Techmeme
June 16, 2021, 10:35 AM

Top News

New York Times:
Biden names Lina Khan, an antitrust expert who wrote the “Amazon Antitrust Paradox”, as FTC chair, after the Senate voted 69-28 to confirm her as commissioner  —  Ms. Khan, who first attracted notice as a critic of Amazon, was confirmed by the Senate as a commissioner on the agency on Tuesday.
Rolfe Winkler / Wall Street Journal:
Sources: some of Apple's healthcare efforts, including a pilot primary healthcare service with Apple-employed doctors, have stalled due to internal concerns  —  Tech giant has envisioned hiring doctors to offer primary care, now focused on Watch  —  Apple Inc. Chief Executive Tim Cook …
Bloomberg:
Japan Display, which sold its smartphone screen factory last year, is pivoting to VR; LCDs are projected to dominate the VR headset market over the next 5 years  —  - Superseded on mobile, LCDs can better compete with OLED in VR  — JDI believes headset business could grow into a linchpin
Sarah Perez / TechCrunch:
Spotify launches Spotify Greenroom, a new app that allows Spotify users worldwide to join or host live audio rooms, and turn those conversations into podcasts  —  In March, Spotify announced it was acquiring the company behind the sports-focused audio app Locker Room to help speed its entry into the live audio market.
Mitchell Clark / The Verge:
Google unveils features for Android including end-to-end encryption for RCS-based one-to-one chats in Messages, starred messages, emoji mashup suggestions, more  —  Earthquake Alerts in more places and better accessibility  —  Google has announced seven new features for Android …
Tom Warren / The Verge:
Ahead of Microsoft's event to unveil the next gen of Windows, a Windows 11 build leaks, showing a revamped UI, like a new taskbar with centered app icons, more  —  Screenshots have leaked online  —  Screenshots of Microsoft's upcoming Windows 11 operating system have appeared online today.
Lauren Feiner / CNBC:
Waymo raises $2.5B from Alphabet, a16z, Tiger Global, and others, to advance its autonomous driving tech and grow its team  —  - Google sibling company Waymo announced a $2.5 billion investment round Wednesday, which will go toward advancing its autonomous driving technology and growing its team.
Ben Thompson / Stratechery:
Overview of House lawmakers' recent antitrust-focused bills, which target consumer tech giants, vary in radicalness, and at times conflict with each other  —  From the Wall Street Journal:  —  These bills are the ultimate outcome of the House Subcommittee on Antitrust's investigation …
Ingrid Lunden / TechCrunch:
Novo, a neobank targeting small businesses, raises $40.7M Series A led by Valar Ventures  —  Small businesses have traditionally been underserved when it comes to IT — they are too big and have too many requirements that can't be met by consumer products, yet are much too small to afford …
More: FinSMEs
David Cohen / Adweek:
Wall Street Journal:
Alibaba's Taobao was clandestinely scraped by a web crawler for 8 months, leading to a leak of 1.1B pieces of user data, including user IDs and phone numbers  —  Software developer scrapes 1.1 billion pieces of user data, including IDs and phone numbers, over eight months
Anna Edgerton / Bloomberg:
At a Senate antitrust hearing, Amazon and Google defended their smart home device businesses from criticism by Democrats and Republicans  —  Alphabet Inc.'s Google and Amazon.com Inc. defended their smart-speaker businesses as U.S. senators warned the grip the companies have over the market could harm competition and consumer privacy.
Alex Hern / The Guardian:
Amazon blames social media companies for its failure to remove fake reviews, saying they are slow to act when warned about such reviews  —  Firm says sites are slow to act when warned that fake reviews are being solicited on their platforms  —  Amazon has blamed social media companies …
Daphne Leprince-Ringuet / ZDNet:
IBM unveils the Quantum System One, its first quantum computer physically built outside of the US, in Germany in partnership with research institute Fraunhofer  —  Big Blue has, for the first time, built a quantum computer that is not physically located in its US data centers.
Paul Sawers / VentureBeat:
BrowserStack, a cross-browser website testing service for DevOps, raises $200M Series B led by BOND, at a $4B valuation  —  Elevate your enterprise data technology and strategy at Transform 2021.  —  BrowserStack, a website testing platform for developer operations (DevOps) teams …
Jon Porter / The Verge:
Honor says Google apps will return to its phones, starting with the 50 series, announced in China today, after Huawei sold off the brand at the end of last year  —  Officially announced today in China  —  The Honor 50 series will be able to ship with Google's apps and services …
More: SlashGear
Bloomberg:
Amazon's planned new African HQ, located in Cape Town, has met with fierce resistance and protests by indigenous people, with 50,000 objections  —  - Khoisan group trying to stop building of $291 million project  — City of Cape Town says venture will add jobs, boost economy
Kyle Wiggers / VentureBeat:
Introhive, which offers SaaS tools to automate CRM, raises $100M Series C led by equity firm PSG, bringing its total raised to $140M+  —  Elevate your enterprise data technology and strategy at Transform 2021.  —  Introhive, a software-as-a-service (SaaS) customer relationship management …

Sponsor Posts

Google:
Try Gemini 3 Pro  —  Google's newest and most intelligent AI model that helps you bring any idea to life
Shopify:
Shopify's new AI commerce stack  —  Their VP of Product digs into just-launched products to help entrepreneurs and developers build with the latest AI and tech.
Zoho:
Email fatigue is real: Here's how smart email tools help you regain control  —  Picture this: It's Monday morning.  You walk into the office feeling energized and ready to take on the week.
IDrive:
Protecting your Cloud Applications Data  —  Backing up Office 365, Google Workspace, Dropbox & Box data is critical to preventing data loss or corruption, complying with laws and avoiding critical downtime in case of a disaster.

Featured Podcasts

Uncapped with Jack Altman:
Saam Motamedi from Greylock Partners
Conversations with people I admire about things I'm genuinely interested in.
Subscribe to Uncapped with Jack Altman.
Invest Like the Best:
Henry Ellenbogen - Man Versus Machine
The leading destination to learn about business and investing. We do this by showcasing exceptional talent and ideas.
Subscribe to Invest Like the Best.
Grit:
How Evan Spiegel Is Building the Future of Computing
Grit explores what it takes to create, build and scale world-class organizations.
Subscribe to Grit.
Acquired:
10 Years of Acquired (with Michael Lewis)
Learn the playbooks that built the world's greatest companies - and how you can apply them as a founder, operator, or investor.
Subscribe to Acquired.
Lenny's Podcast:
Why humans are AI's biggest bottleneck (and what's coming in 2026) | Alexander Embiricos (OpenAI Codex Product Lead)
Interviews with world-class product leaders and growth experts to uncover actionable advice to help you build, launch, and grow your own product.
Subscribe to Lenny's Podcast.
Tools and Weapons with Brad Smith:
Ted Sarandos: Netflix and how tech changed storytelling
Microsoft Vice Chair and President Brad Smith speaks with leaders in government, business, and culture to explore the most critical challenges at the intersection of technology and society.
Subscribe to Tools and Weapons with Brad Smith.
 

About This Page

This is a Techmeme archive page. It shows how the site appeared at 10:35 AM ET, June 16, 2021.

The most current version of the site as always is available at our home page. To view an earlier snapshot click here and then modify the date indicated.

More News

Kaitlyn Tiffany / The Atlantic:
Ashley Lampard / Rest of World:
Manish Singh / TechCrunch:

Earlier Picks

Benjamin Mayo / 9to5Mac: