Spangle, an AI e-commerce startup founded by former Bolt CEO Maju Kuruvilla, has raised $15 million in a new funding round, valuing the company at $100 million after the investment. Led by NewRoad Capital Partners, the all-equity Series A round comes over a year after the Seattle-based startup raised a $6 million seed round at … Read more
New TVs from TCL and Hisense, like the TCL X11L, are closing the performance gap to those from Sony, LG, and Samsung. For all the time that I’ve been covering technology, there’s been a hierarchy when it comes to TV brands. The big three – Sony, Samsung, and LG – have been on top for … Read more
President Donald Trump has no shame in admitting what he wants to get out of attacking Venezuela and threatening other energy resource-rich nations. “We’re gonna get the oil flowing the way it should be,” he said January 3rd, soon after his administration stunned the world with what many policy experts and Democratic lawmakers are calling … Read more
Later this month, Volvo will unveil its new EX60 SUV. The Swedish automaker has adopted some of the latest trends in electric vehicle design for the EX60, like a structural battery pack and the use of very large castings. As always with automakers teasing a new car, concrete details are only emerging slowly ahead of … Read more
Volvo is starting to trickle out some details about its upcoming midsize electric SUV, the EX60, before its official debut January 21st. The EX60 will have an estimated range of 400 miles (or 810km based on the generous WLTP standard in Europe). That’s significantly more range than any previous Volvo EV — at least until … Read more
Apple announced Wednesday that JPMorgan Chase is the new issuer of the Apple Card, replacing Goldman Sachs. Apple said that the transition will likely take up to 24 months. While Apple is changing its banking partner, the Apple Card will continue to use the Mastercard network for payments. For consumers, nothing is changing at the … Read more
Waymo has spent the past three years refining and testing a minivan-like vehicle made by Chinese automaker Zeekr. And now, before this robotaxi joins Waymo’s official commercial fleet, it’s getting a new name, the company told TechCrunch. The Zeekr RT robotaxi will now be named Ojai (pronounced “oh-hi”) — after the village in the Topatopa … Read more
A planned spacewalk outside the International Space Station has been postponed due to a “medical concern” with one of the crew members aboard the orbital complex, NASA announced Wednesday. The excursion was set to begin Thursday morning. Astronauts Mike Fincke and Zena Cardman planned to head outside the space station for six-and-a-half hours to prepare … Read more
In what may mark the tech industry’s first significant legal settlement over AI-related harm, Google and the startup Character.AI are negotiating terms with families whose teenagers died by suicide or harmed themselves after interacting with Character.AI’s chatbot companions. The parties have agreed in principle to settle; now comes the harder work of finalizing the details. … Read more
Disney Plus will be getting a vertical video feed later this year, Disney announced as part of its Global Tech & Data Showcase for advertisers at CES, Deadline reports. According to a Disney announcement cited by Deadline, the company’s goal is to “explore its use in a variety of ways across categories, and content types, … Read more