All aboard the learn-to-code train! As another holiday season looms and kids everywhere start clamouring for shiny stuff, we’ve got you covered with a bumper edition of our annual STEM gift guide. This year’s guide is packed with more than 20 ideas to engage toddlers, excite tweens and inspire teens to get under the hood of the tech world through play.

Products in the STEM learning category typically promise to give kids a head-start on learning core coding and/or electronics concepts while they play. How much learning actually gets done is still a bit of an open questio but ideas in the category have generally converged around a few approaches — so there’s a stronger sense of ‘tried & tested’ out there now. We’re also encouraged to see increasing attention to diversity in STEM.

A few other trends are evident this year — most notably around supply issues linked to the pandemic-triggered (and still lingering) global supply chain crunch. Said crunch appears to be having some impact on product choice and availability.

One category-adjacent example: Sphero’s RVR+, a (mostly) school and makerspace focused programmable robot, was listed as unavailable for supply reasons when we started compiling the guide earlier this fall — but at the time of writing the website reports it’s back in stock “just in time for the holidays.”

‘Out of stock’ labels also remain a regular sight on STEM-focused marketplaces that range maker hardware, such as AdaFruit and Pimoroni. The latter told us recently it’s been managing ongoing shortages of Raspberry Pi hardware by rejigging featured products to mesh with available inventory. So creative stock hacks abound.

Supply issues may also be further decelerating innovation in what had already become a less experimental market compared to earlier, investor-fuelled boom years. The vertical had relatively few wholly new product launches for 2022, as players focused on shifting existing inventory instead.

The upshot is a feeling there’s a bit less fun and excitement to go around than in years past, furthered as more STEM startups pivoted to selling to the formal educational market (not so much to home buyers).

That crossover, from clever toys nudging informal learning to curriculum-focused products catering to formal education, is reshaping the kind of STEM kit on offer and making lots of stuff in the category feel, well, more serious. But — don’t despair — there’s still plenty of fun choices for gift-buying parents and relatives wanting to give budding builders and tiny techies a leg up to grasp the power and possibility of programming.

Suggested gifts in our guide run the gamut from a doll that sings the praises of coding to line-following programmable robots and hardware hacking electronics maker kits. There’s also a DIY computer kit and a sensor-packed robot-on-wheels that can dance and talk back.

As ever, we’ve made sure to include gift options that hit a wide range of price-points, starting at just $6 for a bare microcontroller that throws your kid in at the STEM learning deep end (they’ll need to source other electronics components, have access to a computer and the Internet, and display no shortage of determination to unlock the learning potential with that one), scaling all the way up to $250 for a talking robot on wheels that’s packed with (perhaps too many) distracting bells & whistles, with plenty of choice and price-tags in between. Enjoy!

Gift suggestions are grouped by age for easy reference: 2+, 5+, 8+ and 12+ years.

This article contains links to affiliate partners where available. When you buy through these links, TechCrunch may earn an affiliate commission.

2+ years

Lego Coding Express

Lego’s Coding Express is a train set for playful early years coding exploration — featuring 200+ Duplo bricks, including a push-and-go motorized train with lights, sounds and color sensors. The sensors interact with colored action coding blocks which kids place on the track. The set includes activity and inspiration cards to get your toddler started on grasping linear logic — with a free app to expand the parentally guided learning potential.

Age: 2-5
Price: $230from Amazon
Made by: Lego Education

Codie the Coder

Surprise Powerz, the U.S.-based startup behind this cute learning doll, Codie the Coder, was set up back in August 2019 with a STEM-centric mission to inspire girls, especially black and Latina girls, to “break barriers, solve problems and have fun doing it”. “We aim to get more STEM role models in the hands of more girls all across the nation to build their confidence in these critical subjects early,” it explains.

Founder and CEO, Kristel Bell, tells TechCrunch that Codie the learning doll speaks over 75 “coding-related phrases” — just squeeze her hand to hear the doll speak short phrases and questions. She says the goal is to inspire little girls to learn “they also have a place within the tech space” by seeing and hearing a coder role model which looks and talks like them, and engages them in an open ended conversation as they play. “Representation matters,” she adds.

Surprise Powerz’ STEM learning dolls are designed for pre-schoolers and up. Absolutely no screens required.

Age: 2-5
Price: $65 from Surprise Powerz
Made by: Surprise Powerz

Botzees Mini

Botzees’ expressive, line-sensing bot for budding programmers offers a variety of ways for kids to learn core coding concepts as they play. As well as programming challenges, the Botzees Mini pack features math and music puzzles too, throwing a little melody into the tech mix.

Kids control the bot by placing it on the pre-drawn path on maps provided — or by line drawing themselves. The coding element involves kids placing command cards on the robot’s path to control its motion, sound and appearance, with feedback coming at them via the bot’s changing facial expressions (which are displayed on its built-in screen). Supported functions cover programming basics like cause and effect, if/then logic, sequencing and debugging. No additional screens or companion apps are required.

Age: 3+
Price: $70from Amazon
Made by: Pai Technology/Botzees Toys

Switcheroo Coding Crew

Turn learning STEM basics into an “interactive coding adventure” with Switcheroo Coding Crew. The kit aims to teach kids basic coding concepts, early counting and math skills, critical thinking, spatial concepts, sequential logic and more with the help of a battery-powered programmable truck that sports changeable colored shells.

