Yelp, which made a name for itself giving restaurant recs, just bought an auto services website. In the company’s earnings report on Thursday, Yelp revealed that it agreed to buy RepairPal, a site for car repair estimates, for $80 million in cash Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Exosonic, a startup developing supersonic commercial air travel and UAV tech, is winding down after five years of operation. In an update posted to its website, Exosonic said it was unable to find the traction necessary to continue operations. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Solar energy is booming, which is good news for Glint Solar. The Norwegian software-as-a-service startup has built a platform that’s helping energy giants and large solar developers such as E.ON, Recurrent Energy, and Statkraft cut the time it takes to plan and pre-design solar installations to accelerate the transition to renewables. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Seagrass punches above its weight. The marine plant only occupies 0.1% of the ocean floor but can be credited with supporting marine ecosystems of plants and fish, filtering ocean water and capturing quite a bit of carbon Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Many people who want to have children can’t, or shouldn’t, carry a pregnancy for a variety of reasons. Gestational surrogacy can be a great option for those individuals — if they can endure the lengthy wait times and afford to pay for the costly service. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Amber Hill spent 14 years as a medical researcher. She didn’t mind the work, but there was one thing she consistently hated: administrative tasks.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

French tech startup Alan held a press conference this morning to announce three product updates. While it is better known as a health insurance company, the startup has always been trying to offer more than insurance coverage. It wants to build a super app for all things related to healthcare Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

The end of zero-interest rates has driven companies to look for savings wherever they can, but one area continues to be a major budget drain. Observability — collecting and understanding data and systems — typically remains an organization’s second-highest cloud expenditure, right after cloud provisioning itself. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

CareYaya, a platform that matches people who need caregivers with healthcare students, is working to disrupt the caregiving industry. The startup, which exhibited as part of the Battlefield 200 at TechCrunch Disrupt, is looking to enhance affordable in-home support, while also helping students prepare for their future healthcare careers. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

CoffeeSpace is on a mission to help people find partners for their startup ideas online. The startup, which exhibited as part of the Startup Battlefield 200 at TechCrunch Disrupt 2024, has launched a social networking app that matches people exploring startup ideas and looking for co-founders.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Buying a home has always been complicated. You have to figure out how much money to put down and how that down payment will affect a monthly mortgage bill. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

In 2014, Ivan Crewkov moved his family from Serbia to the U.S. as his startup, Cubic.AI, was preparing to launch a Kickstarter campaign for its smart speaker. A week before the campaign was supposed to go live, Amazon launched its Echo smart speaker, rendering Cubic.AI essentially dead in the water. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Hummingbirds is a female-founded startup that connects hyperlocal content creators with locally-based brands that reward them for sharing products with their small and highly engaged communities via social media.  The company announced Wednesday its latest funding round of $5.4 million, bringing the total amount raised to $10 million. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

MealMe, a unified API that embeds food and retail ordering into consumer apps and websites, announced on Thursday that it secured $8 million in Series A funding. The newly raised capital brings the total amount raised to $16 million.  MealMe has undergone several changes since its launch in 2019. Initially, Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

A new startup setting out to combat the scourge of deepfakes and spoofed evidence in the age of AI is showing off its wares on the Startup Battlefield stage at TechCrunch Disrupt 2024 this week. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Meet Luna, a health and well-being app for teen girls that is designed to help them navigate teenhood. The app lets teens ask questions about their health and wellness and get responses from experts. It also lets them track their periods, moods, and skin. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

It might not be the sexiest of subjects, but facilities management is central to any business that has a physical premises — the bigger that footprint becomes, the more complex it gets. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Fixing the climate crisis is a vast, world-sized puzzle. But one particularly large piece of this ginormous conundrum is construction and real estate — which collectively amount for around 40% of global greenhouse gas emissions. Enter Munich-based data startup Emidat, which has built a software platform for automating the generation of validated Environmental Product Declaration Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

There are plenty of startups now that have AI bots that will listen to your meetings, transcribe them, make notes, and create insights. That means companies in this area must differentiate themselves by offering additional feature sets and integrations. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Lithuania’s Vinted has secured a new valuation of €5 billion (around $5.4 billion at current exchange rates), after the second-hand fashion marketplace closed a secondary share sale worth €340 million ($367 million). Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

U.S. venture capital giant General Catalyst has announced a fresh $8 billion in funds as it looks to ramp up its investments in multi-sector early-stage startups globally, with a specific focus on the U.S., Europe, and India. The capital constitutes around $4.5 billion for its “core VC funds” which spans seed and growth equity funding, Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

A new app called Screenable will help parents introduce their children to technology by turning an iPhone or iPad into a starter phone. The app is designed to grow over time with a child, as it offers different modes for kids of different ages. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Each year, supply chain disruptions cost the global economy trillions of dollars. In a recent McKinsey poll, nine in ten businesses said they had encountered logistics challenges over the past 12 months. Headwinds have only grown stronger as chaos reigns in key shipping corridors. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Upflow, a French startup we’ve been covering for quite a while, originally focused on managing outstanding invoices. The company is now announcing a shift in its strategy to become a B2B payment platform with its own payment gateway to complement its accounts receivable automation solution. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Interface.ai, a customer automation platform for banks and other financial institutions, today announced that it closed a $30 million funding round led by Avataar Venture Partners. $20 million of the round was equity, while the remaining $10 million was in the form of debt. It’s Interface’s first outside capital; the startup had been completely bootstrapped Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices