Former crypto hedge fund manager sentenced to prison after not complying with court orders

TechCrunch Newsletter

By Christine Hall Friday, September 29, 2023

In today's top story, Three Arrows Capital's Su Zhu was arrested in Singapore while attempting to leave the country. The co-founder of the now-defunct crypto hedge fund was sentenced to four months in prison. Zhu is not the only one investigators want to arrest. Meanwhile, Apple has been busy revamping and updating much of its operating system lately, and now it’s iCloud.com's turn. See what's new in features for Drive, Mail and Notes. And Discord resolved a widespread outage caused by "unusual traffic spikes." Wonder what you all were doing . . .  Image Credits: Getty Images

More top reads A chip off the old butcher's block: Meal kits were where it was at for a lot of people who didn't want to stress about what to make for dinner. Now one of the biggest ones in the sector was just sold. So what happened to Blue Apron? (TC+) More people or more impressions?: X, formerly Twitter, has paid almost $20 million to creators, according to its CEO. We break down what that could mean. Meanwhile, Twitter's former head of trust and safety says X is headed for a "rule of law" clash with the European Union. Read on. Discounted: It's rumored that WestBridge Capital is in the advanced stages of inking a deal to buy a stake in India's Meesho. Get the scoop. Google Pixel Event: Next week, Google unveils its new Pixel products. See what's on tap. Pitch Deck Teardown: I point, you point, let's all point at point.me's $10 million Series A deck and learn what Haje liked and didn't like. (TC+) No fakers here: BeReal pushes back at a report claiming the social media app is losing steam by saying it now has 25 million daily users. Find out why BeReal objects. Europe's got capital: Two large equity funds launched out of Europe this week. What are we to make of this? VC Office Hours: Pivotal Ventures' Erin Harkless Moore discusses how data can help improve social impact investing. Learn how. (TC+) Off balance: Startups may have trouble finding their enterprise footing, even with the software market softening. Here's why. (TC+) Image Credits: Michael Nagle/Bloomberg / Getty Images

How to pitch me: 7 investors discuss what they're looking for in September 2023 This week, Walter Thompson surveyed seven venture capitalists about what early-stage investors are currently looking for in a new investment. You're also in luck — six out of the seven listed below included their contact details. Now the only hard part is crafting a story about your startup that's so convincing, they'll recognize the value in your idea and wire you some cash. Read how the following investors prefer to be approached and which questions they're most likely to ask once you're in the room: Maria Buitron, principal, Piva Capital Karl Alomar, managing partner, M13 Raja Ghawi, partner, Era Ventures Anamitra Banerji, managing partner, Afore Capital Mukaya (Tai) Panich, CIO and CEO, SCB 10X David Phelps, founder, chairman and CEO; Merlin Ventures and Merlin Cyber Kavita Gupta, founder and general partner, Delta Blockchain Fund TechCrunch+ is our membership program that helps founders and startup teams get ahead of the pack. You can sign up here. Use code "DC" for a 15% discount on an annual subscription. Read More Image Credits: Masahiro Makino / Getty Images

On the pods Equity has the update on the writers strike’s implications on AI, deals of the week from OpenAI and Arc, YC and the role of accelerators in the startup world, and shifts in the tech labor market as layoffs subside. Listen here. Read More Image Credits: Bryce Durbin

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Russian zero-day purchase platform posts $20M bounty for iOS, Android hacking tools

TechCrunch Newsletter

By Christine Hall Wednesday, September 27, 2023

In today's top story, a Russian zero-day seller is now offering to pay researchers $20 million for hacking tools that would allow its customers to hack iPhones and Android devices. Get the scoop. Next, read about a former Tinder CEO's startup out to fight loneliness with an AI chatbot. Investors like it. Meanwhile, a Brazilian super app developer secured $30 million in new funding to add insurance and financing components. Read more. And Meta's annual Connect conference started today, and we reported on all the new hardware and software, including Meta Quest 3. Here are some highlights: Meta's $500 Quest 3 targets consumer mixed reality Xbox Cloud Gaming is coming to Meta Quest 3 in December Qualcomm launches its next-gen chips for XR and AR platforms Ray-Ban Meta smart glasses livestream to Instagram and Facebook Meta Quest 3 convinced me to love VR by downplaying the metaverse Finally, as seen on TV: Senior reporter Kyle Wiggers will appear on CBS tomorrow at 12:35 p.m. ET to discuss the latest news about ChatGPT. Image Credits: Benoit Daoust / Shutterstock

