In about an hour, Apple will announce its quarterly earnings. So you’ll soon be able to read all about it on TechCrunch as we have a team ready to look at all these numbers and find out if they’re moving up or down. But I’m going to use this opportunity to give you a few thoughts about what’s going to happen and what you should look for. Read More
Self-driving race cars are a few years away but why not simulate the roar of robotic Formula 1 cars with a little Raspberry Pi magic? The folks at Piborg are offering the opportunity for hackers and makers to try and drive their own autonomous car brain in a centralized race. They’ve launched a Kickstarter and they’re looking for folks to download the autonomous racing code, modify… Read More
Scopely is announcing that it has raised a $55 million Series B round of funding. The Los Angeles-based company has built tools for promoting and monetizing mobile games — some of those games are developed in-house, others are created by outside studios. “The vision is creating the most premium experiences on people’s phone across a network of developers,” co-founder… Read More
A new startup called Rockets of Awesome launching today wants to make shopping for kids’ clothing easier by offering to do it for you. Similar in concept something like StitchFix, which sends boxes of clothing free of charge for home try-on, Rockets of Awesome helps parents build their children’s wardrobe by sending seasonal selections, and only charging for those items… Read More
Launched just 18 months after Kickstarter itself, the original Glif was an early beacon of what was to come for the crowdfunding platform, with an innovative tripod mount for smartphones unlike any other. Studio Neat has taken its sweet time to launch the sequel, but it was worth the wait; it’s a marvelously clever piece of engineering. I spent some time with the prototype to take a… Read More
As has been the case with so many industries, the pendulum of VR will eventually swing back from dedicated apps towards web-based systems — and when that happens, Google will be ready. It published details of a new method for delivering serious surround sound over the web, a system it calls Omnitone. Read More
More consolidation in the so-called big data space. Publicly-listed U.S. big data company Teradata has acquired London-based Big Data Partnership, a startup that provides big data solutions and training to help companies become more savvy in the use of, well, big data. You may have noticed a recurring theme here. Read More
After a months-long bidding process and many layoffs, Yahoo has finally found a buyer. Verizon (which owns AOL, which owns TechCrunch) is officially acquiring Yahoo’s core business for $4.8 billion, which includes Yahoo’s advertising, content, search and mobile activities. Read More
Researchers and companies have been exploring new ways to improve buildings through analytics software, prefabrication, connected devices, new materials and construction automation. It’s striking that most of these efforts are trying to patch problems within the legacy framework of “permanent” construction. Could it be that the one thing that is taken for granted is the… Read More
It was just a matter of time, really. With the new slate of Star Wars films on an annual schedule, and drones invading the skies all around us, the timing was right for this kind of synergistic force push. RC toy maker Propel is launching a quartet of drones modeled on some familiar modes of transportation from a galaxy far, far away. Launching this fall/winter, the Lucasfilm-approved… Read More
