FIFA will use 10 to 12 cameras, collecting up to 29 data points per player 50 times per second, to make semi-autonomous offside decisions at the Arab Cup — The use of technology to help officials make more accurate offside decisions will be tested at the Fifa Arab Cup, which starts on Tuesday.
Developer productivity service Raycast, which helps manage SaaS tools, raises a $15M Series A led by Accel and Coatue — Developer-focused productivity tool Raycast has raised $15 million in Series A funding, led by Accel and Coatue. Also participating in the round were angel investors Johnny Boufarhat …
London-based Plum, a money management app, raises a $24M Series A from dmg ventures and others, bringing its total funding to $43M — Plum, Europe's ultimate money management app, has successfully raised a total of $24 million from a Series A funding round that will help propel …
Adobe: online US consumers spent $7.1B on Cyber Monday, below expectations and down from $10.8B in 2020, as many shoppers return to physical stores — Online retailers offered fewer discounts because of limited inventory, while more shoppers returned to stores
Chinese agencies release rules aimed at regulating the ride-hailing industry to protect drivers and riders, including setting up local supervisory offices — - Several agencies issue most comprehensive guidelines to date — Didi's investors are grappling with uncertainty over its fate
Wise reports H1 2021 revenue rose 33% YoY to £256.3M as pre-tax profits dropped to £18.8M from £20M in H1 2020; headcount grew 32% YoY to 2,883 — Currency exchange fintech listed in London in July with a valuation close to £9bn — Profits at currency exchange …
Singapore-based YouTrip, which helps make multi-currency transactions more efficient, raises a $30M Series A led by anonymous prominent Asian family offices — Singapore-based YouTrip, an online bank that focuses on making multi-currency transactions less costly and more efficient …
UK's CMA says Meta must sell Giphy, after finding the deal could harm social media users, rival platforms by denying access to GIFs, and UK advertisers — After its investigation found it could harm competition — The UK's competition regulator has officially ruled that Facebook parent …
Q&A with Forte founder and CEO Josh Williams on Forte's $725M Series B, adding “real purpose” to speculation-fueled tokens via games, potential regulation, more — Forte raised $725 million on the expectation that it will provide the building blocks for triple-A game companies to make NFT games.
Sources: Clearlake Capital will buy Quest Software, which makes tools for IT departments, from Francisco Partners for $5.4B including debt — Deal values former Dell unit at $5.4 billion, including debt, sources say — Clearlake Capital Group LP has struck a deal to buy Quest Software Inc …
Thought Machine, which helps banks launch cloud-based services, raises a $200M Series C led by Nyca Partners at a $1B+ valuation — Thought Machine, a 2014 (Xoogler) founded startup that sells cloud-based b2b banking services, has closed a $200 million Series C round and announced …
Booking.com plans to acquire its Sweden-based flight-booking partner Etraveli Group from CVC Capital Partners for ~$1.83B — Skift Take — Booking Holdings is on a pre-Christmas buying spree after announcing two pending acquisitions, ETraveli Group and Getaroom, within two weeks.
Sources: UK's CMA is expected to block Meta's proposed acquisition of Giphy — Move would be the first time the competition watchdog has reversed a Big Tech acquisition — The UK competition regulator is expected to block Meta's acquisition of online gif platform Giphy in the coming days …
A look at the challenges spies face with biometrics, smartphones, and surveillance cameras, and how AI sifting through data changes espionage — U.S., rivals seek ways to adapt spycraft to a changing world; being on the grid can blow your cover, but so can staying off
UK-based Motorway, a second-hand car auction site used by 4K+ car dealers, raises a $190M Series C at a $1B+ valuation after raising a $67.7M Series B in June — It was only in June that Motorway - a U.K. platform on which professional car dealers can bid in an auction for privately owned cars for sale …
Sky Mavis says its crypto-based game Axie Infinity quadrupled DAUs in under 3 months to 2M in October, as some analysts question Axie's economic sustainability — Video game analysts are questioning the economic sustainability of pay-to-play ‘Axie’ — Eight months ago …
Slice, whose credit cards are used by 5M+ people in India and let users pay their bills interest-free over three months, raises a $220M Series B — Rajan Bajaj, founder of fintech Slice, chimed in on a Twitter thread earlier this year and wondered aloud what he needs to do to turn his startup into a unicorn before he turns 30.
Vestager asks the EU Parliament and Council to approve the Digital Markets Act and the Digital Services Act as a matter of urgency, even if they are imperfect — EU competition chief argues in favour of getting “80 per cent now than 100 per cent never” — Margrethe Vestager …
How “neo-conglomerates” like Apple, Amazon, Alphabet, Microsoft, and Meta replaced and outgrew industrial conglomerates like GE, Toshiba, and Johnson & Johnson — As General Electric and other old-school behemoths break up, Amazon, Apple, Alphabet, Microsoft and Meta are taking …
Gurman: Apple is still working on a multi-device charger, other short and long-distance wireless chargers, and reverse wireless charging for its devices — Despite its failed AirPower experiment a few years ago, Apple is reportedly still working on a multi-device charger for its products.
Report: Raspberry Pi Trading hired investment banks Stifel and Liberum to advice on a London IPO planned for this spring, that would value Raspberry at ~$500M — The listing could see Raspberry Pi valued at $500m — According to a report in The Telegraph, Raspberry Pi Trading …
Recent cyberattacks on Iran's fuel distribution system and an Israeli LGBTQ dating site show that Iran-Israel cyberwar is impacting civilians on a large scale — Iranians couldn't buy gas. Israelis found their intimate dating details posted online. The Iran-Israel shadow war is now hitting ordinary citizens.
A look at efforts to develop brain-computer interfaces, including Musk's Neuralink and a DARPA program to build a 64,000-electrode array for brain implants — The idea of a synthetic experience uploaded to the mind has been a sci-fi fantasy forever. New brain-computer interfaces are making it nonfiction—very slowly.
Adobe: US consumers spent $8.9B online on Black Friday, down from the record $9B in 2020, the first ever YoY decline — - Traffic at retail stores on Black Friday dropped 28.3% compared with 2019 levels, according to preliminary data from Sensormatic Solutions.
Nextcloud and ~30 other EU companies file an antitrust complaint with the European Commission against Microsoft for bundling OneDrive and Teams with Windows — Nextcloud and almost 30 other European companies have filed a complaint about Microsoft's anti-competitive behavior with its OneDrive cloud storage offering.
Spotify confirms it is retiring the Car View mode in its mobile apps, offering no replacement, but says it is working to improve how users listen while driving — Everyone likes listening to music in their car, so it's little surprise that Spotify had a Car View mode, allowing users to jam …
Bloomberg : Google says it plans to counter Japan's FTC over claims that it hobbles rivals in search; a source says Japan's FTC s...
