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In January, Missouri Representative Emanuel Cleaver will introduce the Endowment Transparency Act into Congress, a move that could, frankly, change everything.

Cleaver’s proposed legislation seeks to amend the Higher Education Act of 1965 to require universities and colleges to share information about how and whether they are allocating endowment investment funds to women- and minority-owned firms. These higher education institutions, which collectively manage more than $821 billion in assets, have been notoriously secretive about where they invest money and, despite calls for change, many have refused transparency.

Educational behemoths play a critical role in the venture market as limited partners. TechCrunch previously reported on the pressing need for those at the top to bear more responsibility for the uneven venture landscape that disproportionately shuts out women and people of color. Those calls have turned to cries for more diverse fund managers and more money invested into minority-led funds — or at least criteria that LPs hold venture general partners accountable for the type of companies in which they invest.

Harrowing stats on the number of diverse fund managers, paired with the dearth of capital allocated to minority fund managers and founders, is indicative of the role endowments can play in maintaining existing inequities. Speaking with TechCrunch, Cleaver said when he attempted to reach out to higher education institutions to discuss their reticent behavior regarding asset managerial diversity and allocation, even he, at times, had doors shut in his face.

“These colleges brag about inclusion because they have minorities on their faculty and an inclusive student body, so they think everything is OK,” he said. “But let me just say, it was noble to desegregate a student body and faculty, but it is nobler to desegregate economics because they are reasons things are as they are.”

Proposed legislation would force US higher education endowments to reveal where they invest by Dominic-Madori Davis originally published on TechCrunch

Crypto news publication The Block announced today that its CEO, Michael McCaffrey, has resigned after failing to disclose a series of loans from former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried’s company Alameda Research. Axios first reported the news.

The capital was used in part to finance an employee-led buyout of the company, among other more extracurricular activities.

McCaffrey will be replaced by the company’s chief revenue officer, Bobby Moran, effective immediately, according to a statement. “No one at The Block had any knowledge of this financial arrangement besides Mike,” Moran wrote.

McCaffrey confirmed that in a series of tweets Friday: “I didn’t disclose the loan to anyone. Absolutely no one at The Block knew about the financial arrangement between my holding company and SBF, including the editorial and the research teams.” He claimed his rationale for this decision was to not “compromise the objectivity” of coverage surrounding SBF.

The Block was founded in 2018 by Mike Dudas. In 2020, McCaffrey took over as CEO. By April 2021, McCaffrey led a buyout of all of The Block investors, making the firm owned by employees, with McCaffrey as the biggest stakeholder. Even today, he remains the company’s majority shareholder.

Dudas told TechCrunch in an exchange after the news came out that he is “exploring what, if any, avenues exist to get The Block into trustworthy ownership.”

Dudas explained to TechCrunch that at the time of The Block’s sale, his “understanding was that Mike McCaffrey’s family was wealthy and loaned him money to buy out [his stake] and the VCs so the team could assume full independent ownership.”

In a tweet, Dudas said, “I’d like to buy The Block back.”

Media companies must disclose conflicts of interest when they arise; even the appearance of conflicts can prove damaging to a brand, as they can undercut reader trust in its impartiality.

“Mike’s decision to take out a loan from SBF and not disclose that information demonstrates a serious lack of judgment,” Moran wrote. “It undermines The Block’s reputation and credibility, especially that of our reporters and researchers, as well as our efforts at industry-leading transparency.”

McCaffrey received three loans for a total of $43 million from Bankman-Fried/Alameda. The first loan was for $12 million and was used to buy out The Block and make him CEO in 2021. The second was for $15 million in January to fund operations at the media and data research company. Finally, earlier this year, a loan for $16 million was provided to McCaffrey to buy personal real estate in the Bahamas.

The Block funds its newsroom via a combination of advertisements and research. The publication’s data section is a tool that TechCrunch utilizes from time to time.

That SBF-related capital went into a media company is not a surprise; the former web3 mogul was prolific in his media investments. However, given the lack of disclosure relating to the loans in question, this particular episode is different. Current staff and former executives were incensed about the transactions, the lack of transparency and effectively being lied to by their leader for a lengthy period.

