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We’re only in the second week of 2023, but demo days have already begun as founders try to keep momentum alive in the ever-changing crypto market.

Beacon, a web3-focused early-stage accelerator program, launched last year, and its flagship cohort just graduated. The teams in the first cohort, known as Cohort 0, presented their ideas on Tuesday during a demo day, exclusively covered by TechCrunch.

“For Cohort 0, we spoke with over 1,000 projects to end up at 15 companies in Cohort 0 with 13 graduating at our Demo Day,” Sandeep Nailwal, core contributor of Beacon and co-founder of Polygon, said to TechCrunch. “With the current rate of applications for Cohort 1, we’re planning to land at a similar 1% acceptance rate.”

The three-month program runs twice a year and accepts about 15 to 20 applicants for its fall and spring cohorts.

“We feel like Cohort 0 is our MVP of Beacon,” Nailwal said. “So for this cohort, we hand-picked our favorite teams through taking calls with founders sourced through our networks.”

Mentors include Jack Lu, CEO and co-founder of Magic Eden; a handful of venture capitalists; Rob Behnke, co-founder of Halborn; Brendan Farmer, co-lead at Polygon Zero; Dan Kim, VP of business development and listing at Coinbase; and Miles Anthony, CEO and co-founder of Decentral Games, to name a few.

For the next cohort, there will be a standard $250,000 investment, with an $8 million post-money valuation from Beacon for each company in the program, Nailwal noted. In Cohort 0, investments were done on a case-by-case basis as the team was refining its process, he added.

Beacon is “chain-agnostic,” which means most of the teams in Cohort 0 were building cross-chain applications, Nailwal said. However, Ethereum topped the list for the most teams building on that blockchain. Of the 13 companies, there were 29 founders across nine countries and 13 cities, Kenzi Wang, core contributor at Beacon and co-founder of Symbolic Capital, said during the demo day.

The startups focused on a range of crypto subsectors, like gaming, infrastructure, decentralized lending and borrowing, and developer tooling, to name a few. Almost all of the startups in the cohort are seed stage, with the exception of one company, Community Gaming, at Series A.

Here are the details behind Cohort 0’s 13 startups:

Company name: Arcana

What it does: Web3 toolkit for developers
Founders: Mayur Relekar, Aravindh Kumar
Stage: Seed
The pitch: Arcana wants to help supplement the technological stack for developers with tools to help build secure decentralized applications (dApps). Its core tools include user authentication, storage of data on its decentralized network and access control. The platform aims to provide developers building applications on “almost any chain” the ability to leverage its services and tools.

Company name: Blinkmoon

What it does: Game development studio
Founders: Hugh Behroozy, Hajeir Mazinani
Stage: Seed
The pitch: Blinkmoon is building an independent gaming development studio to focus on the growing web3 sector. Prior to this, its team members helped create the visuals for “Guardians of the Galaxy” and “Game of Thrones,” as well as worked on gaming franchises like League of Legends: Wild Rift, NBA, the Dead Rising and Rainbow Six, to name a few.

Company name: ChapterX

What it does: Web3 event experience
Founders: Chase Guo
Stage: Seed
The pitch: ChapterX is a web3 event experience platform that aims to provide organizers the ability to transform their events into unique experiences. The startup provides options to engage attendees through either physical events or customizable virtual worlds in the metaverse with aspects like decentralized autonomous organization (DAO) governance or GameFi. Users can also convert their 2D NFTs into 3D avatars through its re-skin system and discover new worlds and join communities through its network.

Company name: Colexion

What it does: GameFi ecosystem
Founders: Abhay Aggarwal
Stage: Seed
The pitch: Colexion is a card-based GameFi ecosystem that aims to bring Web 2.0 games into the web3 ecosystem through fantasy-focused content. Its system, Colexion Core, provides a host of services like minting, marketplaces, bridges, wallets and more to help traditional games navigate the web3 world. The company is focused on the Asia-Pacific region and has over 15 million active users across more than 10 nations, according to its website. Colexion is backed by Polygon, Brevan Howard, Jump Capital, Symbolic Capital, Firestarter and GSR.

Company name: Community Gaming

What it does: Esports platform
Founders: Chris Gonsalves
Stage: Series A
The pitch: Community Gaming aims to be an all-in-one esports competition platform that offers infrastructure to industry players. The platform is backed by Ethereum- and Solana-based blockchain payment technologies and provides players, organizers and game developers tools to create, facilitate and participate in esports tournaments. It also provides users the ability to monetize their gameplay by completing quests, a daily content engine for earnings and game discovery.

