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SimilarWeb raises $120M for its AI-based market intelligence platform for sites and apps

Israeli startup SimilarWeb has made a name for itself with an AI-based platform that lets sites and apps track and understand traffic not just on their own sites, but those of its competitors. Now, it’s taking the next step in its growth. The startup has raised $120 million, funding it will use to continue expanding its platform both through acquisitions and investing in its own R&D, with a focus on providing more analytics services to larger enterprises alongside its current base of individuals and companies of all sizes that do business on the web.

But not, it seems, necessarily an IPO at the moment.

“We will pursue whatever we feel is necessary to grow, so that decision will come from delivering value, not chasing an IPO,” Or Offer, SimilarWeb’s founder and CEO, said in an interview.

Co-led by ION Crossover Partners and Viola Growth, the round doubles the total amount that the startup has raised to date to $240 million. Offer said that it was not disclosing its valuation this time around except to say that his company is now “playing in the big pool.” It counts more than half of the Fortune 100 as customers, with Walmart, P&G, Adidas and Google, among them.

For some context, it hit an $800 million valuation in its last equity round, in 2017.

SimilarWeb’s technology competes with other analytics and market intelligence providers ranging from the likes of Nielsen and ComScore through to the Apptopias of the world in that, at its most basic level, it provides a dashboard to users that provides insights into where people are going on desktop and mobile. Where it differs, Offer said, is in how it gets to its information, and what else it’s doing in the process.

For starters, it focuses not just how many people are visiting, but also a look into what is triggering the activity — the “why”, as it were — behind the activity. Using a host of AI tech such as machine learning algorithms and deep learning — like a lot of tech out of Israel, it’s being built by people with deep expertise in this area — Offer says that SimilarWeb is crunching data from a number of different sources to extrapolate its insights.

He declined to give much detail on those sources but told me that he cheered the arrival of privacy gates and cookie lists for helping ferret out, expose and sometimes eradicate some of the more nefarious “analytics” services out there, and said that SimilarWeb has not been affected at all by that swing to more data protection, since it’s not an analytics service, strictly speaking, and doesn’t sniff data on sights in the same way. It’s also exploring widening its data pool, he added:

“We are always thinking about what new signals we could use,” he said. “Maybe they will include CDNs. But it’s like Google with its rankings in search. It’s a never ending story to try to get the highest accuracy in the world.”

The global health pandemic has driven a huge amount of activity on the web this year, with people turning to sites and apps not just for leisure — something to do while staying indoors, to offset all the usual activities that have been cancelled — but for business, whether it be consumers using e-commerce services for shopping, or workers taking everything online and to the cloud to continue operating.

That has also seen a boost of business for all the various companies that help the wheels turn on that machine, SimilarWeb included.

“Consumer behavior is changing dramatically, and all companies need better visibility,” said Offer. “It started with toilet paper and hand sanitizer, then moved to desks and office chairs, but now it’s not just e-commerce but everything. Think about big banks, whose business was 70% offline and is now 70-80% online. Companies are building and undergoing a digital transformation.”

That in turn is driving more people to understand how well their web presence is working, he said, with the basic big question being: “What is my marketshare, and how does that compare to my competition? Everything is about digital visibility, especially in times of change.”

Like many other companies, SimilarWeb did see an initial dip in business, Offer said, and to that end the company has taken on some debt as part of Israel’s Paycheck Protection Program, to help safeguard some jobs that needed to be furloughed. But he added that most of its customers prior to the pandemic kicking off are now back, along with customers from new categories that hadn’t been active much before, like automotive portals.

That change in customer composition is also opening some doors of opportunity for the company. Offer noted that in recent months, a lot of large enterprises — which might have previously used SimilarWeb’s technology indirectly, via a consultancy, for example — have been coming to the company direct.

“We’ve started a new advisory service [where] our own expert works with a big customer that might have more deep and complex questions about the behaviour we are observing. They are questions all big businesses have right now.” The service sounds like a partly-educational effort, teaching companies that are not necessarily digital-first be more proactive, and partly consulting.

New customer segments, and new priorities in the world of business, are two of the things that drove this round, say investors.

“SimilarWeb was always an incredible tool for any digital professional,” said Gili Iohan of ION Crossover Partners, in a statement. “But over the last few months it has become apparent that traffic intelligence — the unparalleled data and digital insight that SimilarWeb offers — is an absolute essential for any company that wants to win in the digital world.”

