Latest and Hotest Technology Updates

This is going to be the last Daily Crunch for the year, as the news machine seems to be winding down for its New Year’s nap. It’s been a pleasure putting these together while Alex has been AFK  — alas, my little sprint has come to an end. Alex should be back next week, and I’ll be moving on to help wrangle all the news from CES.

Many thanks to the Daily Crunch team, and to all of you, for letting me hang out for a few days. Have a safe and wonderful new year!

—Greg

The TechCrunch Top 3

• TuSimple’s biggest test yet: Autonomous trucking company TuSimple says it has completed its first driverless test run on public roads, successfully completing an 80-mile trip with no human intervention. Will road-tripping kids of the future know the joy of convincing a truck driver to honk the horn?
• 6 things in cybersecurity we didn’t know last year: Our security editor Zack Whittaker knows his stuff, so when he makes a big list of cybersecurity things that were new to him this year, I listen. Like, for example, that the biggest cost in a ransomware attack often isn’t the ransom itself.
• eVTOLs in 2022: Is 2022 the year in which eVTOLs finally … take off? Calling it a “make it or break it year” for electric aircraft that can hover and take off/land vertically, Aria Alamalhodaei has a great multipart look at the state of the industry and the challenges on the flight path ahead. Linked above is part two, here’s part one from earlier this month.

Startups/VC

• GlobalBees joins the unicorn club: GlobalBees, an Indian company that specializes in acquiring/partnering with promising “digitally native brands” to help them grow, has raised $110 million in a round valuing it at $1.1 billion.
• Southeast Asian startups to watch in 2022: “As someone who covers Southeast Asia startups and funding stories, the best word I can think of to describe 2021 is ‘whoa!'” writes Catherine Shu.

Dear Sophie: Will the H-1B lottery be based on the highest wages?

Dear Sophie,

I graduated in December, and I'm currently working on OPT for an early-stage biotech startup. I'm not sure how much my employer knows about the H-1B lottery process or if they are planning to put me in the lottery.

I heard that the next lottery will not select H-1B candidates based on the highest salaries paid. What else should I know?

— Gifted Grad

(TechCrunch+ is our membership program, which helps founders and startup teams get ahead. You can sign up here.)

Read More

Big Tech Inc.

• Samsung's C-Lab: One of my favorite parts of CES — which we’re regretfully skipping in-person this year — is how a number of huge companies use it as a way to exhibit the otherwise secret projects they’ve been tinkering on in their in-house incubators. Brian Heater has a list of Samsung’s latest side quests, which varies from pet recognition AI to diaper sensors.
• Apple puts Foxconn plant on probation: Apple put operations at a 17,000-person factory in India on pause, following reports that hundreds of employees had to be treated for food poisoning. Apple says it has sent out independent auditors to evaluate the food safety and living conditions, with the local government also demanding action.

TechCrunch Experts

TechCrunch wants you to recommend growth marketers who have expertise in SEO, social, content writing and more! If you're a growth marketer, pass this survey along to your clients; we'd like to hear about why they loved working with you.

If you’re curious about how these surveys are shaping our coverage, check out this article on TechCrunch+ from Miranda Halpern, "10 growth marketing experts share their 2022 predictions and New Year's resolutions."

Read More

• Senior Fullstack Engineer at Made Renovation (United States)
• IT Service Desk Manager, Senior/Specialist Systems Administration at Washington State Department of Natural Resources (Olympia, WA, USA)
• Applications Administrator at RTA (Chicago, IL, United States)
• Senior Software Engineer - Java at Veeva (Dublin, OH, USA)
• Product Support Engineer at Veeva (Dublin, OH, USA)

See more jobs on CrunchBoard

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This is going to be the last Daily Crunch for the year, as the news machine seems to be winding down for its New Year’s nap. It’s been a pleasure putting these together while Alex has been AFK  — alas, my little sprint has come to an end. Alex should be back next week, and I’ll be moving on to help wrangle all the news from CES.

Many thanks to the Daily Crunch team, and to all of you, for letting me hang out for a few days. Have a safe and wonderful new year!

—Greg

The TechCrunch Top 3

• TuSimple’s biggest test yet: Autonomous trucking company TuSimple says it has completed its first driverless test run on public roads, successfully completing an 80-mile trip with no human intervention. Will road-tripping kids of the future know the joy of convincing a truck driver to honk the horn?
• 6 things in cybersecurity we didn’t know last year: Our security editor Zack Whittaker knows his stuff, so when he makes a big list of cybersecurity things that were new to him this year, I listen. Like, for example, that the biggest cost in a ransomware attack often isn’t the ransom itself.
• eVTOLs in 2022: Is 2022 the year in which eVTOLs finally … take off? Calling it a “make it or break it year” for electric aircraft that can hover and take off/land vertically, Aria Alamalhodaei has a great multipart look at the state of the industry and the challenges on the flight path ahead. Linked above is part two, here’s part one from earlier this month.

Startups/VC

• GlobalBees joins the unicorn club: GlobalBees, an Indian company that specializes in acquiring/partnering with promising “digitally native brands” to help them grow, has raised $110 million in a round valuing it at $1.1 billion.
• Southeast Asian startups to watch in 2022: “As someone who covers Southeast Asia startups and funding stories, the best word I can think of to describe 2021 is ‘whoa!'” writes Catherine Shu.

Dear Sophie: Will the H-1B lottery be based on the highest wages?

Dear Sophie,

I graduated in December, and I'm currently working on OPT for an early-stage biotech startup. I'm not sure how much my employer knows about the H-1B lottery process or if they are planning to put me in the lottery.