Company name: Cubist

What it does: Web3 developer tools and infrastructure
Founders: Ann Stefan, Deian Stefan, Riad Wahby, Fraser Brown
Stage: Seed
The pitch: Cubist is a developer tools and infrastructure provider that aims to bring today’s software engineering practices and security to web3 builders. Its toolkit focuses on providing safer and more secure options so developers can build, test and deploy easily across multi-chain and cross-chain dApps. Its founders include a former fintech COO and computer science professors from Carnegie Mellon University and UC San Diego. The team members have spent their careers retrofitting security for real-world systems and have collectively published over 80 research papers on related topics like computer systems, programming languages, security and cryptography.

Company name: FastLane

What it does: MEV solutions for Ethereum-based blockchains and rollups
Founders: Alex Watts, Jordan Hagan
Stage: Seed
The pitch: The FastLane protocol focuses on generating revenue for validators, increasing effectiveness for algorithmic traders and reducing the stress on network participants when overwhelmed with redundant transactions without the need to install or manage custom software on validating nodes. The protocol aims to reduce transaction spam and improve the overall Ethereum network health by monetizing propagation bottlenecks in the layer-2 blockchain Polygon and distributing the rewards to validators involved.

Company name: Meta Apes

What it does: Web3 game
Founders: Taylor Shim, Nicholas Carr
Stage: Seed
The pitch: Meta Apes is a free-to-play and win-to-earn mobile web3 game built on the BNB Application Sidechain (BAS). Players have the ability to build their own cities and communities while competing and exploring others to win the “race to space.” The game aims to combine traditional gaming elements like massively multiplayer online (MMO) strategies and web3 elements such as in-game currencies. The team has worked at places like Ubisoft, Gameloft, Zynga, AppLovin and Epic.

Company name: Mystic Moose

What it does: Web3 gaming developer
Founders: Mike Levine
Stage: Seed
The pitch: Mystic Moose is a web3 platform, gaming studio and publisher that was formed by a team of gaming veterans who have worked at Activision, LucasArts and Electronic Arts. Its first game, Planet Mojo, was built on top of its scalable backend platform Sumatra and is a browser-based server of interconnected games. Its auto chess game, Mojo Melee, is currently in alpha playtesting and plans to launch fully in the first quarter of this year on browsers and mobile. The studio is backed by Animoca Brands, Republic Crypto and Polygon Studios, among others.

Company name: Nillion

What it does: Web3 infrastructure
Founders: Alex Page, Andrew Yeoh, Andrew Masanto
Stage: Seed
The pitch: Nillion is a web3 infrastructure startup focused on securing storage, computation and fragmentation of data on the internet. “Nillion is a deep technology infrastructure project,” Andrew Yeoh, the company’s founding chief marketing officer, previously told TechCrunch. “While blockchains decentralize finance, Nillion aims to decentralize everything else and the rest of data.” The founders include ex-Uber, Indiegogo and Hedera Hashgraph employees, as well as executives from Coinbase and Nike. The company raised more than $20 million in December 2022 from over 150 investors in a “conscious decision” to prevent concentrated ownership, Nillion CEO Alex Page said in a statement.

Company name: Davos Protocol

What it does: Stable asset lending protocol
Founders: Varun Satyam, Julian Hayward, Filipe Gonçalves
Stage: Seed
The pitch: Davos Protocol is home to its stable asset, DAVOS, which is stabilized by its monetary policy that balances yield generation and price stability on a weekly basis by leveraging liquid staking, according to its website. It provides users the ability to borrow DAVOS using liquid staking tokens as collateral. Users can also supply stable asset pairs to provide liquidity, yield farm and earn rewards. The team aims to promote blockchain technology in mainstream adoption by incentivizing borrowers and stakers through its protocol. Its strategic partners include Polygon and Ankr.

Company name: Timeswap

What it does: Decentralized lending and borrowing protocol
Founders: Ameeth Devadas, Harshita Singh, Ricsson Ngo
Stage: Seed
The pitch: Timeswap is a decentralized lending and borrowing platform as well as an automated market maker (AMM) protocol powered by Polygon. Its key features include flexible interest rates and collateral factors so users can have the flexibility to decide their risk-return profile as well as allowing users to create any Ethereum-based ERC20 token pool by providing the proper liquidity. Since launching in August 2020, the platform has done over $4 million of lending, borrowing and liquidity volume on its protocol without any token incentives, according to a post from August.