The Block founder says he’s exploring ways to get the publication into ‘trustworthy’ hands by Jacquelyn Melinek originally published on TechCrunch

Microsoft today announced that it acquired Lumenisity, a U.K.-based startup developing “hollow core fiber (HCF)” technologies primarily for data centers and ISPs. Microsoft says that the purchase, the terms of which weren’t disclosed, will “expand [its] ability to further optimize its global cloud infrastructure” and “serve Microsoft’s cloud platform and services customers with strict latency and security requirements.”

HCF cables fundamentally combine optical fiber and coaxial cable. They’ve been around since the ’90s, but what Lumenisity brings to the table is a proprietary design with an air-filled center channel surrounded by a ring of glass tubes. The idea is that light can travel faster through air than glass; in a trial with Comcast in April, a single strand of Lumenisity HCF was reportedly able to deliver traffic rates ranging from 10 Gbps to 400 Gbps.

“HCF can provide benefits across a broad range of industries including healthcare, financial services, manufacturing, retail and government,” Girish Bablani, CVP of Microsoft’s Azure Core business, wrote in a blog post. “For the public sector, HCF could provide enhanced security and intrusion detection for federal and local governments across the globe. In healthcare, because HCF can accommodate the size and volume of large data sets, it could help accelerate medical image retrieval, facilitating providers’ ability to ingest, persist and share medical imaging data in the cloud. And with the rise of the digital economy, HCF could help international financial institutions seeking fast, secure transactions across a broad geographic region.”

Lumenisity was founded in 2017 as a spinoff from the Optoelectronics Research Centre at the University of Southampton to commercialize research in HCF. Prior to the acquisition, the startup raised £12.5 million (~$15.35 million) in funding across several funding rounds from investors, including the Business Growth Fund and Parkwalk Advisors.

Lumenisity claims its fibers are deployed in customer networks “with the longest spans ever reported utilizing HCF technology.” Beyond Comcast, U.K. operator BT recently piloted Lumenisity’s tech, which BT claimed at the time had the potential to slash latency by up to 50% compared to traditional fiber. Infrastructure company euNetworks Fiber UK Limited is also testing Lumenisity cable to serve the London Stock Exchange.

Earlier this month, Lumenisity completed construction of a 40,000-square-foot HCF manufacturing facility in Romsey, U.K., which the company says will enable “scaled-up” production of its HCF technology in the future.

“This is the end of the beginning, and we are excited to start our new chapter as part of Microsoft to fulfil this technology’s full potential and continue our pursuit of unlocking new capabilities in communication networks,” Lumenisity wrote in a statement on its website. “We are proud to be acquired by a company with a shared vision that will accelerate our progress in the hollowcore space.”

Microsoft acquires startup developing high-speed cables for transmitting data by Kyle Wiggers originally published on TechCrunch

Amazon is ending support for a program that allowed patients to share HIPAA-protected health information with healthcare organizations through Alexa. The news was first reported by Voicebot.ai.

The invite-only program, which first launched in 2019, allowed select developers to create and launch HIPAA-compliant healthcare skills for Alexa (skills are the third-party voice apps that run on Alexa devices). The skills released as part of the program allowed consumers to ask the virtual assistant for help with things like booking an appointment, accessing hospital post-discharge instructions, checking on the status of a prescription delivery and more.

Amazon launched the program with six healthcare organizations, including Boston Children’s Hospital, Livongo, Swedish Health Connect, Cigna Health Today, Atrium Health and Express Scripts. As of last week, only three of these organizations had applications active on the Alexa Skills store, according to Voicebot.ai.

“We regularly review our experiences to ensure we are investing in services that will delight customers,” a spokesperson from Amazon told TechCrunch in an email. “We are continuing to invest heavily in developing healthcare experiences with first and third-party developers, including Alexa Smart Properties for Healthcare.”

The Alexa Smart Properties for Healthcare unit aims to make it easy and cost effective for hospitals and providers to care for their patients. Last year, Amazon rolled out new solutions for healthcare providers and senior living centers as part of Alexa Smart Properties. The solutions were designed to meet the needs of deploying Alexa devices at scale and will allow the facility’s administrators to create customized experiences for their residents or patients.

Amazon’s decision to end support the for HIPAA-protected Alexa tool comes as Business Insider recently reported the company is on pace to lose $10 billion this year from Alexa and other devices. In addition, Amazon’s Alexa team was reportedly the most-affected by layoffs at the company. Prior to the official layoffs announcement, reports indicated that Amazon’s leadership was closely evaluating its Alexa business.

