out. Kyle reports.

• Do you actually lift weights: Start-up Tonal Training Home – most recently valued at $ 1.6 billion – threw over a third of its employees to help it become a “self-sustaining and profitable business.” Natasha M reports.

Five investors explain why Latin America is ready to make it through the crypto winter

Photo credit: gece33 (opens in new window) / Getty Images

Even as a group of crypto companies continue their catastrophic collapse, “investors supporting DeFi startups in Latin America are positioning themselves for a rebound,” reports Anna Heim.

She surveyed five investors who have invested in companies in the region’s crypto and DeFi sector to learn more about how their ethos has changed since the winter began and why consumer adoption in LatAm is stronger than other markets:

• Matias Nisenson, co-founder, DeFi Wonderland

• Christine Chang, Head of Business Development and Ventures, Tribal

• Patricio Jutard, co-founder and general partner, Newtopia VC

• Claire Diaz-Ortiz, Chair of the Startup Committee, VC3; scout, Little Perkins

• Andy Areitio, general partner, TheVentureCity

(TechCrunch + is our membership program, which helps founders and startup teams move forward. You can register here.)

Big Tech Inc.

Before we dive into today’s great technology stories, we wanted to point out some stories from late yesterday that have continued to catch our attention another day.

The first is Kirstenits report that answers the question of whether Tesla’s top AI chief for the Autopilot vision team will return. We can now confirm that it is negative. For all DoorDash lovers out there in the US, the subtotal minimum is likely to increase in your area, Rebecca write. Meanwhile, Sarah leans into a report that TikTok has passed YouTube as the place where all children and teenagers spend their time. And Rebecca also covered how Uber is being sued by over 550 women over allegations of sexual assault by drivers.

Okay, now on to the show. Our colleagues did so well for a second day that there is a lot to dig into. Now you already know that Twitter went down this morning for users all over the world, Amanda reports. Alex was not entertained. During the chaos, Twitter began testing some new features. Amanda also wrote that users were reminded to add alt text descriptions for photos, while Ivan described its new custom timeline test.

In financial news, Kyle Plaid reports that add read-only support for cryptocurrency exchanges. Finally, Manish covered the Internet and Mobile Association of India, a technology advocate group that decided to drop cryptocurrency due to regulatory uncertainty.

• So you want to play a game?: Revenue from non-gaming apps beat games in the US Apple App Store for the first time, Sarah reports. Meanwhile, Lauren writes about Nintendo’s new acquisition in the CG animation area and Sony’s new loyalty program for PlayStation.

• Plugged in: Panasonic Launches a $ 4 Billion Battery Factory for Electric Vehicles in Kansas Jaclyn Writing can be the greatest in the world. The commercial electric car company Arrival makes some tough financial and workforce decisions, if you know what we mean, to reach the van product goal, Kirsten reports. Kirsten also reports that the ink on Walmart’s deal with Canoo is barely dry, and Rebecca writes about one of the warnings – that it does not want Canoo to sell electric cars to Amazon.

• Brrrr, it’s cold here: In another hit for cryptocurrency, one of the sector’s largest lenders, Celsius, filed for bankruptcy, claiming the need to stabilize the business. Manish have more.

• Trust, more like antitrust: Natasha L has a few compelling stories today. One is that Google is facing a new antitrust inquiry in Italy over a claim that the search engine giant may have “abused a dominant position by obstructing data portability rights granted to individuals under the EU General Data Protection Regulation”. The second is about how Amazon is in talks with the EU to try to decide its antitrust investigation into the use of merchant data.