Tag: TechCrunch

TechInnovation. Egyptian fintech MNT-Halan lands $120M from Apis Partners, DisrupTech and others (Tage Kene-Okafor, TechCrunch)

Image Credits: MNT-Halan Over 70% of Egypt’s young and fast-growing population of over 100 million is financially underserved despite mobile penetration exceeding 90%. Traditional banks often overlook...

TechInnovation. PayPal acquires Japan’s Paidy for $2.7B to crack the buy-now, pay-later market in Asia (Kate Park, TechCrunch)

Image Credits: Yichuan Cao/ NurPhoto / Getty Images PayPal Holdings, the U.S. fintech company, announced an acquisition of Paidy, a Japanese buy now, pay later (BNPL) service platform, for approximately $2.7...

TechInnovation. Nigeria’s Prospa gets $3.8M pre-seed to offer small businesses banking and software services (Tage Kene-Okafor, TechCrunch)

Image Credits: Prospa In Nigeria, there are more than 40 million micro-businesses underserved in some form or another regarding banking services. Although some of these businesses have registered bank...

TechInnovation. Owl Ventures and Harvard Management Company back India’s study abroad platform Leap in $55 million round (Manish Singh, TechCrunch)

Image Credits: Dhiraj Singh / Bloomberg / Getty Images Leap, a two-year-old startup with headquarters in San Francisco and Bangalore that is helping students in India find the...

TechInnovation. Talking shop with Twitter’s recent head of corp dev — and now VC — Seksom Suriyapa (Connie Loizos, TechCrunch)

Seksom Suriyapa was seemingly destined to land at a venture firm. A Stanford Law graduate, he worked at two blue-chip investment banks before joining...

TechInnovation. Rivian’s electric R1T pickup truck, R1S SUV get their official EPA ranges (Kirsten Korosec, TechCrunch)

Image Credits: Kirsten Korosec Rivian announced Friday that the first edition version of its all-electric R1T pickup truck has an official EPA range of 314 miles,...

TechInnovation. NYC-based insurance underwriting platform Kalepa raises $14M Series A led by Inspired Capital (Mike Butcher, TechCrunch)

Image Credits: Kalepa founders / AP Kalepa, an insurance underwriting platform based out of New York, has raised a $14 million Series A funding round led by Inspired...

TechInnovation. Instagram may not be a photo-sharing app anymore, but Glass is (Amanda Silberling, TechCrunch)

Image Credits: Glass Instagram made headlines (including this one) when product head Adam Mosseri said in June that the app is “no longer just a square photo-sharing app,”...

TechInnovation. Playbyte’s new app aims to become the ‘TikTok for games’ (Sarah Perez, TechCrunch)

Image Credits: Playbyte A startup called Playbyte wants to become the TikTok for games. The company’s newly launched iOS app offers tools that allow users to make and share simple...

TechInnovation. Australia’s TechnologyOne acquires UK-based higher-ed platform Scientia for $16.6M (Mike Butcher, TechCrunch)

Image Credits: Getty Images TechnologyOne, an Australian SaaS enterprise, has agreed to acquire UK-based higher education software provider Scientia for £12 million /$16.6 million in cash. TechnologyOne claims to...

TechInnovation. Apple delays plans to roll out CSAM detection in iOS 15 after privacy backlash (Zack Whittaker, TechCrunch)

Image Credits: Bryce Durbin / TechCrunch Apple has delayed plans to roll out its child sexual abuse (CSAM) detection technology that it chaotically announced last month, citing feedback from...

TechInnovation. Barbershop technology startup theCut sharpens its platform with new $4.5M round (Christine Hall, TechCrunch)

Image Credits: theCut co-founders Obi Omile Jr. and Kush Patel/theCut TheCut, a technology platform designed to handle back-end operations for barbers, raised $4.5 million in new...

TechInnovation. Customer experience startup Clootrack raises $4M, helps brands see through their customers’ eyes (Christine Hall, TechCrunch)

Image Credits: Mykyta Dolmatov (opens in a new window)/ Getty Images Getting inside the mind of customers is a challenge as behaviors and demands shift, but Clootrack believes it has...

TechInnovation. SimpliFed serves up $500,000 pre-seed toward infant nutrition support (Christine Hall, TechCrunch)

Image Credits: Vladmir Godnik / Getty Images Feeding babies can take many different forms, and is also an area where parents can feel less supported as they navigate...

TechInnovation. Zip acquisition of Payflex means Africa is ripe for BNPL disruption (Tage Kene-Okafor, TechCrunch)

Image Credits: Getty Images Australian buy now, pay later (BNPL) company Zip this week acquired South Africa-based BNPL player Payflex for an undisclosed amount. It’s a piece of news...

TechInnovation. For VCs, the game right now is musical chairs (Connie Loizos, TechCrunch)

Image Credits: Cordelia Molloy Science Photo Library (opens in a new window)/ Getty Images In many ways, there has never been a better time to be a venture...