Techmeme
September 3, 2021, 9:00 AM

Top News

Wayne Ma / The Information:
Sources: Apple's planned VR/AR headset will need a wireless connection to an Apple device for full functionality; Apple completed work on VR/AR chips last year  —  New details of the custom chips designed by Apple for its forthcoming virtual reality and augmented reality headset indicate …
Insider:
Sources: Amazon will launch its own TV featuring Alexa and no third-party manufacturer branding in the US, possibly as soon as October  —  - Amazon is planning to roll out its own Amazon-branded TV, Insider has learned.  — A US launch is targeted for as soon as October.
Anirban Sen / Reuters:
Sources: Reddit is planning an IPO for as soon as early 2022, following a $10B valuation in August  —  Reddit Inc, the operator of online message boards that became the go-to destination for day traders chasing this year's frenzy for so-called ‘meme’ stocks, is seeking to hire investment bankers …
Reuters:
Filings: NLRB is investigating two complaints by Apple employees, including one by senior engineering PM Ashley Gjøvik who alleges workplace harassment and more  —  The U.S. National Labor Relations Board is investigating two cases filed by employees against Apple, records on the agency's website show.
Andrew Thurman / CoinDesk:
Dom Hofmann's Loot, with NFTs of random lists of items ostensibly from a fantasy video game, had $46M in sales in just 5 days, attaining a market cap of $180M+  —  The latest non-fungible token (NFT) craze is among the simplest - and the strangest - yet: a randomly generated list …
Sheila Dang / Reuters:
Sources: AWS plans to hire content moderators to look for emerging extremist groups and remove content that violates its cloud service policies  —  Amazon.com Inc (AMZN.O) plans to take a more proactive approach to determine what types of content violate its cloud service policies …
Ash Parrish / The Verge:
Gamesight data shows a dip in Twitch viewership on Wednesday, possibly 5%-15%, as some streamers took #ADayOffTwitch to bring awareness to “hate raids”  —  It seems as if the Twitch walkout was a success  —  Streamers took a day off Twitch on September 1st to bring attention …
Issie Lapowsky / Protocol:
Following Texas' abortion law, tech companies could face suits over providing on-demand rides to clinics, subpoenas requesting user data, and more  —  With the Supreme Court deciding not to block Texas' effective ban on abortion this week, fears have been rightly focused on the people in Texas …
Francesco Rizzato / Opensignal:
State of 5G in the US: New York had the fastest download speed at 114 Mbps, while Vermont had the slowest at 42.2 Mbps but the best 5G video experience  —  As U.S. carriers continue to hit new milestones in their 5G network rollouts, Opensignal has now conducted the most comprehensive analysis …
More: CNET
Andrew J. Hawkins / The Verge:
General Motors says it is temporarily halting production at six of its North American factories due to the global chip shortage  —  ‘The situation remains complex and very fluid’  —  General Motors, parent company of Chevrolet, GMC, Cadillac, and Buick, said it was temporarily halting production …
Bloomberg:
JD.com's real estate unit has agreed to buy a controlling stake in China Logistics in a deal valuing the company at ~$2.1B, a 7% premium to Wednesday's close  —  - E-commerce giant agrees to acquire controlling stake  — Offer price is about a 7% premium to Wednesday close
Bloomberg:
Delivery Hero raises €1.25B via convertible notes, its third equity-linked issuance in less than two years  —  Delivery Hero SE raised 1.25 billion euros ($1.5 billion) from an offering of notes convertible into shares, marking the food-delivery company's third equity-linked issuance in less than two years.
Tweets: @bloombergau
Sam Schechner / Wall Street Journal:
Ireland's Data Protection Commission, on behalf of the EU, fines WhatsApp €225M for privacy violations, the second-largest fine under GDPR; WhatsApp will appeal  —  Regulators say chat-service unit failed to disclose fully how it collected and shared data about its users
Muyao Shen / CoinDesk:
A doge meme NFT that sold for $4M in June is now valued at $225M+ after it was fractionalized into nearly 17B tokens and sold in a one-day auction  —  Just three months after a non-fungible token (NFT) representing an image of the original Shiba Inu dogecoin meme sold for about $4 million …
Romain Dillet / TechCrunch:
Point, a neobank, raises $46.5M Series B led by Valar Ventures, bringing its total raised to $60M  —  Challenger bank Point has raised a $46.5 million Series B funding round.  The company offers an account associated with a debit card.  And the startup positions itself as a premium debit card company …
The Verge:
Apple's updated rules allowing web signup links appear to apply only to apps that don't make much money for Apple, like Netflix and Spotify  —  It's for apps that don't make Apple any money anyways  —  While vocal app developers accused Apple last week of spinning a lawsuit settlement …
Aditya Kalra / Reuters:

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Earlier Picks

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