As for acquisitions, SimilarWeb has historically made these to accelerate its technical march. For example, in 2015 it acquired Quettra to move deeper into mobile analytics and it acquired Swayy to move into content discovery insights (key for e-commerce intelligence). Offer would not go into too much detail about what it has identified as a further target but given that there are quite a lot of companies building tech in this area currently, that there might be a case for some consolidation around bigger platforms to combine some of the features and functionality. Offer said that it was looking at “companies with great data and digital intelligence, with a good product. There are a lot of opportunities right now on the table.”

The company will also be doing some hiring, with the plan to be to add 200 more people globally by January (it has around 600 employees today).

“Since we joined the company three years ago, SimilarWeb has executed a strategic transformation from a general-purpose measurement platform to vertical-based solutions, which has significantly expanded its market opportunity and generated immense customer value,” said Harel Beit-On, Founder and General Partner at Viola Growth, in a statement. “With a stellar management team of accomplished executives, we believe this round positions the company to own the digital intelligence category, and capitalize on the acceleration of the digital era.”

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AMD grabs Xilinx for $35 billion as chip industry consolidation continues

The chip industry consolidation dance continued this morning as AMD has entered into an agreement to buy Xilinx for $35 billion, giving the company access to a broad set of specialized workloads.

AMD sees this deal as combining two companies that complement each other’s strengths without cannibalizing its own markets. CEO Lisa Su believes the acquisition will help make her company the high performance chip leader.

“By combining our world-class engineering teams and deep domain expertise, we will create an industry leader with the vision, talent and scale to define the future of high performance computing,” Su said in a statement.

In an article earlier this year, TechCrunch’s Darrell Etherington described Xilinx new satellite focused chips as offering a couple of industry firsts:

It’s the first 20nm process that’s rated for use in space, offering power and efficiency benefits, and it’s the first to offer specific support for high performance machine learning through neural network-based inference acceleration.

What’s more, the chips are designed to handle radiation and the rigors of launch, using a thick ceramic packaging.

In a call with analysts this morning, Su pointed to these kinds of specialized workloads as one of Xilinx’s strengths. “Xilinx has also built deep strategic partnerships across a diverse set of growing markets in 5G communications, data center, automotive, industrial, aerospace and defense. Xilinx is establishing themselves as a strategic technology partner to a broad set of industry leaders,” she said.

The success of these kinds of mega deals tend to hinge on whether the combined companies can work well together. Su pointed out that the two companies have been partnering for a number of years and already have a relationship, and the two company leaders share a common vision.

“Both AMD and Xilinx share common culture, focused on innovation, execution and collaborating deeply with customers. From a leadership standpoint, Victor and I have a shared vision of where we can take high performance and adaptive computing in the future,” Su said.

In a nod to shareholders of both companies, she said, “This is truly a compelling combination that will create significant value for all stakeholders, including AMD and Xilinx shareholders who will benefit from the future growth and upside potential of the combined company.”

So far stockholders aren’t impressed with AMD stock down over 4% in pre-trading, while Xilinx stock is up over 11% in pre-trading.  Xilinx has a market cap over $28 billion compared with AMD’s $96.5 billion, creating a massive combined company.

This deal comes on the heels of last month’s ARM acquisition by Nvidia for $40 billion. With two deals in less than two months totaling $75 million, the industry is looking at the bigger is better theory. Meanwhile Intel took a hit earlier this month after its earnings report showed weakness in its data center business.

While the deal has been approved by both company’s boards of directors, it still has to pass muster with shareholders and regulators, and is not expected to close until the end of next year.

When that happens Su will be chairman of the combined company, while Xilinx president and CEO, Victor Peng will join AMD as president, where he will be in charge of the Xilinx business and strategic growth initiatives.

It’s worth noting that the Wall Street Journal first reported that a deal between these two companies could be coming together earlier this month.

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Leading Edge Equipment has a technology to improve solar manufacturing and $7.6 million to go to market

Only a few weeks after the successful public offering of Array Technologies proved that there’s a market for technologies aimed at improving efficiencies across the solar manufacturing and installation chain, Leading Edge Equipment has raised capital for its novel silicon wafer manufacturing equipment. 

The $7.6 million financing came from Prime Impact Fund, Clean Energy Ventures and DSM Venturing, and the company said it would use the technology to ramp up its sales and marketing efforts. 

For the last few years researchers have been talking up the potential of so-called kerfless, single-crystal silicon wafers. For industry watchers, the single-crystal versus poly-crystalline wafers may sound familiar, but as with many things with the resurgence of climate technology investment, maybe this time will be different.