The play-set includes a town-themed puzzle board and a set of mission challenge cards to get things rolling. Screen-free play.

Age: 4-7
Price: $30 from Amazon
Made by: Learning Resources

5+ years

codeSpark Academy – gift subscription

For kids with access to an iPad (or Android-powered tablet), codeSpark Academy sells a range of subscription plans for ‘learn to code’ content in a gaming wrapper which aims to foster sequencing skills and help kids get a head start in STEM as they design and play. The software is centered on a proprietary game-making platform that features a set of cartoon characters called “The Foos.” Kids learn problem solving and coding by engaging with challenges and building their own games.

CodeSpark Academy says its approach is based on research-backed curriculum from MIT and Princeton. Its system includes a word-free interface to maximize accessibility and self-directed learning, with a claim that no prior experience is needed for kids to get coding.

Gift subscriptions start at around $60 per 6 months access — though you’ll have to stump up more to also get the ‘free’ plush toy pictured above…

Ages: 5-9
Price: Gift plans from $60 for 6 months (up to $225 for a lifetime sub, ‘Glitch’ plushy included)
Made by: codeSpark

Miko 3

Meet Miko 3: A sensor-laden, emoting tablet-on-wheels that’s been programmed to entertain and inform curious young minds. Encased in a brightly colored, robot-shaped shell is a voice- and face-recognizing AI (plus built-in speaker) which enables it to respond to questions and commands, piping up with interesting facts or playing tunes for a child’s dance party, and so on. A lot of what Miko offers is pure entertainment so there’s a risk STEM learning takes a back seat to other more fun interactions. This is also definitely not a tech lite (nor screen-free) learning option.

Still, parents hoping to accelerate the development of budding young coders might be won over by educational content the bot can put on tap for kids — via its curated ‘Talents’ app store. Available content includes Kidloland’s Coding School app. Again, though, good luck getting children to focus on something that techie when they could just be asking the bot to spin circles or play hide and seek…

Some of Mike 3’s digital content is bundled with the base price of the bot; unlimited premium kids content requires a subscription.

Ages: 5-10
Price: $249 (plus optional subscription)
Made by: Miko

Osmo Coding Starter Kit

If your wannabe coder already has access to a tablet like an iPad, Osmo’s clever add-on system turns screen time into STEM learning time via hybrid digital/physical play. The product is comprised of a base stand to lift the screen off the table, making room for little hands to physically build lines of code, and a reflector that enables the software to keep track of their table-top programming.

As the name suggests, the Osmo Coding Starter Kit is the place to start. The kit is designed to help kids build coding skills in progression — walking them through three hands-on learning games. Kids learn coding basics by putting together the colorful physical programming blocks, and get real-time feedback by watching their coding adventure play out on the screen.

Ages: 5-10
Price: $99
Made by: Osmo

Tacto Coding

For another spin on physical/virtual play, PlayShifu’s Tacto Coding system turns an existing (compatible) tablet into a dedicated kids coding station. Children are encouraged to get to grips with programming basics by playing through a variety of mini challenges with the look and feel of puzzle games.

The attention-grabbing twist is they interact with digital content on the touchscreen using a range of (physical) figurines arrayed around the tablet base-station. This (er, metaverse ready?) cross-over device is aimed at turning learning coding into child’s play — and a physical-virtual adventure.

PlayShifu’s child-friendly learn-to-code approach also has advanced modes to support kids as they progress, including offering Scratch programming language support so they can try their hand at block-based coding.

Age: 6-12
Price: $40 from Amazon
Made by: PlayShifu

8+ years

Ozobot STEAM Kits

Ozobot has been selling mini programmable STEM learning robots for several years, but these days it’s a lot more focused on the K-12 educational market. New for 2022 it’s added a bunch of STEAM kits into its product mix. You’ll need to either already own or buy one (or more) Ozobots to get the most out of these — but if you already have Ozobot kit at home they could be worth a look.

The OzoGoes to the Solar System kit combines the pull of its rolling robots with a paper-based educational kit for learning about the planets in our solar system, with the bots helping to illustrate their movements. Another kit — OzoGoes to the Sun, Earth & Moon — is similar but doesn’t require as many Ozobots to get the kinetic learning rolling.OzoGoes Around A Sundial (pictured above) has kids deploying their bot as a tool to help learn how to use the sun to tell the time.

Ozobot says the STEAM learning kits were designed by “experienced educators and curriculum developers” so homeschooling parents especially may want to check them out. The kits feature both screen-free (paper-based) and on-screen project-based activities.

Age: 8+
Price: From $30
Made by: Ozobot

Sphero Mini Activity Kit – Kids Coding Activity Kit

Another programmable robotics maker that’s been rolling around the STEM learning space for years is Sphero. It’s also become increasingly geared towards the school markets. But a solid entry point for parents looking to give their kids a very-high energy taste of making code approachable (and fun) is the Sphero Mini Activity Kit – Kids Coding Activity Kit.

The kit comes with a Sphero Mini programmable bot plus a construction set containing STEM-inspired activity cards and bits and bobs so kids can build mazes, design obstacle courses, build towers, play croquet and more. The Sphero bot can be code-controlled using Blocks drive mode — which relies on basic drag-and-drop coding commands — or kids can tap into the Sphero Edu app to expand their programming knowledge. There’s also a Sphero Play app that turns the spherical gizmo into a game controller for arcade-style games if/when they get bored of all the STEM activities.

