Author: azeeadmin

Ettitude, recently graduated from the ERA accelerator, is looking to ride the growing wave of e-commerce by offering eco-friendly sheets.

The company offers bamboo lyocell sheets and pajamas, which feel like a hybrid between silk and cotton, and stay cool longer than cotton or other fabrics.

Bamboo lyocell fabric is essentially organic fabric made from weaving together tiny fibers of organic bamboo material or pulp. Ettitude says that the fiber yield per acre from bamboo is about 10 times higher than cotton and requires less than 10 percent of the water to grow.

I tried out the Ettitude sheets and found that they were indeed soft and kept me cool in the hot NYC summer, but they also require slightly more attentive laundering. Ettitude sheets should be washed in cold water and separately (or in a laundry bag), which is a slight departure from throwing your sheets in with the regular wash.

Still, the company is growing. Ettitude, a predominantly bootstrapped company, first launched in Australia and gained traction via ecommerce channels. Late this summer, the company launched in the U.S. and has sold “tens of thousands” of units, with a 20 percent month over month growth rate.

Ettitude has taken some investment from friends and family, and also received $100,000 in investment from Entrepreneurs Roundtable Accelerator .

While the consumer side of the business seems to be growing, Ettitude is also receiving inbound requests from enterprise brands such as airlines to get involved with the brand. Qantas, the largest airline in Australia, has started selling Ettitude in its online portal to frequent fliers.

Ettitude Queen set sheets cost $178.

Ettitude, recently graduated from the ERA accelerator, is looking to ride the growing wave of e-commerce by offering eco-friendly sheets.

The company offers bamboo lyocell sheets and pajamas, which feel like a hybrid between silk and cotton, and stay cool longer than cotton or other fabrics.

Bamboo lyocell fabric is essentially organic fabric made from weaving together tiny fibers of organic bamboo material or pulp. Ettitude says that the fiber yield per acre from bamboo is about 10 times higher than cotton and requires less than 10 percent of the water to grow.

I tried out the Ettitude sheets and found that they were indeed soft and kept me cool in the hot NYC summer, but they also require slightly more attentive laundering. Ettitude sheets should be washed in cold water and separately (or in a laundry bag), which is a slight departure from throwing your sheets in with the regular wash.

Still, the company is growing. Ettitude, a predominantly bootstrapped company, first launched in Australia and gained traction via ecommerce channels. Late this summer, the company launched in the U.S. and has sold “tens of thousands” of units, with a 20 percent month over month growth rate.

Ettitude has taken some investment from friends and family, and also received $100,000 in investment from Entrepreneurs Roundtable Accelerator .

While the consumer side of the business seems to be growing, Ettitude is also receiving inbound requests from enterprise brands such as airlines to get involved with the brand. Qantas, the largest airline in Australia, has started selling Ettitude in its online portal to frequent fliers.

Ettitude Queen set sheets cost $178.

Fist announced at Apple’s education event in Chicago, the company today launched its new “Everyone Can Create” curriculum on Apple Books. The curriculum joins Apple’s “Everyone Can Code” initiative by offering teachers a way to integrate drawing, music, filmmaking and photography into their classroom lesson plans.

Specifically, “Everyone Can Create” is designed to take advantage of Apple’s new 9.7-inch iPad and Apple Pencil, also introduced at the company’s event this March in Chicago. Before its introduction, only Apple’s expensive iPad Pro model offered Pencil support. The new iPad, however, is just $299 for schools, like the prior 9.7-inch device. (Or it’s $329 for consumers.)

The curriculum itself was built by Apple in collaboration with teachers and educators, and works to alongside Apple’s built-in apps like GarageBand, iMovie, Clips, and others. It’s been in preview since the news of its arrival earlier this year, with educators in over 350 schools worldwide giving it a go. Now, it’s open to all, the company says.

Included in the curriculum are four project guides for drawing, music, video, and photos, each with a series of projects that build skills progressively. In total, there are 300 lesson plan ideas across media, projects, and subjects. Not all are focused on the creative arts, to be clear. For example, a math teacher can use the iPad camera’s burst mode to capture the arc of a basketball toss to measure its parabola, the company explains in its announcement. Students can also use the camera to learn about fractals or use Apple Pencils and apps to learn about symmetry.

“We believe Apple technology can help unleash every child’s creative genius,” said Philip Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Marketing, in a statement about the launch. “Working closely with teachers, we have built the Everyone Can Create curriculum to help bring creative expression and the arts into the classroom, and to help students stay engaged through creativity and ultimately be more successful.”

