Author: azeeadmin

You will never know as much as your lawyers do about the legal services they provide to you. It is a classic asymmetry of information, where the party that knows less gets the worse deal. In this case, that is you, the startup founder.

As an attorney and a co-founder of a venture-backed startup that made it over the finish line, I have been on both sides of the table. Through that experience, I’ve adopted an approach for managing legal spend which you can use to help ensure that you get the most from the money you put toward legal fees.

Have you had a great experience with a startup lawyer? Tell us in this brief survey.

Overview of Common Fee Structures

There are really only three legal fee structures: flat, hourly and contingency. In addition to these, attorneys may charge differently for consultations (free vs. paid), may or may not require a retainer to be paid before starting work, and perhaps will entertain certain forms of deferred compensation, such as delayed payment or equity in lieu of cash (though most will not, knowing that odds are well stacked against your startup).

Flat fees. Always good for self-contained, relatively routine legal tasks, such as business formation and subsequent stock issuance, standard IP assignments, employee handbooks, employee compensation plans, trademarks, etc. In the ideal case, you are paying your lawyer to do something they have done a hundred times before, with only minor tweaks along the way – it is predictable work that comes at a predictable price. Recent changes to the California Rules of Professional Conduct (effective 11/1/2018) have provided further guidance to lawyers and clients concerning flat fee structures, making them relatively more transparent in theory, if not in practice.

The key question for flat fees, of course, is how much should your particular matter cost? The most accurate answer here, unsurprisingly, is that “it depends” – on the experience of the attorney, on the particular legal task at hand, on your unique business circumstances, etc. While the typical business incorporation might be $2,000 all-in, a seed financing (assuming common forms are used) could be anywhere between $5,000 and $20,000).

What are the exact flat fees you should pay? We’ll have more on that soon.

Hourly fees. This is the preferred method of billing for most attorneys, not necessarily because it results in more total fees, but because the lawyer has at least some assurance she will not end up working “for free” when the client inevitably has additional questions, makes unexpected changes, or requires counsel on ancillary topics. The particular hourly rate you pay depends primarily on the experience of the attorney, usually measured in years (the absolute minimum I would suggest you consider is three years), with most solo practitioners charging somewhere between $175 to $300 per hour, boutique firms charging between $300 and $500 per hour, and large firms charging anywhere between $400 (junior associates) to $950 (experienced partners) per hour — though everything in Manhattan is more expensive.

Contingency fees. While conceptually intriguing to some, contingency fees (usually 30 percent to 40 percent of the amount potentially awarded in a given legal matter, hence the contingency) are not typically relevant for early-stage startups where the goal is generally to avoid litigation. For that reason, I will focus mostly on flat versus hourly fees.

Finally, when it comes to retainer fees, it is helpful to know that lawyers must follow strict trust accounting practices (see Rules of Professional Conduct 4-100; and also Rule 4-200 for attorney fees in general). You can even reference these rules if you ever find yourself in a fee dispute. Remember, too, that government administrative or filing fees (e.g. the cost of filing for a trademark) are always distinct from the fees paid to compensate your lawyer and therefore should be itemized separately on any billing statement you receive.

How to Keep the Fees Down

Given that background, there are a number of things you can do to help keep your lawyer fees in check:

1. Hire lawyers who have experience with the particular task you are asking them to perform. Most lawyers have a specialty of some sort (however broadly defined) in which they are most adept and therefore efficient. The last thing you want to do is pay a lawyer to educate themselves in a new practice area. Lawyers will generally list their core practice areas on their website, and it is in these areas they are most likely to be proficient. It would be a mistake in my opinion to hire a lawyer to do any work outside the explicitly enumerated practice areas shown on their website. If you are considering hiring a true business generalist, then at least try to get a sense for the practice areas in which he or she most often provides counsel and be sure there is significant overlap with your needs, including experience working with startups specifically; also, consider ratcheting up the required minimum level of experience to at least 7-10 years.

2. Educate yourself and then let your lawyer know you understand the basics. Today there are numerous high-quality, free templates and other resources available for the most common legal tasks facing startups (see links below). If you need new Terms of Service, for example, carefully read one of the many templates available, insert comments where you see fit, and pass on this marvelous example of intellectual aspiration to your attorney for final drafting. This will let the attorney know you have a basic understanding of what the assignment entails and at the very least reduce perceived asymmetries of information, improving your relative bargaining position.

a. Startup documents: Docracy, Upcounsel, Cooley Go.
b. Financing documents – Y Combinator, NVCA, SeriesSeed.