This newest development is the latest turn in Amazon’s push into healthcare, as the company made numerous headlines this year in relation to its healthcare initiatives.

In August, the companyshut down Amazon Care, which had been a telehealth employer-focused virtual primary care business. The service first launched in 2019 as a pilot program in Seattle, and it’s unclear just how much traction it had gained before being shut down.

Last month, the company launched Amazon Clinic, which Amazon describes as a virtual health “storefront.” With Amazon Clinic, users can search for, connect with and pay for telehealth care, addressing a variety of conditions that are some of the more popular for telehealth consultations today. Amazon Clinic initially launched in 32 states in the U.S.

Amazon ends support for third-party HIPAA-compliant Alexa skills by Aisha Malik originally published on TechCrunch

Elon Musk’s desire to stir conspiratorial shit up by giving select outsiders aligned with his conservative agenda access to Twitter systems and data could land the world’s richest man in some serious doodoo with regulators on both sides of the Atlantic.

In recent days, this access granted by Musk to a few external reporters has led to the publication of what he and his cheerleaders are framing as an exposé of the platform’s prior approach to content moderation.

So far these “Twitter Files” releases, as he has branded them, have been a damp squib in terms of newsworthy revelations — unless the notion that a company with a large volume of user generated content A) employs trust and safety staff who discuss how to implement policies, including in B) fast-moving situations where all the facts around pieces of content may not yet be established; and C) also has moderation systems in place that can be applied to reduce the visibility of potentially harmful content (as an alternative to taking it down) is a particularly wild newsflash.

But these heavily amplified data dumps could yet create some hard news for Twitter — if Musk’s tactic of opening up its systems to external reporters boomerangs back in the form of regulatory sanctions.

Ireland’s Data Protection Commission (DPC), which is (at least for now) Twitter’s lead data protection regulator in the European Union is seeking more details from Twitter about the outsider data access issue.

“The DPC has been in contact with Twitter this morning. We are engaging with Twitter on the matter to establish further details,” a spokeswomen told TechCrunch.

Earlier today, Bloomberg also reported on concerns over the pond about outsiders accessing Twitter user data — citing tweets by Facebook’s former CISO, Alex Stamos, who posited publicly that a Twitter thread posted yesterday by one of the reporters given access by Musk “should be enough for the FTC to open an investigation of the consent decree”.

Twitter’s FTC consent decree dates back to 2011 — and relates to allegations that the company misrepresented the “security and privacy” of user data over several years.

The social media firm was already fined $150 milloion back in May for breaching the order. But future penalties could be a lot more severe if the FTC deems it is flagrantly breaching the terms of the agreement. And the signs are foreboding, given the FTC already put Twitter on notice last month — warning that “no CEO or company is above the law”.

Another consideration here is the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) — which contains a legal requirement that personal data is adequately protected.

This is known as the security — or “integrity and confidentiality” — principle of the GDPR, which states that personal data shall be:

processed in a manner that ensures appropriate security of the personal data, including protection against unauthorised or unlawful processing and against accidental loss, destruction or damage, using appropriate technical or organisational measures (‘integrity and confidentiality’).

Handing user data (and/or systems access that could expose user data) over to non-staff to sift through might therefore raise questions over whether Twitter is in full compliance with the GDPR’s security principle. There is a further question to consider here, too — of what legal basis Twitter is relying upon to hand over (non-public) user data to outsiders, if indeed that’s what’s happening.

On the face of it, Twitter users would hardly have knowingly consented to such extraordinary processing under its standard T&Cs. And it’s not clear what other legal bases could reasonably apply here. (Twitter’s terms invoke contractual necessity, legitimate interests, consent, or legal obligation, variously, as regards processing users’ direct messages or other non-public comms depending on the processing scenario — but which of any of those bases would fit, if it is indeed handing this kind of non-public user data to non-employees who are neither Twitter service providers nor entities like law enforcement etc, is debatable.)

Asked for her views on this, Lilian Edwards — a professor of Law, Innovation and Society at Newcastle Law School — told us that how the GDPR applies here isn’t cut and dried but she suggested Twitter disclosing data to unforeseen third parties (“who might share it willy-nilly”) could be a breach of the security principle.