Company name: Ylide

What it does: Decentralized protocol for wallet communication
Founders: Ignat Shapkin, Kirill Zubkov, Danila Simonov
Stage: Seed
The pitch: Ylide is a decentralized protocol for wallet-to-wallet communication that allows multichain messaging, data storage into smart contracts and end-to-end encryption. It also has its own mail client as well as tools for developers to integrate communication features into their projects, “as easily as building a Lego set,” the team said.

Web3-focused Beacon launches flagship demo day with 13 crypto startups by Jacquelyn Melinek originally published on TechCrunch

A live-action series based on the tabletop roleplaying game Dungeons & Dragons is coming to Paramount+. The pilot of the show was written and directed by Rawson Marshall Thurber, who wrote films like “Dodgeball” and “Red Notice.”

The series will be co-produced by Hasbro’s eOne and Paramount Pictures, who are also working together on the upcoming movie “Dungeons & Dragons: Honor Among Thieves.”

Hasbro acquired Dungeons & Dragons publisher Wizards of the Coast in 1999, but in the last few years, Hasbro has reorganized the subsidiary into a more prominent division at the games company. These television and movie adaptations of the game are part of the company’s longterm plan to drum up more money from the popular roleplaying game.

“The brand is really undermonetized,” said Wizards of the Coast president Cynthia Williams about Dungeons & Dragons in a December investor call. But she also added that the game has never been more popular. Paramount+ says that more than 50 million fans have played or interacted with the franchise since its release almost half a century ago.

“The D&D strategy is a broad four-quadrant strategy, where we have this powerful brand that has similar awareness, say like ‘Lord of the Rings’ or ‘Harry Potter,’” said Hasbro CEO Chris Cocks on the same call. “And we’re going to imbue it with blockbuster entertainment, like we have with the movie coming up.”

A potential problem with this plan, though, is that Dungeons & Dragons is a framework through which people create their own fantasy-inspired stories and games — there isn’t really a core canon or plot that unifies the interest of all players of the game. You could surmise that most “Harry Potter” fans feel an emotional attachment to the story of the orphaned boy wizard and his friends, but you can’t really have a favorite character or scene in Dungeons & Dragons. For the most part, every group’s game has different fan-made characters and events. While Wizards of the Coast does publish some books with “official” lore and ideas, they’re not essential to gameplay.

Since the Hasbro acquisition, there have been a few attempts to bring the popularity of “Dungeons & Dragons” to the big screen. In 2000, the film “Dungeons & Dragons” hit theaters, but it was a box office bomb. This was followed by two direct-to-DVD “Dungeons & Dragons” films in 2005 and 2012, which also performed poorly.

As Hasbro invests in blockbuster content like a movie and TV series, Dungeons & Dragons fans and content creators are currently protesting the company’s changing gaming license. Since 2000, fans have been able to make a living by selling their own additions to the game under an open gaming license, but Wizards of the Coast has confirmed that it will alter this license soon. Under the new gaming license, all creators making more than $50,000 annually from licensed content will have to report their revenue to Wizards of the Coast, and those making more than $750,000 per year will pay royalties starting in 2024.

Paramount+ orders a live-action ‘Dungeons & Dragons’ series by Amanda Silberling originally published on TechCrunch

A meeting between TikTok’s CEO, Shou Zi Chew, and senior European Union lawmakers which took place today saw the video sharing platform’s chief executive quizzed on a range of topics — including its preparations to comply with incoming pan-EU rules focused on content governance and safety (aka the Digital Services Act; or DSA), and its approach to existing rules on privacy and data protection (including the General Data Protection Regulation).

Other topics the EU said its commissioners brought up in the meetings with Chew included child safety, Russian disinformation and the transparency of paid political content.

TikTok has faced a range of regulatory scrutiny across the bloc in recent years, including complaints from consumer protection authorities and a number of interventions by data protection authorities — as well as having two open GDPR enquiries in Ireland (one into TikTok’s processing of children’s data; and another into its data transfers to China), which beganin 2021.

In recent years it has also sought to respond to regional concerns about data security by opening one of its so-called “transparency and accountability centers” to host visitors from the bloc and field their questions. Plus it’s undertaking a data localization project — that will see EU users’ information stored in a Dublin based data center — as another response to data protection and security concerns (although that project has faced delays and can’t entirely fix the data transfer issue since TikTok has admitted some non-EU-based staffers can access EU user data).

