Conductor execs buy their company back from WeWork

It’s been less than two years since WeWork announced the acquisition of SEO and content marketing company Conductor — but those two years have been bumpy, to say the least.

Briefly: Parent organization The We Company’s disastrous attempt to go public resulted in the ouster of CEO Adam Neumann, an indefinite delay of its IPO and reports that the company was weighing the sale of subsidiaries Meetup, Managed by Q and Conductor.

So it’s no surprise that Conductor is, in fact, being sold — not to another company, but to its own CEO and co-founder Seth Besmertnik, COO Selina Eizik and investor Jason Finger (managing partner of The Finger Group and founder of Seamless).

“We’re grateful for our time with WeWork, during which we’ve been able to invest aggressively in R&D, doubling the size of our team with world-class talent that helps our customers achieve success everyday,” Besmertnik said in a statement. “People don’t want to be advertised to or sold to anymore. Our solutions make it easier for brands to deliver marketing that is helpful and valuable. It’s marketing that consumers actually seek out.”

The company also says that Conductor’s employees will be given a new category of stock that they’re calling founder-preferred shares, turning them into “250 employee co-founders” who can appoint a representative to the board of directors. This should give them a bigger stake and a bigger say in where Conductor goes from here.

In fact, Besmertnik noted that pre-acquisition, the Conductor team (including himself) owned less than 10% of the company, while under the new structure, employees will own “more than four times what they did when we sold the company” — and combined with Besmertnik and Eizik’s shares, they have a majority stake.

“Our ownership model is going to really create an even more committed and even more passionate group of people as we apply that to our mission and vision,” he told me.

Conductor started out with a focus on helping marketers optimize their websites for search, then expanded with tools for creating the content that’s being found through search. Since its acquisition, the company has operated as a WeWork subsidiary, and it’s currently working with more than 400 enterprises including Visa, Casper and Slack.

The financial terms were not disclosed, but Conductor says that as a result of the deal, it’s fully divested from The We Company.

WeWork acquires SEO and marketing company Conductor

https://ift.tt/eA8V8J Conductor execs buy their company back from WeWork https://ift.tt/2PR46dZ

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Atom Finance’s free Bloomberg Terminal rival raises $12M

{rss:content:encoded} Atom Finance’s free Bloomberg Terminal rival raises $12M https://ift.tt/36rtEVr https://ift.tt/2E7y086 December 12, 2019 at 02:00PM

If you want to win on Wall Street, Yahoo Finance is insufficient but Bloomberg Terminal costs a whopping $24,000 per year. That’s why Atom Finance built a free tool designed to democratize access to professional investor research. If Robinhood made it cost $0 to trade stocks, Atom Finance makes it cost $0 to know which to buy.

Today Atom launches its mobile app with access to its financial modeling, portfolio tracking, news analysis, benchmarking, and discussion tools. It’s the consumerization of finance, similar to what we’ve seen in enterprise SAAS. “Investment research tools are too important to the financial well-being of consumers to lack the same cycles of product innovation and accessibility that we have experienced in other verticals” CEO Eric Shoykhet tells me.

In its first press interview, Atom Finance today revealed to TechCrunch that it’s raised a $10.6 million Series A led by General Catalyst to build on its quiet $1.9 million seed round. The cash will help the startup eventually monetize by launching premium tiers with even more hardcore research tools.

Atom Finance already has 100,000 users and $400 million in assets it’s helping steer since soft-launching in June. “Atom fundamentally changes the game for how financial news media and reporting is consumed. I could not live without it” says The Twenty Minute VC podcast founder and Atom investor Harry Stebbings.

Individual investors are already at a disadvantage compared to big firms equipped with artificial intelligence, the priciest research, and legions of traders glued to the markets. Yet it’s becoming increasingly clear that investing is critical to long-term financial mobility, especially in an age of rampant student debt and automation threatening employment.

“Our mission is two fold” Shoykhet says. “To modernize investment research tools through an intuitive platform that’s easily accessible across all devices, while democratizing access to institutional-quality investing tools that were once only available to Wall Street professionals.”

Leveling The Trading Floor

Shoykhet saw the gap between amateur and expert research platforms first hand as an investor at Blackstone and Governors Lane. Yet even the supposedly best-in-class software was lacking the usability we’ve come to expect from consumer mobile apps. Atom Finance claims that “for example, Bloomberg hasn’t made a significant change to its central product offering since 1982.”