Apple has proven fairly successful with its prior curriculum, “Everyone Can Code,” which is now used by over 5,000 schools, community colleges and technical colleges worldwide. It also offers a large library of third-party education apps for teachers to tap into – there are nearly 200,000 on today’s App Store.

“Everyone Can Create” is now available in English on Apple Books, with other languages rolling out by the end of 2018. Apple Stores will also feature “Everyone Can Create” at its Apple Teacher Tuesday sessions.

Fist announced at Apple’s education event in Chicago, the company today launched its new “Everyone Can Create” curriculum on Apple Books. The curriculum joins Apple’s “Everyone Can Code” initiative by offering teachers a way to integrate drawing, music, filmmaking and photography into their classroom lesson plans.

Specifically, “Everyone Can Create” is designed to take advantage of Apple’s new 9.7-inch iPad and Apple Pencil, also introduced at the company’s event this March in Chicago. Before its introduction, only Apple’s expensive iPad Pro model offered Pencil support. The new iPad, however, is just $299 for schools, like the prior 9.7-inch device. (Or it’s $329 for consumers.)

The curriculum itself was built by Apple in collaboration with teachers and educators, and works to alongside Apple’s built-in apps like GarageBand, iMovie, Clips, and others. It’s been in preview since the news of its arrival earlier this year, with educators in over 350 schools worldwide giving it a go. Now, it’s open to all, the company says.

Included in the curriculum are four project guides for drawing, music, video, and photos, each with a series of projects that build skills progressively. In total, there are 300 lesson plan ideas across media, projects, and subjects. Not all are focused on the creative arts, to be clear. For example, a math teacher can use the iPad camera’s burst mode to capture the arc of a basketball toss to measure its parabola, the company explains in its announcement. Students can also use the camera to learn about fractals or use Apple Pencils and apps to learn about symmetry.

“We believe Apple technology can help unleash every child’s creative genius,” said Philip Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Marketing, in a statement about the launch. “Working closely with teachers, we have built the Everyone Can Create curriculum to help bring creative expression and the arts into the classroom, and to help students stay engaged through creativity and ultimately be more successful.”

Apple has proven fairly successful with its prior curriculum, “Everyone Can Code,” which is now used by over 5,000 schools, community colleges and technical colleges worldwide. It also offers a large library of third-party education apps for teachers to tap into – there are nearly 200,000 on today’s App Store.

“Everyone Can Create” is now available in English on Apple Books, with other languages rolling out by the end of 2018. Apple Stores will also feature “Everyone Can Create” at its Apple Teacher Tuesday sessions.

Google just announced new features for Google Maps on Android and iOS. The update is rolling out this week and features a bunch of new features focused on commuting, music and getting more personal data from you.

While Google Maps is particularly useful for road trips and vacation, the app can also be useful for stressful commutes. Google is resurfacing some of those features with a new ‘Commute’ tab.

After setting up your home and work address, the app will help you know what to expect in the morning and the evening. If you drive to work, Google Maps now tells you how long it’s going to take and if there are any alternative routes. It works pretty much like Waze’s ETA screen and tells you if it’s going to be faster or slower in 30 minutes or an hour.

If you take the bus or train to work, Google Maps can help you find out when you should leave. The app takes into account the walk or drive to the station. Those public transit features compete directly with Citymapper and most likely relies on a lot of open data.

Talking about public transit, you’ll be able to see your bus or train on the map, slowly moving closer to you. The app also tells you how long you have to wait. This feature will be available in 80 regions around the world. In Sydney, the app tells you how full the next bus is going to be.

Unfortunately, this update comes with a privacy drawback. Until very recently, you could associate your home and work address with your Google account in Google Maps.

Now, you need to activate ‘web & app activity’, the infamous all-encompassing privacy destroyer — I used to store my home and work address and I can no longer change those addresses without enabling that. If you activate that setting, Google will collect your search history, your Chrome browsing history, your location, your credit card purchases and more.

And Google nudges you to activate that “feature” all the time. You need to turn on ‘web & app activity’ to use Google Assistant on an Android device for instance. It’s becoming quite clear that Google is monetizing its newest features with your data.

In other news, Google is also adding music controls in Google Maps. You’ll be able to control Spotify, Apple Music and Google Play Music. It looks like the company is taking advantage of taller screens to add a banner near the bottom of the screen with the current song and the ability to skip a song or pause the music.

There will be a new button on the right to open your music app as well. Spotify users on Android will also be able to browse the Spotify library from Google Maps directly.

Google just announced new features for Google Maps on Android and iOS. The update is rolling out this week and features a bunch of new features focused on commuting, music and getting more personal data from you.