Silicon wafer production today is a seven-step process in which large silicon ingots created in heavily energy-intensive furnaces are sawed into wafers by wires. The process wastes large amounts of silicon, requires an incredible amount of energy and produces low-quality wafers that reduce the efficiency of solar panels.

Using ribbons to produce its wafers, Leading Edge’s manufacturing equipment uses the floating silicon method to reduce production to a single step, consuming less energy and producing almost no waste, according to the company.

Leading Edge Equipment was founded by longtime experts in the silicon foundry industry — Alison Greenlee, a quadruple-degreed graduate of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology who worked on floating silicon method that reduces waste in the manufacturing of silicon for solar cells; and Peter Kellerman, the progenitor of floating silicon method technologies.

The two founded Leading Edge Equipment to rejuvenate a project that had been mothballed by Applied Materials after years of research.

The two won $5 million in federal grants and raised an initial $6 million from venture capital firms in 2018 to kick off the technology.

Leading Edge expects that its equipment could become the standard for silicon substrate manufacturing.

Kellerman, now the emeritus chief technology officer, was replaced by Nathan Stoddard, a seasoned silicon manufacturing technology expert who has worked on teams that have brought three different solar wafer technologies from concept to pilot production. Stoddard, a former colleague of Greenlee’s at 1366 — one of the early companies devoted to new silicon production technologies — was won over by Greenlee and Kellerman’s belief in the old Applied Materials technology. 

The company claims that its technology can reduce wafer costs by 50%, increase commercial solar panel power by up to 7% and reduce manufacturing emissions by more than 50%.

To commercialize the project, earlier this year the team brought in Rick Schwerdtfeger, a longtime innovator in solar technology who began working with CIGS crystals back in 1995. In the 2000s Schwerdtfeger spent his time in building out ARC Energy to scale next-generation furnace technologies. 

“After critical technology demonstrations and the development of a new commercial tool, we are now ready to launch this technology into market in 2021,” said Schwerdtfeger in a statement. “Having recently secured a 31,000 square foot facility and doubled the size of our team, we will use this new funding to prepare for our 2021 commercial pilots.”

 

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Esports pioneer Dino Ying talks to TechCrunch about the next phase of VSPN

Following the news that China’s esport giant VSPN (Versus Programming Network) has raised close to $100 million in a Series B funding round led by Tencent Holdings, TechCrunch interviewed founder and CEO Dino Ying via email about his strategy for the company.

Founded in 2016 and headquartered in Shanghai, VSPN was one of the early pioneers in esports tournament organization and content creation out of Asia. It has since expanded into other businesses, including offline venue operation.

VSPN began hosting the first large-scale esport event with offline audiences in August, although tournaments now operate under strict COVID-19 prevention measures.

TechCrunch: VSPN has a large content production ecosystem surrounding its esports activity. Can you expand on the detail behind your stated short-form video strategy? Will this involve TikTok?

Ying: VSPN intends to use our world-class video production capabilities and industry insights to create different forms of content. We will give our existing fans and a wider audience a new and vivid esports experience. Kuaishou, as our investors and a strategic partner, will support in all ways as a media platform to help our content reach more users. Short-form video is an important part of our future strategy and we look forward to working with platforms all over the world in this regard.

TC: What is VSPN’s share of the esports market?

Ying: There is no official estimation of the size of the esports market, but VSPN is by far the largest esports organization in China, with over 1,000+ employees and covering every major esports tournament you’ve ever heard of. By many measures, we are the largest esports organization in the world and will continue to expand.

TC: Why do you think Shanghai has become a center for esports?

Ying: As the biggest and perhaps most international city in China, it has a vibrant and increasingly sophisticated economy. Tech innovation and new industries are actively encouraged to grow here.

The Shanghai government has implemented supportive measures and policies to encourage the growth of esports both domestically and internationally. Thanks to these measures Shanghai has become an international hub for the biggest and best tournaments in the world.

VSPN events have returned, despite COVID-19

VSPN events have returned, despite COVID-19. Image via VSPN

TC: How important is research into esports for VSPN and why?

Ying: It is vital for VSPN. As an esports total solutions provider aiming to build a sustainable global esports ecosystem, data and R&D allows us to give our fans a richer experience. The research center will allow us to continually improve as a company and develop the industry.

TC: You are the co-founder and chairman and CEO by title. What is the role of co-founder Ethan Teng?