Atom Finance Team

So a year ago, Shoykhet founded Atom Finance in Brooklyn to fill the void. Its web, iOS, and Android apps offer five products that combine to guide users’ investing decisions without drowning them in complexity:

• Sandbox – Instant financial modeling with pre-populated consensus projections that automatically update and are recalculated over time
• Portfolio – Track your linked investment accounts to monitor overarching stats, real-time profit and loss statements, and diversification
• X-Ray – A financial research search engine for compiling news, SEC filings, transcripts, and analysis
• Compare – Benchmarking tables for comparing companies and sectors
• Collaborate – Discussion boards and group chat for sharing insights with fellow investors

“Our Sandbox feature allows users to create simple financial models directly within our platform, without having to export data to a spreadsheet” Shoykhet says. “This saves our users time and prevents them from having to manually refresh the inputs to their model when there is new information.”

Shoykhet positions Atom Finance in the middle of the market, saying “Existing solutions are either too rudimentary for rigorous analysis (Yahoo Finance, Google Finance) or too expensive for individual investors (Bloomberg, CapIQ, Factset).”

With both its free and forthcoming paid tiers, Atom hopes to undercut Sentieo, a more AI-focused financial research platform that charges $500 to $1000 per month and raised $19 million a year ago. Cheaper tools like BamSEC and WallMine are often limited to just pulling in earnings transcripts and filings. Robinhood has its own in-app research tools, which could make it a looming competitor or a potential acquirer for Atom Finance.

Shoykhet admits his startup will face stiff competition from well-entrenched tools like Bloomberg. “Incumbent solutions have significant brand equity with our target market, and especially with professional investors. We will have to continue iterating and deliver an unmatched user experience to gain the trust/loyalty of these users” he says. Additionally, Atom Finance’s access to users’ sensitive data mean flawless privacy, security, and accuracy will be essential.

The $12.5 million from General Catalyst, Greenoaks, Global Founders Capital, Untitled Investments, Day One Ventures, and a slew of angels gives Atom runway to rev up its freemium model.  Robinhood has found great success converting unpaid users to its subscription tier where they can borrow money to trade. By similarly starting out free, Atom’s 8-person team hailing from SoFi, Silver Lake, Blackstone, and Citi could build a giant funnel to feed its premium tiers.

Fintech can feel dry and ruthlessly capitalistic at times. But Shoykhet insists he’s in it to equip a new generation with methods of wealth creation. “I think we’ve gone long enough without seeing real innovation in this space. We can’t be complacent with something so important. It’s crucial that we democratize access to these tools and educate consumers . . . to improve their investment well-being.”

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Atom Finance’s free Bloomberg Terminal rival raises $12M

If you want to win on Wall Street, Yahoo Finance is insufficient but Bloomberg Terminal costs a whopping $24,000 per year. That’s why Atom Finance built a free tool designed to democratize access to professional investor research. If Robinhood made it cost $0 to trade stocks, Atom Finance makes it cost $0 to know which to buy.

Today Atom launches its mobile app with access to its financial modeling, portfolio tracking, news analysis, benchmarking, and discussion tools. It’s the consumerization of finance, similar to what we’ve seen in enterprise SAAS. “Investment research tools are too important to the financial well-being of consumers to lack the same cycles of product innovation and accessibility that we have experienced in other verticals” CEO Eric Shoykhet tells me.

In its first press interview, Atom Finance today revealed to TechCrunch that it’s raised a $10.6 million Series A led by General Catalyst to build on its quiet $1.9 million seed round. The cash will help the startup eventually monetize by launching premium tiers with even more hardcore research tools.

Atom Finance already has 100,000 users and $400 million in assets it’s helping steer since soft-launching in June. “Atom fundamentally changes the game for how financial news media and reporting is consumed. I could not live without it” says The Twenty Minute VC podcast founder Harry Stebbings.

Individual investors are already at a disadvantage compared to big firms equipped with artificial intelligence, the priciest research, and legions of traders glued to the markets. Yet it’s becoming increasingly clear that investing is critical to long-term financial mobility, especially in an age of rampant student debt and automation threatening employment.

“Our mission is two fold” Shoykhet says. “To modernize investment research tools through an intuitive platform that’s easily accessible across all devices, while democratizing access to institutional-quality investing tools that were once only available to Wall Street professionals.”