3. Ask to be notified when a certain dollar amount has been billed, or to receive an informal billing update at the end of each week (even if the billing is not strictly itemized). When subject to hourly billing, it is always a good idea to stay informed of where exactly you stand. While providing detailed off-cycle billing can be a burden for lawyers, providing an informal billing update to a client generally is not and most attorneys will oblige. Also, it never hurts to ask your lawyer for time/cost estimates before starting an assignment — here again you can request the attorney notify you when they surpass their estimate; if only subconsciously, you have anchored the amount the attorney believes is appropriate to bill on the matter, which can provide you leverage on future assignments if they ultimately exceed that amount.

4. Ask for an “emerging company” discount. Most lawyers who work with startups are willing to provide discounts to smaller companies: in the case of large firms, to attract the most well-funded startups; and in the case of smaller firms or solo practitioners, to better serve their primary client type — small, undercapitalized enterprises. Remember, too, most solo practitioners are themselves entrepreneurs who have taken the risk of launching their own businesses (albeit a law firm) so they can be surprisingly sympathetic to other founders in the same situation.

5. Consider deferred fee structures. Deferred fee structures generally involve payment in something other than cash, or payment at a time in the future; there are two primary types: (a) payment of fees delayed until close of pending investment; and (b) equity (or other consideration) offered in lieu of cash. I once heard of an attorney who accepted a vintage Martin acoustic guitar as full payment for fees in the high four-figure range. Although I would very carefully consider any deferred fee structures — because they can create a misalignment of incentives (or worse, an outright conflict of interest) — they can in certain situations be a workable choice for cash-strapped startups and risk-tolerant attorneys.

6. Get clarity on costs, expenses, billing rates for administrative assistants, paralegals, etc. One advantage to working with firms who staff assistants, paralegals, junior and senior associates — all of whom support the partners of a firm — is that billable rates generally range from lowest to highest, respectively. Whenever possible, you can request that paralegals and junior associates do the most routine (yet time-consuming) work, leaving critical negotiations to the partners and high-level drafting to senior associates. Finally, make sure you understand in advance what costs and expenses the firm will pass on to you (e.g. photocopying, postage, couriers, travel) and whenever possible, ask if these costs can be waived or reduced.

Follow these tips from the outset and with some experience, you can be sure that you will efficiently allocate resources against your legal service needs.

On that note, have you already had a great experience with a startup lawyer? TechCrunch is looking for the ones founders love to work with the most. Fill out this quick survey to tell us about your experiences and we’ll share the results with you.

Daniel T. McKenzie, Esq., manages the Law Offices of Daniel McKenzie, specializing in the representation of startups and startup founders. Prior to establishing his law offices, Daniel McKenzie co-founded and served as lead in-house counsel for Reelio, Inc., backed by eVentures, and acquired in 2018 by Fullscreen (a subsidiary Otter Media and AT&T).

DISCLAIMER: This post discusses general legal issues, but it does not constitute legal advice in any respect. No reader should act or refrain from acting on the basis of any information presented herein without seeking the advice of counsel in the relevant jurisdiction. TechCrunch, the author and the author’s firm expressly disclaim all liability in respect of any actions taken or not taken based on any contents of this post.

GM is sprucing up its smartphone app for owners of the all-electric Chevrolet Bolt through a collaboration with charging network companies EVgo, ChargePoint and Greenlots.

The idea is to take aggregate dynamic data from each of the EV charging networks so owners can have a “more seamless charging experience.” In short: GM wants to make it easier and more intuitive for Bolt EV owners to find and access charging. Removing hurdles from the charging experience can go a long way in convincing more people to buy the Bolt EV, or any EV for that matter.

The partnership with EVgo, ChargePoint and Greenlots is a notable start considering that collectively that means more than 31,000 charging ports.

“GM believes in an all-electric future, and this is a significant step to make charging easier for our customers,” said Doug Parks, General Motors vice president of Autonomous and Electric Vehicle Programs. “By collaborating with these three companies, we expect to reduce barriers to create a stronger EV infrastructure for the future. This is an important step toward achieving GM’s vision of a world with zero emissions.”