Age: 8+
Price: $89
Made by: Sphero

littleBits Electronic Music Inventor Kit

The littleBits STEM learning brand — which, since 2019, has been owned by the aforementioned Sphero — is fixed on helping kids learn how electronics hardware works, one connectable component at a time. Perfect if you’ve got a budding hardware hacker on your hands.

Musically minded kids should appreciate putting together (and rocking out) with this littleBits Electronic Music Inventor Kit, which guides them to build a “rockin’ synth guitar,” air drums or another unique creation of their own using the 8 bits and 18 accessories provided in the kit.

Age: 8+
Price: $100
Made by: Sphero

Snap Circuits Code Journey

Veteran electrical engineering STEM brand Elenco has devised a kid-friendly system of encased, snap together electronics components to encourage children to learn about circuits by building them. The Code Journey rover kit, pictured above, adds programming into this mix.

Children are encouraged to get coding by assembling circuits that they mount on the Snap Rover — using components like LEDs, a speaker, jump wires and more — and then by coding commands to send to the vehicle so it can take instructions and perform missions. Programming the rover is done using a simple graphical interface in the Snap Circuits App. There’s also support for Blockly Coding’s drag-and-drop interface as kids’ skills advance.

Age: 8+
Price: $103.74
Made by: Elenco

Coding Lab GinoBot

Cyprus-based Engino has spent years developing a programmable robotics platform for teaching STEM and physical robotics. Newly introduced into the US and UK markets is its Coding Lab: GinoBot. The programmable 4-wheel drive robotics vehicle (which can be assembled into one of two models) packs Wi-Fi and Bluetooth connectivity, color sensors, programmable RGB lights, an ultrasound sensor and infrared distance sensors — for powerful programmable play.

Also on board: Built-in connectors to enable structural and mechanical expansion, and the ability to plug in open electronics (such as Raspberry Pi, Microbit and Arduino, or Engino’s own ERP sensor modules) to further expand what’s on board, paving the way for a budding hardware hacker to grow their engineering skills.

Age: 9+
Price: $137.23
Made by: Engino

Code Rocket

Stuff a stocking with Code Rocket and spread a little STEM smarts! This dinky, spaceship-shaped circuit board is armed with built-in LED lights, speaker, and buttons, and designed to teach C++ coding through hands-on electronics. As well as space-themed electronics, the pack provides access to over 20 online lessons. Said lessons introduce kids to concepts like loops, variables and functions as they program the rocket booster LEDs, code a countdown to liftoff, send morse code sound messages, and more. Both block-based and typed C++ coding is supported. Access to a desktop computer to program the electronics is required.

Age: 8-12
Price: $54.99
Made by:Let’s Start Coding

Piper Make Light Show

San Francisco-based Piper Make has clocked up almost a decade in the STEM learning gizmo business — expanding to offer a range of products that encourage hands-on learning and typically blend electronics hardware with distinctive laser-etched wood base structures. The Piper Make Light Show, pictured above, offers a festive intro to programmable electronics. Curious youngsters will be encouraged to learn how to program the light panel to do stuff like display scrolling messages, display light art or host a Tetris-style game.

Programming the kit requires access to a computer (using the bundled micro-USB to USB-A cable) to access Piper’s drag-and-drop coding platform: make.playpiper.com. For the Light Show to work you’ll also need to have Piper’s base kit (aka, the Piper Make Starter Kit) — which comes with a Raspberry Pi microcontroller that’s used to power all its products.

Age: 8+
Price: $59 for the Make Light Show (plus $49 for a Starter Kit if required)
Made by: Piper

imagiCharm besties starter kit

Got twin girls with an eye for tech? Get them into coding with imagiCharm’s besties starter kit — which ships a pair of its customizable tween-friendly, Internet connected “charms”. The Swedish startup’s Tamagotchi-esque connected gizmos are designed to inspire by teaching how to use code to change the look and function of the 8×8 matrix of colored LED lights.

The battery-powered charms can be attached to a school backpack or worn as digital jewellery to show off its coding owner’s latest look/vibe/mood/feels.

Age:8-13+
Price:$136
Made by:imagi Labs

Smart Coding Watch Kit

Has your little engineer been eyeing up the Apple Watch? Why not get them to think outside the hermetically sealed, high shine, proprietary tech box by putting together their own smart watch? And learning to program it on open source hardware with this micro:bit add-on Smart Coding Watch Kit. The STEM learning kit guides them through assembling the wearable and learning how to program functions for it by connecting it to a computer and using free programming software. Options include graphical programming languages like Makecode and Scratch, or microPython or JavaScript.

(As well as access to a desktop computer for programming the hardware, you’ll need a micro:bit board — not included in the watch kit — to power the wearable. If you don’t already own that STEM-focused microprocessor remember to pick one of those up too.)

Age: 8+
Price: $9.90 (+ $29.99 for a micro:bit)
Made by: Elecfreaks

Boolean Box

How about getting your kid learning programming by building a computer of their own to code on? That’s the goal of build-it-yourself Boolean Box.

The DIY computer kit (powered by a Raspberry Pi 4) has been around for a few years — and was conceived with the goal of encouraging girls into coding. But it’s also designed to be an approachable option for children of any gender to up their STEM smarts.

