News

September 22, 2021 By Cassandra Garrison MEXICO CITY (Reuters) – Mexican used-car platform Kavak said it has more than doubled its valuation to $8.7 billion based on its latest funding round, making it the second-most valuable startup in Latin America as it eyes further expansion beyond its home market. Kavak’s chief executive, Carlos Garcia, told […]

September 22, 2021 By Nick Carey MUNICH (Reuters) – Battery power may be the frontrunner to become the car technology of the future, but don’t rule out the underdog hydrogen. That’s the view of some major automakers, including BMW and Audi, which are developing hydrogen fuel-cell passenger vehicle prototypes alongside their fleets of battery cars […]

September 22, 2021 ZURICH (Reuters) – Barry Callebaut has made two changes to its executive committee, appointing Masha Vis-Mertens as its new Chief Human Resources Officer and Massimo Selmo as Chief Procurement Officer. Both changes will be effective from October 1, 2021, the Swiss chocolate maker said on Wednesday. (Reporting by John Revill; Editing by […]

September 22, 2021 By Koustav Samanta and Sonali Paul SINGAPORE (Reuters) -Oil prices climbed more than 1% on Wednesday, extending overnight gains after industry data showed U.S. crude stocks fell more than expected last week in the wake of two hurricanes, highlighting tight supply as demand improves. U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures rose […]

September 22, 2021 By Richard Cowan and Susan Cornwell WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Democrats in the House of Representatives passed a bill on Tuesday to fund the U.S. government through Dec. 3 and suspend the nation’s borrowing limit until the end of 2022, sending it to the Senate where Republicans have vowed to block it. The […]

September 22, 2021 SYDNEY/MELBOURNE (Reuters) -A magnitude 6.0 earthquake struck near Melbourne on Wednesday, Geoscience Australia said, one of the country’s biggest quakes on record, causing damage to buildings in the country’s second largest city and sending tremors throughout neighbouring states. The quake’s epicentre was near the rural town of Mansfield in the state of […]

September 22, 2021 MANILA (Reuters) – The Philippines’ lower house of Congress has approved a bill imposing taxes on tech giants like Facebook, Alphabet’s Google and Youtube, and Netflix. Voting 167-6-1, lawmakers late on Tuesday approved on third and final reading a bill imposing a 12% value-added tax (VAT) on digital transactions in the Philippines. […]

September 22, 2021 (Reuters) – SoftBank Group’s Vision Fund had invested in a $2.5 billion private equity fund set up by former U.S. Treasury secretary Steven Mnuchin, the Financial Times. Mnuchin’s Liberty Strategic Capital, which was launched earlier this year, recently raised funds from sovereign wealth funds in the Middle East including Saudi Arabia’s Public […]

September 22, 2021 By Byron Kaye SYDNEY (Reuters) – Facebook Inc has told Australian publishers it has stopped negotiating licencing deals, an email to the industry seen by Reuters showed, a move which came just six months after the passing of a law designed to make tech giants pay for news content. While Facebook has […]

September 22, 2021 By Colin Packham CANBERRA (Reuters) – An Australian-EU trade deal would be mutually beneficial and allow EU members a greater presence in the Indo-Pacific, said Australia’s trade minister, as Canberra tries to repair ties with Paris after the scrapping of a $40 billion submarine deal. Australia last week cancelled a deal with […]

September 22, 2021 SHANGHAI (Reuters) -China Evergrande Group’s main unit said on Wednesday that it would make a bond interest payment on Sept. 23 after private negotiations with bondholders, as global investors worry over a possible default by China’s No. 2 property developer. In a Shenzhen exchange filing, Hengda Real Estate Group Co Ltd said […]

Evermos’ founding team (l to r): Arip Tirta, Ghufron Mustaqim, Iqbal Muslimin and Ilham Taufiq Evermos is an Indonesian social commerce startup with two goals: to let people earn extra income by opening online stores without spending capital and to help small brands grow into household names. The company, which focuses on halal products and […]

Taiwan-based smartphone manufacturing giant Foxconn and national Thailand oil supplier PTT PLC are moving forward with an agreement to start an electric vehicle manufacturing facility in Thailand. The facility is expected to begin rolling out vehicles by 2023. Foxconn had previously reported plans to begin building factories in both Thailand and the U.S. next year. […]

Real-time supply chain visibility company project44 has acquired last-mile tech platform Convey for $225 million. Together, the two companies will combine forces to provide end-to-end supply chain visibility, from the raw materials to the front door. The acquisition will bolster project44’s “Real-time Transportation Visibility Platform” (RTTVP), which provides information on shipments in transit across all […]

To get a roundup of TechCrunch’s biggest and most important stories delivered to your inbox every day at 3 p.m. PDT, subscribe here. Hello from day one of Disrupt. I just hopped out of watching Battlefield companies pitch — more on them below! — to write this for you. Disrupt is looking smooth, impressive and […]

Smart fitness gear is often limited by being static and non-portable. (And, well, eye-wateringly expensive.) Think Peloton‘s stationary bike for spin classes or wall-mounted strength training rig Tonal. Great if you’re at home and can afford to shell out thousands on a fancy home gym, but what if you want to take your workout with […]

Jon Fingas Contributor Jon Fingas is a contributing writer at Engadget. More posts by this contributor Defense Department seeks nuclear propulsion for small spacecraft A Chinese EV startup wants to build a ridable robot unicorn for kids There’s a real chance you’ll need proof of a COVID-19 vaccination to enter certain venues, and Apple is […]

Brynn Putnam has stepped down as CEO of Mirror. The news arrives via a leaked memo to staff also viewed by TechCrunch that notes her exit from the top spot at the connected fitness startup she founded back in 2016. Putnam will continue on as an advisor through next July. This comes a little over […]

We’ve all been there — you’re watching a horror movie, and you know that the main character definitely shouldn’t go into that creepy house, but no matter how much you yell at your TV, you can’t change his fate. But what if you told the guy on screen to steer clear of the house, and […]

If your house has a wooden deck, keeping it in good shape is costly and time consuming. If you don’t keep up with the regular maintenance, it becomes even more costly and time consuming to fix — or, eventually, it all just starts to rot and fall apart. We’ve got robots that can clean our […]