GM plans to take the aggregate charging data from EVgo, ChargePoint and Greenlots and use it to improve the myChevrolet app. For instance, owners will be able to see if a charging station is available and compatible with the Bolt EV. It also will provide real-time data on charge stations to report if a charging station is working.

GM plans to create an app interface that will streamline the enrollment process for each of these networks. The automaker wants owners to be able to activate a charging session using the app instead of a membership card, but didn’t say when that feature would be rolled out.

GM recently made a few updates to the myChevrolet app that lets owners project the energy assist to the vehicle’s infotainment system via Apple CarPlay and Android Auto for drivers with model year 2017 or newer Bolt EVs.

This means Bolt EV drivers can access information through their infotainment system, like vehicle range, charging station locations and search, as well as route planning that takes into consideration charging stops along the way if the destination is out of range.

Original purchasers of new Bolt EVs will have access to these features at no additional cost for five years from the vehicle delivery date, according to GM.

GM doesn’t provide updates about the Bolt EV, and more broadly its electric vehicle program, at the same pace and frequency as say Tesla. But the company is still ramping up and expanding. GM recently expanded a battery lab, and a new LG Electronics plant in Michigan has come online.

The LG Electronics facility in Hazel Park started making battery packs this fall to supply GM’s Orion Assembly Plant, where the automaker builds the all-electric Chevrolet  Bolt.

GM’s plan to launch 20 new all-electric vehicles globally by 2023 and increase production of the Chevy Bolt.

After days of demos and announcements and miles of walking, I’m confident in declaring Holoride the best thing at this year’s CES. The designation of “The best thing at CES 2019” is my badging. This isn’t an official award handed-out by a governing body. This is just me saying Holoride is the best thing I’ve seen at the show.

This year’s CES is fine, I guess. The main theme is connecting services around the smart home. There’s a huge range of devices that now support services from Amazon, Google and Apple. CES 2019 also featured the launch of new silicon chipsets and self-driving platforms. But the thing that impressed me the most is from Holoride, a startup from Audi that wants to put VR in cars to entertain and reduce motion sickness.

Iron Man needs help, Rocket told me. And like that I was thrust into a space battle against Thanos’ bad guys. There was an Oculus on my head and my body was dipping and diving, shooting through space, while I was waving my hands around, blasting the enemy. It was straight out of Disney World (partly because Disney helped with the content). Expect I was in Vegas, in the back of an Audi SUV hitting speeds of 90mph on a track.

After two laps around the track, I walked away fine. I didn’t feel sick at all even though I’m the sort of person who can’t look at their phone in a car.

Matching the VR content to the vehicle’s movements is key to the Holoride experience. In short, when the car moves, the content moves in the same way. This reduces motion sickness and from my demo, I can confirm it works at least on me.

The technology comes from a small startup recently spun out of Audi in a play to put VR in every car. The founders have been working on the technology behind the in-car VR system for several years. The automaker holds a minority interest through subsidiary Audi Electronics Venture, which helped developed the technology. Audi will license the technology to Holoride and the startup will use an open platform to allow any automaker as well as content developers to create whatever reality formats they desire.

I’ve experienced countless VR experiences and this was one of the best demos I’ve had. The use case is compelling too. Not only does it provide entertainment but also solves motion sickness. It’s easy to imagine this in an ad-supported format in the back of a Uber or while on a long distance bus. It could work in planes too. It could improve long car rides with the kids.

Holoride is a long shot and there are countless questions around the content, consumer outreach and compatibility. In order for it to take off it, the company needs to build an ecosystem complete with developers, auto makers and consumers. Building amazing experiences is one thing; selling amazing experiences is even harder.

Illegal child exploitation imagery is easy to find on Microsoft’s Bing search engine. But even more alarming is that Bing will suggest related keywords and images that provide pedophiles with more child pornography. Following an anonymous tip, TechCrunch commissioned a report from online safety startup AntiToxin to investigate. The results were alarming.

[WARNING: Do not search for the terms discussed in this article on Bing or elsewhere as you could be committing a crime. AntiToxin is closely supervised by legal counsel and works in conjunction with Israeli authorities to perform this research and properly hand its findings to law enforcement. No illegal imagery is contained in this article, and it has been redacted with red boxes here and inside AntiToxin’s report.]