Leveling The Trading Floor

Shoykhet saw the gap between amateur and expert research platforms first hand as an investor at Blackstone and Governors Lane. Yet even the supposedly best-in-class software was lacking the usability we’ve come to expect from consumer mobile apps. Atom Finance claims that “for example, Bloomberg hasn’t made a significant change to its central product offering since 1982.”

Atom Finance Team

So a year ago, Shoykhet founded Atom Finance in Brooklyn to fill the void. Its web, iOS, and Android apps offer five products that combine to guide users’ investing decisions without drowning them in complexity:

• Sandbox – Instant financial modeling with pre-populated consensus projections that automatically update and are recalculated over time
• Portfolio – Track your linked investment accounts to monitor overarching stats, real-time profit and loss statements, and diversification
• X-Ray – A financial research search engine for compiling news, SEC filings, transcripts, and analysis
• Compare – Benchmarking tables for comparing companies and sectors
• Collaborate – Discussion boards and group chat for sharing insights with fellow investors

“Our Sandbox feature allows users to create simple financial models directly within our platform, without having to export data to a spreadsheet” Shoykhet says. “This saves our users time and prevents them from having to manually refresh the inputs to their model when there is new information.”

Shoykhet positions Atom Finance in the middle of the market, saying “Existing solutions are either too rudimentary for rigorous analysis (Yahoo Finance, Google Finance) or too expensive for individual investors (Bloomberg, CapIQ, Factset).”

With both its free and forthcoming paid tiers, Atom hopes to undercut Sentieo, a more AI-focused financial research platform that charges $500 to $1000 per month and raised $19 million a year ago. Cheaper tools like BamSEC and WallMine are often limited to just pulling in earnings transcripts and filings. Robinhood has its own in-app research tools, which could make it a looming competitor or a potential acquirer for Atom Finance.

Shoykhet admits his startup will face stiff competition from well-entrenched tools like Bloomberg. “Incumbent solutions have significant brand equity with our target market, and especially with professional investors. We will have to continue iterating and deliver an unmatched user experience to gain the trust/loyalty of these users” he says. Additionally, Atom Finance’s access to users’ sensitive data mean flawless privacy, security, and accuracy will be essential.

The $12.5 million from General Catalyst, Greenoaks, Global Founders Capital, Untitled Investments, Day One Ventures, and a slew of angels gives Atom runway to rev up its freemium model.  Robinhood has found great success converting unpaid users to its subscription tier where they can borrow money to trade. By similarly starting out free, Atom’s 8-person team hailing from SoFi, Silver Lake, Blackstone, and Citi could build a giant funnel to feed its premium tiers.

Fintech can feel dry and ruthlessly capitalistic at times. But Shoykhet insists he’s in it to equip a new generation with methods of wealth creation. “I think we’ve gone long enough without seeing real innovation in this space. We can’t be complacent with something so important. It’s crucial that we democratize access to these tools and educate consumers . . . to improve their investment well-being.”

https://ift.tt/2E7y086 Atom Finance’s free Bloomberg Terminal rival raises $12M https://ift.tt/36rtEVr

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GetYourGuide widens its horizons, will expand its Originals short tours into day trips and more

GetYourGuide has made a name for itself as the startup that helped the stale idea of guided tours for travellers on its head. Tapping into the generation of consumers who think of travel not just as going somewhere, but having an “experience” (and, ideally, recording it for Insta-posterity), it has built a marketplace to connect them with people who will help guarantee that this is what they will get. It’s a concept that has helped it sell more than 25 million tickets, hit a $1 billion valuation, and raise hundreds of millions of dollars in VC funding.

And the startup has grown quite a lot since passing the 25 million mark in May. “We’ve had 40 million travelers over the last 12 months. We’re the market leader in every European geography. We’re #2 in the U.S. and about to become #1,” co-founder and CEO Johannes Reck said at TechCrunch Disrupt Berlin.

Now GetYourGuide is taking the next step in its strategy to expand its touchpoints with users, and grow and diversify its business in the process. The company is expanding its “Originals” business — its own in-house tour operation — into one-day tours and other longer journeys, with the aim of hitting 1 million sales of Originals this year. It will kick off the effort with a small number — between five and 10 — one-day tours in different exotic locations. Examples will include “dune-bashing in Dubai,” glacier excursions from Reykjavik, and trips to Bali’s “most instagrammable hidden spots.”