While Google Maps is particularly useful for road trips and vacation, the app can also be useful for stressful commutes. Google is resurfacing some of those features with a new ‘Commute’ tab.

After setting up your home and work address, the app will help you know what to expect in the morning and the evening. If you drive to work, Google Maps now tells you how long it’s going to take and if there are any alternative routes. It works pretty much like Waze’s ETA screen and tells you if it’s going to be faster or slower in 30 minutes or an hour.

If you take the bus or train to work, Google Maps can help you find out when you should leave. The app takes into account the walk or drive to the station. Those public transit features compete directly with Citymapper and most likely relies on a lot of open data.

Talking about public transit, you’ll be able to see your bus or train on the map, slowly moving closer to you. The app also tells you how long you have to wait. This feature will be available in 80 regions around the world. In Sydney, the app tells you how full the next bus is going to be.

Unfortunately, this update comes with a privacy drawback. Until very recently, you could associate your home and work address with your Google account in Google Maps.

Now, you need to activate ‘web & app activity’, the infamous all-encompassing privacy destroyer — I used to store my home and work address and I can no longer change those addresses without enabling that. If you activate that setting, Google will collect your search history, your Chrome browsing history, your location, your credit card purchases and more.

And Google nudges you to activate that “feature” all the time. You need to turn on ‘web & app activity’ to use Google Assistant on an Android device for instance. It’s becoming quite clear that Google is monetizing its newest features with your data.

In other news, Google is also adding music controls in Google Maps. You’ll be able to control Spotify, Apple Music and Google Play Music. It looks like the company is taking advantage of taller screens to add a banner near the bottom of the screen with the current song and the ability to skip a song or pause the music.

There will be a new button on the right to open your music app as well. Spotify users on Android will also be able to browse the Spotify library from Google Maps directly.

We are less than a month away from the release of Red Dead Redemption 2, the sequel to one of the most popular games of the PS3/Xbox era. Red Dead Redemption launched in 2010, meaning that fans of the franchise have waited for almost a decade to continue their adventure through the early American frontier.

Today, Rockstar Games has released a little over 4 minutes of gameplay footage, showing off a special glimpse of first-person mode. Usually a third-person game, Rockstar has let slip that the next game will have a first-person mode for folks who want to fully immerse.

Part of the draw to RDR comes from the beauty of its open world experience. With RDR2, Rockstar has challenged itself to make everything bigger, better, and more dynamic. In this trailer, the company shows off small but significant details like the dynamic weather (see Arthur Morgan’s frosty breath in the snow) and also gives us a deeper look at important game mechanics like Dead Eye.

As part of the expansion of the RDR world itself, players are also getting even more customization options, with the ability to decide what Arthur wears, eats, and how well he handles his own physical hygiene. Though it’s not show in this particular trailer, we’ve also learned that players can customize their horses as well.

You can check out the full gameplay trailer below. Red Dead Redemption 2 is available starting October 26.

Universal remote system Caavo is addressing some of the complaints with its first-generation hardware with today’s release of a new, more affordable system. Unlike the original, $400 home theater product, this second device arrives at consumer-friendly price point of $99.95 and adds support for 4K HDR, as well as other features focused on playlist creation and community sharing.

Caavo has always gotten points for being unique. It designed an odd device solving a pain point a number of people don’t have – that of owning too many streamers, game consoles, and other set-top boxes, and struggling with constantly switching remotes and flipping between various devices.

In reality, the people reviewing systems like these – tech reporters, generally – face this exact problem, with Fire TVs, Apple TVs, Chromecasts, Rokus, and other gaming consoles and boxes cluttering up their living rooms. But most consumers they are not.

The mainstream is still just now cutting the cord with cable TV and picking up their first media streaming device, or adding one to the mix in addition to their cable box. They may or may not have a traditional game console. Switching in between a couple of HDMI inputs on a TV set hasn’t felt like an overwhelming struggle to be solved. And finding something good to watch isn’t so hard either – if anything, there’s too much great TV these days.

Caavo then, wasn’t for everyone – it was for a sliver of the market.

The new, low-cost Control Center by Caavo aims for broader appeal.

The Control Center lets you connect up to four devices and a soundbar, compared with the original Caavo’s eight devices. It ditches the pricier device’s fancy cable management system that used posts to organize cables for just a set of standard HDMI ports on the back of its box. It also doesn’t ship with the 3″ red-and-white HDMI cable – you bring your own.

And it drops its design-forward real wood covers and decorative touches for a shiny black look instead.