The research found that terms like “porn kids”, “porn CP” (a known abbreviation for ‘child pornography’), and “nude family kids” all surfaced illegal child exploitation imagery. And even people not seeking this kind of disgusting imagery could be led to it by Bing.

When researchers searched for “Omegle Kids”, referring to a video chat app popular with teens, Bing’s auto-complete suggestions included “Omegle Kids Girls 13” that revealed extensive child pornography when searched. And if a user clicks on those images, Bing showed them more illegal child abuse imagery in its Similar Images feature. Another search for “Omegle for 12 years old” prompted Bing to suggest searching for “Kids On Omegle Showing”, which pulled in more criminal content.

The evidence shows a massive failure on Microsoft’s part to adequately police its Bing search engine and to prevent its suggested searches and images from assisting pedophiles. Similar searches on Google did not produce as clearly illegal imagery or as much concerning content as Bing did. Internet companies like Microsoft Bing must invest more in combatting this kind of abuse through both scalable technology solutions and human moderators. There’s no excuse for a company like Microsoft that earned $8.8 billion in profit last quarter to be underfunding safety measures.

TechCrunch received an anonymous tip regarding the disturbing problem on Bing after my reports last month regarding WhatsApp child exploitation image trading group chats, the third-party Google Play apps that make these groups easy to find, and how these apps ran Google and Facebook’s ad networks to make themselves and the platforms money. In the wake of those reports, WhatsApp banned more of these groups and their members, Google kicked the WhatsApp group discovery apps off Google Play, and both Google and Facebook blocked the apps from running their ads with the latter agreeing to refund advertisers.

Unsafe Search

Following up on the anonymous tip, TechCrunch commissioned AntiToxin to investigate the Bing problem, which conducted research from December 30th, 2018 to January 7th, 2019 with proper legal oversight. Searches were conducted on the desktop version of Bing with “Safe Search” turned off. AntiToxin was founded last year to build technologies that protect networks against bullying, predators, and other forms of abuse. [Disclosure: The company also employs Roi Carthy, who contributed to TechCrunch from 2007 to 2012.]

AntiToxin CEO Zohar Levkovitz tells me that “Speaking as a parent, we should expect responsible technology companies to double, and even triple-down to ensure they are not adding toxicity to an already perilous online environment for children. And as the CEO of AntiToxin Technologies, I want to make it clear that we will be on the beck and call to help any company that makes this its priority.” The full report, published for the first time here, can be found here and embedded below:

TechCrunch provided a full list of troublesome search queries to Microsoft along with questions about how this happened. Microsoft’s Chief Vice President Of Bing & AI Products Jordi Ribas provided this statement: “Clearly these results were unacceptable under our standards and policies and we appreciate TechCrunch making us aware. We acted immediately to remove them, but we also want to prevent any other similar violations in the future. We’re focused on learning from this so we can make any other improvements needed.”

Microsoft claims it assigned an engineering team that fixed the issues we disclosed and it’s now working on blocking any similar queries as well problematic related search suggestions and similar images. However, AntiToxin found that while some search terms from its report are now properly banned or cleaned up, others still surface illegal content.

The company tells me it’s changing its Bing flagging options to include a broader set of categories users can report including “child sexual abuse”. When asked how the failure could have occurred, a Microsoft spokesperson told us that “We index everything, as does Google, and we do the best job we can of screening it. We use a combination of PhotoDNA and human moderation but that doesn’t get us to perfect every time. We’re committed to getting better all the time.” 

Microsoft’s spokesperson refused to disclose how many human moderators work on Bing or whether it planned to increase its staff to shore up its defenses. But they then tried to object to that line of reasoning, saying “I sort of get the sense that you’re saying we totally screwed up here and we’ve always been bad, and that’s clearly not the case in the historic context.” The truth is that it did totally screw up here, and the fact that it pioneered illegal imagery detection technology PhotoDNA that’s used by other tech companies doesn’t change that.

The Bing child pornography problem is another example of tech companies refusing to adequately reinvest the profits they earn back into ensuring the security of their own customers and society at large. The public should no longer accept these shortcomings as repercussions of tech giants irresponsibly prioritizing growth and efficiency. Technology solutions are proving insufficient safeguards and more human sentries are necessary. These companies must pay now to protect us from the dangers they’ve unleashed, or the world will be stuck paying with its safety.