Once kids have built and booted up the computer they’ll be nudged to start coding. Whether by learning to program mini games with Scratch, code Minecraft hacks with Python, or play at being a budding inventor using the bundled breadboard and electronics components to do circuit projecting… just add a TV or monitor and they’re good to go.

Age: 8+
Price: $199.99
Made by: Boolean Girl Tech

12+ years

CircuitPython Starter Kit with AdaFruit Itsy Bitsy M4

Get your little maker started as a hardware hobbyist with CircuitPython using this cute electronics Starter Kit from AdaFruit — powered by an ItsyBitsy M4 microprocessor.

AdaFruit’s website offers tons of beginner guides for help learning all the ins-and-outs of electronics and hardware making. (Note: As well as containing small parts, some light soldering is required to attach headers to the ItsyBitsy, so the build process may require parental supervision.)

Age: Young engineer
Price: $24.95
Made by: AdaFruit

Legendary

Give the gift of inspiration and a sense of belonging to the next generation of expectation-smashing women in STEM. Legendary, by Represented Collective, is a 56-card collection — featuring 41 profiles of professional women in science, technology, engineering and math — curated to showcase the often underrepresented contributions of primarily Black, Indigenous, Women of Color (BIWoC), and to celebrate what it describes as “a diverse set of women and their accomplished, yet nuanced stories”.

Age: Precocious tween+
Price: $40
Made by: Represented Collective

Trilobot Complete Kit

Pimoroni is ranging this handsomely rugged-looking, Raspberry Pi-based Trilobot Complete Kit, which it bills as a “mid-level” robot learning platform.

Designed with educational use in mind, kids first assemble the bot then boot up the on-board Pi and install the Trilobot Python library in order to get tinkering with programming by running examples that let them play around with the bot’s features and functions. As their mastery grows, there’s a possibility of connecting a controller to remote control the rover — if they can figure out the code calls.

The three-wheeled bot sports a pair of grippy, “moon-buggy” wheels up front and a ball caster round the back for 2x front wheel drive. As well as its Pi microprocessor engine, the bot is armed with a Pi v2 camera and an ultrasonic distance sensor. It also sports RGB LED underlighting to dial up the visual fun. Plus you get a 32GB microSD card and 5000mAh USB-C battery pack in this version of the kit (so check local shipping rules to make sure you’re able to receive the battery pack).

Pimoroni has created a detailed, step-by-step beginner tutorial for assembling the Trilobot. After that it’s Python code tinkering time…

Age: Roboticist in training
Price: $120.16
Made by: Pimoroni

Raspberry Pi Pico w

Don’t overlook the gift of pure, unadulterated Raspberry Pi. It’s an incredibly budget-friendly option for STEM learning — such as the $6 Pi Pico microcontroller with wi-fi, pictured above, which is great for powering DIY electro-mechanical projects. Though you will need a bunch of other components and access to a computer to program the hardware.

As we reported earlier this fall, Pi production has been hit by ongoing supply chain challenges since the pandemic but the Pico line is less affected than some of its other (bigger) boards so should be easier to track down.

Pure Pi comes with the baked in advantage of encouraging kids to seek out resources to help themselves learn which was of course the original philosophy behind the wildly successful maker hardware. The Raspberry Pi Foundation offers a solid starting point for setting up newly acquired Pi — and taking the first steps in a learn-to-code journey.

They’ve also published an official guide for MicroPython on the Pico in handy paper-based book form which could make a nice additional gift.

Age: It depends
Price: $6
Made by: Raspberry Pi

Gift Guide: More than 20 STEM gift ideas to inspire kids to code by Natasha Lomas originally published on TechCrunch

A good way to be wrong is to predict the future. A good way to be incredibly and embarrassingly wrong is to predict the future in a medium that is public and everlasting. With that in mind, welcome back to another episode of “TechCrunch Predicts.”

As we did last year, TechCrunch’s Natasha Mascarenhas, Anna Heimand Alex Wilhelm are back with a passel of predictions, hoping to percolate new postulations in your ponderer. Not all the below will come true, but it should help explain where our heads are at after a year’s reporting, writing, newslettering and podcasting. Among the three of us, we’ve spoken to hundreds of people this year, giving us — we hope — a modicum of insight into the state of technology today and what could be coming next.

When we went back and looked at our 2022 predictions, we got things more right than we could have expected. So let’s do it again! What do we see for 2023? Anna is betting on API-led startups, Natasha is wagering on silence and Alex tripled down with a trio of predictions that, we presume, will be wrong in short order. Enjoy!

Anna Heim: The rise of API-first startups will continue in 2023

I am convinced that API-first will be a major trend in 2023, with this approach being both more widespread than it was previously, as well as more successful than less API-heavy options.

That APIs are on the rise isn’t exactly new — but API-first startups are a subgroup in this world, and one that is enjoying tailwinds.

According to findings from API platform Postman based on internal data and a survey, companies that report spending 76% of their development efforts on APIs are “35% more likely to forecast an increase in hiring over the coming year than respondents ranking themselves lowest in API-first.”

3 views: Predicting 2023’s key startup themes by Anna Heim originally published on TechCrunch

Open source Twitter alternative Mastodon has gained a bit of attention in the wake of Elon Musk’s Twitter acquisition. Now, it’s gaining interest from third-party Twitter app developers, as well. The makers of popular Twitter clients, including Aviary and Tweetbot, have recently set their sights on building similar clients for the growing Mastodon user base.