More regulatory scrutiny is coming as this year TikTok could also face direct oversight by the European Commission itself — if it’s deemed to meet “gatekeeper” criteria under the Digital Markets Act (DMA).

The DMA, which came into force at the start of November and is set to start to apply from early May, is intended to supplement traditional ‘after the fact of abuse’ antitrust regulation by applying a proactive set of operational ‘dos and don’ts’ to the most powerful, intermediating platforms and will put some hard limits on anti-competitive practices like self-preferencing (as well as introducing some firm requirements in areas like interoperability and data portability). So EU compliance requirements for platforms that fall under the DMA regime will step up considerably.

While it’s not yet confirmed whether TikTok will be designated a core platform service subject to the DMA, there’s no doubt that fostering a solid working relationship with the bloc’s executive is in its strategic interests — as the Commission will be making designations and overseeing compliance for both the DMA and for a layer of additional obligations that will apply to a subset of larger platforms (so called VLOPs) under the DSA — a category TikTok is almost certain to fall into (even if it avoids being designated a DMA gatekeeper).

The DSA also entered into force last November but the bulk of provisions won’t apply before February 2024. However VLOPs have a shorter implementation period — with compliance expected to be up and running later this year; platforms are given four months for implementation after a VLOP designation is made (so by mid year the DSA is likely to be force for a first wave of VLOPs).

Talking of strategic interests, the chaos of Elon Musk’s erratic leadership of rival social network Twitter also arguably creates an opportunity for TikTok to present a more cooperative face to the Commission — and seek to win friends (or at least avoid making enemies) among commissioners who are gaining powerful new oversight capabilities (and enforcement powers) atop digital platforms this year.

It’s clear the Commission is dining out on the photo opportunities of a Big Tech CEO coming in person to Brussels to press commissioner flesh.

In a statement following a meeting between TikTok’s CEO and the EU’s EVP and head of digital strategy, Margrethe Vestager, the Commission said:

The objective of the meeting with TikTok was to review how the company is preparing for complying with its obligations under the European Commission’s regulation, namely the Digital Services Act (DSA) and possibly under the Digital Markets Act (DMA). At the meeting the parties also discussed GDPR and matters of privacy and data transfer obligations with a reference to the recent press reporting on aggressive data harvesting and surveillance in the US.

The EU’s VP for values and transparency, Věra Jourová, also had a face-to-face meeting with Chew — and the EU said she asked about several concerns, including the protection of personal data of Europeans and steps TikTok is taking to address disinformation on its platform, as well as raising a recent controversy when TikTok was accused of using the data of journalists to try to identify the source of internal leaks.

In a read-out of the meeting, the EU said Jourová “appreciated” the fact that TikTok joined the bloc’s Code of Practice on Disinformation (2020) and how it “swiftly implemented EU sanctions against Russian propaganda outlets”, as it put it.

(One wonders if this flavor of public praise by the EU is also a subtle sideswipe at Musk and Twitter — given some blatant snubs the latter has doled out to Brussels in recent months, such as the shuttering of its local policy office.)

The EU’s read out also notes that it acknowledges TikTok “recognises that non-EU state actors try to manipulate the content on the platform to spread disinformation and puts efforts to address this issue”, adding the company informed it it is investing in Ukraine and will deliver a detailed report under the Disinformation Code.

(That might make interesting reading — given a study last spring found Russian state propaganda to be flourishing on TikTok in spite of a claimed ban on uploads.)

After being questioned by Jourová about the awkward issue of the (ab)use of the data of journalists to try to identify internal leakers, the EU said Chew confirmed this was wrong and told it the people responsible for the incident no longer work for the company. (And there’s also a tacit contrast with the EU recently warning Musk about the arbitrary suspension of journalists who had been reporting on Musk’s decision making at Twitter.)

Per the EU, the TikTok CEO also discussed TikTok’s efforts around GDPR compliance — and talked about its investment in content moderation practices, which he told it aim to limit the effect of hate speech and other “toxic content”.

Chew also used the opportunity of facetime with EU commissioners to claim TikTok’s “mission is to inspire creativity and bring joy” — rather than, y’know, dwelling on awkward accusations (and/or moral panic) that the platform is a societal manipulation project/’tool of cultural control’ targeted as Western kids and with authoritarian links to the Chinese state…

In a statement after the meeting, Jourová avoided direct reference to such concerns — opting instead for more diplomatic language about the need for TikTok to ‘regain regulatory trust’:

I count on TikTok to fully execute its commitments to go the extra mile in respecting EU law and regaining trust of European regulators. There cannot be any doubt that data of users in Europe are safe and not exposed to illegal access from third-country authorities. It is important for TikTok and other platforms to swiftly get ready for compliance with the new EU digital rulebook, the Digital Services Act and the Digital Markets Act. I am also looking forward to seeing the first report under the new anti-disinformation Code to be delivered by the end of January. Transparency will be a key element in this regard.

