Farmers have got to do something about pests. But nobody really likes the idea of using more chemical pesticides. Thomas Laurent’s company, Micropep, thinks the answer might already be in the plants themselves. Micropep is exploring how naturally occurring compounds, known as micropeptides, might work as an entirely new class of pesticides. If the startup […]
Micropep taps tiny proteins to make pesticides safer Read More »
After hearing that a U.S. Navy submarine ran into an underwater mountain, Joe Wolfel was surprised to find out just how little both government and commercial organizations knew about the ocean floor. It stuck with him throughout his time in the Navy and years later he launched a company to try to fix it. Wolfel
Terradepth wants to map the rest of the ocean floor Read More »
Nathan Rosenberg, the founder of farm automation platform Farmblox, said if there is one thing to know about trying to sell technology to farmers, it’s that you can’t tell them what to do. “[Farmers] are multigenerational,” Rosenberg told TechCrunch. “It is not a profession, it’s more a community, a way of life, and you need
Eric Zhu started building Aviato, an analytical platform for private market data, in a very typical place for an entrepreneur: the bathroom in his Carmel, Indiana, high school. Now the 17-year-old’s startup is emerging from stealth with $2.3 million in venture funding. Aviato tracks funding rounds and headcount, similar to competitors like Crunchbase and PitchBook, but
When Tade Oyerinde first set out to fundraise for his startup, Campus, a fully-accredited online community college, it was incredibly difficult. VCs have backed for-profit education companies in the past, including Coursera and Udacity, but backing a more traditional two-year college is different. Plus, he was looking for funds a few years ago when higher
Why it made sense for an online community college to raise venture capital Read More »
When Jaclyn Rice Nelson and Noah Gale launched AI talent and services company Tribe AI in 2019, they had to convince companies that having an AI strategy mattered. After the release of ChatGPT in 2022 and the AI mania it ushered in, the startup has experienced a “massive boom” in demand, Gale told TechCrunch. Rice
Tribe AI raised venture capital to keep up with demand after six years of bootstrapping Read More »
Renegade Partners co-founders Renata Quintini and Roseanne Wincek have seen it all in their careers — notably over the past four years when they launched their first fund as the COVID pandemic took hold and navigated the economic roller coaster that followed. Now, with a second $128 million fund — and a plan to write
Community colleges aren’t immune from the current reckoning higher education is facing. Student enrollment is declining while institutions keep raising tuition prices which can prevent students from finishing their programs. Clearly, it’s time for the industry to try something new. Tade Oyerinde thinks startups can help. Oyerinde is the founder and CEO at Campus, a
Campus wants to crack the code to get community college to work for everyone Read More »
For some, AI fatigue is real — but clearly venture investors haven’t grown tired of the category. In the first half of 2024 alone, more than $35.5 billion was invested into AI startups globally, recent Crunchbase data found. Five of the six venture rounds of more than $1 billion raised in the first half of 2024
Here’s the full list of 28 US AI startups that have raised $100M or more in 2024 Read More »
Welcome to Startups Weekly — your weekly recap of everything you can’t miss from the world of startups. Sign up here to get it in your inbox every Friday. This week we’re looking at an AI startup that wants to help people get creative with video; Kudos, which raised $3 million to help get rid
Defending Russia’s EU neighbors | TechCrunch Read More »