While the Twitter exodus has only impacted a sliver of the social network’s overall user base, the influx of newcomers to the much smaller Mastodon ecosystem has had a significant impact on its community. Today, Mastodon has grown its active user base to somewhere between 3.3 million and 3.6 million, according to independent estimates, up from 655,000 in the days just after Musk’s Twitter takeover.

New Mastodon users are learning the basics of how to choose a server and find their friends, as well as learning about other community values, like the use of “content warnings” for their posts, when appropriate. They’re also realizing that Mastodon is not a Twitter clone, despite some initial similarities. Universal search doesn’t exist, requiring heavier use of reposts and hashtags to increase a post’s visibility. Direct messages work differently than on Twitter. An equivalent to quote tweets isn’t available. And so on.

The new Mastodon clients now in the works, however, could help make Mastodon feel more familiar to former Twitter users who are looking to make the shift to the “fediverse” — as the interconnected collection of servers powering Mastodon and other apps is called.

To be fair, the Mastodon community was not hurting for mobile apps. There were already quite a few third-party clients available, in addition to the official app, including MetaText, Tootle, Toot!, Mast, Mastoot, Tusky, Mercury and others. Several of these have seen increased development activity over the past month or so, as their makers realized their app side projects had suddenly gained a new following.

But for longtime Twitter users, the addition of well-known app makers from the Twitter ecosystem is an exciting prospect.

Among these is Tapbots, known for its popular Twitter app Tweetbot for iOS and Mac. Hailed as one of the third-party Twitter clients that keeps improving with age, the company earlier this year had released Tweetbot 7, which added features like picture-in-picture, a stats tab and widgets. Now, Tweetbots’ developer Paul Haddad is working on a similar app for Mastodon.

Haddad said that while the company hasn’t experienced disruption to the Twitter API since Musk’s takeover (besides a small increase in bugs and other issues), they’ve lost their contacts at Twitter following the layoffs and subsequent employee departures.

To address the “large number of requests” from current users leaving Twitter, the company is now working on a subscription-based app for Mastodon users that is much like Tweetbot.

The app, called Ivory, is still in the initial stages of development, but will likely appeal to Tweetbot users who want an app that also offers quick access to key features — in this case, navigation buttons that take you to your home timeline, @ mentions, favorites, search and trends, and your own user profile. You can swap out some buttons for others if you prefer. For example, a long press on the search button lets you switch over to a statistics feature or another screen for configuring mute filters. In addition to helping users mute topics they don’t care about or find disturbing, the latter could also help older Mastodon users from having to constantly read about Twitter and Musk in their feeds — something that’s been a steady complaint since the Twitter exodus.

And for creating a new post, it adds a floating button with a little horn — a nod to Mastodon’s version of the tweet, which is sometimes called a “toot.”

“Our starting goal for the app is to replicate the Tweetbot experience for Mastodon,” said Haddad. “We want people who are familiar with Tweetbot on Twitter to feel like they are at home with Ivory. Once we have a solid 1.0 version we’ll start working on adding more Mastodon-specific features, as well as some features that we’ve wanted to add to Tweetbot but couldn’t because of technical limitations,” he noted.

One of Ivory’s differentiators is that, unlike Twitter, it won’t show metrics like the number of boosts (Mastodon’s retweets), or the number of favorites or comments a post received in timeline view — a design choice intended to reduce screen clutter (and perhaps, clout-chasing).

Tapbots says Ivory will be developed alongside Tweetbot as they share a lot of code, and a Mac version of both Tweetbot and Ivory are in development, too.

The app is already proving popular, as the TestFlight version of the app blew up and quickly became full after its release.

Another third-party Twitter app maker, Shihab Mehboob who develops Aviary, has also begun work on a Mastodon client, called Mammoth. The new app will be a paid download with a yet-to-be-determined price, and will include the latest Mastodon API features when they’re released, as well as 4.0 features like editing posts and edit history. An iPad and Mac version will be released, as well.

“I was motivated by wanting a ‘good’ Mastodon app out there, as all the existing ones lacked features or design paradigms in one way or another. They all fell short, and didn’t feel native to the iOS and Apple platforms either. So I set out to make my own that achieves all this,” Mehboob explains. He says the app differentiates itself with an iOS-focused design “that feels at home on your device,” and a comprehensive feature set.

“It’s also a joy to use, and has some cool features like sharing posts as images, viewing them in AR, tweaking various parts via settings, and more,” Mehboob adds.

However, one notable third-party Twitter app developer, The Iconfactory, makers of the popular Twitterific apps for iOS and Mac, said they haven’t yet decided to enter the Mastodon app space. Co-founder Gedeon Maheux admits they, too, have lost their API contacts at Twitter in recent weeks. But for now, the company is just watching the development of this alternative ecosystem — and using Mastodon for themselves.

“It’s exciting to be a part of a service that’s growing and adapting to many new users, just as Twitter did back in the day,” said Maheux. “As for a Mastodon app from The Iconfactory, we don’t have anything to announce at this time,” he noted.

Of course, all these third-party apps will still have to compete with Mastodon’s own app, which has been seeing its own improvements since Musk’s Twitter acquisition, and gained another developer to help speed up app updates. But unlike Twitter, which actively worked to crush third-party clients in years past, Mastodon is open to new developments.