Ying: Ethan Teng is co-founder and president of VSPN. Ethan as one of the most important partners of VSPN, with his dedicated esports industry experience, he plays a vital role in leading and managing the company’s strategic goal setting and day to day management.

TC: What is the nature of the strategic relationship with Tencent?

Ying: VSPN is a key partner of Tencent in the esports industry. With Tencent’s support, VSPN has built a leading position in esports tournament content production. Since the emergence of esports in China, our deep-rooted industry expertise has helped further develop the esports ecosystem to grow and mature. Alongside Tencent we will continue to generate new opportunities within the industry.

TC: What made you choose these partners and why? What was the strategic thinking behind these decisions?

Ying: Together with Kuaishou, VSPN aims to establish an esports short-form video ecosystem to diversify existing content, and to build the connections between top quality creators and channels. With an extensive portfolio in the consumer and TMT sectors, both Tiantu Capital and SIG will utilize their industry insights and expertise to aid VSPN’s strategic development. With our investors, we will empower esports to be the new sports for the next generation.

TC: In addition to the core esports tournament and content production business, VSPN has branded esports venues. How important are these other businesses — like the venues — to the core offering of VSPN? What sort of growth do you expect in the next few years?

Ying: Regardless of business lines, VSPN’s core mission is to provide the best esports experiences for our fans. And these experiences include not just online viewing experiences, but also offline ones where fans physically attend. We see our offline business as a natural way to extend our services to our fans; it is an important supplement to our overall offerings. We expect to grow it per our fans’ and partner’s demands.

TC: Mobile esports, especially the KPL and PUBG MOBILE (or Peacekeeper Elite in China), have attracted more and more female audiences. What is the future of esports among women / girls?

Ying: Mobile gaming has really helped extend esports’ reach to female participants and audiences. Rightfully so, we see a future of esports where female participants take a more prominent role than they have done. Not just onstage as athletes, but also off stage as fans and more importantly backstage as top quality producers and decision-makers in the industry. The impact of having more female fans, athletes and professionals is exciting and will be hugely beneficial to the wider industry.

TC: What is the future of esports in augmented reality?

Ying: We think esports in its full form will look and feel a lot different from what we’ve seen so far in sports and entertainment. The possibility of integrating real-world gaming and virtual competitions is fascinating. VSPN is only beginning to test the boundaries of new technologies such as AR, VR. The emergence of these technologies will help us create fresher experiences, and the possibilities are endless.

VSPN headquarters

VSPN headquarters. Image via VSPN

TC: Please tell us more about your personal history.

Ying: Firstly, thank you for having me — it is a real pleasure to speak to TechCrunch and be able to announce our fundraise to the world. I have been working in the gaming and esports industry all my life and I’m excited about the future. With the team at VSPN we are proud to be pioneers in the esports industry.

I live between Beijing and Shanghai, but I spend a lot of my time travelling to other Chinese cities like Xi’an, Chengdu, Guangzhou and Shenzhen where we have esports arenas and business interests. Usually I travel internationally to some of our overseas operations and competitions, so I look forward to that when travel becomes easier.

I am a fan of traditional sports too and an avid football fan. I follow some of the European leagues — whenever I can, I go to matches to enjoy the atmosphere; I went to Stamford Bridge early this year and loved it, but seeing the AC versus Inter Derby live is hard to beat…

TC: Why did you get into this business and how?

Ying: Mostly because I am a HUGE gaming fan! I’ve been playing computer games since I was a teenager and enjoy playing all types. Earlier this year I played COD Warzone as soon as it came out and often play PUBG Mobile; I’m extremely lucky to be in an industry which I’ve loved since I was very young. It’s a great way to connect with friends and I am proud to have worked in game development and publishing for my whole career. Five years ago, esports seemed like the obvious next step because of the competitive element. We saw the beginnings of a trend and founded VSPN with a world-class team to make that potential a reality.

VSPN is very proud to be leading the world in a relatively new industry. We think esports will continue to grow exponentially and will be an incredibly important part of the entertainment industry in years to come. To lead a Chinese company with a global future is really exciting.

TC: What motivates you as a businessman?

Ying: Bringing new forms of entertainment to millions of people around the world and building a global business.

TC: Who inspires you most in the business world?

There are so many fantastic businessmen in China who are doing some really innovative things at the moment. For example, the live-streaming industry has become enormous in 2020 due to the pandemic and has offered entrepreneurs a new way to sell products and engage with new audiences.