GetYourGuide Originals have been working well. “We’ve had tremendous success, we have an average score of 4.8 [out of 5] compared to 4.4 for the other marketplace activities,” Reck said. Originals have a 40% higher repeat rate than other activities.

“And we’re now extending it to day trips. For those who are not familiar with the travel experience, day trip is the single biggest vertical inside of experiences,” Reck said.

Originals was launched a year and a half ago as a way for GetYourGuide to build its own tours — which it kicked off first with shorter walking tours — as a complement to the marketplace where it offers travellers a way of discovering and purchasing places on tours organised by third parties. Today it offers 23 different Originals in 17 cities like Paris, London, Berlin and Rome.

Up to now, GYG has sold some 200,000 places on its Originals tours — which is actually a tiny proportion of business, when you consider that the number of tours booked through the platform has passed 25 million.

The startup likes to describe its own Orignals as “like Netflix Originals, but in the real world!” And that analogy is true in a couple of ways. Not only does it give GYG more curatorial control on what is actually part of the tour, where it’s run, who guides it and more; but it gives the company potentially a bigger margin when it comes to making money off the effort, and means it does not have to negotiate with third parties on revenue share and other business details.

That’s, of course, not considering the challenges of scaling in this way.

Adding in more Originals and extending to transportation to get to the destination (and potentially staying overnight at some point) will mean taking on costs and organizational efforts, and risks, around more operational segments: making sure vehicles are safe and working, that hotels have clean sheets (and rooms), and more. More things can go wrong, and customers will have many more reasons to complain (or praise). It will be one of those moments when the startup will have to rethink what it’s core competency is, and whether it can deliver on that.

On the other side, if it works, GYG will diversify its the business while finding new revenue streams. But the strategy to grow Originals is a logical next step for other reasons, too.

The most important of these is probably competition: GYG may have been the pioneer of hipster travel experiences, but today it is by no means the only company focusing on this segment. Companies like Airbnb and TripAdvisor have tacked on tours and “Experiences” as a complement to their own offerings, as ways of extending their own consumer touchpoints beyond, respectively, booking a place to say or finding a cool place that popular with locals, or figure out what attractions to see.

Get Your Guide needs to find ways of keeping existing and new users returning to its own platform, rather than simply tacking on its tour packages while organising other aspects of their vacation.

The other is that, as Get Your Guide continues to break ground on changing the conversation around travel, building its own content rather than relying on others to fulfil its vision will become ever more essential, and paves the way for how the company will approach adding ever more components into the chain between your home and your destination.

https://ift.tt/36tN10i GetYourGuide widens its horizons, will expand its Originals short tours into day trips and more https://ift.tt/2ruNikR

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Glovo’s Sacha Michaud: “I think there will be consolidation”

Many companies realized that there was a huge opportunity when it comes to on-demand delivery of food and groceries. And apparently, too many companies as Glovo co-founder Sacha Michaud expects some consolidation in the space in the near future.

At TechCrunch Disrupt Berlin, the General Manager of Northern, Central and Eastern Europe for Uber Eats Charity Safford and Glovo’s co-founder Sacha Michaud sat down with TechCrunch’s Natasha Lomas to discuss all of the ups and downs that come with running a delivery service.

And it’s clear that the conversation has shifted over the years from ‘look what you can order from your phone’ to ‘is it possible to turn a profit’. When asked directly about profitability, both companies said that it depends on the market.

“It varies a lot country by country. We're profitable on a unit economics basis in some countries,” Safford said.

“From an investor’s perspective — and I don't think it's just related to the gig economy or delivery — I think there's more scrutiny on tech companies full stop. It’s not just about growing, but they say ‘show me the route to profitability and tell me when you're going to be profitable,’” Michaud said.

Michaud then said that Spain and Southern Europe are the best markets for Glovo. The company generates an operating profit in those markets. “Latin America will become operation profitable next year,” he added. Glovo wants to focus on markets where the company can be the leader or at least the second player.

Recently, Just Eat and Takeaway.com have announced plans to merge and form a food delivery giant. But that could be just the first step.

“I think there will be consolidation. Our vision is that we’re aiming for profitability. We want to be profitable and depend on ourselves, which would put us in a really nice position to be. We'd not depend on acquisitions or investments. And that's our focus over the next 12 to 18 months,” Michaud said. Glovo has had “conversations not about investments or acquisitions.” with Uber Eats.

