YC-Backed Taskpipes Is SaaS To Simplify Using Lots Of (Other) SaaS Platforms

If there was a neat label for startups whoseraison d’être is to take the strain out of dealing with other startup services thenTaskpipes would be wearing that badge proudly on its lapel.The YC-backed, U.K. founded b2b startup is attacking what it says is a growing data-management problem for businesses — created by the proliferation and adoption of SaaS platforms. So, in other words, those shiny, cloud-based platforms which promise to streamline...

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YC -Backed Akido Labs Provides A Standardized API Layer For Hospital App Developers

Many hospitals in America have made the switch to electronic health records (EHR) systems to manage patient medical information in the last couple of decades. This is supposed to make record-keeping easier and more efficient, but the systems are different for each hospital and often can’t communicate with each other. This makes it hard for health app developers to design apps that run on each unique system.Currently, if an app uses patient health...

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How To Play VC Poker With Billions In The Pot

d ve a direct effect on late-stage investors, who are most aware of these final prices and are concerned with exiting their investments in a timely manner. But it also matters to earlier-stage investors.While VCs always care about those final exit prices, they care far more about getting their portfolio companies to their next round of financing. VCs at each stage of the pipeline are deeply cognizant of the valuations that will be offered in the...

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Swifty Teaches Apple’s New Programming Language On Your iPhone

Last summer, Apple surprised almost everyone at WWDC with the announcement of Swift, a new programming language for iOS and Mac development.The language feels like something Apple would invent. Like several of the languages currently popular in web development, it has a concise, readable syntax that’s easier to pick up than Apple’s older language, Objective-C. It was engineered by Apple’s compiler experts, so in addition to being compatible with...

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Facebook Plans To Turn Messenger Into A Platform

Next week at its F8 developer conference, Facebook will announce new ways for third parties to offer experiences through its Messenger app, according to multiple sources. Facebook hopes to make Messenger more useful, after seeing Asia’s chat apps WeChat and Line succeed as platforms that go beyond just texting with friends.At first, Facebook will focus on how third parties can build ways for content and information to flow through Messenger. Depending...

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Medium Now Lets You Write Posts From Its iOS App

Popular blogging platform and publisherMedium has announced that the latest update to its iOS app will finally let users compose posts from their iPhone or iPad.It’s a feature that many fans of the platisher (publorm?) have been begging the company for from day one. It’s landing in the wake of another recent update, which let you start writing an outline or short post in an editor located at the top of the page. Both changes encourage more writing...

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This Box Bruteforces Your iPhone PIN Without Triggering The 10-Guess Limit

A simple PIN might keep your iPhone safe from the prying hands of a curious toddler or a drunk friend. But slap that thing in a robot that exists for no reason but to try every possible PIN one-by-one, and it’ll crack it right open.These machines have existed for a while, but this one is particularly crazy: if you’ve got your iPhone set to clear all of its data after 10 failed guesses, it’ll try to exploit its way past that.Note the “try” in that...

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Apple Researching Taptic Feedback For Keyboards With No Physical Keys

Apple has a new patent application that modifies one of their existing inventions based on one of their newly announced techs: Taptics. The application, published by the USPTO today (via Patently Apple) features a virtual keyboard design that resembles the current Magic Trackpad accessory in its construction, with a smooth piece of aluminum used instead of physical buttons. Virtual buttons without touch-based input are used instead, and Apple employs...

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Apple Researching Taptic Feedback For Keyboards With No Physical Keys

Apple has a new patent application that modifies one of their existing inventions based on one of their newly announced techs: Taptics. The application, published by the USPTO today (via Patently Apple) features a virtual keyboard design that resembles the current Magic Trackpad accessory in its construction, with a smooth piece of aluminum used instead of physical buttons. Virtual buttons without touch-based input are used instead, and Apple...

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Quid Raises $39M More To Visualize Complex Ideas

Quid just announced that it has raised $39 million Series D.Quid describes itself as “the artificial intelligence company that accelerates research and insights to address the world’s most complex issues.” More specifically it points to its ability to process millions of documents and create a visual map of the results — for example helping a business visualize the online response to a product launch.The company, by the way, was once the owner of...

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Tesla Says It Will Now Be “Impossible To Run Out Of Range Unintentionally” In A Model S

A few days ago, Elon Musk pledged to “end range anxiety” for Model S owners by way of an over-the-air software update.Today, he’s detailed how he plans to do that.The short version: the Model S will now run constant calculations (regardless of whether or not you’re using the built in turn-by-turn system) on how far you are from a supercharger.If you are about to drive too far from a supercharger to make it back to one, the car will warn you. “This...

