This Week in Apps: Twitter Notes, Instagram age verification, Spotify’s Live Events
Welcome back to This Week in Apps, the weekly TechCrunch series that recaps the latest in mobile OS news, mobile applications and the overall app economy. The app industry continues to grow, with a record number of downloads and consumer spending across both the iOS and Google Play stores combined …
Italy’s data watchdog latest to warn over use of Google Analytics
Another strike against use of Google Analytics in Europe: The Italian data protection authority has found a local web publisher’s use of the popular analytics tool to be non-compliant with EU data protection rules owing to user data being transferred to the U.S. — a country that lacks a…
Smiler comes up with a different kind of gig economy for event and venue photographers
Traditional venue photography providers like DEI Global, MagicMemories, Picsolve and Sharingbox are reliant on fixed equipment, permanent staffing costs, and on-site printed products. So Amsterdam, Netherlands-based Smiler came up with a different approach. Freelance photographers can simply use th…
Rimac raises more than $500M from Porsche, Softbank and Goldman Sachs
Rimac Group said Tuesday it has raised 500 million euro ($536 million), funds that will help the Croatian startup expand beyond its electric hypercar roots and grow into a global EV components supplier — and eventually a publicly traded company. Softbank Vision Fund 2 and Goldman Sachs led the Seri…
Getir, the $12B instant delivery startup, plans to axe 14% of staff globally and cut aggressive expansion plans
It continues to be a very rough week for e-commerce companies in Europe. In the latest development, TechCrunch has learned and confirmed that Getir — the $12 billion quick commerce upstart that grocery essentials and sundries and promises delivery of them in minutes — is cutting 14% of …
Nexi, the Italian payments giant, buys Germany’s Orderbird for $140-150M to expand its SMB strategy
More consolidation is apace in the world of payments: Nexi, the Italian fintech that scooped up rivals Danish-based Nets and then Italy’s SIA to create a $12.5 billion European payments giant, has made another acquisition, this time to dig deeper into financial services for small and medium b…
TikTok says ‘Project Texas’ will bolster security for U.S. users in wake of China data access concerns
Over the weekend, TikTok wrote to Republican Senators to assure them that it’s working on a program called “Project Texas” to bolster data security for U.S.-based users. This was in response to the Senators’ letter to the company dated June 27 that questioned its data access…