But the most pressing concern right now for food delivery companies right now is that delivery partners could be reclassified as employees in some markets. Both companies insist that couriers actually like flexibility.

“It would be a big change for sure and that would be something that we would do, only if it was deemed necessary, because again we're hearing right now that that's not the way that the couriers would like to be classified,” Safford said.

https://ift.tt/2E88C1V Glovo’s Sacha Michaud: “I think there will be consolidation” https://ift.tt/34jh61b

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Portify raises £7M Series A for its fintech app for ‘modern’ or gig economy workers

Portify, the London fintech startup that offers an app and various financial products to help gig economy and other modern, flexible or “self-employed” workers better manage their finances, has raised £7 million in Series A funding.

The round, which comes a year after the company raised £1.3 million in seed investment, is led by Redalpine (an early investor in N26, Taxfix, Finiata, amongst others), with participation from existing investors Kindred, and Entrepreneur First (EF).

Founded in May 2017 by EF alumni Sho Sugihara (CEO) and Chris Butcher (CTO), Portify has set out to help address the financial volatility many modern works face, especially those who take part in flexible work or the so-called gig economy, or are self-employed in other sectors such as tradespeople or those in the creative industry.

The startup offers a number of tailored financial products, accessible via its mobile app, in addition to using Open Banking to provide financial insights into your current financial status and income, and help with short and long-term financial planning. However, until recently, the go-to-market strategy was primarily a B2B2C play — via partnerships with various gig economy platforms, such as Deliveroo. That’s now expanded to B2C.

“If you weren’t working for a select partner platform, you couldn’t access the app,” says Portify co-founder and CEO Sho Sugihara. “We did this because we wanted to make sure we were 100% focused on our target modern worker persona, and helping to financially include them. But once we started working closely with our initial users, we realised that while being modern workers, many of them also fell into the ‘credit invisible’/thin file segment, lacking access to basic financial products.

“There are a variety of reasons why they are thin file, but the main causes for our users centre around having an unconventional, fluctuating earnings pattern, being a recent migrant to the U.K., or simply never having taken out other credit products before, due to not trusting them”.

Sugihara says that while many thin file modern workers do work with gig or temporary staffing platforms, the fintech startup also saw that many do not, or they switch work platforms frequently with gaps in between. This includes sole traders or those in employment but temporarily looking to top up their incomes.

“To make sure we fulfil our mission of financially including all thin file modern workers, we felt it important we make our app as accessible as possible,” he explains. “In practice, this means that users can download the app directly off app stores now”.

Meanwhile, Portify says it will use the new funding to offer credit building and personal loans for “micro-business use”. It already launched credit services in the app earlier this year.

“Our revolving credit line caps out at £250 today,” says Sugihara. “We plan to increase this amount to higher values for a select cohort of our users: £500-1,000. Many modern workers are essentially tiny businesses/sole traders and face issues that any SME would face, like fluctuating earnings and turnover. While there are many products out there serving cash flow issues for large SMEs, our modern worker segment is extremely underserved. They fall somewhere between a consumer and business in the eyes of incumbent financial institutions who don’t really know how best to serve them. We see a big opportunity there, and are going after it”.

At the same time, Portify has begun working with the major credit bureaus to report the data produced by its app — with a user’s consent, of course — to help improve credit scores.

“Being credit invisible is a big pain point for modern workers,” adds the Portify CEO. “Even if you have an above national average income from modern working and work 80 hour weeks, you can really struggle to get basic personal loans, let alone a mortgage, just because you’re not in full time employment and don’t fulfil the tick boxes set out by incumbent institutions. Our users have repeatedly asked for our help in solving this problem”.

https://ift.tt/eA8V8J Portify raises £7M Series A for its fintech app for ‘modern’ or gig economy workers https://ift.tt/35kQLkE

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Yubo raises $12.3 million for its social app for teens

French startup Yubo has raised a $12.3 million funding round led by Iris Capital and Idinvest Partners. Existing investors Alven, Sweet Capital and Village Global are also participating. The startup has managed to attract 25 million users over the years — there are currently tens of thousands of people signing up to the platform every day.

Yubo is building a social media app for young people under 25 with one focus in particular on helping teenagers meeting new people and creating friendships. Compared to the most popular social media apps out there, Yubo isn’t focused on likes and followers.