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In Emerging Markets, Internet Blamed For Having Negative Impact On Morality

A new study out this morning from Pew Research takes a deep dive into the impact that internet access is having on emerging markets, especially in terms of how it’s shaping public opinion.Today, tech companies like Facebook and Google have made significant investments in bringing internet access to developing countries, the former withinitiatives like Internet.org designed to offer free mobile internet access in select geographies, and the latter...

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Shuddle Raises $9.6M For Its Uber-Style Service For Kids And Seniors

As Uber continues to extend is well-funded tentacles into ever-more categories of transportation, a startup focusing on children and elderly people has raised some money of its own to compete. Shuddle, a car service and app founded one of the co-founders of Sidecar and aiming its service on minors and seniors, is today announcing a Series A round of $9.6 million led by RRE Ventures.Existing investors Comcast Vento res, Forerunner Ventures, Accel...

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U.K. Gov’t Aims Cash At Driverless Cars, Internet Of Things And Digital Currencies

Giving his final budget before the U.K. general election this May, and inevitable sales pitch to the U.K. electorate, Chancellor George Osborne has announced several tranches of cash for nascent technologies — including £100 million for driverless car technology; £40 million for research into the Internet of Things; and £10 million to go towards investigating the “future potential” of digital currency technology. The budget also set out plans for...

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PlayStation’s Vue Live Streaming Cord-Cutter TV Service Launches In The U.S.

PlayStation is officially debuting its live streaming video service in the U.S. today, launching PlayStation Vue in New York, Chicago and Philadelphia with pricing beginning at $50 per month. The on-demand and live-streaming video service includes content partners like Fox News, AMC and Turner Broadcasting and offers channels like CBS, Discovery, Animal Planet, Syfy, Food Network and many more, depending on the package you select. Vue was originally...

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With $1 Million In New Funding, Dattch Lesbian Dating App Rebrands To Her

Dattch, the Pinterest-inspired dating app for queer women, has today re-launched with a new name (Her) as well as $1 million in new funding from investors such as Reddit’s Alexis Ohanian, YC’s Garry Tan and Michael Birch. Founder Robyn Exton said that people too often thought Dattch stood for some combination of ‘dyke’ or ‘butch’ or ‘snatch’, and that ‘Her’ more closely represents the evolution of the product. “We are all Her,” said Exton. For...

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Fradio’s New App Lets Anyone Be A DJ, Broadcast Live Radio To Friends And Fans

A new application called Fradio is officially launching today, offering a service that allows anyone to become a DJ, broadcasting their favorite tracks to their friends or fans, and even talking over the tunes with a push of a button in order to engage their audience. The app, which is backed by Australian music service Guvera, is making its debut at the SXSW music festival in Austin where a number of artists, including Steve Aoki, A-Trak, and...

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Launcher, The Banned iOS Widget That Let You Launch Other Apps, Is Back

With iOS 8, Apple introduced a way for mobile applications to add widgets to its Notification Center that offered snapshots of information, like today’s weather, stock quotes, headlines, and more. But one clever app called Launcher took advantage of the new functionality to turn its widget into a tool that allowed you to tap to launch other apps installed on your phone. Last fall, Apple booted the app from the App Store for unknown reasons. But...

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Head-To-Head Mobile Fantasy App Draft Raises $3.5 Million Led By Upfront Ventures

We all know that fantasy sports is a huge and growing business. But when it comes to fantasy sports on mobile, most apps are just companion experiences used by fantasy sports players to track how their teams are doing. A new fantasy sports app called Drafthopes to change that, and has raised $3.5 million in Series A funding to do so.Draft was founded by Jeremy Levine and Nicolo Giorgi, the guys who had previously built daily fantasy sports site StarStreet...

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Facebook Introduces Free Friend-To-Friend Payments Through Messages

When you chat with friends about settling debts or splitting the bill, Facebook doesn’t want you to have to open another app like PayPal or Venmo to send them money. So today it unveiled a new payments feature for Facebook Messenger that lets you connect your Visa or Mastercard debit card and tap a “$” button to send friends money on iOS,Android, and desktop with zero fees. Facebook Messenger payments will roll out first in the U.S. over the coming...

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Satellite operators find common voice for future communications

Chief executives of the world’s leading satellite operators met recently at the Satellite 2015 Conference in Washington, USA, to announce that henceforth, they will work with a common voice to detect the future of satellite communications. The world’s only CEO-driven satellite organisation also known as ESOA, is expanding to include satellite operators from the ITU’s region 1, namely Europe, the Middle East, Africa and the Commonwealth of Independent...

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