Author: TechCrunch News

Boeing and NASA said Thursday that the first crewed flight test of the Starliner capsule would be further delayed due to a new crop of technical issues with the spacecraft. The first crewed mission was scheduled to fly two NASA astronauts on July 21 after being pushed back from an earlier April launch date. Officials…

Uber, Lyft, DoorDash and other app-based ride-hail and delivery companies will have to reimburse California gig workers potentially millions of dollars for unpaid vehicle expenses between 2022 and 2023. The back payments come from a provision in Proposition 22, the controversial law that classifies gig workers as independent contractors rather than employees and promises them…

Toyota will spend an additional $2.1 billion to build a new battery plant in North Carolina, the latest sign that the automaker is attempting to catch up with an industry that has embraced the move to electric vehicles. The Japanese automaker also announced Wednesday it will build its first U.S.-made electric SUV at its Kentucky…

Amazon will pay the FTC a $25 million penalty as well as “overhaul its deletion practices and implement stringent privacy safeguards” to avoid charges of violating the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act to spruce up its AI. Amazon’s voice interface Alexa has been in use in homes across the globe for years, and any parent…

Capillary Technologies, an Indian SaaS startup that offers solutions for loyalty management and customer engagement, has raised $45 million in a funding round, as it plans to expand into global markets and widen its reach through mergers and acquisitions. The funding arrives at a crucial time amidst the prevailing market slowdown, where startups, particularly those…

Photonic computing startup Lightmatter is taking its big shot at the rapidly growing AI computation market with a hardware-software combo it claims will help the industry level up — and save a lot of electricity to boot. Lightmatter’s chips basically use optical flow to solve computational processes like matrix vector products. This math is at…

Few lawyers would be foolish enough to let an AI make their arguments, but one already did, and Judge Brantley Starr is taking steps to ensure that debacle isn’t repeated in his courtroom. The Texas federal judge has added a requirement that any attorney appearing in his court must attest that “no portion of the…

Now that Twitter’s API access is locked behind a tall paywall, long beloved third-party apps are shutting down. The latest to bite the dust is Block Party, an anti-harassment tool that helped people stay safe from targeted harassment on Twitter. “We’re heartbroken that we won’t be able to help protect you from harassers and spammers…

Taxfix leaped to a $1 billion valuation in 2022 on the back of a popular mobile app used by consumers help with tax returns. But fast forward to 2023, and the Berlin-based accounting startup is taking an audit of its own affairs. TechCrunch has learned and confirmed that Taxfix has laid off 20% of its…