Thousands of people gathered Wednesday night in a southern Chinese city for Zhang Xiaolong, Tencent’s low-key executive who built WeChat eight years ago. It’s no longer adequate to call the app a messenger, for it now enables myriads of functions that infiltrate Chinese people’s private and public lives.

It wasn’t just the tech circles tuning into the event. Civil servants, real-estate agents, salon owners, fruit vendors, teachers, artists — anyone who use WeChat to facilitate daily work — watched attentively for news and tips that came out of the annual conference.

Zhang, nickname Allen, is by nature a hardcore product manager. He went to great lengths during his 4-hour speech telling people productivity is WeChat’s holy grail, and that he wants to make user sessions “short and efficient.” He called out apps obsessed with keeping users on, which many may agree include ByteDance’s video app TikTok and news aggregator Jinri Toutiao.

That’s a tough sell, though, for WeChat is anything but a disposable tool. The app now boasts over 1 billion daily users. 750 million of them open WeChat Moments, a scrolling feed of friends’ updates, each day during which they check it more than 10 times. User growth is cooling, but that’s expected given the super app’s enormous base. In addition to being a social network, the juggernaut has also devised a host of new features that may generate more eyeball time — and help it maintain meaningful growth.

An app universe

Two years ago, WeChat made a move that would speed up its evolution from a simple app into an all-in-one platform. It rolled out so-called mini programs, which are stripped-down versions of native apps with only core features in exchange for smaller size and quicker access. To date, there are over 1 million such lite-apps and 200 million people access them every day, an achievement that inspired other tech giants to follow suit.

Zhang said from the outset that mini apps weren’t meant to replace regular apps, for the latter provide a more complete user journey. In effect, mini apps are getting more powerful as they further integrate with chats and gain new capabilities, such as an upcoming Siri-like voice assistant. Mini programs are also making inroads into the offline world, facilitating transactions like scan-to-pay at subway turnstiles, all without the fuss of app downloads.

There’s no mini-program “store” at the moment, but a less conspicuous infrastructure is taking shape. Users can already look mini apps up on WeChat’s internal search engine and may soon be able to rate them, according to Zhang. WeChat will in turn factor those reviews into search results, akin to how the App Store works.

The public space

Whether mini programs threaten the existing app ecosystem is disputed, but one thing is certain: They have a strong appeal to those without the capacity or need to build full-size apps, like a teacher who wants a tool to broadcast announcements to parents. There may be only a few dozen users, so a lightweight, easy-to-build app makes more economic sense.

Governments have also warmly embraced WeChat as part of a national effort to streamline public services. Anyone who’s lived in China would dread its red tape. Mini programs are digitizing many tasks that traditionally required numerous visits to government offices, such as renewing one’s social security card.

While public services may not be a big revenue driver, they do boost users’ dependence on WeChat. Alibaba’s digital wallet Alipay also offers a plethora of public services, though many are limited to payments. “After all, WeChat has more use cases, from social networking to payments, so local governments find it closer to people’s lives,” a third-party mini program developer for government services told TechCrunch, asking not to be named because the person wasn’t allowed to discuss the matter publicly.

New growth fuel

The world is watching when China’s most used app will hit its wall on user growth. WeChat hasn’t seen much momentum overseas except among Chinese expats and outbound tourists. Back home, senior users are fueling its growth. 65 million of WeChat’s monthly users are now over the age of 55, the app’s fastest growing cohort. Many of them turn out to love mini games, which are part of the mini-program universe. These games, which tend to be casual and easier to play than PC or mobile app games. have surpassed 400 million monthly users. For some context, China reached an estimated 700-million mobile game population in 2018, according to market research firm iResearch.

Curiously, WeChat hasn’t pushed monetization aggressively despite commanding a gigantic user base. Zhang has reiterated that monetization isn’t his priority, but changes are underway. WeChat is planning to add more advertising inventories to mini apps in 2019, executive of WeChat open platforms Du Jiahui said during the event. Tencent earnings show that lite-apps and Moments are already driving advertising revenues for the company over the last few months. Tencent is also under pressure to find alternative monetizing channels as its core revenue driver — video games — took a hit amid an industry shakeup last year, prompting the firm to place more focus on enterprise-facing businesses.

