Year: 2018

 Failure doesn’t usually happen “to” startups. It happens when founders rationalize problems until it’s too late. Attack problems early and the startup will advance. Rationalize that the problems don’t exist and you’ll just be another depressing startup post-mortem. Read More

 Roche, the global pharmaceutical company from Switzerland today announced it will scoop up Flatiron Health, a startup analyzing real-time oncology data to help cancer patients and doctors in a $1.9 billion deal. Flatiron has also confirmed the deal to TechCrunch. Two years ago, Roche led a $175 million deal in the startup at a $1.2 billion valuation. At the time of the deal, Roche agreed… Read More

 Sure, yesterday’s big wood staining HomePod news was a bit of a black eye for Apple’s smart speaker, but it’s going to be a boon for one very specific, extremely narrow product category. I’m sure I’m going to get 50 similar pitches the minute this story publishes, but Pad & Quill owner Brian Holmes beat everyone to the punch by alerting us to a $20 leather… Read More

 Despite a lot of backlash over a big redesign for the Snapchat app — which to be sure is a very big deal for a product-centric company like Snap — Snap CEO Evan Spiegel vigorously defended the redesign and basically said people need to get used to it. Spiegel said at the Goldman Sachs Internet & Technology Conference that even people complaining about the app was a sort of… Read More

 Bike-sharing has become the hot new mode of transportation for startups. Today, Lyft is announcing a partnership with the Baltimore Bike Share program to support new transportation hubs for bikes, and designated pickup and drop-off spots for Lyft, The Baltimore Business Journal reports. The partnership, which is also supported by Baltimore’s department of transportation, entails a… Read More

 It’s no secret that the cryptocurrency market cap has grown faster than the broader crypto industry. This means that the options for tools to help hold, track and manage your cryptocurrency are still pretty slim. CoinTracker is one of the recently launched startups trying to help. Part of YC’s Winter ’18 class, it’s a platform to track your crypto across all… Read More

 The ARCEP just published a thorough 65-page report (embedded below) about the devices we use every day. The report says that devices give you a portion of the internet and prevent an open internet. “With net neutrality, we spend all our time cleaning pipes, but nobody is looking at faucets,” ARCEP president Sébastien Soriano told me. “Everybody assumes that the devices that… Read More

 Google has added a notable addition to its line of “Go” edition apps – the lightweight apps designed primarily for emerging markets – with the launch of Gmail Go. The app, like others in the Go line, takes up less storage space on users’ smartphones and makes better use of mobile data compared with the regular version of Gmail. The app offers standard Gmail… Read More

 The Essential Phone, still among the best deals you can find in smartphones today, is now set to be available in three new colors, including “Ocean Depths,” “Copper Black” and “Stellar Gray.” These include two previously announced colours, the aquamarine-ish Ocean Depths and the dark matte “Stellar Gray,” but also the surprising third options,… Read More

 Stem cells derived from a human placenta hold the key to unlocking a myriad of potentials in regenerative medicine and are the focus of X-Prize and Singularity University founder Peter Diamandis’ new endeavor. Called Celularity, the startup is a spinout from Celgene, a global biopharmaceutical company creating gene therapies. Diamandis teamed up with Dr. Robert Hariri, the founder of… Read More