If I had to name one it would be Mark Ren (COO at Tencent Holdings) — he is an exceptional businessman. The way he has helped create sustainable ecosystems in the entertainment space and captured trends is something every businessman should aspire to. This is something VSPN works hard at and we are very proud to be such close partners of Tencent.

TC: What is your opinion of Silicon Valley?

Ying: It’s an amazing place and has shown the world how technology can improve lives all over the world. For many years it has led the world as a centre for creativity and innovation and continues to be an inspiration to entrepreneurs around the world. In China, we have lots of Silicon Valleys!

TC: Is there anything else you’d like to say to TechCrunch readers?

Ying: This has been a challenging year for many businesses and the esports industry has had to adapt, but I think the world has seen how big esports is and how it can bring communities and cultures together. As the industry grows there will bigger and bigger online and offline tournaments across the world, especially with 5G and mobile gaming becoming even more popular. We look forward to being at the forefront of esports for competitors all over the world and hopefully some of your readers will enjoy watching our original content and tournaments.

Finally, with celebrities and big brands seeing live streaming and casual gaming as a new way to engage with a wider audience, the future for VSPN is very, very bright.

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Tencent leads $100M Series B funding round into China-based esport provider VSPN

Further confirmation that the esports market is booming amid the pandemic comes today with the news that esports “total solutions provider” VSPN (Versus Programming Network) has raised what it describes as “close to” $100 million in a Series B funding round, led by Tencent Holdings . Other investors that participated in the round include Tiantu Capital, SIG (Susquehanna International Group), and Kuaishou. The funding round will go toward improving esports products and its ecosystem in China and across Asia.

Founded in 2016 and headquartered in Shanghai, VSPN was one of the early pioneers in esports tournament organization and content creation out of Asia. It has since expanded into other businesses, including offline venue operation.

In a statement, Dino Ying, CEO of VSPN (see also our exclusive interview) said: “We are delighted to announce this latest round of funding. Thanks to policies supporting Shanghai as the global center for esports, and with Beijing, Chengdu, and Xi’an expressing confidence in the development of esports, VSPN has grown rapidly in recent years. After this funding round, we look forward to building an esports research institute, an esports culture park, and further expanding globally. VSPN has a long-term vision and is dedicated to the sustainable development of the global esports ecosystem.”

Dino Ying, VSPN CEO

Dino Ying, VSPN CEO. Image via VSPN

Mars Hou, general manager of Tencent Esports, commented: “VSPN’s long-term company vision and leading position in esports production are vital for Tencent to optimize the layout of the esports industry’s development.”

We had a hint that Tencent might invest in VSPN when, in March this year, Mark Ren, COO of Tencent Holdings, made a public statement that Tencent would provide more high-quality esports competitions in conjunction with tournament organizers like VSPN.

As we observed in August, Tencent, already the world’s biggest games publisher, said that it would consolidate Douyu and Huya, the previously competing live-streaming sites focused on video games.

In other words, Tencent’s investment into VSPN shows it is once again doubling-down on the esports market.

This Series B funding round comes four years after VSPN’s 2016 Series A funding round, which was led by Focus Media Network, joined by China Jianteng Sports Industry Fund, Guangdian Capital and Averest Capital.

Now, VSPN has become the principal tournament organizer and broadcaster for PUBG MOBILE international competitions, and China’s top competitions for Honor of Kings, PUBG, Peacekeeper Elite, CrossFire, FIFA, QQ Speed and Clash Royale. This will tally-up 12,000 hours of original content. The company has partnered with more than 70% of China’s esports tournaments.

In March, another huge esports player, ESL, joined forces with Tencent to become a part of the PUBG Mobile esports circuit for 2020.

In addition to its core esports tournament and content production business, VSPN has branded esports venues in Chengdu, Xi’an and Shanghai. In May, VSPN launched its first overseas venue, V. SPACE in Seoul, South Korea.

And even offline events are coming back. VSPN hosted the first large-scale esport event with offline audiences in August this year. And the LOL S10 event will open 6,000 tickets. However, all tournaments will operate under strict COVID-19 prevention measures and approval processes by the Chinese government, and not all esports events are allowing offline audiences.

VSPN said it will continue to focus on building an esports short-form video ecosystem, improving the quality of esports content creation, and reaching more users via different channels. VSPN currently houses more than 1,000 employees in five business divisions.

