Amazon’s Alexa-powered Echo and Echo Dot arrive in the UK and Germany
We suspected it was happening and now Amazon has confirmed that the Amazon Echo and smaller Echo Dot is coming to the UK (and Germany), the first release outside of the U.S. for the e-commerce giant’s voice-controlled speaker and smart home hub. Read More
Twitter launches on Apple TV, Fire TV and Xbox One
Twitter needs to figure out a way to continue to grow — and it certainly seems open to looking into a lot of new places outside your phone to figure out how to do that. Today, the company said it is launching an app on the Apple TV, Xbox One and Amazon Fire TV, which will allow users to view Twitter content through the apps on their televisions. That includes live streams of 10 NFL… Read More
Apply now to the Startup Battlefield at Disrupt London
Applications are now open for the Startup Battlefield at Disrupt London this December 5-6th. The Battlefield is TechCrunch’s premiere startup competition. Three times a year, the Battlefield takes place at TechCrunch Disrupt, where 20-something new companies will have the opportunity to present their product live onstage. They then face questions from our expert judging panel. In the… Read More
Uber starts self-driving car pickups in Pittsburgh
Beginning today, a select group of Pittsburgh Uber users will get a surprise the next time they request a pickup: the option to ride in a self driving car. The announcement comes 1.5 years after Uber hired dozens of researchers from Carnegie Mellon University’s robotics center to develop the technology. Read More
The first real Apple Watch
The Apple Watch Series 2 is the first real Apple Watch. It delivers on the promise of a mostly passive device that can accomplish simple tasks in 1-3 seconds. There is now built-in GPS which allows for exercising without having to lug along a comparatively heavy iPhone just to get accurate tracking. And it’s completely waterproof, as any decent sport watch should be. Read More
Meet the London startup powering Just Eat’s new illuminated scooters
Just Eat’s new range of branded illuminated scooters feature backlit boxes carrying the new Just Eat logo and will soon be lighting up the streets of London. Read More
For your videos, Valossa knows if you’re happy or sad
Video analytics platform Valossa just launched Val.ai, a platform to help video creators, advertisers and other video boffins figure out what’s going on in video. In addition to computer-vision tricks, the platform can do sentiment analyses (person is happy / person is sad) and even heart rate analysis based on a high-definition video stream alone. Read More
Crunch Report | iOS 10 Available Today
It’s the second day of Disrupt SF 2016. We interview Startup Battlefield company EverlyWell, iOS 10 is available today, YC MOOCs are on the way, Alexa App store hits 3,000 skills, and co-working space Industrious lands a Series B. All this on Crunch Report. Read More
These are the six finalists in the TechCrunch Disrupt SF 2016 Startup Battlefield
Over the last two days, over 5,000 attendees (along with hundreds of thousands of people tuning in online) have watched 25 companies duke it out for the right to call themselves the Startup Battlefield Winner at Disrupt SF 2016. These are the six companies that remain: BlazingDB BlazingDB lets you run SQL queries on a database, using GPUs to do the heavy lifting for incredible efficiency.… Read More
Apple works to fit the smart home under a single roof
Wait for others to take the first steps, let things mature a bit, then swoop in with a simpler, more unified solution. It’s the first entry on the first page of the Apple playbook. And it tends to work like a charm. If you’re reading this, odds are pretty good that you’re in possession of some small piece of the connected home puzzle, a smart lightbulb or thermostat or maybe… Read More
Spincle allows everybody to shoot VR content on their smartphones
VR content is really in the hands of the early adopters at the moment. For most consumers there’s just not much accessibility in creating VR moments. Launching today out of TechCrunch Disrupt SF’s Startup Battlefield, Spincle is aiming to bring VR content capture to mobile in a way that’s highly shareable. Quite a few apps have tried their hands at being the Instagram for… Read More
Apple also released watchOS 3 today and here’s what’s new
Today has been a massive Apple update day. The company released iOS 10, tvOS 10 and also watchOS 3. After announcing it at WWDC, it’s finally here — and it’s a huge update. I won’t mention all the changes with watchOS 3. Instead, I’ll focus on three topics — speed, app switching and watch face switching. With watchOS 3, your favorite apps stay in memory so… Read More
Affectiva and Uber want to brighten your day with machine learning and emotional intelligence
Your phone doesn’t know how you’re feeling — but you may want it to if that capability came with a few fringe benefits. Affectiva makes emotion-detection software, and CEO Rana el Kaliouby was full of ideas today at Disrupt SF as to how it could be deployed, from gifs to Ubers. Read More
Giftbit lets retailers create their own e-commerce currency
Giftbit, a company that operates a digital gift card marketplace for online retailers, is launching a new product today at TechCrunch Disrupt SF that will enable merchants to easily create their own custom currency — meaning gift cards, promo codes and refund credits — without having to build their own, internal systems. Available as an API, the new service drops into the… Read More
Chatbot Sensay wants to connect the world by sharing knowledge
Sensay, one contestant at the TechCrunch Disrupt SF Battlefield, is aiming to be the first breakout cross-platform chatbot — but, unlike most that provide services and information at a convenience chat, its currency is people. Read More
Myki rolls out a password manager that locks all your info away on your phone
Everything is getting hacked to the point that it’s getting kind of ridiculous — and everyone needs to have secure passwords. The trouble, however, is making them tough to crack and also being able to remember them. That’s led to a blossoming ecosystem of password management services like OnePassword. But if you ask Antoine Vincent Jebara and Priscilla Elora Sharuk,… Read More
WeConnect is an app to support addiction recovery
Keeping close, quantified track of personal progress is absolutely imperative for one group of people: recovering alcoholics and drug addicts. And it’s this often isolated segment of society that the startup behind the WeConnect app is aiming to help. Read More
Nvidia’s tiny new self-driving AI computer sips power
Nvidia revealed a new configuration of its DRIVE PX 2 in-car autonomous driving computing platform today, which vastly improves power efficiency and drops physical size compared to the original unveiled at CES earlier this year. The new single-core configuration will be used by Baidu in its own self-driving cars, as part of the previously announced partnership between the two companies to create… Read More
UK’s national cyber security unit working on automated defenses
Giving his first public speech as CEO of the NCSC, at the Billington Cyber Security Summit in Washington today, Ciaran Martin warned that far too many unsophisticated cyber attacks are succeeding, going on to discuss the government’s new more pro-active cyber security strategy. Read More
White House’s DJ Patil wants to disrupt the criminal justice system with data
At TechCrunch Disrupt SF 2016 today, I had a chance to chat with DJ Patil, the nation’s deputy chief technology officer for data policy and chief data scientist. We talked about what he’s been up to at the White House lately, the criminal justice system and a recently-launched data justice initiative. Since the launch of the White House’s Police Data Initiative in May… Read More
Be the first to comment on "Here’s your chance to get into TechCrunch’s AI Pavilion at Disrupt London for free"