DraftKings and FanDuel strike a deal with NCAA to suspend all college contests

 DraftKings and FanDuel, the two largest providers of daily fantasy sports in the U.S., have simultaneously announced that they reached a deal with the NCAA to temporarily suspend college sports on both platforms after this weekend’s March Madness tournament ends. While the contests weren’t necessarily a large portion of each platform (NCAA contests constitute just three percent… Read More Post by startupsnows.blogspot.com

Flex is an alternative to tampons you can have sex while wearing

 Things can get messy if you have sex on your period, so many couples avoid it. But The Flex Company wants to replace outdated pads and tampons with a sleek, disc-shaped blood blocker. Flex can be worn during sex to prevent making a mess. The disposable Flex discs are disposable, can be worn for up to 12 hours, and even comes in a stylish little packet. They’re doctor-approved to be… Read More Post by startupsnows.blogspot.com

Postmates launches Amazon Prime-style subscription service, hits 1 million monthly deliveries

 Postmates, which is now completing 1 million deliveries a month, is digging in deeper to the e-commerce space with the launch of Postmates Plus Unlimited, a $9.99 per month subscription service that gets you free deliveries on all “Plus” orders over $30, minus the service fee. Plus merchants include American Apparel and thousands of other partners in the Postmates preferred… Read More Post by startupsnows.blogspot.com

Blispay, the financing program for SMBs, raises $12.75m in seed funding

 Big box retailers like Best Buy and Target have all kinds of financing card programs for their customers. But smaller and medium-sized merchants have no way to give their customers the same kind of financing plans. Until now. Blispay is a new startup founded by Greg Lisiewski, formerly of BillMeLater, which was acquired by PayPal for nearly $1 billion in 2008. From that point, he served… Read More Post by startupsnows.blogspot.com

Spain’s Glovo acquires Italy’s Foodinho to expand on-demand delivery service

 Spain’s Glovo, which operates a local on-demand delivery service similar to Postmates in the US, or Jinn and Quiqup in the UK, has acquired Italy’s Foodinho. Read More Post by startupsnows.blogspot.com

Mission 360 is a VOD platform for yoga, meditation, fitness classes

 We all want to be in better shape, but the commitment of going to a gym or a yoga class can be costly and time-consuming. Mission 360 is looking to eliminate all of the friction involved with working out, letting users work out right from their home through on-demand video classes. The model is similar to Classpass, in that users get unlimited access to Mission 360’s entire store of… Read More Post by startupsnows.blogspot.com

Investors pour $70 million into Juicero, a smart kitchen appliance maker

 Juicero.com a food tech startup that makes internet-connected kitchen appliances, raised $70 million in Series B funding in a round led by Artis Ventures. Juicero’s flagship product is a $699 counter top device that cold presses juice out of “packs” of already prepped fruit and veggies. The packs- reminiscent of the cups and pouches used in single-cup coffee brewers from… Read More Post by startupsnows.blogspot.com

Seoul-based learning app developer Knowre partners with Sylvan Learning

 Knowre, a Seoul-based learning app developer, has taken a big step forward in its American expansion plans. The company announced today that its math programs, which gives kids personalized recommendations, will be used in Sylvan Learning tutoring centers. Sylvan is the largest paid tutoring company in the U.S. by market share, with more than 800 locations. Read More Post by startupsnows.blogspot.com

Shoowin lets you reserve playoff tickets to sports events on the cheap

 All sports fans love a good playoff game. But actually attending one is something most folks never have the chance to do. The ticket prices for these games, from pro basketball to college football bowl games, is exorbitant. Plus, you don’t even know if your team is going until way late in the season, when prices are at their highest. Shoowin, a new startup backed by BBG Ventures, is… Read More Post by startupsnows.blogspot.com

Airware snatches $30M to sell complete drones to the Fortune 500

 Airware used to sell drone operating systems. Now it’s swiveling to sell the whole flying kit and caboodle: drone hardware, the software to control them, and the cloud where their data goes. It discovered that big enterprise companies didn’t know how to piece together drone systems themselves, so they were slow to adapting to the tech that could save them money and keep employees… Read More Post by startupsnows.blogspot.com

Southeast Asian mobile Internet company Garena announces $170M Series D

 Garena, a Singapore-based company that makes mobile gaming, e-commerce, and payment apps, said today that it has raised a $170 million Series D. Read More Post by startupsnows.blogspot.com

Innovation Act might be dead, but innovation lives on

 As a former patent examiner, I recognize that the patent system, in its purest form, should protect and incentivize innovation through a limited-term contract, offering exclusive monopoly rights covering a technology, product or design element. In practice, it’s much uglier, and by no means did the Founding Fathers intend for patents to be utilized toward incremental monopolization ploys. Read More Post by startupsnows.blogspot.com

