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The incomparable Mike Butcher just celebrated 15 years at TechCrunch. You get less for murder these days, so that’s a hell of a milestone, and (as far as we know) he didn’t even seriously maim, far less murder, anyone. Awesome work, Mike. Glad to have you here with us! — Christine and Haje
The TechCrunch Top 3
- Crowdsourcing the shipping world: Backers delivered $80 million to Xeneta, on a $265 million valuation, for the Norway-based company’s crowdsourcing approach to determining air and sea freight rates, Ingrid reports. Xeneta has already acquired 300 million data points from over 100 of the world’s biggest shipping companies to figure out the market rate for certain routes.
- Sound on: Floor sound just got elevated — Sonos’s new Sub Mini subwoofer drops October 6 in some markets. Darrell has more.
- Keep reaching for that wallet: The digital wallet just got some open source love, Paul reports. The Linux Foundation has created the OpenWallet Foundation to develop interoperable digital wallets and evolve them from just a place to keep your currency into basically a physical wallet replacement.
Startups and VC
Meta Platforms is looking at India’s burgeoning startup ecosystem as it bolsters its bet on the metaverse. The social juggernaut has partnered with the Indian IT Ministry’s startup hub to launch an accelerator in the country to broaden innovation in emerging technologies, including augmented reality and virtual reality, Manish reports.
Following this week’s closing of the Ultimaker/MakerBot merger, the combined company is announcing a new name. The entity will be known as [drumroll, please] UltiMaker. Yes, really. As far as merged names go, it’s not a particularly exciting one, as Brian comments in his article — but the executive shakeup has some more juicy details in it: MakerBot CEO steps up and Ultimaker CEO steps down.
- Watt a big investment!: Ex-Googler’s TeraWatt raises $1 billion to expand commercial EV charging, reports Rebecca.
- Wait, where are you calling from this time?: Digital nomads can work from anywhere, much to the utter chagrin of HR departments everywhere. This startup just raised $12 million to try to make things a little bit less confusing, Mike reports.
- Have you tried turning it off and on again?: InsightFinder raises fresh capital to predict when IT problems might occur, Kyle reports.
- A bank would still smell as sweet by any other Neem: Pakistan’s Neem raises $2.5 million to serve underbanked communities with its embedded finance platform, Jagmeet reports.
- Box, meet boat. Boat, box: Kyle reports that MyCarrier raised $22 million to match small shippers with freight carriers.
You’ve sold your company. Now what?
Scaling a company from conception to acquisition is a real accomplishment, but it’s not the finish line, according to investor and frequent TC+ contributor Marjorie Radlo-Zandi.
“You may wonder if the acquirer truly understands your products, values, culture or the customer needs that drive the business,” she writes. “Staff will wonder if there’ll be a place for them as a part of another company.”
In her latest column, she shares “six guiding principles that will set a transaction up for success” and help you achieve your full earnout.
(TechCrunch+ is our membership program, which helps founders and startup teams get ahead. You can sign up here. Use code “DC” for a 15% discount on an annual subscription!)
Big Tech Inc.
It’s a Twitter kind of a day! Elon Musk may be regretting one of his choices, but today, most of Twitter’s shareholders were confident about theirs — they gave the green light to Musk’s proposed $44 billion buyout offer, Taylor writes. Paul tells us that Twitter and Musk are due in court on October 17 to see if the social media giant can make Musk carry out his purchase. In other Twitter news, we enjoyed Zack’s look into what was uncovered about the company when Peiter Zatko, who can now go by “Mudge” and people know who that is, testified to Congress. Also today, Aisha reported on Twitter rolling out podcasts to Blue subscribers.
- Get your read on: Brian brings us a look at Amazon’s basic Kindle features, including USB-C, improved display and blue color.
- That photo tho!: China may not like cryptocurrency, but that has not stopped many of its citizens from being Ethereum enthusiasts. Rita reports on why “The Merge” may be good for them.
- Patch up: Apple releases iOS and macOS fixes to guard against vulnerabilities, including a new zero-day under attack, Carly writes.
- Your Facebook community just got Discorded: Amanda has your look at Meta’s new “Community Chats” coming soon to Messenger and Facebook Groups near you.
- Sizzle!: Peloton announced late yesterday that co-founders John Foley and Hisao Kushi resigned amid company shakeup. Brian has more.
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