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Cloud9 adds the MAJKL Valorant roster to create Cloud9 White as its first women’s esports team

Cloud9 has brought on the all-women MAJKL Valorant squad to become its first women’s esports team.

Moving forward, the team of Alexis “alexis” Guarrasi, Annie “Annie” Roberts, Jasmine “Jazzyk1ns” Manankil, Katsumi and Melanie “meL”Capone will compete as Cloud9 White in competition for Riot Games’ Valorant league.

The new team is sponsored by AT&T.

As MAJKL, the team has already won first place in the FTW Summer Showdown tournament — a part of the Valorant Ignition Series. That $25,000 prize put the team as the sixth highest paid team on the competitive circuit.

“What stood out to me about MAJKL is that they had to work hard to perfect their play, find each other, and then compete as a unit,” said Gaylen Malone, senior general manager of Cloud9, in a statement. “They are a talented group of women who came together with the goal of being the best at the game and were committed to doing what it took to get there, and watching their improvement over just the past few months has been incredible.”

Competitive esports should be one place where women and men can compete on equal footing, but the league is still subject to the same problems that beset other competitive events. Few women are members of the elite teams in esports. Competitors like FaZe Clan (which is sponsored by TechCrunch’s parent company’s parent company, Verizon) only has one girl on their Fortnite roster.

“Our goal is to not only provide value to gamers with AT&T’s products and services, but to also contribute to real, meaningful change in the industry by giving this powerhouse team and other talented women what they need to succeed,” said Shiz Suzuki, associate vice president, sponsorships & experiential marketing, AT&T, in a statement. “We can’t wait to tell their stories and see the best of the best represent Cloud9 and AT&T on some of the world’s largest stages.”

Female gamers experience the same kind of harassment and unequal treatment that women in other sports are subjected to.

“A lot of female gamers get driven away, and they don’t want to be seen as gamers,” Madison “Maddiesuun” Mann told the online publication ShondaLand. “I remember in high school, I was pretty insecure about it. I didn’t tell anybody I played video games until I graduated — it’s just that weird insecurity.”

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Daily Crunch: Facebook launches cloud gaming service

Facebook gets into cloud gaming while continuing its public dispute with Apple, Ant Group prepares for a massive IPO and Pinterest embraces iOS widgets. This is your Daily Crunch for October 26, 2020.

The big story: Facebook launches cloud gaming service

Facebook is launching a cloud gaming service of its very own, although the focus is different from Google’s Stadia or Microsoft’s xCloud. Rather than trying to recreate the console experience on other devices, the social network’s gaming service is limited to mobile games, particularly on reducing the friction between seeing an ad for a game and playing the game.

The service is launching on the web and on Android, but it’s not available on iOS. Facebook blamed Apple’s App Store terms and conditions for the absence.

Facebook’s Jason Rubin told TechCrunch that Apple’s rules for cloud gaming service present “a sequence of hurdles that altogether make a bad consumer experience.”

The tech giants

Twitter will show all U.S. users warnings about voting misinfo and delayed election results — Starting today, Twitter users in the U.S. will see two large notices at the top of their feeds that aim to “preemptively debunk” misinformation related to voting.

Ant Group could raise as much as $34.5B in IPO in what would be world’s largest IPO — The long-anticipated IPO of Alibaba-affiliated Chinese fintech giant Ant Group could raise tens of billions of dollars in a dual-listing on both the Shanghai and Hong Kong exchanges.

Pinterest’s new widget brings photos from favorite boards to your iOS 14 home screen — As iPhone owners began customizing their iOS 14 home screens with new widgets and custom icons, Pinterest iOS downloads and searches surged.

Startups, funding and venture capital

Tencent leads $100M Series B funding round into China-based esport provider VSPN — Founded in 2016, VSPN was one of the early pioneers in esports tournament organization and content creation out of Asia.

Linktree raises $10.7M for its lightweight, link-centric user profiles — The Melbourne startup says that 8 million users, including celebrities like Selena Gomez and brands like Red Bull, have created profiles on the platform.

This startup wants to fix the broken structure of internships — Symba created white-label software to help companies communicate and collaborate with their now-distributed interns.

Advice and analysis from Extra Crunch

Good and bad board members (and what to do about them) — The CircleUp saga brings up questions about what happens behind the scenes at startups and about board composition specifically.

What would Databricks be worth in a 2021 IPO? — We’ve described Databricks as “an obvious IPO candidate,” and now it sounds like an offering is indeed in the works.