“If you’ve consented [to Twitter’s expansive terms], have you authorized these uses — so no security breach? I think there has to be an element of egregiousness here,” she argued. “How much you didn’t expect this and how open to security and privacy threats it leaves you — e.g. if it includes personal info like passwords or phone numbers?”

“It’s tricky,” she added — citing guidance put out by the U.K.’s data protection authority which notes that security measures required under the GDPR “should seek to ensure that the data: can be accessed, altered, disclosed or deleted only by those you have authorized to do so (and that those people only act within the scope of the authority you give them”.

“Well Musk has authorized them right, but should he? Are they security risks? I think a reasonable DPA would look at that quite sternly.”

At the time of writing, it is not clear which data exactly or how much systems access Twitter is providing to its chosen outsider reporters — so it’s not clear whether any non-public user data has been handed over or not.

One of the reporters given access by Twitter, journalist Bari Weiss, claimed in a tweet thread (which references four other writers associated with the publication she founded that will be reporting on the data) that: “The authors have broad and expanding access to Twitter’s files. The only condition we agreed to was that the material would first be published on Twitter.”

Another of these writers, Abigail Shrier, further claimed: “Our team was given extensive, unfiltered access to Twitter’s internal communication and systems.”

Still, both tweets lack specific detail on the kind of data they’re able to access.

Twitter has also — via an employee — denied it is providing the reporters with live access to non-public user data in response to alarm over the level of access being granted. The company’s new trust & safety lead, Ella Irwin, tweeted in the last few hours to claim that screenshots of an internal system view of accounts that were being shared online, seemingly showing details of the internal access provided to the outsiders by Twitter, did not depict live access to its systems.

Rather said she had herself provided these screenshots of this internal tool view to the reporters — “for security purposes”.

Irwin’s tweet also claimed that this screenshot sharing methodology was chosen to “ensure no PII [personally identifiable information] was exposed”.

“We did not give this access to reporters and no, reporters were not accessing user DMs,” she added in response to a Twitter user who had raised security concerns about the reporters’ access to its systems (and potentially to DMs). Irwin only joined Twitter in June as a product lead for trust & safety — but was elevated to head of trust & safety last month (via The Information) to replace the former head, Yoel Roth, who resigned after just two weeks working under Musk over concerns about “dictatorial edict” by Musk taking over from a good faith application of policy.

Setting aside the question of why Twitter’s new head of trust & safety is spending her time screenshotting internal data to share with non-staff whose purpose is to publish reports incorporating such information, her choice of nomenclature here is notable: “PII” is not a term you will find anywhere in the GDPR. It’s a term preferred by US entities keen to whittle the idea of ‘user privacy’ down to its barest minimum (i.e. actual name, email address etc), rather than recognizing that people’s privacy can be compromised in many more ways than via direct exposure of PII.

This is important because the relevant legal terminology in the GDPR is “personal data” — which is far broader than PII, encompassing a variety of data than might not be considered PII (such as IP address, advertiser IDs, location etc). So if Irwin’s primary concern is to avoid exposing “PII” she either does not understand — or is not prioritizing — the security of personal data as the EU’s GDPR understands it.

That should make European Union regulators concerned.

While Ireland’s DPC is currently the lead data supervisor for Twitter, since Musk took over the company at the end of October — and set about slashing headcount and driving scores more staff to leave of their own volition, including a trio of senior security, privacy and compliance executives who resigned simultaneously a month ago— questions have been raised about the status of its claim to be “main established” in Ireland for the GDPR.

As we’ve reported before, unilateral US-based decision making by Musk risks Twitter crashing out of the GDPR’s one-stop-shop (OSS) mechanism, as it requires decision making that affects EU users’ data to involve Twitter’s Irish entity. And if the company loses its claim to main establishment status in Ireland it would immediately crank up its regulatory risk as data supervisors across the EU, not just the DPC, would be able to open their own enquiries if they felt local users’ data was at risk.

With Musk now opening Twitter’s systems up to unexpected outsiders he’s putting on a very public spectacle that invokes big questions about security and privacy risks which — failing robust oversight by the DPC — could make other EU data protection authorities increasingly concerned about the integrity of Twitter’s Irish oversight, too. (And the GDPR does allows for emergency interventions by non-lead DPAs if they see a pressing risk to local users’ data so Twitter could face dialled up scrutiny elsewhere in the EU even while still ostensibly inside in the OSS, such as TikTok recently has in Italy.)