Instead, the app helps you build your own tiny little community of friends. Yubo wants to become a familiar place where you belong, even if high school sucks for instance.

More details in my previous profile of the company:

Yubo is a social network about socializing

In addition to meeting new people, you can start conversations and create live video streams to hang out together. Each stream represents a micro-community of people interacting through both video and a live chat.

Since 2015, Yubo users have sent each other 10 billion messages and started 30 million live video streams. Overall, the user base has generated 2 billion friendships.

Soon, users will be able to turn on screensharing to show something on their phones. And at some point in 2020, Yubo should release Yubo Web in order to expand Yubo beyond your smartphone and enable new use cases, such as video game live-streaming.

With today’s funding round, the company wants to attract users in new markets. Yubo is mostly active in the U.S., Canada, the U.K., Nordic countries, Australia and France. Up next, the startup is going to focus on Japan and Brazil. The company plans to hire 35 new people.

When it comes to business model, the company started monetizing its app in October 2018 with in-app purchases to unlock new features. In 2019, the startup has generated $10 million in revenue.

Yubo will also use this funding round to improve safety. It’s a never-ending process, especially when there are young people using your platform. The company already partners with Yoti for age verification. Users will soon be able to create a blocklist of certain words to customize their experience.

In addition to continuous work on flagging tools and live-stream moderation algorithms in order to detect inappropriate content, the company will also increase the size of its moderation team. The company has also put together a safety board with Alex Holmes, Annie Mullins, Travis Bright, Mick Moran, Dr. Richard Graham and Anne Collier.

https://ift.tt/2RLKQAP Yubo raises $12.3 million for its social app for teens https://ift.tt/2qFQQQy

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Twitter will now preserve JPEG quality for photo uploads on the web

Twitter is changing the way it processes uploaded images, and the new way of doing things will be much-appreciated by any photographers sharing their work on the platform. Twitter engineer Nolan O’Brien shared that the platform will now preserve JPEG encoding when they’re uploaded via Twitter on the web, instead of transcoding them, which results in a degradation in quality that can be frustrating for photo pros and enthusiasts.

There are some limitations to keep in mind — Twitter will still be transcoding and compressing the thumbnails for the images, which is what you see in your Twitter feed. But once users click through, they will get the full, uncompressed (at least, not additionally compressed) image you originally uploaded, provided it’s a JPEG.

Starting today, Twitter will preserve JPEGs as they are encoded for upload on Twitter for Web. (Caveat, cannot have EXIF orientation)

For example: the attached photo is actually a guetzli encoded JPEG at 97% quality with no chroma subsampling.https://t.co/1u37vTopkY pic.twitter.com/Eyq67nfM0E

— Nolan O'Brien (@NolanOBrien) December 11, 2019

Twitter will also still be stripping EXIF data (data that provides more information about the picture, including when, how and, potentially, where it was taken or edited), which is readable by some applications. The platform has previously done this, and it’s good that it does, because while sometimes photographers like to peek at this info to check things like aperture or ISO setting on a photo they admire, or to transmit copyright info, it also can potentially be used by people with bad intentions to spy on things like location.

The example above posted by O’Brien is actually a really illustrative one when it comes to showing what kind of detail and quality can be preserved when Twitter doesn’t further compress or transcode your JPEG photos. This is a small, but great feature tweak for the platform, and hopefully it continues to make Twitter more photo-friendly in the future.

from Social – TechCrunch https://ift.tt/eA8V8J Twitter will now preserve JPEG quality for photo uploads on the web Darrell Etherington https://ift.tt/2Pbbce8
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Daily Crunch: Apple adds new iPhone parental controls

{rss:content:encoded} Daily Crunch: Apple adds new iPhone parental controls https://ift.tt/2EaxsOV https://ift.tt/2CoAoqu December 11, 2019 at 06:53PM

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. The iPhone’s new parental controls can limit who kids can call, text and FaceTime and when

With the release of iOS 13.3, parents will for the first time be able to set limits over who kids can talk to and text with during certain hours of the day. These limits will apply across phone calls, Messages and FaceTime.

In practice, this means parents could stop their child from texting friends late at night or during the school day. It also allows parents to manage the child’s iCloud contacts remotely.

2. Pear, whose seed-stage bets are followed closely, just raised $160 million for its third fund

That’s more than twice the $75 million that the firm raised for its second fund in 2016 and triple the $50 million it raised for its debut fund back in 2013.