The two current GDPR probes of TikTok in Ireland remain ongoing — with, per the regulator, the prospect of the children’s data enquiry being wrapped up by (or before) the middle of this year (depending on how quickly disputes between DPAs can be settled). While the China data transfers enquiry could also reach a decision around mid year — but, again, we understand there are a variety of factors in play that could spin out the process so a final decision might not appear until the end of the year.

TikTok was contacted for its view on the EU meetings but at the time of writing the company had not responded.

Europe quizzes TikTok on data safety, disinformation and DSA compliance by Natasha Lomas originally published on TechCrunch

ChatGPT, a new artificial intelligence tool that achieved virality with its savvy messaging ability, has certainly struck a chord. The tool, made available to the general public just last month, is smart enough to answer serious and silly questions about profound topics, which has landed it in debates led by writers, educators, artists and more.

But for investors, ChatGPT’s surge isn’t just an inspiration for them to run and back the next big AI tool. Some are thinking through ways to integrate the technology into their workflows to do their jobs better, smarter and maybe even cheaper.

Many investors shrugged at the idea of artificial intelligence replacing the more monotonous parts of their work. After all, in a business driven by value-add and personality, who would want to admit that AI could do their job?

But stigma aside, venture has tried to automate itself for years, whether in deal discovery or even investment support. But ChatGPT being a specifically text-based support tool, automation could be making its way to rejection letters, market maps, or even bits of due diligence — all in order to stay afloat in a changing venture landscape.

The use cases

Kate McAndrew, general partner at Baukunst, said she would be “shocked” if associates weren’t using ChatGPT given that the AI is a “natural evolution of snippets.” As for herself, she admits to not even using Google’s AI autocomplete, writing all of her emails from scratch. She said that method is slow, “but feels genuine in a way that is important to me.”

Some investors expressed that ChatGPT could be used for fact-checking purposes around market size claims or growth potential; at the same time, so could Google. The argument for AI, of course, would be that the content would be original and perhaps more targeted toward someone’s exact questions, while a general Google search may require extra digging and piecing different articles together.

Hustle Fund general partner Eric Bahn is a proponent of ChatGPT and used it to write his end-of-year essay for his investors last month. He shared the prompt he used and the output and said investors responded well to it.

Bahn hasn’t used it for pass responses, though it made sense to him that associates might.

Some investors are (cautiously) implementing ChatGPT in their workflows by Natasha Mascarenhas originally published on TechCrunch

It’s only been a few days since CES closed its doors, but there are still plenty of new gadgets to be had. Some companies, after all, would rather not launch their products into the noise that is the world’s largest consumer electronics show. Seattle-based Wyze is one of these. The company made its name by launching an extremely affordable security camera back in 2017 and while it has since expanded well beyond that (think air purifiers, gun safes and vacuums), its camera offerings remain core to its identity (and, most likely, revenue). Indeed, Wyze’s founders recently promises that in the coming year, the company would go back to its basics and make 2023 the year of the camera. Today, it is kicking this off with the launch of its indoor/outdoor Wyze Cam Pan v3.

The new camera features a completely new design, which also now allows the waterproof wired camera to tilt a full 180 degrees, on top of its 360-degree panning ability.

The previous version only had a 93-degree vertical range, but otherwise, the two cameras feature comparable specs. These include Wyze’s HD sensor with color night vision, which works surprisingly well, as well as the ability to track objects and people once the camera detects motion, 24/7 recording on a microSD card and two-way audio. Since it’s a bit more flexible, the new version is also easier to mount inverted on a wall or ceiling. One nifty feature — though not new — is that you can set the camera to continuously monitor a room in a constant pattern by setting 4 waypoints.

Wyze sent me a review unit earlier this month and on top of these basic specs, maybe the most important update here is that the new camera is very quiet. Wyze says it reduced the motor noise by half — and that’s quite notable. And since the camera can now fully tilt down, the company also introduced a new privacy mode that points the camera down and eliminates its field of view. I’m not sure what I was expecting, but it’s also quite small, though it feels heavier than you expect and is generally well-built.