In the box: Control Center, Universal Remote with batteries, power supply, IR Blaster 

Most importantly, the new device supports 4K HDR and Dolby Atmos – which the flagship product lacked, and was a definite hurdle in getting consumers to buy. (After all, if you’re the type of person with too many streamers, you’re probably rocking a nice TV, too. And at $400, lacking HDR was seen as a non-starter for those in the market for something like this.)

The company says the Control Center will be able to detect that the TV and source are HDR capable. It then negotiates with the source to allow the source to send an HDR bit stream and sends it to the TV.

The Control Center’s universal remote keeps the same button layout as before, for the most part, with its big, centered “Caavo” button for calling up the software’s main menu for switching devices and apps, alongside its various other navigation and TV controls. It’s simple enough to use, and still has the little stand, too, which has always been a nice touch.

Of course, the big selling point for a universal remote system is universal support for TVs. Caavo works to control TV power and volume across a range of top devices, like LG, Panasonic, Phillips, RCA, Samsung, Sharp, Sony, Toshiba and Vizio.

Setting up my (crappy!) Polaroid TV was more cumbersome. It figured out the volume controls, but not the power on/off. I still have two remotes. Oh well. (I was never really the target demographic, though. We’re not home media geeks – we watch just as often on mobile devices than the big screen. And we’re generally happy here with just a Roku.)

Caavo can connect a variety of streaming devices – Roku, Fire TV, Apple TV with Siri Remote, Nvidia Shield TV, cable set-top boxes (Xfinity, UVerse, Dish, DirecTV, etc.), DVD/Blu-ray players, and game consoles. But adding something weird – like this goofy AirTV Player from Dish – was more trouble than it was worth. (You would probably need a bit a tech support to try to map the buttons correctly here.)

The Control Center adds support for Amazon Alexa and Google Assistant voice controls through a voice app. (e.g. Alexa, tell Caavo to…”) But it doesn’t feel natural. And if you want to use Alexa with your Fire TV, or Siri on Apple TV for their device-specific commands, you’ll still need their remotes. You can, however, use verbal commands to power on the Control center, search for shows and movies, control the volume, play content, and other remote-control functions.

Some of this still feels gimmicky, but that’s not Caavo’s fault, necessarily. Talking to TVs just isn’t as natural as grabbing a remote and mashing a button. It may not be for everyone.

You can locate a lost remote by pressing a button on the top – a standard feature on Roku’s high-end device, too.

With some of Caavo’s earlier key problems – like lack HDR support and a too-high price point – addressed, the company turned its focus to its software with the launch of Control Center.

“We want to provide a solution for people who are as entertainment obsessed as we are – who want to see all their options across all their devices and apps and subscriptions in one place,” says co-founder Andrew Einaudi. “The only thing we are more obsessed with than watching great shows is talking about them, so we wanted to create a new community where you could always find something great to watch.”

Like the first device, Caavo’s Control Center offers universal search across streaming services – an unbiased list of places where you can watch what you want. (Roku does this too, so it’s not really a Caavo exclusive.)

While individual streaming services like Netflix use a combination of algorithms based on viewing behavior to make suggestions, Caavo is going a different route in Control Center – it’s offering its own editorial suggestions. The interface will now feature hand-picked, curated lists compiled by editors and tastemakers in the Caavo community.

You can contribute, too, through the new “My Lists” feature which let you make lists of things to watch across streaming services and live TV alike, then share them with the Caavo community through the Crowd Surfing feature. You can also keep them private, if you choose.

“We are improving our algorithms on the software side but there’s also something to be said for real recommendations from real people,” noted Einaudi.

I’m not convinced this feature is all that useful, however. Because “anyone” can contribute, the lists section is cluttered with random suggestions, often without titles that make any sense to anyone but the original creator. “Things are about to get weird,” offered one list. “Pumpkin Spiced Scares,” was another. (Frankly, I’d take an algorithm, if I’m being honest.)

Caavo’s team includes those with deep expertise in hardware and media services, and it’s raised over $32 million in funding to get off the ground. The company now has 60 patents and patents-pending on its home entertainment system – something of value for a future acquirer, perhaps.

There’s a sort of obsessive, home media center geek quality to the original Caavo and now this new Control Center. It’s not perfect and even at $100, it’s still not for everyone. At the end of the day, universal remote systems feel like a luxury, not a necessity.

But Caavo has built a lot of technology here in an attempt to make difficult things feel seamless, from switching in between inputs to finding you a movie or show across streaming services then letting you launch it right in your favorite app on the device you prefer. But when it struggles or lags, you definitely notice – and wonder why you needed so many boxes in the first place.