3. Uber guarantees space for skis and snowboards with Uber Ski feature

Starting on December 17 in select cities, an Uber Ski icon will pop up on the app, allowing passengers to order a ride with confirmed extra space or a ski/snowboarding rack. Nundu Janakiram, Uber’s head of rider experience, said to expect more features like this.

4. Accel and Index back Tines, as the cybersecurity startup adds another $11M to its Series A

Founded in February 2018 by ex-eBay, PayPal and DocuSign security engineer Eoin Hinchy, Tines automates many of the repetitive manual tasks faced by security analysts so they can focus on other high-priority work.

5. How Station F is boosting the French tech ecosystem

Three years after unveiling Station F at Disrupt, its director, Roxanne Varza, came back to our stage to provide an update on the world’s biggest startup campus, where there are now 1,000 companies at work.

6. Hyperproof wants to make it easier to comply with GDPR and other regulations

As companies try to figure out how to comply with regulations like GDPR, ISO or Sarbanes Oxley, Hyperproof is launching a new product to workflows that will allow them to gain compliance in a more organized way.

7. Introducing ‘Dear Sophie,’ an advice column for US-bound immigrant employees

Dear Sophie is a collaborative forum hosted by Extra Crunch and curated by Sophie Alcorn, who is certified as a specialist attorney in immigration and nationality law by the State Bar of California Board of Legal Specialization.

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Apply to the pitch-off at TC Sessions: Robotics & AI 2020

Mark your calendars and dust off your public-speaking skills. This year, there’s an exciting new opportunity at TC Sessions: Robotics & AI, which returns to  UC Berkeley on March 3, 2020. We’ve added a pitch-off specifically for early-stage startups focused on AI or robotics.

You heard right. In addition to a full day packed with speakers, breakout sessions and Q&As featuring the top names, leading minds and creative makers in robotics and AI, we’re upping the ante. We’ll choose 10 startups to pitch at a private event the night before the show opens. Here’s how it works.

The first step: Apply to the pitch-off by February 1. TechCrunch editors will review all applications and select 10 startups to participate. We’ll notify the founders by February 15 — you’ll have plenty of time to hone your pitch.

You’ll deliver your pitch at a private event, and your audience will consist of TechCrunch editors, main-stage speakers and industry experts. Our panel of VC judges will choose five teams as finalists, and they will pitch the next day on the main stage at TC Sessions: Robotics + AI.

Talk about an unprecedented opportunity. Place your startup in front of the influential movers and shakers of these two world-changing industries — and get video coverage on TechCrunch, too. We expect attendance to meet or exceed last year’s when 1,500 people attended the show and tens of thousands followed along online.

Oh, and here’s one more pitch-off perk. Each of the 10 startup team finalists will receive two free tickets to attend TC Sessions: Robotics + AI 2020 the next day.

TC Sessions: Robotics & AI 2020 takes place on March 3. Apply to the pitch-off here by February 1. Don’t want to pitch? That’s fine — but don’t miss this epic day-long event dedicated to exploring the latest technology, trends and investment strategies in robotics and AI. Get your early bird ticket here and save $100. We’ll see you in Berkeley!

Is your company interested in sponsoring or exhibiting at TC Sessions: Robotics & AI 2020? Contact our sponsorship sales team by filling out this form.

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Carsome raises $50M for its used-car sales platform in Southeast Asia

Carsome, a Malaysia-based marketplace for trading used cars, has closed a new $50 million financing round to fend off its rivals and grow its business in Southeast Asian markets.

The new financing round, dubbed Series C, was funded by MUFG Innovation Partners (MUIP), the corporate venture capital arm and a wholly owned subsidiary of Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group (MUFG); Daiwa PI Partners, the private equity arm of Japan’s securities group Daiwa Securities; Endeavor Catalyst; and Ondine Capital.

Existing investors, including Gobi Partners and Convergence Ventures, also participated in the round, which pushes the four-year-old startup’s total raise to date to $85 million.

Carsome operates one of the largest car-trading platforms in Southeast Asia, connecting with dealers individuals who wish to sell cars. The startup is today operational in Malaysia, Indonesia and Thailand and claims its platform sees more than 40,000 cars worth more than $300 million trade on the platform.

