I had originally planned to run a pitch-off in Muscat today from 3pm to 6pm but it looks like that is cancelled. I only received 12 requests to pitch and of that group only two companies confirmed they would attend (thanks Nabnee and SnapType). That’s very disappointing and it’s clear that there’s a lot of work to be done here in the Omani ecosystem. Sadly I’m… Read More

 Pronoun, a self-publishing service for authors, is shutting down after promising free ebook distribution for authors. The company, which raised millions in funding and ended up being sold to Macmillan announced the shutdown in an email to authors and on its website. Two years ago Pronoun set out to create a one-of-a-kind publishing tool that truly put authors first. We believed that the power… Read More

 European startup Natural Cycles is pushing to establish its EU-certified “digital contraceptive app” as a globally accepted contraception option — and compete with tried and tested options used by millions of couples worldwide. Read More

 This week on Technotopia I talk to Chris Boos, the creator of a bot that can play FreeCiv, a Civilization clone. His solution demonstrates the power of machine learning and, wildly, has beaten multiple humans at the game. Boos’ company, Arago, specializes in building tools that build themselves. Humans can show his bots how to do something – manage a piece of software, for… Read More

 If something scary or infuriating happens with your Uber, sending an email to support doesn’t always cut it. And if you’ve ridden thousands of miles with Uber and paid them boatloads over the years, you might expect better service. You’re always just a few taps away from switching to Lyft, right? This week, TechCrunch spotted Uber testing new “Premium Support”… Read More

 Over the past 20 years there have been 11,459 accidents across the network of oil and gas pipelines that crisscross the U.S. The toll in human lives and financial damages is severe and something that can be avoided. Technology startup Enview has developed tools for geospatial analytics that oil and gas companies and utilities are beginning to use to monitor and manage their networks. Read More

There is a lot of fraud in online payments. This discussion explores the field, and Tracy also provides a pointer to a great open problem that an entrepreneur can look into. Sramana Mitra: Let’s...

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 Founder Gym, co-founded by Mandela Schumacher-Hodge and Gabriela Zamudio, is unveiling its online platform to support and train underrepresented founders building tech startups. Instead of describing it as a school, bootcamp or incubator, Founder Gym describes itself as a topical, four-week training program that covers topics like fundraising, pitching, user growth and problem validation. Read More

 A bitcoin transaction wastes as much electricity as it takes to power an American home for a week, and legendary coder Bram Cohen wants to fix that. Cohen has started a new company called Chia Network that will launch a cryptocurrency based on proofs of time and storage rather than bitcoin’s electricity-burning proofs of work. Read More

 Back in April the Netherlands-based Rockstart bootcamp announced it was adding an AI track. It’s now named the first batch of startups in the inaugural six-month program, with teams hailing from as far afield as India, Singapore, South Africa and the US. Read More

Charlie O’Donnell, Partner at Brooklyn Bridge Ventures, talks about his Seed investing activities and related industry trends.

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Jonathan Lewy, Managing Partner at Investo, discusses pre-seed investment strategies and the Series A gap.

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 The latest company to emerge from startup accelerator Expa Labs is focused on helping online marketplaces make money from advertising. Promote founder and CEO Siddharth Vora used to lead the engineering team for advertising products at StumbleUpon. (StumbleUpon’s founder Garrett Camp went on to start Expa, which runs Expa Labs.)  Vora said he became convinced that with their user data… Read More

Cloud finance and accounting firm BlackLine (Nasdaq: BL) went public just over a year ago. Since then, the company’s valuation, along with the accolades it has received, has grown steadily. Recently...

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Sramana Mitra: What form did it take? What tools did you build? What did you enable customers to do that they couldn’t do before? Chaitanya Chandrasekhar: We talked about search engines. We talked...

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 Researchers at Dartmouth University have found that a 3D printed shape covered in aluminum foil can improve wireless range and increase Wi-Fi security. The project, which appeared on Eurekalert, involves placing a reflector on and around a Wi-Fi router’s antennae to shape the beam, increasing range and preventing it from passing through to unwanted spaces. “With a simple investment… Read More

 It’s hard to believe that fintech startup Revolut still doesn’t have a proper banking license. Many users will tell you that Revolut’s electronic wallets already feel like traditional bank accounts with an IBAN and a payment card. But the startup is finally applying for a proper banking license in Lithuania. This process is going to take a few months — the startup… Read More

 CargoX announced today that it has raised $20 million in Series C funding led by Goldman Sachs. The startup is currently focused on the Brazilian market, where it connects businesses that need to ship something with drivers who have excess capacity in their trucks. The goal is to help truckers make more money while reducing shipping costs for businesses. Read More

 This is the final installment in the series “A Startup Takes Flight.” We started by creating a company — the Internet of Wings, a provider of drone-delivered chicken sandwiches that pivoted into general food delivery — and examined some of the most common financing terms entrepreneurs and VC investors discuss. It’s time to get our investors a liquidity event… Read More

 As video becomes increasingly important to the media business (to the point where it’s become a cliché), a startup called Vidrovr aims to help publishers find the most relevant videos to go along with their content. So if I’m writing an article about, say, controversial comments from a tech CEO, I could use Vidrovr to search for footage of other times that the CEO discussed the… Read More