Since Musk took over the company, Twitter has shuttered its communications function — so it was not possible to put questions to a press office about the level of data access that is being provided by Twitter to outsider reporters or the legal basis it’s relying upon for sharing this information. But we’re happy to include a statement from Twitter if it wants to send one.

Ireland’s privacy watchdog engaging with Twitter over data access to reporters by Natasha Lomas originally published on TechCrunch

Keeping fit doesn’t need a lot of technology. A decent pair of running shoes and an exercise mat might just do it. But of course sometimes a little extra tech can give an inspiring boost — so long as whatever it is is useful, accessible and can move with you.

The smart spot for fitness tech is stuff that enhances and/or motivates training and performance. Think well designed kit, easy to access expertise, and trackers that give meaningful, actionable feedback, rather than expensive gym-style machinery that locks you into a subscription and chains you to the same static hardware every day.

So this holiday season if you’re buying a gift for a fitness lover or that special athlete in your life check out our round-up of smarter gift ideas — picked for their on-the-go potential to up their game or boost training anywhere.

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

Beats Fit Pro exercise-friendly earbuds

Exercising is often either a solo slog or a distracting cacophony at the gym so a good pair of headphones is a must. Just pop on a podcast or your favorite motivational music and off you go. But which buds to pick for a fitness fanatic? Apple-owned Beats’ Fit Pro earbuds are — as the name suggests — designed with physical activity in mind. So there’s at least a half-decent chance they won’t ping out mid run or slip out in a rain of fresh sweat.

As with Apple’s own brand AirPods, the Beats buds feature active noise cancelling but also a transparency mode so the wearer can stay aware of their surroundings — an essential consideration for road runners. For something a little less standard, the line had an update this summer when Beats announced a collaboration with Kim Kardashian, on a trio of nude/flesh toned Beats Fit Pro ‘phones — for an understated fashion statement.

Price: $200 from Amazon

Apple Fitness+ subscription

If you’re buying for an iPhone user, a subscription to Apple’s Fitness+ service could be a quick win — putting all sorts of video and audio workouts on tap on their device, from low intensity yoga to high octane HIIT. Back in October, Apple opened up access to Fitness+ by no longer requiring subscribers also own an Apple Watch so it’s more accessible than ever.

One gifting niggle: You can’t buy a dedicated Fitness+ gift sub from Apple — you’d have to purchase a general Apple Gift Card,instead.

Price: For an idea of how much to load on the Gift Card, the cost of Fitness+ is $9.99 per month — or you could splash out $79.99 for a year’s access.

ClassPass Gift Card

A solid gift idea for a gym bunny who’s always on the road or just easily bored: ClassPass’s monthly fitness membership could be just the ticket as it gives the holder access to a million boutique workaround studios around the world — letting them change up their routine to suit their mood, location, energy level and so on. Activities on offer run the gamut from yoga and pilates to dance, barre, boxing, bootcamp and many more.

ClassPass membership requires a subscription but your recipient doesn’t have to be a member already as there’s a gift purchase option. This lets you choose an amount to give — which can then be redeemed against a membership of their choosing.

Price: Varies by length of membership, but suggested gift amounts start at $50.

Fitbit Versa 4 smart watch

Google-owned Fitbit has been honing a range of fitness smart watches for several years in a bid to challenge the Apple Watch’s dominance of the wearable category, building out from humble beginnings flogging step-tracking wristbands. Marketing for its Versa 4 smart watch touts “better results” from workout routines, thanks to features like a “daily readiness” score to help the wearer pick between a challenging workout or opting for a recovery day. It can also suggest workouts; provide a recommended daily active minutes goal; and serve up a wellness report (drawing on health tracking trends over the past 30 days) — as well as offering partner workouts on-demand — although you’ll need a premium subscription to access these extra bells & whistles (but six months comes bundled free with the smart watch so your recipient will get a good taster). Minus premium, the Fitbit Versa offers the usual core workout tracking plus real-time stats access that smart watches have become best known for.