The startup, which employs about 700 people and has been used by more than 6,000 dealers, also offers dealers and sellers with financing options.

Carsome uses an online auction model to conduct sales, with prospective cars typically listed the day after they are submitted by consumers (following a check-up conducted by the startup’s staff).

This approach allows dealers to check in at a set time each day to look over the cars on offer, while the focus on vetting autos quickly — Carsome can dispatch vehicle checkers directly to a prospective seller’s home — means that consumers can quickly get a sale.

The auction model adds competition and the potential for a seller to make more money than they originally anticipated. That’s a dynamic, as my former colleague explained, that is tricky to replicate in other static sale models.

Eric Cheng, co-founder and chief executive of Carsome, told TechCrunch that the startup is attempting to challenge “opaque and inefficient” middle parties that “exploit the misinformation in the market.”

He added, “we want to establish a brand and a standard that advocates trust, transparency, consistency of service and quality assurance across the region that people and businesses can rely on to make their purchasing decisions.”

The startup, which competes with a number of players, including Carro in Singapore, BeliMobilGue in Indonesia and Carmudi, plans to use the fresh capital to expand to more markets in Southeast Asia, such as the Philippines.

Cheng said Carsome aspires to become “the Visa/Master network of auto transactions, and build a collaborative ecosystem of partners to provide the best experience to consumers in Southeast Asia.”

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Wotch is building a creator-friendly video platform

The team at Wotch has created a new social video platform — but wait, don’t roll your eyes quite yet.

“Obviously, we’re very used to someone creating a new internet video-sharing platform,” said co-CEO Scott Willson. “It must be very irritating for everyone to hear that.”

And yet Willson and his co-founder/co-CEO James Sadler have attempted it anyway, and they’re competing today as part of the Startup Battlefield at Disrupt Berlin. They’re only 22 years old, but Sadler said they’ve been working together for the past few years, with past projects including the development of e-learning platforms.

They were inspired to create Wotch because of YouTube’s recent problems around issues like demonetization, where many YouTubers lost the ability to monetize their videos through advertising, and other controversies like an attempted overhaul of its verification system.

Willson said YouTube has been “leaving out creators in terms of communications,” and as the controversies grew, the pair thought, “there has to be a better way of doing this.”

The key, Sadler added, is giving video creators a bigger say in the process: “We’re very hands-on with these creators. We’re not just sending them an automated email.”

In fact, they’re giving creators an opportunity to buy equity in Wotch to get a stake in the company’s success. They’re also appointing a creator board that will be consulted on company policy.

Wotch creators will be able to make money by selling subscriptions, merchandise and ads — not the standard pre-roll or mid-roll ads (which Willson described as “irritants”), but instead partnerships where they incorporate brand products and messages in their videos.

Asked whether this might create the same tension between advertisers and creators that YouTube has been struggling with, Willson argued, “What it comes down to is correctly matching advertisers with creators.” Some advertisers don’t mind working with video-makers who are “pushing the boundaries” — they just need to know what they’re getting into.

Sadler also said that Wotch will be providing creators with more data about their viewers, like identifying their most loyal fans, their most engaged fans and their first “wotchers.”

And the site will take a different approach to content moderation, using technologies like video frame analysis to identify “risky” content, as well as relying more on community moderation. Sadler said it will be a “consensus” approach, rather than the “dictatorship” of other platforms.

“We’re rewarding users for helping to cleanse these platforms,” he added.

Wotch isn’t identifying any of the big creators who he says have signed on, but Sadler told me that the company is largely focused on emerging markets and has already recruited 25 of the top creators in Brazil (where YouTube has an enormous audience, to sometimes detrimental effect) and throughout South America. Those creators won’t be posting on Wotch alone, but they will be creating exclusive videos for the service.

Sadler said it’s those creators who will draw the viewers: “Consumers are loyal to the creators and not the platforms.” And once they’re drawn in, they’ll also experience “a more social platform — see the things your friends are ‘wotching,’ see the things that your favorite creators are ‘wotching.'”

The startup has raised funding from Dominic Smales, the CEO of influencer marketing company Gleam Futures; Bidstack co-founder Simon Mitchell; and Melody VR founder and COO Steve Hancock. Smales is also leading the creator board.

While a beta version of Wotch is already live, Sadler and Willson plan to launch a revamped version of the service early next year. You can get an early preview of the changes by using the promotional code “TECHCRUNCH.”

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