I heard that the next lottery will not select H-1B candidates based on the highest salaries paid. What else should I know?

— Gifted Grad

(TechCrunch+ is our membership program, which helps founders and startup teams get ahead. You can sign up here.)

Read More

Big Tech Inc.

• Samsung's C-Lab: One of my favorite parts of CES — which we’re regretfully skipping in-person this year — is how a number of huge companies use it as a way to exhibit the otherwise secret projects they’ve been tinkering on in their in-house incubators. Brian Heater has a list of Samsung’s latest side quests, which varies from pet recognition AI to diaper sensors.
• Apple puts Foxconn plant on probation: Apple put operations at a 17,000-person factory in India on pause, following reports that hundreds of employees had to be treated for food poisoning. Apple says it has sent out independent auditors to evaluate the food safety and living conditions, with the local government also demanding action.

TechCrunch Experts

TechCrunch wants you to recommend growth marketers who have expertise in SEO, social, content writing and more! If you're a growth marketer, pass this survey along to your clients; we'd like to hear about why they loved working with you.

If you’re curious about how these surveys are shaping our coverage, check out this article on TechCrunch+ from Miranda Halpern, "10 growth marketing experts share their 2022 predictions and New Year's resolutions."

Read More

• Senior Fullstack Engineer at Made Renovation (United States)
• IT Service Desk Manager, Senior/Specialist Systems Administration at Washington State Department of Natural Resources (Olympia, WA, USA)
• Applications Administrator at RTA (Chicago, IL, United States)
• Senior Software Engineer - Java at Veeva (Dublin, OH, USA)
• Product Support Engineer at Veeva (Dublin, OH, USA)

See more jobs on CrunchBoard

Post your tech jobs and reach millions of TechCrunch readers for only $200 per month.

Hi all, and welcome back to Daily Crunch for December 28, 2021!

I hope you’re all staying dry, warm and safe as we come to the end of another weird year. I haven’t heard from Alex how his vacation is going, which I’m hoping means he’s having a great time and playing way too much Crusader Kings III.

Alex should be back next week. In the meantime, I’ll try to be half as good at wrapping up the top stories from the past day or so.

—Greg

The TechCrunch Top 3

• WTF is .xyz?: Have you noticed the sudden uptick in “.xyz” domains in the wild? Wondering why? Anita Ramaswamy has a great overview of .xyz’s history, its growing role in the web3 world and how Google/Alphabet might’ve sparked the trend.
• Black Girls Code CEO suspended: What’s going on at Black Girls Code? Why was the non-profit org’s CEO and co-founder, Kimberly Bryant, suddenly suspended? Natasha Mascarenhas talked to many of those involved to get some answers.
• ‘The Matrix: Resurrections’ is a bad movie, but…: I still haven’t watched the new “Matrix” (I have a toddler running around, so watching any movie without songs and/or animated dogs is rare) so I can’t vouch for Devin’s headline, but I appreciate him finding a diamond (the movie’s take on our relationship with tech) in what he otherwise considers the rough (everything else.) Spoiler warnings, btw.

Startups/VC

• Where New Zealand startups are poised to win: The startup scene in New Zealand is rocketing — quite literally. Besides rockets, where else might New Zealand find wins? Rebecca Bellan talked with investors in the region and came away with four verticals to watch.
• Religious apps draw investor attention: I’ll never stop being amazed by Connie Loizos’ ability to spot trends I never would’ve noticed. This time it’s a huge uptick in investment in faith-focused apps — from $6.1 million in 2016 to $175 million this year. Connie sat down with the founder of one of these apps (Hallow) for insights on the landscape.

How to be one of the "haves" of SaaS

Software as a service has leveled the playing field for startups in the last decade, but in terms of venture capital, the winners still take all.

According to Sean Fanning, a VP on OpenView's investment team, companies that post stellar growth often take the bulk of VC investment, leaving the lower performers to fight for scraps.

In an in-depth post, Fanning shares three tactics used by SaaS companies with an attractive enterprise value-to-revenue (EV/R) multiple:

Continued execution against large and growing market opportunities.

Leveraging a business model that enables rapid growth (i.e., product-led growth).

Strong unit economics that support high free cash flow margins over the long term.

(TechCrunch+ is our membership program, which helps founders and startup teams get ahead. You can sign up here.)

Read More

Big Tech Inc.

• Even more companies drop from in-person CES: Large companies continue to drop out of the Consumer Electronics Show due to COVID concerns. Following announcements from Intel, T-Mobile, Google, Amazon, Twitter, and more last week, the latest are AMD, OnePlus, MSI, and Procter and Gamble.
• Dutch regulators demand App Store changes: Seems like South Korea started something global with its App Store legislation back in August. The Netherlands is the latest country to tell Apple to change its requirements around in-app purchases — though, curiously, in this case they seem specifically focused on dating apps?

TechCrunch Experts

TechCrunch wants you to recommend software consultants who have expertise in UI/UX, website development, mobile development and more! If you're a software consultant, pass this survey along to your clients; we'd like to hear about why they loved working with you.

• Senior Software Engineer - Java at Veeva (Dublin, OH, USA)
• Product Support Engineer at Veeva (Dublin, OH, USA)
• Associate Security Engineer at Veeva (Dublin, OH, USA)
• Software Engineer- Service Automation at National Communications Services Inc (Anywhere)
• Web Applications Developer at MiraCosta College (Oceanside, CA, USA)

See more jobs on CrunchBoard

Post your tech jobs and reach millions of TechCrunch readers for only $200 per month.