Price: $230 for the smart watch from Amazon; $9.99 per month for premium (once free trial expires)

Whoop 4.0 membership

Move over smart watches! Whoop’s faceless fitness band is geared towards athletes who are serious about tracking their performance and recovery in order to dial up their training and competitive potential. The company claims its sensor-packed tracker yields the “most in-depth fitness and health feedback” available on a wearable — touting “best in class” accuracy measurements that keep tabs on key vital signs like blood oxygen, skin temperature and heart rate metrics — with all this data put to work providing an individual “strain” score which is intended to smartly steer the wearer’s training. Other features include a haptic alarm that can be set to wake the wearer at an optimal time based on sleep needs and cycles (good luck not being late to the office with that though.)

Whoop’s wearable is sold as a fitness subscription with the latest version of the hardware bundled into the membership price. But gift subscriptions are available, with either a one year or two year membership priced at $300 and $480 respectively.

The company also sells a range of undergarments that are compatible with its tracking hardware, as they’re able to house the sensing pod next to your skin — which could make a nice alternative gift for an already paid-up Whoop member.

Price:Depends on length of membership

Nike ZoomX Vaporfly Next% 2 racing shoes

Touted by sportsware giant Nike as one of the fastest shoe it’s ever made, the Nike ZoomX Vaporfly Next% 2 is ‘smart’ in the sense of being highly engineered for a feeling of speed. Packing a full length carbon fiber underfoot plate, the design creates a feeling of propulsion that’s designed to motivate runners to dig deep and up their pace. Layered below that is Nike’s cushiony ZoomX foam for added energetic bounce. Up top, the sneaker fabric incorporates a lightweight mesh for breathability.

The shoe is available in men’s and women’s models and a range of eye-popping colors. Gift heaven for runners.

Price: $250

Agogie Resistance Pants

For the exercise lover who’s not big on apps (or ‘smart’ gadgets), these resistance pants offer a neat low-tech fitness gift option. There’s no tracking or quantification built in — just a little extra physical challenge since the pants come with eight elastic resistance bands sewn into seams running along the legs. The idea is that this will make your usual workout a littletougher by default as the added resistance activates muscles and works them a bit harder, helping boost strength and tone. The pants come in two grades of resistance, as well as in men’s and women’s sizes, with a variety of color options.

Price: $129 from Amazon

Straffr smart resistance band

Give the gift of gym-class style inspiration on the go! German startup Straffr’s smart resistance band bestows its holder with the power perform strength training workouts wherever they are and gives them real-time feedback.

The stretchy band contains sensors running along its length so it can quantify workout performance as you move. The band connects via Bluetooth to a mobile device running Straffr’s companion app — which dispenses feedback verbally as you flex, as well as logging stats, tracking progress and offering a bunch of on-demand strength and HIIT training workouts to help you structure a strength training session.

The smart band is available in two strength grades: Medium (5-15 kg) or Strong (15-25kg).

Price: €99.99 (~$103) or €119.99 ($124) respectively.

Lumen track-it-and-hack-it metabolic fitness

Lumen, a portable breath-testing CO2 sensor, came to market a few years ago. It’s the brainchild of a pair of endurance athletes who went looking for ways to better understand the impact of nutrition and workouts on their bodies to boost their performance. They came across an existing metabolic measurement, called RQ (Respiratory Quotient) — aka, the gold standard for measuring the metabolic fuel usage of an individual — which had been used by top-performing athletes for years but was expensive and difficult for a general consumer to access. Hence they set out to democratize access to elite metabolic tracking.

The upshot is a hand-held breath tester that they claim is able to measure an individual’s RQ in one breath and tell them whether their body is burning carbs or fats to get energy. The companion app guides the user to act on this metabolic tracking — nudging them to improve their metabolic flexibility through diet and exercise suggestions. How is all this good for fitness? Basically, better metabolic health means more energy available to knock it out of the park when you’re working out. So it’s about fuelling right to optimize athletic potential. Though it’s worth emphasizing that Lumen’s approach remains experimental, given the use of novel, proprietary technology.

The product is sold as a subscription service with the breath-testing hardware bundled as part of the initial sign-up price. Packages start at $249 for the Lumen and six months of service (after which the monthly price is $25). To gift the $249-six-month package Lumen offers a Gift Card service which emails a notification to your recipient and ships the product once they redeem it.