Quora’s first acquisition is Arab Spring instigator’s Q&A site Parlio

 “Ex-con” isn’t normally something you find on a founder’s resume. But Google employee Wael Ghonim went to jail for sparking the Egyptian Revolution. Now he might be wearing some golden handcuffs instead, as his startup Parlio just became Quora‘s first acquisition. Parlio’s goal was to spread knowledge — a similar mission to Quora. But rather than… Read More Post by startupsnows.blogspot.com

Branch.co raises $9.2 million to bring financial services where banks don’t go

 San Francisco-based Branch International, or Branch.co, raised $9.2 million to bring digital financial services to mobile phone users in Sub-Saharan Africa. Andreessen Horowitz led the Series A round. Branch’s free-to-download Android app is a kind of “branchless bank for the next generation,” says founder and CEO Matt Flannery. Read More Post by startupsnows.blogspot.com

Expa opens up Expa Labs giving companies $500k in funding

 Expa, the startup studio led by foursquare cofounder Naveen Selvadurai and Uber cofounder Garrett Camp, has today announced the close of a $100 million fund that will go towards both Expa Studios and Expa Labs, a new incubator. Investors in the fund include Garrett Camp, TPG founder David Bonderman, Li Ka-Shing & Solina Chau, Google board member Ram Shriram, RIT Capital Partners,… Read More Post by startupsnows.blogspot.com

Dating app Boompi lets women invite friends to eavesdrop and comment on private messages

 Boompi starts off by following the now well-trodden Tinder-esque location-based dating path. But here’s the clincher: Women on the app can invite friends to eavesdrop and secretly comment on their private conversations with prospective dates. If that feels like privacy violation as a feature, that’s because it is. Read More Post by startupsnows.blogspot.com

Gett looks to acquire Radio Taxis in the UK

 Gett, the on-demand taxi app looking to take on the likes of Uber, has just announced that it has launched a bid to acquire Radio Taxis in London. The deal would bring the total number of black cabs available to users to 11,500 black cabs, which is equivalent to half of all the licensed taxis in the city. The acquisition is still subject to shareholder approval. However, if it goes through… Read More Post by startupsnows.blogspot.com

Lobster lets you sell your Facebook photos to advertisers

 Lobster, the marketplace for buying and selling user generated content, has just announced an integration with Facebook. This means that Facebook users can sign up with Lobster to sell their content to advertisers. Here’s how it works: Facebook users can sign up with Lobster to have their Facebook photos marketed on the platform. Advertisers (or regular folks) can then browse through… Read More Post by startupsnows.blogspot.com

Square copies Stripe with new online checkout API

 Watch out Braintree, Stripe and other online checkout systems, Square is going after you. The company launched new APIs today for offline and online stores. But the bigger news is that e-commerce merchants can now process credit card payments using a simple form. Behind the scene, Square processes the payment. Like Stripe, you don’t need to sign up to an e-wallet. You can Read More Post by startupsnows.blogspot.com

Parrot’s Henri Seydoux to talk about the future of drones at Disrupt NY

 Parrot has been a pioneer in the drone industry. The company started working on drones nearly ten years ago before it was cool. That’s why we’re glad to announce that Parrot founder and CEO Henri Seydoux will join us on stage at TechCrunch Disrupt New York on May 9-11, 2016. Read More Post by startupsnows.blogspot.com

Frichti grabs $13.4 million for its full stack food delivery service

 French startup Frichti is making the news again with yet another round of financing. This time, the company is raising $13.4 million (€12 million) from Idinvest, existing investor Alven Capital, as well as busin Read More Post by startupsnows.blogspot.com

Planday, the workforce management solution for shift-­based businesses, scores $14M Series B

 Planday, the Danish startup that offers a cloud-based “shift planning” solution for various types of businesses that employ a flexible workforce, such as restaurants, hotels, stores, call centers and gyms, has scored $14 million in Series B funding. Read More Post by startupsnows.blogspot.com

Women aren’t the only ones who feel they’re not paid fairly in tech

 Comparably, the Glassdoor-like platform for self-reporting employment and compensation data, has released some data around culture at tech companies. Within a couple of weeks of launching, over 2,000 people have submitted data around what it’s like working at their respective companies in tech, if they believe they’re paid fairly and if they’re satisfied with their equity stake. Read More Post by startupsnows.blogspot.com

Slice Labs raises $3.9M to insure on-demand workers when they’re on the job

 Tim Attia, co-founder and CEO of Slice Labs, said there’s “a ticking time bomb” threatening the on-demand economy — namely, insurance and liability. Attia’s tackling that problem with Slice, which will offer insurance for on-demand workers and providers, starting with rideshare drivers and then homeshare hosts. The startup is announcing today that it has raised… Read More Post by startupsnows.blogspot.com

Hopper raises $16 million for a travel app that tells you the best time to fly

 Hopper, the makers of a handy travel application that tells you the best time to fly in order to find the best deals, has now raised additional capital to continue to grow its business. It has also scored a partnership with American Airlines which allows it to sell AA’s tickets through its app. In terms of the new investment, the company announced $16 million in a growth funding… Read More Post by startupsnows.blogspot.com