Wednesday, April 17, 2024

Good afternoon, and welcome to your Hump Day edition of TechCrunch PM. Boston Dynamics pulled a switcheroo today after calling attention to the retirement of its Atlas humanoid. It was a good tactic, I must say. Meanwhile, 3D-printing enthusiasts can check out Form 4, and U.S. Klarna users have a new credit card to get. And don’t forget to check out how Meta is faring in Europe. Let’s go!

TechCrunch Top 3

Image Credits: Boston Dynamics

Humanoid ambitions: Boston Dynamics’ Atlas humanoid robot goes electric. You have to watch it do this little crab maneuver. Read More

A new Form: It’s been five years since Formlabs upgraded its 3D printer offering. Now meet Form 4. With faster printing speeds, the company is pushing into the medical industry after showing that it can print 130 dental crowns in 20 minutes. Read More

Klarna credit card hits the U.S.: You asked for it, and now you have it. Users can earn up to 10% cash back on selected merchants when using the card in its app. The card also integrates with the company’s AI assistant to find deals on planned purchases. Read More

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Afternoon must-reads

Back to the drawing board for Meta: A “consent or pay” play is what Meta wants to do with users in the European Union. However, guidance from an EU data protection organization suggests otherwise. This sends Meta back to redo its business model to comply. Read More

Speaking of this new guidance: Natasha Lomas takes us inside the European Data Protection Board’s opinion and what it will mean for Meta and other adtech giants. Read More

It pays to be Premium: LinkedIn is working on a new LinkedIn Premium Company Page subscription, which will include AI to write content and new tools to grow follower counts, among other features to raise the profiles of the company using them. This feature “underscores how Microsoft-owned LinkedIn continues to diversify its business model while also trying to make itself more useful overall.” Read More

Maximum severity: That was the rating that Palo Alto Networks gave to an existing zero-day vulnerability because “the vulnerability allows hackers to gain complete control of an affected firewall over the internet without authentication.” Read More

Mercury heats up the consumer banking world: The business banking startup is taking a nod from customers to launch a consumer product. This is an interesting time for Mercury, as it is “the target of federal scrutiny around its practice of allowing foreign companies to open accounts through one of its partners, Choice Bank.” Read More

Tesla does some advertising: The electric vehicle maker divulged how much it spent to advertise on X. Read More

Inside LemFi’s play to be a fintech to the Global South diaspora: Six months after being shut down by Ghana regulators, LemFi is back in business in the country and is gearing up for a big expansion into Asia. Read More

StrictlyVC event: You can expect a tech star–studded lineup, including Lina Khan and Steve Case, at the Strictly VC event taking place June 11 in Washington, D.C. Read More

Money, money, money

NeuBird is building a generative AI solution for complex cloud-native environments after raising $22 million. Read More

How Found Energy, with a new $12 million in seed funding, went from “self-cannibalizing robots” to cleaning up heavy industry. Read More

Diagon, which raised $5.1 million, puts ex-Tesla supply chain muscle to work for small businesses. Read More

B2B marketplace The Folklore bags $3.4 million seed to get brands into global stores. Read More

Around the web

Give Elon his money back: Among the asks of Tesla shareholders is for them to reinstate a $56 billion compensation package meant for CEO Elon Musk. A judge in Delaware rejected this package as part of a shareholder lawsuit, ABC News reports.

Sharing is caring: Amazon may have scaled back on its cashless checkout, but perhaps it was for a bigger cause: To license the technology to others. Bloomberg has more.

Hack hits Change Healthcare: We covered the Change Healthcare hack a few times since it happened, and now there’s more to the story, including Wired’s look at how much the company has spent on the response.

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TechCrunch Minute

New Atlas robot stuns experts in first reveal from Boston Dynamics: Brian Heater told us Tuesday that Boston Dynamics was retiring its humanoid Atlas that was powered by hydraulics. Today we know why: It unveiled a new Atlas robot powered by electricity. Hit play and let’s chat!