Price:Subscription plan starts at $250

Ultrahuman’s activity sensitive smart ring

A rising trend in fitness-related health data is more general consumer use of continuous glucose monitoring tech — which was originally designed for diabetes management. CGMs contain sensing filaments which the user ‘wears’ in the skin of their arm to track their blood sugar swings — a form of semi-invasive tracking that’s being explored as a way to quantify diet and lifestyle and, the claim is, optimize how you exercise. Indian startup Ultrahuman is one of several fitness-focused firms commercializing CGM tech in recent years — in its case selling a subscription service (its Cyborg/M1 tracker) geared towards improving metabolic health and “supercharging” exercise performance.

A recent addition to its product mix is a smart ring, the eponymous Ultrahuman Ring, which is designed to work with the aforementioned M1 CGM subscription service — linking real-time blood glucose insights with other health data that’s picked up by the sensor-packed ring (the latter tracks the wearer’s sleep quality, stress levels and activity density).

The goal is to get a deeper understanding of the wearer’s metabolic events (since many factors can affect a person’s glucose levels) and serve up better nudges to help them optimize activity and lifestyle. But if buying a CGM as a present seems a bit daunting, the Ultrahuman Ring also works as a standalone (and subscription-free) health and fitness wearable, linked to its companion app. In this scenario the sensing hardware puts the focus on tracking sleep, stress, movement and recovery (with the potential to upgrade the level of tracking by adding an M1 sensor later).

As well as detailed sleep tracking metrics, the Ultrahuman Ring generates a “Movement Index” (aka a measure of physical activity vs inactivity throughout the day to track that balance) and a “Body Index”, based on tracking sleep, activity and stress, to give the wearer a steer on how primed they are for activity. So even without any semi-invasive sensor action, Ultrahuman claims the ring will guide its wearer to optimize their activity by finding the lowest effort required to get results.

The ring’s hardware has been designed with workouts in mind so it’s sweat and water resistant (up to 7ft). Plus it has enough built in memory that its owner can workout without needing to also have their phone on them.

Price: $299

Gift Guide: On-the-go fitness tech to boost their training anywhere by Natasha Lomas originally published on TechCrunch

On Thursday, Disney+ launched its first-ever ad-supported plan, “Disney+ Basic,” in the U.S. at $7.99 per month, which is the same price as the previous ad-free plan before Disney raised the price to $10.99/month. However, Roku users wanting to switch to the new plan are out of luck — at least for now.

According toDisney Plus’s support website, the ad-supported tier is “not currently available on Roku devices.” It’s also not available on the Microsoft Windows desktop app, the site informs. So, at the moment, U.S. subscribers with Disney+ Basic or Disney Bundles like Disney Bundle Duo Basic (Disney+ Basic and Hulu’s ad plan) or Trio Basic (Disney+ Basic, Hulu’s ad plan and ESPN+) are unable to stream on Roku or Windows.

Disney told TechCrunch that it is still in talks with Roku about reaching an agreement that suits both parties. It’s our guess that the dispute is over an ad-share agreement as, by default, channels must enter an ad revenue split with Roku. Disney, however, declined to provide specifics. Roku also declined to comment on the negotiations.

Roku has cemented itself as the top smart TV platform in the United States. So, it’s a major disadvantage for Disney+ not to have its new ad-supported tier available on Roku devices at launch.

Netflix ran into a similar problem when it launched its ad-supported plan a month ago.

At the time, Netflix told TechCrunch that, at launch, support for its “Basic with Ads” plan wasn’t available on tvOS devices but would be coming soon. According to Netflix’s support website, it’s still unavailable on Apple TV as well as PlayStation 3 consoles.

Disney+ ad-supported plan is currently unavailable on Roku devices by Lauren Forristal originally published on TechCrunch

The team at DocSend discovered that more and more successful slide decks have something in common: a very good summary slide. In this article, we will look at a bunch of great examples culled from my TechCrunch Pitch Deck Teardown series and detail what needs to go on the slide.

Why you need a summary slide

As a startup founder, your company should be designed to fail as fast as possible. In other words, if what you are building is impossible, find out as quickly as you can so you can get your life back, drink a cocktail or two and attempt to start another business. A summary slide exists, essentially, to help your fundraising journey fail quickly, resulting in your investor deciding not to invest.