Third-party Twitter app makers turn their attention to Mastodon by Sarah Perez originally published on TechCrunch

We’re over the moon to announce the three early-stage startups that will take the stage and go head-to-head in the pitch competition at TC Sessions: Space — next Tuesday, December 6, in Los Angeles. There’s still time to join this mission.

Buy your pass right now to watch these early-stage space aces square off in front of a live audience.

The contenders will have to be at their very best to impress this group of expert space-focused VCs — Jory Bell, general partner at Playground Global; Mark Boggett, co-founder and CEO of Seraphim Space; Tess Hatch, partner at Bessemer Venture Partners; and Emily Henriksson, principal at Root Ventures.

What’s at stake? The competitors will all receive invaluable exposure to investors and plenty of media attention. But only one will rise above the rest to win the glory — and earn an automatic place in the Startup Battlefield 200 at Disrupt 2023.

Not familiar with the SB 200? It’s a juried cohort of 200 early-stage startups selected by TechCrunch. Each SB 200 company receives a VIP experience that includes, for starters, exhibiting on all three days of the show — for free — plus a shot at winning $100,000.

Okay, let’s get to it. Here are the three early-stage space startups that we chose to compete in the TC Sessions: Space Pitch-off.

Arch Rift: This startup builds oxygen helmets that deploy automatically. They’re designed for use in space tourism and future space settlements and — according to the website — to help “make space safe and accessible to all.”

Plasmos: This startup is developing a reusable, affordable space tug designed to deliver up to four small satellites to anywhere in lower Earth orbit.

Fluix: Increases thermal performance in data storage and processing by utilizing an all-in-one modular liquid cooler.

Be in the room to watch these founders in action, learn more about their cutting-edge technology and see who wins the day.

TC Sessions: Space takes place on December 6 in Los Angeles. Buy your pass today, and then join us to see and learn about the latest space tech and trends, meet rising-star founders and network for opportunities to build a stronger startup.

Is your company interested in sponsoring or exhibiting at TC Sessions: Space? Contact our sponsorship sales team byfilling out this form.

Meet the startups competing at TC Sessions: Space by Lauren Simonds originally published on TechCrunch

Google’s latest “feature drop” for Pixel phones and the Pixel Watch brings features like a call quality enhancement function called “Clear Calling,” free access to Google One’s VPN service, a new privacy and security settings hub, and Fitbit sleep profiles for the Pixel Watch.

Here’s the summary of all the features included in this announcement.

Exclusive Pixel 7 and 7 Pro features

During the Pixel 7 series launch, Google said that folks buying the new devices would get access to a VPN included in Google One subscriptions at no cost. With the latest update, that feature will become available to the Pixel 7 and the Pixel 7 Pro owners.
If you are a user of the company’s latest flagship phone, Google is also introducing its clear calling feature. It will reduce background noise and enhance your voice so the person on the other side of the call can hear you better.

The latest update brings speaker labels to the Recorder app that will automatically assign labels to multiple people in the recording. What’s more, the app will introduce a line break whenever the speaker changes in transcriptions. Journalists and interviewers will be pretty happy with this feature. Professional transcription tools like Otter.ai offers this service, but it’s a good feature to have on your phone. Hopefully, Google introduces this feature to other Pixel devices too.

Features for all Pixel phones

Google is introducing a new hub so that you can easily access your privacy and security settings. It includes shortcuts to the app security feature, screen lock settings, Find My Device and Google Security Checkup. The hub will show you action cards if any of your accounts are at risk and suggest steps to bolster security for them.

The update has a bunch of new wallpapers to celebrate the International Day of People with Disabilities.
Pixel devices are finally getting a Spatial Audio update if you pair your phone with the Pixel Buds Pro. Google says this pairing enables head tracking for an immersive experience. But you’ll have to wait until January to get it.

Pixel Watch updates

Pixel Watch owners are getting a Fitbit Premium feature even if they are not Fitbit Premium subscribers: Sleep Profiles. This function tracks 10 different things like sleep duration, disruptions and bedtime consistency to analyze your sleep. It also assigns you a cute animal based on your sleep patterns if you wore the Pixel Watch for 14 nights in November.

Google’s new Watch is also getting Tiles for weather and favorite contacts — Tiles are widget-like screens that give you information at a glance. These Tiles were also a part of the company’s December feature release for Android.
The search giant has also promised that the Pixel Watch will get a fall detection feature next year. Once triggered, the watch will contact emergency services if it detects that you are unresponsive. Notably, the Apple Watch has had this feature since the Series 4 model.

These features will roll out to the Pixel watch and Pixel phones (for Pixel 4a and above) through over-the-air updates starting today.

Google’s new Pixel update brings new features like clear calling and Google One VPN by Ivan Mehta originally published on TechCrunch

BrightDrop, General Motors’ electric delivery van subsidiary, added DHL Express Canada to its portfolio of customers, marking the company’s entrance into its first international market.

BrightDrop has also started production on its Zevo 600 delivery vans (formerly called EV600) at GM’s CAMI Assembly plant in Ontario, the company said Monday at the plant’s grand opening. The facility is expected to produce 50,000 Zevo vans annually by 2025, with scaled production of the Zevo 600 and the Zevo 400 (formerly EV410) scheduled for January 2023 and “late 2023,” respectively.