(Reminder: Extra Crunch is our membership program, which aims to democratize information about startups. You can sign up here.)

Everything else

NASA discovers water on the surface of the sunlit portion of the moon — Previously, we knew that water was present as ice on the dark part of the moon, but this is still a groundbreaking discovery.

Human Capital: Court ruling could mean trouble for Uber and Lyft as gig workers may finally become employees — Megan Rose Dickey has officially launched her newsletter focused on labor, diversity and inclusion in tech.

Original Content podcast: ‘Lovecraft Country’ is gloriously bonkers — Bonkers!

The Daily Crunch is TechCrunch’s roundup of our biggest and most important stories. If you’d like to get this delivered to your inbox every day at around 3pm Pacific, you can subscribe here.

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Dallas’ ShearShare has a marketplace connecting stylists with available seats at salons and $2.3 million in funding

Courtney Caldwell and her husband Tye have been building the Dallas-based startup ShearShare, which provides a marketplace service connecting stylists with open seats at hair salons, since 2017.

Since their launch the two co-founders have been committed to the humble hustle of starting their own business — including flying between San Francisco and Dallas weekly to participate in the 19th 500 Startups cohort or participating in Y Combinator’s Fellowship program.

Now, with a seed round of $2.3 million and another non-dilutive cash grant from Google for Startups Black Founders Fund, the early-stage company is ready to expand.

The two co-founders certainly have a pedigree in the beauty industry. Tye Caldwell has been a luminary in the industry and is a member-elect of the Professional Beauty Association’s advisory board. Together with Courtney he runs an award-winning salon in Dallas.

ShearShare co-founders Tye and Courtney Caldwell

Meanwhile, Courtney Caldwell spent more than 20 years working for Oracle in technology marketing. But the two hadn’t really been exposed to the venture capital industry. So when they came up with the idea to start a service providing online matchmaking between salons and stylists — based on their own need to fill a chair at their salon — they didn’t really no where to turn.

Enter TD Lowe. A longtime investor on her own and with organizations like StartupGrind, Lowe introduced the couple to the world of venture capital and startups, and the two were off to the races.

“We pioneered on-demand barbershop and space rentals,” Courtney said. “If a salon or barbershop has an open station a stylist can book it like they would a hotel room.”

According to the Caldwells, the beauty industry is the second largest industry for freelancers and independent contractors. Unlike other companies that are trying to serve stylists by offering them features like booking and appointments independent of salons — or services for salons alone — ShearShare is trying to serve both sides of the marketplace with the tools they need.

“We’re not a StyleSeat. We’re not a Squire,” said Courtney. What they are is expanding rapidly. The company has listings in more than 600 cities ranging from a chair that rents for $15 in Georgia to one that rents for $569 in the heart of Manhattan in New York City.

The company processes payments for the stylists directly through a partnership with a local payment solution called First American Payments based in Ft. Worth, Texas.

“Everyone is setting their sights on direct-to-consumer,” said Courtney. “This is a way we’re helping to keep people at work and refuel the individual economic recovery.”

The next step for the company is to begin launching more ancillary services for stylists. They’re pioneering an insurance policy for stylists that would cover them from on-the-job lawsuits.

“It’s becoming a huge opportunity for the stylist that just didn’t exist,” said Tye. And it all began when the two Caldwells couldn’t find any options when they searched for any terms related to renting space at a barbershop, they said. “We reached out to a friend and told her about the opportunity that we’d been presented with and she said, ‘Guys… that’s a billion-dollar idea.’ ”

That friend was Lowe — who came in to advise the couple and show them the ropes of startup investing.

It’s at least an idea that’s worth tens of millions. That’s how much the startup Mayvenn has raised for its business providing hair extensions and other cosmetics to stylists.

Now with its new funding, ShearShare is ready to expand, the couple said.

ShearShare’s backers include: Precursor Ventures, Revolution’s Rise of the Rest Seed Fund, Structure Capital, Backstage Capital and 500 Startups, alongside new participants Bread and Butter Ventures, ArlanWasHere Investments (Arlan Hamilton’s fund, in which Mark Cuban is the sole LP), Lightspeed Venture Partners Scouts Program (with Veronica Juarez and Jason McBride leading), Jaylon Smith of the Dallas Cowboys through the Minority Entrepreneurship Institute, Thaddeus Young of the Chicago Bulls with Reform Venture, the Bumble Fund, Notley Ventures, Sachse Family Fund and other global investors.