I’m calling it “failure” here, but what we are really doing is preventing you or your would-be investor from wasting time: There’s absolutely no point in landing a meeting and talking their heads off for 45 minutes if it turns out that they would never invest because your company is at the wrong stage.

Your summary slide should include enough of the right information that can help an investor tick the box that says, “Yes, this startup fits with our investment thesis.” Specifically, it helps cement your company in time and place by helping investors figure out how much you are raising, what stage your business is in and well, what the hell your company actually does.

How do you set the stage?

Your summary slide is probably going to be your first or second slide. Many prefer to let the cover slide be pretty minimalist, but it still needs to do a little bit of the lifting. Personally, I like to think of the first two slides of a pitch deck as setting the stage, and by extension, the first two slides, together, create the context for what’s about to happen.

Hook your investors with the perfect summary slide by Haje Jan Kamps originally published on TechCrunch

Despite a turbulent web3 market, dedicated people and companies continue working to build meaningful products and a better global financial system. Mark your calendar and join crypto experts, engineers, top-tier ecosystems, institutions and VCs for The Cross Chain Coalition Web3 Demo Day on January 11, 2023.

Start the New Year off right by joining this livestream showcase of 12 hot new startups building the future of web3 infrastructure, DeFi, NFT and gaming applications.

Don’t miss this free online event — register today!

The CCC Web3 Demo Day is packed with presentations and pitches. Check out one of the featured speakers:

Taariq Lewis is the founder of VolumeFi, an agency that specializes in the development and growth of blockchain protocols, which most recently supported the Paloma protocol. Lewis also co-founded the Cosmos-focused UniFi DAO, the Promise credit and repayment tracking protocol and Aquila, a B2B credit infrastructure platform.

Some of the other kings and queens of crypto you’ll hear from include:

Bryan Colligan, founder, AlphaGrowth
Unique Divine, co-founder, NibiruChain
Kavita Gupta, founder & GP, Delta Blockchain Fund
Elizabeth Yin, co-founder & General Partner, Hustle Fund

The Cross Chain Coalition Web3 Demo Day, which takes place on January 11, 2023, is a joint production between the CCC and TechCrunch. Register now for this free event to reserve your seat at the virtual table.

Announcing The Cross Chain Coalition Web3 Demo Day, a free online event by Lauren Simonds originally published on TechCrunch

Roblox is adding two new ways for people who spend time in its virtual worlds to find old friends and make new ones.

The company announced Friday that it would introduce a contact importer and friend recommendations, two new features designed to connect existing users to each other and to bring new players into its experiences.

The features have long been the the norm elsewhere, but most things about Roblox work quite a bit differently from other social networks and more traditional online games. For one, Roblox serves a much younger demographic, including tens of millions of kids under the age of 13 who use the app on a daily basis. Young users age 13 to 18 comprise another massive chunk of the company’s user base and Roblox is making efforts to retain that age group and build around their needs as they age up.

The two new features work like you’d expect. New and existing phone-verified Roblox users over the age of 13 who play on mobile will be prompted to scan for contacts on their devices and add any friends that show up. Any nicknames saved in a phone will automatically stay tagged to that user across the platform. For privacy’s sake, anyone eligible for the contact importer can disable the ability to be discovered through their phone number. Existing users can also invite friends through the contact interface, making it easier for dedicated Roblox players to loop in their friends and bring more users to the platform.

Roblox’s new friend recommendations feature is also straightforward, providing a list of people “you may know and want to connect with.” The company is giving the new social tool some prominent real estate, featuring it on the home page for eligible users age 13 and older. For safety reasons, Roblox says that the feature will only make “high quality” connections, so it won’t be trying to connect people who don’t already have a high probability of knowing each other. Two users might share a number of mutual friends or have interacted recently in one of Roblox’s many game-like portals.

Roblox Senior Product Director Garima Sinha told TechCrunch that the pair of new social utilities will create fresh “entry points” that help new users plug in to their real-life social circles right away. “People care more and more about finding friendships,” Sinha said.

Ultimately while deeper social graph-building features are standard on other platforms, Roblox’s unusually young user base means the company moves deliberately when considering new features that connect users or give them new ways to interact.

“There’s very little we do just to get market fast or because others have it,” Sinha said.

Roblox will let 13+ users import contacts and add recommended friends by Taylor Hatmaker originally published on TechCrunch