Over 25,000 Zevo 600s have been reserved by customers like DHL that are eager to reach net-zero goals — DHL has put aside €7 billion to get there by 2050. So far, BrightDrop has delivered 150 vehicles to FedEx, its U.S. launch customer. Those vans were built at a Michigan facility by German contracted supplier Kuka AG in order to meet customer demand in advance of the CAMI plant’s opening.

“Bringing BrightDrop to Canada and starting production at CAMI is a major step to providing EVs at scale, while delivering real results to the world’s biggest brands,” said Travis Katz, BrightDrop president and CEO, in a statement. “Our international expansion is proof that we can deliver exactly what our customers need where they need it. Having DHL Express Canada come onboard as a new customer shows the confidence legacy brands have in our ability to deliver.”

DHL Express Canada will add its first BrightDrop Zevo vans to its fleet early next year, said BrightDrop. The GM subsidiary didn’t provide TechCrunch with a more firm timeline nor how many delivery vans DHL reserved. A spokesperson from the company told TechCrunch that BrightDrop sees an opportunity to contribute substantially to DHL’s fleet, 60% of which will be electric by 2030.

To accompany the vans, DHL will pilot BrightDrop’s Trace eCarts — smart, electrically propelled carts that are designed to help logistics companies efficiently transport multiple packages from van to recipient — and subscription-based software platform in Toronto, with more regions to follow. BrightDrop Core, the software platform, was unveiled last month at GM’s investor day as a way to provide customers with more detailed insights into their operations.

The launch of the Ontario plant follows BrightDrop’s projections that it is on track to reach $1 billion in revenue next year — an impressive feat, if true, considering the company is so young. BrightDrop only launched last year, but GM gave it a kick-start in the form of an $800 million investment to convert the CAMI plant into a high-volume EV production facility.

BrightDrop would not share specifics on the price to reserve or buy its vehicles.

BrightDrop expands e-delivery van business to Canada with DHL Express by Rebecca Bellan originally published on TechCrunch

Not quite a decade ago, two technologies were racing toward an unseen finish line. They weren’t competing with each other — the adoption of one didn’t lock out the other. But to avoid catastrophic climate consequences, the order of the finish mattered.

Autonomous vehicles had to lose, and electric vehicles had to win.

It wasn’t clear at the time which one would take the checkered flag. In some ways, autonomous vehicles seemed to have momentum on their side, making considerable progress since the first ones cautiously completed the DARPA Grand Challenge in 2007. Ten years later, seemingly everyone had a self-driving division.

Meanwhile, electric vehicles were off to a slow start. Early models could go less than 100 miles per charge on batteries that cost about a third of the cost of the entire car. Tesla broke the mold in 2012 with the Model S, but it was priced outside the bulk of the U.S. auto market. By 2017, the picture hadn’t changed much.

What a difference five years makes.

Autonomous vehicles have largely stalled while EVs have surged ahead. Self-driving vehicles may have conquered many mundane driving scenarios, but they’re still frequently stymied by other situations that human drivers navigate on a daily basis — pedestrians, inclement weather, construction zones.

Yes, Waymo and Cruise are operating taxi services that are open to the public, but they’re only available in parts of Tempe and San Francisco, respectively, cities they’ve been mapping and testing in for years. As anyone who’s driven in a different city knows, each metro area has its own quirks. Making the leap to a new city won’t be easy. Even former boosters like Lyft co-founder and president John Zimmer, who just six years ago said the majority of rides on the network would be autonomous today, now expects just 1% to 10% of future rides would fit that bill.

EVs, on the other hand, have been ascendant. Battery prices have fallen from over $1,000 per kilowatt-hour in the early 2010s to just over $100. Investors are pouring money into battery startups, and battery manufacturers are racing to build a global network of factories.

While affordable EVs remain rare, prices have come down since the Model S was introduced, and the number of models has expanded dramatically. Sales in Europe, China, and the U.S. have swelled, and the future is looking even rosier in the wake of legislative and regulatory action that is cementing batteries as the go-to energy source for cars and light trucks.

Those two trends are diverging not a moment too late.

Autonomous driving’s blunders are good news for the climate by Tim De Chant originally published on TechCrunch

As inflation and general economic uncertainties spur C-suites to identify cost-cutting areas within their organizations, software-as-a-service (SaaS) spend is becoming a prime target.

SaaS is obviously a broad category, covering any centrally hosted software that’s licensed on a subscription basis. But no matter the flavor, SaaS is a growing line item in companies’ budgets — a line item that’s threatening profitability.

According to a recent report from SaaS purchasing management platform Vertice, SaaS pricing inflation is growing four times faster than global inflation. Moreover, customers are putting 53% more toward licensing than they were five years ago, the survey found, with $1 in every $8 that enterprises spend today going into SaaS products.

That might sound like an enormous pile of recurring cash. But it’s not surprising when you consider the average organization now uses around 110 SaaS solutions, according to BetterCloud, with large companies using an estimated 447.

Management has come down aggressively: Fifty-seven percent of IT teams told Workato in a 2022 poll that they’re under pressure to reduce SaaS spend — a task that’s easier said than done in organizations where teams and even entire divisions rely on SaaS suites to get their work done.