Beyond the upfront cost, the new device requires a Control Center Service Plan of $1.99/month or $19.99/year, in order to use universal search, voice control, editorial guides, My Lists, Crowd Surfing, app launching, deep linked content, and Caavo Cache (a history and privacy feature). It’s, at least, cheaper than TiVo.

Control Center is available at Best Buy, BestBuy.com and Caavo.com beginning today, October 1.

Tech specs are below. 

Main Unit
Size: 263 x 150 x 35 mm
Weight: 1.0kg
HDMI: 4 inputs, 1 output. HDMI 2.0, HDCP 2.2
USB: Service port only
IR: 3.5mm IR out
Power: Adaptor: 110-240V 50-60Hz AC. Draws up to 700mA; Set: DC 12V 2A
Ethernet: 100Mbps
Wireless: 2.4 and 5 GHz (802.11 2×2 ac) and Bluetooth 4.0

Supported Audio Formats
PCM, 8 Channels, 24 bits, 192kHz
Dolby Digital, Dolby Digital Plus, Dolby TrueHD and Dolby Atmos up to 8 channels and up to
192kHz
DTS and DTS-HD Master Audio up to 8 channels and up to 192kHz

Supported Video Formats
max RGB/YUV444/YUV422/YUV420 4K (3840×2160) 10-bit at 60Hz
HDR pass-through (HDR 10)

Remote Control
Size: 38 x 174 x 22 mm
Weight: 0.1kg
Range: 6m-12m, under typical conditions
Connection: Bluetooth LE
Batteries: 2 x AAA

 

I’d like to meet some high-tech folks in Vancouver this week and I need your help. I’d like to hold a micro meet up at about 7pm on October 4 and I need a recommended place. If we can manage it we might be able to have a pitch off as well so let me know if you Vancouverians (Vancouverites?) know of any place with a bar and maybe a little stage and a microphone.

Please let me know if you can think of any good spots and I’ll finalize the meetup tomorrow. Email me at john@techcrunch.com or Tweet me @johnbiggs with ideas/help.

See you soon, eh!

The slow and steady rise of Babbel has been impressive on many fronts. The company is now managing the top-grossing language learning app in the world. That’s why I’m excited to announce that we’ll have founder and CEO Markus Witte as well as CEO U.S. Julie Hansen at TechCrunch Disrupt Berlin.

Babbel has been around for over a decade. The company started with a web-based language learning service. It was based on Adobe Flash and HTML. Now, most Babbel users interact with the service using the company’s mobile app.

And Babbel also represents a European success story. Thanks to the European Union, many people live, work and travel all around Europe. It creates a unique market opportunity as the continent is a highly fragmented market when it comes to languages — there are dozens of different languages. That’s why building a language learning startup in Berlin is the perfect fit.

Babbel operates with a freemium, subscription-based model. Downloading the app is free, but you need to pay a subscription to unlock all the features.

More recently, Babbel has been betting on the U.S. as its next market opportunity. Many Europeans want to learn English, and it’s also true in the U.S. Immigrants want to improve their knowledge of English.

It’s a different market that causes a different set of challenges. That’s why the company has named Julie Hansen as CEO of the U.S. division of Babbel.

If you want to hear both Hansen and Witte talk about Babbel’s past ten years and the company’s next ten years, you should come to Disrupt Berlin.

Buy your ticket to Disrupt Berlin to listen to this discussion and many others. The conference will take place on November 29-30.

In addition to fireside chats and panels, like this one, new startups will participate in the Startup Battlefield Europe to win the highly coveted Battlefield cup.

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Markus Witte

Babbel Founder and CEO

Markus Witte is CEO and founder of Babbel , the world’s top-grossing language learning app. He describes Babbel as a learning company inside and out: “Heading a team in which each and every person, as well as the organization itself, is constantly learning new things is incredibly fulfilling.”

Markus began his career at NYU, and later lectured at Humboldt University in Berlin, where he discovered his passion for teaching. Following his time as an academic, he led the development of online marketing and web infrastructure and managed the online and systems teams at music software company Native Instruments. Coming back to learning and teaching, he founded Babbel with three others in 2007.

Julie Hansen

Babbel CEO U.S.

Julie Hansen is CEO U.S. at Babbel. Based in the company’s New York office she is leading the US expansion of the world’s top-grossing language learning app.

Before joining Babbel, Julie was the COO and President of Business Insider. Under her leadership the news site became the most visited business outlet on the internet. Prior to Business Insider, Hansen held top management roles at sports site NCAA.com, Condé Nast Publications, and Time Inc. Julie has over two decades of experience growing digital media companies, launching interactive web sites, deploying mobile apps, and leading online and offline marketing campaigns. She began her career at Penguin Books, publishing learning software for literature among other products.