Like its other modern cameras, the new system also supports Wyze’s subscription AI and storage service for automatically detecting and tagging events (this starts at $2/month/camera but even without paying, you get 14 days of free cloud storage). In my experience, this works quite well (I mostly use it to detect people and packages at our front door). I haven’t used it outside yet, but Wyze promises that the camera is waterproof, up to IP65 specs. The company recommends you use its $14 outdoor power adapter, though.

The last version of its panning camera cost $44 (plus about $6 flat-rate shipping) on Wyze.com and about $50 at third-party vendors with free shipping. The new version will cost $34 (plus shipping) when you order direct from Wyze. That’ll likely mean it’ll set you back $40 on Amazon, for example. Given Wyze’s flat-rate shipping rate, you’re usually better off buying direct when ordering more than one unit (assuming you don’t mind the slower shipping). There are cheaper options from the likes of TP-Link brand Kasa, for example, though Wyze may have many of these competitors beat in terms of its software smarts.

We would be remiss not to note that Wyze Cam Pan v2 was one of the cameras that had a security flaw that the company took a long time to acknowledge publicly and only finished patching last year (except for the Wyze Cam V1, which it couldn’t patch because of its hardware limitations). A hacker would’ve needed access to the camera’s random ID number through your local network to exploit this vulnerability. Security flaws are almost inevitable (and we’ve seen far more problematic issues with security cameras over the years), but Wyze’s mistake here was to not talk about this one for years. I’d like to think that Wyze has learned from this and has since strengthened its approach to security (and its app supports two-factor authentication), but it’s something worth keeping in mind.

Wyze launches its new $34 pan and tilt security camera by Frederic Lardinois originally published on TechCrunch

Tomorrow, January 11, is a big day in the web3 universe. It’s The Cross Chain Coalition Web3 Demo Day, a showcase of 12 boundary-pushing early-stage startups building projects across web3, DeFi, NFT and gaming.

Today we’re revealing the final four startups ready to deliver their best five-minute pitch to a global audience, including some of the industry’s most influential founders and investors. Folks like Jonathan King (Coinbase Ventures), Mary-Catherine (MC) Lader (Uniswap Labs), Etiënne vantKruys (TRGC) and many more.

Register today, and don’t miss the chance to network with top blockchain investors — live in our event chat.

And now, without further ado, here are the final four startups ready to impress investors:

Meet Candy Shop, a one-stop solution provider designed to make NFT deployment and brand-management problems a thing of the past. Founded by Anson Cheung, this project aims to provide the entire NFT value chain from within your own dedicated shop.

Meet Coinfront, a digital currency banking and payments infrastructure for web2 companies. Co-founder Ash Shoukr and team aim to build the easiest way to accept and settle crypto payments.

Meet Knabu, a project specializing in secure transaction settlement. Founded by Gabrielle Patrick, the company builds clearing infrastructure designed to let firms leverage distributed ledger technology, become payment institutions or become electronic money institutions.

Meet Wallchain, an already-profitable web3 anti-bot solution, founded by Yurii Kyparus. The solution is designed to protect DEXes from MEV bots by getting inside user transactions and leaving zero opportunities for bots.

Join us tomorrow — January 11 — for the Cross Chain Coalition Web3 Demo Day and see for yourself what the brilliant minds behind 12 up-and-coming projects are building.

Register now for this free online event and reserve your seat at the virtual table.

Check out the final four startups pitching tomorrow at CCC Web3 Demo Day by Lauren Simonds originally published on TechCrunch

Google has warned that growth in the use of Android in India may stall due to an antitrust order issued by the Indian antitrust watchdog last year over the U.S. company’s domination in the country.

The order, which was issued by the Competition Commission of India (CCI) in September, found that Google had abused its dominant position in the market for mobile operating systems by imposing restrictive contracts on mobile manufacturers.

The CCI ordered Google to change its contracts with manufacturers, allowing them more freedom to install rival apps and services on Android devices. According to a Reuters report, Google filed a challenge with India’s Supreme Court and said that the order would require some modifications of its existing contracts and new license agreements. It would alter the company’s existing arrangements with over 1,100 device manufacturers and thousands of app developers.

“Tremendous advancement in growth of an ecosystem of device manufacturers, app developers and users is at the verge of coming to a halt because of the remedial directions,” the company said in the filing, as quoted by the news agency. “No other jurisdiction has ever asked for such far-reaching changes based on similar conduct.”

