Author: Tech Crunch Online News

Go-Jek plans to raise $2B more for Southeast Asia ride-hailing battle

Indonesia’s Go-Jek is planning to raise $2 billion from investors to fuel its ride-hailing battle with Grab in Southeast Asia. Go-Jek raised $1.5 billion earlier this year from investors that include Chinese trio Tencent, Meituan and JD.com, as well as Google, Allianz and Singapore sovereign fund Temasek. Now it is planning to raise a further… Continue reading Go-Jek plans to raise $2B more for Southeast Asia ride-hailing battle

A Tesla investor says he was recently questioned by US regulators about that infamous ‘funding secured’ tweet

Last week, onstage at TechCrunch Disrupt, regulator Jina Choi, who heads the SEC’s wide-reaching San Francisco unit, declined to confirm or deny that the SEC is investigating Tesla CEO Elon Musk for possible fraud. Said Choi, “I can’t tell you about any particular investigation in our office. And I can’t confirm or deny the existence… Continue reading A Tesla investor says he was recently questioned by US regulators about that infamous ‘funding secured’ tweet

Online used car startup Shift raises $140 million

Shift Technologies, an online marketplace for used cars, has closed a Series D financing round of more than $140 million in equity and debt. The round, which consists of about $70 million in debt and $71 million in equity, was led by automotive retailer Lithia Motors. Bryan DeBoer, CEO and president of Lithia, will join Shift’s… Continue reading Online used car startup Shift raises $140 million

Uber is investing $150M in Toronto to expand self-driving car efforts

Months after an Uber self-driving vehicle struck and killed a pedestrian in Tempe, Arizona, the ride-hailing giant has announced it’s adding a new engineering hub in Toronto and expanding its autonomous research team as it refocuses its self-driving car efforts. In his first visit to the Canadian tech hub since becoming CEO of Uber last year,… Continue reading Uber is investing $150M in Toronto to expand self-driving car efforts

Google Street View rival Mapillary collaborates with Amazon to read text in its 350M image database

Mapillary, the Swedish startup that wants to take on Google and others in mapping the world by way of a crowdsourced database of street-level imagery, is taking an interesting step in the development of its platform. The company is now working with Amazon, and specifically its Rekognition API, to detect and read text in Mapillary’s… Continue reading Google Street View rival Mapillary collaborates with Amazon to read text in its 350M image database

Brazilian startup Yellow raises $63M — the largest Series A ever for a Latin American startup

After selling their ridesharing startup, 99, to Didi Chuxing for $1 billion last year, Ariel Lambrecht and Renato Freitas didn’t waste any time throwing their hats back in the ring. Months after their big exit, the pair joined forces with Eduardo Musa, who spent two decades in the bicycle industry, to start another São Paulo-based mobility startup.… Continue reading Brazilian startup Yellow raises $63M — the largest Series A ever for a Latin American startup

Discover Sono Motors’ vision of the electric car at Disrupt Berlin

New car makers have been popping up left and right. But instead of creating yet another Tesla-like company, German company Sono Motors is working on something completely new — a solar-powered car. That’s why I’m excited to announce that the company’s co-founder and CEO Laurin Hahn will join us at TechCrunch Disrupt Berlin. Sono Motors… Continue reading Discover Sono Motors’ vision of the electric car at Disrupt Berlin

Zoox is offering autonomous rides in SF this week

Zoox, the self-driving car startup worth a reported $3.2 billion post-money valuation, is offering autonomous rides this week as part of the Global Climate Action Summit. The Global Climate Action Summit convenes state and local leaders, scientists, non-profits and others to discuss climate action opportunities. In partnership with the Fairmont hotel in San Francisco, Zoox will… Continue reading Zoox is offering autonomous rides in SF this week

Comma.ai’s George Hotz ousts George Hotz as CEO

Comma.ai’s board, of which founder George Hotz is the only member, is making changes at the autonomous driving startup: Hotz is no longer CEO of the company. A new CEO, who Hotz declined to name, is expected to be announced Friday via the company’s Medium blog. He confirmed that the CEO is indeed a human… Continue reading Comma.ai’s George Hotz ousts George Hotz as CEO