Silicon Valley loves a party, and we’re ready to help you get your swerve on. We’ve just released a fresh batch of tickets to the 2nd Annual TechCrunch Winter Party. Our fabulous midwinter fete takes place on Friday, February 8 at Galvanize in San Francisco.

Here’s a hot tip: buy your ticket now, because they won’t sit around for long. Last year, nearly 1,000 people came to the party and — as cliché as it sounds — a good time was had by all. You do not want to miss this event.

Never been to a TechCrunch party? You’re in for great fun and even better opportunity. Relax with cocktails, tasty canapés and the chance to connect and converse with your entrepreneurial siblings — as well as some of the Valley’s prominent movers, shakers and potential star-makers.

And, if you really want to shine a spotlight on your early-stage startup, buy a demo table for $1,500. You never know who might stop by your booth and potentially turn the party into a major cause for celebration. Oh, and that price also includes three attendee tickets. Score!

Of course, it’s not a TechCrunch party without plenty of games, activities, giveaways (free tickets to Disrupt San Francisco, anyone?) and, ‘natch, awesome swag.

Here are the party particulars.

• When: Friday, February 8, 6:00 p.m. – 9:00 p.m.
• Where: Galvanize, 44 Tehama St., San Francisco, CA 94105
• Ticket price: $85

We’ll keep releasing tickets in batches over the next couple of weeks, so if you miss this round, keep your eyes on our Facebook and Twitter feeds to stay up to date on the next release.

Join us to celebrate everything startup while enjoying plenty of food, drink and opportunity. Get your tickets to the 2nd Annual TechCrunch Winter Party today.

The Daily Crunch is TechCrunch’s roundup of our biggest and most important stories. If you’d like to get this delivered to your inbox every day at around 9am Pacific, you can subscribe here:

1. How Trump’s government shutdown is harming cyber and national security
The government has been shut down for nearly three weeks, and there’s no end in sight. While most of the core government departments — State, Treasury, Justice and Defense — are still operational, others like Homeland Security, which takes the bulk of the government’s cybersecurity responsibilities, are suffering the most.

2. With SEC workers offline, the government shutdown could screw IPO-ready companies
The SEC has been shut down since December 27 and only has 285 of its 4,436 employees on the clock for emergency situations. While tech’s most buzz-worthy unicorns like Uber and Lyft won’t suffer too much from the shutdown, smaller businesses, particularly those in need of an infusion of capital to continue operating, will bear the brunt of any IPO delays.

3. The state of seed 

In 2018, seed activity as a percentage of all deals shrank from 31 percent to 25 percent — a decade low — while the share and size of late-stage deals swelled to record highs.

4. Banking startup N26 raises $300 million at $2.7 billion valuation

N26 is building a retail bank from scratch. The company prides itself on the speed and simplicity of setting up an account and managing assets. In the past year, N26’s valuation has exploded as its user base has tripled, with nearly a third of customers paying for a premium account.

5. E-scooter startup Bird is raising another $300M 

Bird is reportedly nearing a deal to extend its Series C round with a $300 million infusion led by Fidelity. The funding, however, comes at a time when scooter companies are losing steam and struggling to prove that its product is the clear solution to last-mile transportation.

6. AWS gives open source the middle finger 

It’s no secret that AWS has long been accused of taking the best open-source projects and re-using and re-branding them without always giving back to those communities.

7. The Galaxy S10 is coming on February 20 

Looks like Samsung is giving Mobile World Congress the cold shoulder and has decided to announce its latest flagship phone a week earlier in San Francisco.

Lyft is gearing up to roll out its next generation of shared scooters in partnership with Segway Ninebot. This comes on the heels of Segway-Ninebot’s announcement of its newest scooter, the Model Max.

The Model Max was designed with the realization that wear and tear is a major issue for shared electric scooter services. It’s supposed to be stronger, have a better rider experience and more operational efficiency, with a battery that can last 37.5 miles on a single charge, compared to just 15 miles.

To help with bumpy roads, the Model Max features air-filled, 10-inch front and rear wheels, versus 8-inch ones. The scooters also feature a wider baseboard.