After three and a half years of investigation, the Indian watchdog fined Google $161.9 million for its anti-competitive practices related to Android devices in several markets, such as licensable OS for smartphones, app store, web search services and non-OS specific mobile web browsers. The regulator concluded that the Android maker dominated all those markets.

Google had responded to the order and said that it was a “major setback for Indian consumers and businesses.” The company also appealed the ruling to the country’s appellate tribunal, the National Company Law Appellate Tribunal (NCLAT).

Last week, the tribunal dismissed Google’s plea for an interim stay on the antitrust order and directed the company to pay 10% of the $161.9 million penalty while the case is due for hearing next month.

This was not the first time Google had been subject to an antitrust investigation. The company was previously investigated by authorities in other countries. For instance, Google eventually lost its appeal against a massive $4.3 billion fine in Europe.

India’s antitrust order will stall Android’s progress in the country, Google warns by Jagmeet Singh originally published on TechCrunch

German-based biotech company BioNTech SE is set to acquire InstaDeep, a Tunis-born and U.K.-based artificial intelligence (AI) startup InstaDeep for up to £562 million (~$680 million) in its largest deal yet.

Per The Financial Times, the German vaccine maker intends to useInstaDeep’s machine learning to “improve its drug discovery process, including developing personalised treatments tailored to a patient’s cancer.”

BioNTech is said to pay £362 million — a mix of cash and an undisclosed amount of BioNTech shares — upfront. The remaining £200 million is dependent on on how InstaDeep performs in the future, according to the company’s statement.

Last January, InstaDeep,founded by Karim Beguir and Zohra Slim in 2014, raised $100 million in Series B financing led by Alpha Intelligence Capital and CDIB.BioNTech was among the participating investors which also included Chimera Abu Dhabi, Deutsche Bahn’s DB Digital Ventures and Google.

The Tunis and London-based enterprise AI startup whichuses advanced machine learning techniques to bring AI to applications within an enterprise environment, hasoffices in Paris, Tunis, Lagos, Dubai and Cape Town.

CEO Begur, in an interview with TechCrunch last year, said InstaDeep uses reinforcement learning, a kind of machine learning that helps design optimization strategies and tackles them simultaneously.Instances where InstaDeep applies its AI tech includes helping a large shipping company to efficiently transport thousands of containers to a railway station or automate scheduling for 10,000 trains. Other examples are the design of advanced therapeutics with silicon and routing components on a printed circuit board.

Thecompany is currently working on a moonshot product to automate railway scheduling with Deutsche Bahn, the largestrail operator in Europe.

In 2019, InstaDeep formed a multi-year strategic collaboration with BioNTech to launch a joint AI innovation lab where they would deploy the latest advances in AI and ML to develop novel immunotherapies. This acquisition is as a result of this long-term partnership that has seen InstaDeep become the centerpiece of a growing portfolio of initiatives around AI and ML at BioNTech.

BioNTech intends to use computational solutions to create personalised drugs for cancer patients and according to its CEOUğur Şahin, “The acquisition of InstaDeep allows us to incorporate the rapidly evolving AI capabilities of the digital world into our technologies, research, drug discovery, manufacturing and deployment processes. Our aim is to make BioNTech a technology company where AI is seamlessly integrated into all aspects of our work.”

InstaDeep’s 240-man team will continue to provide its AI and machine learning services to other companies, including Google and Nvidia, per the company’s statement.

“AI is progressing exponentially and our mission at InstaDeep has always been to make sure it benefits everyone. We are very excited to join forces and become one team with BioNTech, with whom we share the same culture of deep tech innovation and focus on positive human impact,” said Beguir on the acquisition. “Together, we envision building a world leader that combines biopharmaceutical research and AI with the aim to design next-generation immunotherapies that enhance medical care – thus, helping fight cancer and other diseases.”

The transaction is expected to close in the first half of 2023, subject to customary closing conditions and regulatory approvals.

BioNTech acquires Tunisian-born and U.K-based AI startup InstaDeep for £562M by Tage Kene-Okafor originally published on TechCrunch

Apple today shared an update on its subscription businesses and global App Store, noting that the tech company has now paid out a record $320 billion to app developers since 2008 — a number that reflects the revenue apps have generated, minus Apple’s commission. In addition, the tech giant said it now has more than 900 million paid subscriptions across Apple services, with subscriptions on the App Store driving a “significant” part of that figure.