More top reads What's that shaking?: Google launches earthquake alerts on Android in India. Read more. Smoothing out Africa's payment landscape: QED and Partech back South African payment orchestration platform Revio in a $5.2 million seed round. Here's how Revio plans to take on payment failures. The fabric of our developer lives: Meet Rayon, a collaborative design tool for architects and designers. Now draw. Businesses need payment love, too: OpenAI CEO Sam Altman was one of the many backers of Slope's $30 million round. Learn how it digitizes B2B payments. Head in the Cloudfare: Cloudflare launches new AI tools to help customers deploy and run models. Read more. Speaking of OpenAI: Lots of reports on OpenAI. First, the company is reportedly in talks with Jony Ive about a hardware project. Get that scoop. This news follows yesterday's rumor that OpenAI plans to raise new funding at a valuation of $80 billion to $90 billion. Mercedes boy: You will have a ball navigating the freeways with Mercedes' hands-off, eyes-off automated driving system. See it in action. It's not you, it's me: Though less than a year in, Snap decides to shutter its enterprise services division. Find out why. Well, now what?: Some new research suggests that a vast majority of VC-backed U.K. startups do "nothing" on climate emissions. Read for yourself. More for your Wednesday: Industry Ventures, with stakes in more than 600 venture firms, just raised $1.7B to snap up more stakes — and companies Was tech's 'bull run' simply a temporary surge? (TC+) Walmart returns to Roblox after its first games were attacked by consumer advocacy groups Elon Musk's X removes general option to report misleading info about politics Image Credits: Brian Heater

TC Opinion: Fintech actually has a value system: Here's how we can reclaim it “Fintechs would do well to lean into the current economic moment and focus on applications that blunt the impact of inflation and financial uncertainty on workers and consumers,” writes Avliere CEO and co-founder Yuval Brisker in TechCrunch Opinion. “One of the big lessons of the social finance backlash is that empowerment without education can do more harm than good.” If you’d like to submit an opinion column to TechCrunch, please read our new editorial guidelines. Read More Image Credits: Halfdark / Getty Images

Bootstrapping is cool once again Several factors combined to dampen investor interest in early-stage startups over the last year and change, leading more founders to explore funding alternatives. Dominic Madori-Davis spoke to Hussein Yahfoufi (product lead at Arta Finance) and Healthie founder Erica Jain last week at Disrupt to get their advice for connecting with angels and conserving cash. “Bootstrapping isn't necessarily an all-or-nothing [endeavor]," said Jain. “It's about thinking through the long term and being in control about how you think about the capital journey of your business.” TechCrunch+ is our membership program that helps founders and startup teams get ahead of the pack. You can sign up here. Use code "DC" for a 15% discount on an annual subscription. Read More Image Credits: M. Reinertson/The Photo Group for TechCrunch / Flickr

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Newest Jobs from Crunchboard Lead Engineer at Industrial Data Labs (Houston, TX, USA) Senior Analyst, IT at Charles and Lynn Schusterman Family Philanthropies (New York, NY, USA) Network Administrator – Senior/Specialist at Washington State Department of Natural Resources (Olympia, WA, USA) Chief Technology Officer at The Chronicle of Philanthropy (Anywhere) Senior Developer - Netherlands at Gomocha USA LLC (Utrecht, Netherlands) See more jobs on CrunchBoard Post your tech jobs and reach millions of TechCrunch readers for only $200 per month.