Lyft first launched its electric scooters in Denver, Colo. back in September. Since then, Lyft has brought its scooters to eight additional markets in the U.S. Lyft plans to deploy its new scooters “in the coming months,” Lyft Head of Brand for Bikes and Scooters Ethan Eyler told TechCrunch at a Lyft Hub in Las Vegas. More specifically, Eyler said it’d be the latter half of Q1 or early Q2.Lyft also plans to deploy some Segway-Ninebot scooters with swappable batteries “soon,” Eyler said.

“I think we’re learning, you know,” Eyler said. “I mean, this scooter is the result of a lot of learnings that we’ve done and seeing how the scooters hold up. And with the entire strategy behind charging and swappable batteries and charging, we’re learning from all of that to kind of get to our ultimate plan.”

Swappable batteries can be a useful way to increase vehicle availability and overall vehicle downtime spent charging batteries. Last month, Skip unveiled a new scooter with swappable batteries for those exact reasons.

When Lyft first launched its scooters, it relied on ones from Xiaomi. Not too long after, in October, Xiaomi sent a cease-and-desist letter to Lyft, demanding the company stop using its scooters. Lyft now says it doesn’t have any plans to add any additional Xiaomi scooters to its fleet.

It’s worth noting Xiaomi is a minority shareholder in Segway-Ninebot, and one of its early strategic investors, but Segway operates independently of Xiaomi.

Other scooter companies that rely on Segway-Ninebot include Lime, the now Ford-owned Spin and Uber’s JUMP bike and scooter brand. Meanwhile, Bird has a partnership with Xiaomi for its electric scooters. Moving forward, Lyft has yet to determine if it will work with additional manufacturing partners.

“I think it’s still to be determined,” Eyler said, “Looking at all the potential partners, Segway-Ninebot, in our opinion, builds the best scooters in the market.”

In addition to new scooters, Lyft is working on docking systems for scooters. This was inspired by Lyft’s acquisition of dock-based bike-share system Motivate, Eyler said.

“A lot of the cities we’ve spoken with are very excited about this concept,” Eyler said.

That’s because docks can be a way to provide some order to electric scooter parking, while also providing some assurance to riders that there will be scooters where they expect them to be, Eyler said. Still, riders won’t be required to dock scooters in these stations. They also won’t be required to lock the scooters, despite concerns of theft.

“I mean, [theft] definitely occurs,” Eyler said. “You’re never going to be able to stop all bad actors. We also think this is just a much more prominent vehicle and it feels less of something you could pick up and carry off. Our hope is that will cut down on [theft].”

Locks are not completely off the table, Eyler said, but Lyft is not currently developing locking mechanisms.

To read about how we got to where we are today, check out a recap of the year of scooters below.

The Amazon boogie-man has every retailer scrambling for ways to fight back. But the cost and effort to install cameras all over the ceiling or into every shelf could block stores from entering the autonomous shopping era. Caper Labs wants to make eliminating checkout lines as easy as replacing their shopping carts while offering a more familiar experience for customers.

The startup makes a shopping cart with a built-in barcode scanner and credit card swiper, but it’s finalizing the technology to automatically scan items you drop in thanks to three image recognition cameras and a weight sensor. The company claims people already buy 18 percent more per visit after stores are equipped with its carts.

Today, Caper is revealing that it’s raised a total of $3 million including a $2.15 million seed round led by prestigious First Round Capital and joined by food-focused angels like Instacart co-founder Max Mullen, Plated co-founder Nick Taranto, Jet’s Jetblack shopping concierge co-founder Jenny Fleiss, plus Y Combinator. Caper is now in two retailers in the NYC area, though it plans to use the cash to expand to more and develop a smart shopping basket for smaller stores.

“If you walked in to a grocery store 100 years ago versus today, nothing has really changed” says Caper co-founder and CEO Lindon Gao. “It doesn’t make sense that you can order a cab with your phone or go book a hotel with your phone, but you can’t use your phone to make a payment and leave the store. You still have to stand in line.”

Autonomous retail is going to be a race. $50 million-funded Standard Cognition, ex-Pandora CTO Will Glaser’s Grabango, and scrappier startups like Zippin and Inokyo are all building ceiling and shelf-based camera systems to help merchants keep up with Amazon Go’s expanding empire of cashierless stores. But Caper’s plug-and-play cart-based system might be able to leapfrog its competitors if it’s easier for shops to set up.

