Google launches a website version of its Read Along education app for children

Google launches a website version of its Read Along education app for children

Google has launched a website for its Read Along app for encouraging young children to practice reading. The website, which is introduced as a public beta, works with Chrome, Firefox and Edge browsers on Desktop and Android, with support for iOS and more browsers such as Safari coming soon. The concept of the website is […]

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Cybrary secures $25M to grow its platform for cybersecurity training

Cybrary secures $25M to grow its platform for cybersecurity training

The cybersecurity industry has taken a hit recently, with economic headwinds prompting layoffs and a broad investor pullback. But some firms have escaped unscathed, like cybersecurity training platform Cybrary, which today announced that it raised $25 million in a Series C funding round. CEO Kevin Hanes conveyed to TechCrunch that the round, which brings Cybrary’s […]

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Are universities doing enough to foster robotics startups?

Are universities doing enough to foster robotics startups?

A few years ago, I got in the habit of asking researchers the titular question: Are universities doing enough to foster robotics startups? To a one, the answer was invariably, “no.” It was a massive blindspot for some of the world’s leading research institutes, both in commercializing their own work and giving their best and […]

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African Leadership Group acquires coding school Holberton

African Leadership Group acquires coding school Holberton

Coding school Holberton today announced that it has entered into an agreement to be acquired by African Leadership Group (ALG). The seven-year-old company, with physical schools across the globe in addition to its core online platform, will split in two. Holberton’s technology platform will become part of ALG’s existing ALX online learning platform and the […]

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Kids’ finance startup GoHenry marches into Europe with Pixpay acquisition

Kids’ finance startup GoHenry marches into Europe with Pixpay acquisition

GoHenry, the U.K.-based financial education app and pre-paid debit card provider for kids, has expanded into Europe for the first time with the acquisition of French startup Pixpay. Terms of the deal were not disclosed. Founded out of London back in 2012, GoHenry has emerged as one of the preeminent fintech companies for children, targeting […]

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At NASA’s Lunabotics competition, students design mining robots for the moon

At NASA’s Lunabotics competition, students design mining robots for the moon

If this year’s Lunabotics competition is any indication, there’s a bright future ahead for the surface of the moon — and below it. The NASA-hosted challenge recently saw 39 teams of university students building lunar mining robots, which were tasked with digging up rocks in simulated regolith (the material making up the lunar surface) at […]

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Perceptron: Analyzing images in the blink of an eye and tracking the life cycle of snow

Perceptron: Analyzing images in the blink of an eye and tracking the life cycle of snow

Research in the field of machine learning and AI, now a key technology in practically every industry and company, is far too voluminous for anyone to read it all. This column, Perceptron (previously Deep Science), aims to collect some of the most relevant recent discoveries and papers — particularly in, but not limited to, artificial intelligence […]

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Post-acquisition, Misty Robotics pivots to education

Post-acquisition, Misty Robotics pivots to education

Back in 2018, a struggling Sphero needed a change. Post-Disney IP deal, life hadn’t been easy for the Colorado robotic toy firm, so it looked to a potentially lucrative new sector: STEM education. History, as Mark Twain may or may not have ever said, rhymes. The source of the quote is uncertain, but the truth […]

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Lightspeed’s Mercedes Bent on why the metaverse isn’t overhyped

Lightspeed’s Mercedes Bent on why the metaverse isn’t overhyped

On the Chain Reaction podcast this week, we dove into a topic that tends to stir up strong emotions, even from those outside the crypto space — the metaverse. Mercedes Bent, an investor at Lightspeed Venture Partners who focuses on consumer investments in crypto, joined us to unpack this loaded term and explain why she […]

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Facebook Messenger provides governments, agencies with free developer tools to combat COVID-19

Facebook Messenger provides governments, agencies with free developer tools to combat COVID-19

Big tech has been making a huge effort to mobilize its power to help people work better together to battle the ongoing coronavirus pandemic — whether it’s creating search and information portals, making sure the most authoritative voices are surfacing above the noise or gathering compute power to supercharge research efforts to find vaccines. Today, […]

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