The company’s App Store in 2022 faced one of its tougher years since its founding, with lawsuits and antitrust actions aimed at limiting its market power. The U.S. Department of Justice is said to now be in the early stages of filing an antitrust lawsuit against Apple, even chiming in on the Apple-Epic Games antitrust appeal recently to point out to the court why the original ruling — which had decided that Apple was not a monopolist — had misinterpreted antitrust law. The U.K. is also probing the Android-iOS duopoly, with a specific focus on browsers and cloud gaming services.

Apple also this year had to make concessions over various parts of its App Store business.

For example, in the Netherlands, it had to comply with an antitrust order that allowed dating apps to use third-party payments. Multiple European countries are probing its App Tracking Transparency framework for antitrust issues. And last month, Apple loosened its grip on App Store pricing with the introduction of 700 new price points and rules that now permit developers to set prices that don’t end in $0.99 to combat complaints that Apple doesn’t let developers run their own businesses as they see fit — a result of a class action lawsuitwith U.S. app developers settled in 2021.

Despite its challenges, Apple’s App Store business continues to grow.

The company noted that more than 650 million visitors from 175 regions worldwide visit the App Store every week and it’s still delivering new experiences. Among the highlights was the launch of Apex Legends on mobile earlier this year, and the growing popularity of a new form of social networking with BeReal, Apple’s “app of the year.”

Apple’s game subscription service, Apple Arcade, also grew in 2022 with the addition of over 50 more titles, including Warped Kart Racers, Jetpack Joyride 2, Gibbon: Beyond the Trees, Wylde Flowers, and Cooking Mama: Cuisine. The service now hosts more than 200 games in total.

Apple also highlighted stats across other services, noting Apple Music has topped over 100 million songs, and growing Spatial Audio adoption with monthly listeners tripling since launch. Shazam’s 20th anniversary in 2022 saw it hitting the milestone of 70 billion all-time Shazams. (It didn’t report on its Podcasts figures, however. )

Apple Fitness+, meanwhile, grew its library to 3,500 workouts and meditations. And Apple TV+ became the first streaming service to win an Academy Award for Best Picture with “CODA.” In February, the Apple TV app will begin streaming Major League Soccer games, after the announcement of a 10-year partnership between Apple and the league.

App Store developers have earned $320 billion to date, says Apple by Sarah Perez originally published on TechCrunch

New Jersey and Ohio are the latest states to ban TikTok on government-owned devices over national security concerns. The two have joined at least 20 other states in doing so. The move comes amid fears that collected data could allow the Chinese government to spy on Americans.

New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy announced on Monday that the state issued a cybersecurity directive to prohibit the use of high-risk software and services, including TikTok, on government-owned devices. In addition to banning TikTok from state devices, Murphy said the state was also banning products and services from numerous other vendors, including Huawei, Hikvision, Tencent and ZTE.

On the same day, Ohio Governor Mike DeWine issued an executive order banning the use of any application owned by an entity located in China on government owned devices. DeWine said in the order that “these surreptitious data privacy and cybersecurity practices pose national and local security and cybersecurity threats to users of these applications and platforms and the devices storing the applications and platforms.”

Wisconsin Governor Tony Evers said on Friday that he planned to join other states in banning the popular short-form video app from state owned devices as well.

“We’re disappointed that so many states are jumping on the political bandwagon to enact policies that will do nothing to advance cybersecurity in their states and are based on unfounded falsehoods about TikTok,” a spokesperson for TikTok said in a statement to TechCrunch. “We are continuing to work with the federal government to finalize a solution that will meaningfully address any security concerns that have been raised at the federal and state level.”

Calls to ban TikTok from government devices mounted after FBI Director Christopher Wray said in November that the app poses national security risks. In December, President Joe Biden approved a bill that prohibits the use of TikTok by the federal government’s employees on devices owned by its agencies. The U.S. military has also banned its service-members from using TikTok on government devices, fearing the app could potentially expose personal data to “unwanted actors.”

There are also efforts to ban TikTok from consumer devices across the United States. Last month, Senator Marco Rubio proposed legislation that would ban TikTok nationally. Rubio said that the app allows the Chinese government “a unique ability to monitor more than 1 billion users worldwide, including nearly two-thirds of American teenagers.”

TikTok has been a source ofsecurity and privacy concerns for several years. Given the increasingscrutiny of TikTok, this may be just the start of the challenges to come for the company in the year ahead.

New Jersey and Ohio are the latest states to ban TikTok on government devices by Aisha Malik originally published on TechCrunch