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iPhone 15 Pro Max review: We tested Apple's best camera at Disneyland

TechCrunch Newsletter

By Christine Hall Tuesday, September 19, 2023

Today's top story has Matthew Panzarino taking Apple's iPhone 15 Pro Max to Disneyland to check out how all of the features do in, dare we say, a frenzied environment? Here’s how it fared. Meanwhile, Google today released what we describe as "a more capable version" of its Bard chatbot. It can tap into your Google apps, double-check answers and more, oh my! Check it out. And if you’re looking for what else the iPhone 15 Pro Max can do, we’ve got that covered. Image Credits: Darrell Etherington

More top reads Because there's no "plan B": European carbon accounting startup Plan A raises $27 million from VC and corporate heavyweights. Measure your carbon footprint. Confirmed!: CrowdStrike acquisition of Bionic.ai for $350 million is no longer a rumor. Go inside the deal. No entry: Y Combinator says visa challenges hamper participation of international founders. Get the scoop. It's all in what you know: Pryon raises $100 million to index and analyze enterprise data. Read more. Legal eagle: Darrow gets served $35 million for an AI that parses public documents for class action lawsuit potential. Gavel drop. AI or isn't it?: TikTok debuts new tools and technology so that creators can label AI content. Get the scoop on this new feature. Material wealth: Scrap metal trading marketplace Metaloop raises $17 million. Search on. IP-Oh network: Cato Networks, valued at $3 billion, lands $238 million ahead of its anticipated IPO. Read more. That's a big chip: New SambaNova chip is designed to handle a 5 trillion parameter model. Let's dance. Skip the line: Amazon's new Just Walk Out cashierless checkout system uses RFID tags to track apparel purchases. Start shopping. More for your Tuesday: Instacart's IPO storms out the gate, showing that unicorns can, in fact, go public and survive (TC+) Unite for Mac releases a new version to turn websites into web apps 8 web3 gaming experts discuss hurdles and opportunities in the road to wider adoption (TC+) News aggregator app SmartNews' latest feature aims to tackle doomscrolling Image Credits: Plan A

At TechCrunch Disrupt If you're wondering why your favorite reporter isn't responding, it's because the TechCrunch team is at Disrupt this week. During this time, we will be bringing you a sampling of the Startup Battlefield 200 companies as we make our way to the top 20 companies. Only one will win the Disrupt Cup and a $100,000 equity-free grand prize. And check out all of our content from the week here. In Diagnostics launches a $30 test that aims to tell you if your liver is working. Read more. Monoclonal antibody treatments have many challenges — Narval is fixing them. Read more. Flint wants to disrupt the battery industry with paper. Read more. BioticsAI wants to improve prenatal ultrasound scans with AI. Read more. Electrified Thermal Solutions' e-bricks could be key to decarbonizing heavy industry. Read more. AI startup speeds up the creation of climate-resilient crops. Read more. Nolej’s AI-generated classroom tools are a force multiplier for educators. Read more. Phalanx protects company data by automatically securing and tracking sensitive documents. Read more. Magnestar wants to solve the satellite signal interference problem for the entire space industry. Read more. Image Credits: Kimberly White/Getty Images for TechCrunch

How deep tech founders can secure early-stage fundraising in a downturn Software as a service is wide open, but deep tech founders hoping to connect with investors have a unique set of problems. New technology often takes a long time to monetize, which means there’s a small community of VCs who have relevant interest and experience. During a downturn, that cohort can get even smaller. Bucking the odds, French photonics company Cailabs acquired seed funding during a down market in 2013. “Here we share the lessons we learned, which can help other deep tech founders looking for funding during a downturn,” writes founder/CEO Jean-François Morizur in TC+. TechCrunch+ is our membership program that helps founders and startup teams get ahead of the pack. You can sign up here. Use code "DC" for a 15% discount on an annual subscription. Read More Image Credits: Rosa María Fernández Rz / Getty Images

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Newest Jobs from Crunchboard IT Technology Analyst I at Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission (Middletown, PA, United States) Software Quality Engineer (SDET) (on location in Huntsville, Alabama) at Legal Media Productions, Inc. (Huntsville, AL, USA) Communications Director at Center for AI Policy (Washington D.C., DC, USA) Government Affairs Director at Center for AI Policy (Washington D.C., DC, USA) Product Manager, Platform Integrations at Black Kite (Boston, MA, USA) See more jobs on CrunchBoard Post your tech jobs and reach millions of TechCrunch readers for only $200 per month.

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