These investors are part of a new breed of investor that’s pushing venture investment into areas that were previously considered beyond the reach of typical firms.

As the chief executive of a beauty and lifestyle startup, Julie Fredrickson told TechCrunch three years ago, “Most of these brands are commensurately underfunded compared to tech companies in similar positions. There’s a chance for a totally new dominant player and no one’s really gunning for it.”

There’s a huge opportunity for businesses serving all aspects of the beauty industry to flourish, entrepreneurs and investors.

“Venture is obsoleting itself as private equity and family offices increasingly go downstream because they’re willing to seek venture-style returns in verticals that venture capital is not prepared or is less educated about,” according to Frederickson.

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Good and bad board members (and what to do about them)

Ryan Caldbeck, co-founder and former CEO of consumer-brands-focused crowdfunding site CircleUp, recently published an email he’d written to a former director on the board of the company.

According to Caldbeck, he wrote the letter after CircleUp had bought out the investor’s firm because he wanted to provide constructive feedback, given that this individual’s “involvement was incredibly difficult for all of CircleUp and our board,” as he explained to this person, whose identity was shielded.

The saga begged questions about what happens behind the scenes at startups and about board composition specifically. But Caldbeck’s situation may be more anomalous than not, suggest some veterans of the industry who have common sense advice around how to avoid problematic board members and how to deal with them if they can’t be avoided.

First, and most obviously, get to know a potential board member as well as possible because who winds up as a director with your company can be a “life-changing decision” in both good and terrible ways, says Joel Peterson, a professor at Stanford’s business school, a former chairman of JetBlue Airways and the founding partner of Peterson Partners, a Salt Lake City-based firm that invests directly in startups and has stakes in many venture funds.

Peterson’s advice is to “interview investors just as they’re interviewing you,” including not only to get a sense for whether someone is knowledgeable and shares your same values but also to get a sense for how much time they have for your company. In his view, venture capitalists are “often the worst board members while angel investors are often really good because they really care about the entrepreneur and have a more hands-on connection with them while they’re developing the business.”

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Freshworks (re-)launches its CRM service

Freshworks, the customer and employee engagement company that offers a range of products, from call center and customer support software to HR tools and marketing automation services, today announced the launch of its newest product: Freshworks CRM. The new service, which the company built on top of its new Freshworks Neo platform, is meant to give sales and marketing teams all of the tools they need to get a better view of their customers — with a bit of machine learning thrown in for better predictions.

Freshworks CRM is essentially a rebrand of the company’s Freshsales service, combined with the company’s capabilities of its Freshmarketer marketing automation tool.

“Freshworks CRM unites Freshsales and Freshmarketer capabilities into one solution, which leverages an embedded customer data platform for an unprecedented and 360-degree view of the customer throughout their entire journey,” a company spokesperson told me.

The promise here is that this improved CRM solution is able to provide teams with a more complete view of their (potential) customers thanks to the unified view — and aggregated data — that the company’s Neo platform provides.

The company argues that the majority of CRM users quickly become disillusioned with their CRM service of choice — and the reason for that is because the data is poor. That’s where Freshworks thinks it can make a difference.

Freshworks CRM delivers upon the original promise of CRM: a single solution that combines AI-driven data, insights and intelligence and puts the customer front and center of business goals,” said Prakash Ramamurthy, the company’s chief product officer. “We built Freshworks CRM to harness the power of data and create immediate value, challenging legacy CRM solutions that have failed sales teams with clunky interfaces and incomplete data.”

The idea here is to provide teams with all of their marketing and sales data in a single dashboard and provide AI-assisted insights to them to help drive their decision making, which in turn should lead to a better customer experience — and more sales. The service offers predictive lead scoring and qualification, based on a host of signals users can customize to their needs, as well as Slack and Teams integrations, built-in telephony with call recording to reach out to prospects and more. A lot of these features were already available in Freshsales, too.

“The challenge for online education is the ‘completion rate’. To increase this, we need to understand the ‘Why’ aspect for a student to attend a course and design ‘What’ & ‘How’ to meet the personalized needs of our students so they can achieve their individual goals,” said Mamnoon Hadi Khan, the chief analytics officer at Shaw Academy. “With Freshworks CRM, Shaw Academy can track the entire student customer journey to better engage with them through our dedicated Student Success Managers and leverage AI to personalize their learning experience — meeting their objectives.”

Pricing for Freshworks CRM starts at $29 per user/month and goes up to $125 per user/month for the full enterprise plan with more advanced features.

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