Inventing The Smart Cart

“I don’t have an altruistic reason to care about retail, but I really want to put a dent in the universe and I think retail is severely under-innovated” Gao candidly remarked. Most founders try to spin a “super hero origin story” about why they’re the right person for the job. For Gao, chasing autonomous retail is just good business. He built his first startup in gaming commerce at age 14. The jewelry company he launched at 19 still operates. He went on to become an investment banker at Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan but “I always felt like I was more of a startup guy.”

Caper was actually a pivot from his previous entry to the space called QueueHop that made cashierless apparel security tags that unlocked when you paid. But during Y Combinator, he discovered how tough it’d be to scale a product that requires a complete rethinking of a merchant’s operations flow. So Gao hoofed it around NYC to talk to 150 merchants and discover what they really wanted. The cart was the answer.

V1 of Caper’s cart lets people scan their items’ barcodes and pay on the cart with a credit card swipe or Apple/Android Pay tap and their receipt is emailed to them. But each time they scan, the cart is actually taking 120 photos and precisely weighing the items to train Caper’s machine vision algorithms in what Gao likens to how Tesla is inching towards self-driving.

Soon, Caper wants to go entirely scanless, and sections of its two pilot stores already use the technology. The cameras on the cart employ image recognition matched with a weight sensor to identify what you toss in your cart. You shop just like normal but then pay and leave with no line. Caper pulls in a store’s existing security feed to help detect shoplifting, which could be a bigger risk than with ceiling and shelf camera systems, but Gao says it hasn’t been a problem yet. He woudn’t reveal the price of the carts but said “they’re not that much more expensive than a standard shopping cart. To outfit a store it should be comparable to the price of implementing traditional self-checkout.” Shops buy the carts outright and pay a technology subscriptions but get free hardware upgrades. They’ll have to hope Caper stays alive.

“Do you want guacamole with those chips?”

Caper hopes to deliver three big benefits to merchants. First, they’ll be able to repurpose cashier labor to assist customers so they buy more and to keep shelves stocked, though eventually this technology is likely to eliminate a lot of jobs. Second, the ease and affordable cost of transitioning means businesses will be able to recoup their investment and grow revenues as shoppers buy more. And third, Caper wants to share data that its carts collect on routes through the store, shelves customers hover in front of, and more with its retail partners so they can optimize their layouts.

One big advantage over its ceiling and shelf camera competitors is that Caper’s cart can promote deals on nearby or related items. In the future, it plans to add recommendations based on what’s on your cart to help you fill out recipes. ‘Threw some chips in the cart? Here’s where to find the guacamole that’s on sale.’ A smaller hand-held smart basket could broaden Caper’s appeal beyond grocers amongst littler shops, though making it light enough to carry will be a challenge.

Gao says that with merchants already seeing sales growth from the carts, what keeps him up at night is handling Caper’s supply chain since the product requires a ton of different component manufacturers. The startup has to move fast if it wants to be what introduces Main Street to autonomous retail. But no matter what gadgets it builds in, Caper must keep sight of the real-world stress their tech will undergo. Gao concludes “We’re basically building a robot here. The carts need to be durable. They need to resist heat, vibration, rain, people slamming them around. We’re building our shopping cart like a tank.”

CES has never been much of a mobile show for Samsung — not with Mobile World Congress a little over a month away. But the company did use its big platform this week to announce the announcement of its next flagship smartphone.

Turns out the Samsung’s not unveiling the Galaxy S10 in Barcelona, either. In fact, the handset will actually make its debut a week before Barcelona’s big mobile show at a standalone Unpacked event in San Francisco. So thanks, Samsung, for those extra frequent flier miles.

We’ve already caught a few glimpses of the handset via a number of leaks, as has become a bit of a tradition for the company. But this gives us another month and a half or so to see the rest of what the premium handset has to offer.

Most notably so far is the company’s decision to forgo the notch, in favor of the camera cutout design Huawei’s helped pioneer. Also reportedly on-tap for the handset is the ability to wirelessly charge compatible devices on contact. 

As the invite notes, this is the 10th anniversary of the Galaxy line. Between that and the company’s insistence on holding a standalone event this time out, it seems likely that we’ll be seeing more than just the S10. Perhaps we’ll get more insight into the forthcoming foldable handset and some more news on the 5G front.