To get a sense of the SaaS landscape in a time of cutbacks and cost reductions, we spoke to analysts at Gartner and PwC who study trends in the software procurement market.

How companies can slash ballooning SaaS costs by Kyle Wiggers originally published on TechCrunch

A company may have a good contact center, but ideally they are able to help customers before they need to make a call. Operative Intelligence helps contact centers figure out what customers want more quickly, improving automated inquiries and cutting down on wait times. The Melbourne and Los Angeles-based startup announced today it has raised $3.5 million in seed funding led by Bonfire Ventures with participation from Wonder Ventures.

Operative Intelligence was founded in 2019 by brothers Peter and James Ianesk, who have spent 25 years working in customer service and contact centers.

More than 10 years ago, James developed a methodology to find out why customers were calling a large Australian health insurer. At that time, contact center systems didn’t have that information, so James came up with a manual system to analyze thousands of Post-It notes transcribed by contact center representatives from customer calls. Those notes were analyzed by a team using the “5 Whys” system for finding the root cause of a problem. As a result, James was able to help that contact center increase its net promoter score 5x.

The brothers continued to work on their method with high-growth tech companies and three years ago, started looking for a way to turn it into a software system.

“What we found 10 years on was that all the contact centers we had worked in continued to experience the same problems and there still wasn’t a solution in the market that surfaced the type of insight that contact centers and businesses need to better meet the needs of their customers at scale,” Peter, Operative Intelligence’s CEO, told TechCrunch.

Operative Intelligence gives contact centers data about why their customers are contacting them without the need to spend time shifting through different sources of data. The fully automated platform analyzes customer inquiries through several channels, including phone calls, emails, chat, web requests, social media, online reviews and customer warranty requests. Then it delivers reports on the root causes of why customers are contacting businesses.

Its platform also breaks down customer inquiries into prioritized lists. One details customer pain points and what they cost the business each year in service costs. Another one is of inquiries that can be completed through self service and its potential ROI. Operative Intelligence also produces reports on contact center performance by site, team and inquiries, and agent effectiveness by inquiry type.

One of Operative Intelligence’s customers used its data to prioritize fixing customer issues over deploying new features, which James said resulted in a 32% reduction in their call volume and a seven-figure reduction in service cost. Another moved more than half of their call volume into digital channels and reduced the time spent on phone calls by 23%, using best practices identified by Operative Intelligence.

The startup’s main competitors include NICE Nexidia, CallMiner and Call Journey. James said Operative Intelligence differentiates as the only platform that can automatically identify the root cause of a customer inquiry, requiring no model training or business tagging of data and having an ROI built into its insights. It can be deployed by a business in two weeks.

In a statement about Bonfire Ventures’ investment, managing director Mark Mullen said, “James and Peter have built an intuitive solution to improve the customer experience at a time when needs are heightened. We look forward to their next moves to utilize AI technology to reshape an untapped space.”

Operative Intelligence helps contact centers figure out what customers really need by Catherine Shu originally published on TechCrunch

Zenly, the popular social mapping app that Snap acquired five years ago, is going to shut down on February 3rd, 2023. This is going to be a sad day as there is nothing quite like Zenly.

The team based in Paris managed to create an app that was at the intersection of a utility app and a social app. More importantly, opening Zenly and using it every day was a delightful experience. The app should be considered as one of the most polished and innovative social app of all time — and an important example for other social app developers.

Zenly’s main feature lets you keep up with your friends’ locations. When you open the app, you can see if friends and family members are hanging out together and where they are right now. On top of that, Zenly has one of the most vibrant messaging experience in a social app.

More recently, Zenly added places. It was the most personal database of places as you could see your friends’ favorite bars and restaurants and even see their own personal map of places. It quickly became a modern Foursquare for my group of friends.

The development team also started rolling out its own maps. Essentially, Zenly was crazy enough to think that it could compete with Google Maps and Apple Maps with a team of 10 people working on a mapping project.

Instead of providing the most accurate map in the world, it was the most playful and iconic map app on my phone. You could see animated cars, boats, rubber ducks, trucks, sea creatures, etc. I spent quite a bit of time flying over Paris and discovering new areas.

Zenly was founded in 2011. The startup was growing nicely, but things became serious after the 2017 acquisition by Snap. Earlier this year, Zenly reached 35 million monthly active users.

And 2022 has been a pivotal year for the social app. After launching a complete redesign, Zenly’s co-founder and CEO Antoine Martin left the company. “We joined Snap five years ago and we started working on Zenly 11 years ago. I want to move on. And I haven’t had the opportunity to take a long paternity leave,” Martin told me in an interview earlier this year.

A few months later, Snapchat’s parent company Snap surprised everyone by announcing that it would shut down Zenly as part of a round of layoffs. Sure, Zenly wasn’t as big as Snapchat. Sure, there was no monetization strategy. But it was a popular, innovative and extremely promising app.

And yet, Snap decided that it didn’t want to sell Zenly to another company or create a spin-off company. Zenly would have become a competitor — in particular, it would have been an alternative to Snap Map.

All of this leads us to the end of Zenly, the social app that helped you spend more time with friends and discover new places. I created my Zenly account on July 30, 2015 (or 2,685 days ago). And now, I have 59 days remaining to use the app. It sucks.

Zenly was the best social app and it will (sadly) shut down on February 3rd by Romain Dillet originally published on TechCrunch