Techmeme
May 7, 2020, 12:25 PM

Top News

Ari Levy / CNBC:
Zoom is acquiring Keybase, a 25-person startup, to add end-to-end encryption to video calls, the first acquisition in the company's nine-year history  —  - Zoom is acquiring Keybase, a 25-person start-up in New York, to add end-to-end encryption to video calls.
Isabelle Kirkwood / BetaKit:
Alphabet's Sidewalk Labs says it will no longer pursue its smart city project at Quayside in Toronto due to “unprecedented economic uncertainty”  —  Sidewalk Labs has announced it will no longer pursue its project at Quayside in Toronto.  The company noted the decision was due to the current …
Dana Wollman / Engadget:
Apple MacBook Pro 13-inch review: nice display, lovely keyboard, and great performance, but models with 10th-gen Intel CPUs are pricey and it can get hot  —  I had a feeling I'd be reviewing a new 13-inch MacBook Pro sooner rather than later.  When Apple refreshed the MacBook Air back in March …
Matt Brian / Engadget:
UK broadband provider Virgin Media and telecom operator O2 announce a £31B merger in an effort to take on BT, Sky, and Vodafone in the country  —  The rumors were true: UK broadband provider Virgin Media and telecoms operator O2 are to merge, their parent companies confirmed today.
New York Times:
Israeli security company says hackers linked to the Chinese military have used Aria-body, a cyberattack tool, on governments and firms in Australia and SE Asia  —  An Israeli security company said the hacking software, called Aria-body, had been deployed against governments and state-owned companies in Australia and Southeast Asia.
Lauren Feiner / CNBC:
Uber leads a $170M investment in Lime, with Bain Capital Ventures, Alphabet, and GV participating, and will transfer its Jump scooter division to Lime  —  - Uber is leading a $170 million investment round in Lime, the companies announced Thursday.  — Uber will transfer its own electric bike …
Brittany A. Roston / SlashGear:
Smart home company Wink to require users pay a $4.99 monthly subscription fee starting May 13, or device automations and accessibility via app will be disabled  —  Smart home company Wink has made a surprising and heavily criticized announcement: it will soon charge a monthly subscription fee.
Apple:
Apple awards $10M from its Advanced Manufacturing Fund to COPAN Diagnostics, a leader in COVID-19 sample collection kit production  —  Cupertino, California — Apple today announced it is awarding $10 million from its Advanced Manufacturing Fund to COPAN Diagnostics, a market leader …
David Kaye / Just Security:
Facebook's efforts are laudable, but the Oversight Board does not end debates over online speech or legitimize content moderation choices by other platforms  —  With the Naming of Oversight Board Members, What Kind of Institution Will This Become?  —  With Facebook's unveiling of the first 20 …
New York Times:
Nick Statt / The Verge:
Epic Games says Fortnite has 350M registered players, up from 250M in March 2019; in April, players logged 3.2B hours in the game  —  More than 3.2 billion hours played in April alone  —  Epic's Fortnite has more than 350 million registered players, the game developer announced on Wednesday.
Dean Takahashi / VentureBeat:
Nintendo reports FY 2019 net profit of $2.43B, up 33.5% YoY, on sales of $12.31B, up 9% YoY; to date, 55.7M Nintendo Switch and Lite consoles have been sold  —  Nintendo reported that its full-year sales for the fiscal year ended March 31 were $12.31 billion, up 9% from $11.30 billion a year earlier.
Maria Jose Valero / Bloomberg:
Shopify and Pinterest partner to let Shopify merchants upload their catalogs to Pinterest and turn products into shoppable Product Pins  —  Shopify merchants in the U.S. and Canada are now able to share their products to about 350 million Pinterest users, the companies announced Thursday.
Brady Dale / CoinDesk:
Square reports $528M in Q1 revenue from its Cash App, with $306M coming from Bitcoin transactions, exceeding the app's fiat revenue of $222M for the first time  —  Bitcoin has flippened USD on Square's Cash App, sort of.  —  As reported in the publicly traded fintech company's …
Emily Bary / MarketWatch:
Lucas Shaw / Bloomberg:
Internal document reveals Twitch is looking to fund a slate of original, unscripted series that would be live and interactive on dating, sports, music, and more  —  - Amazon unit will bankroll slate of unscripted series this year  — Use of Twitch has exploded during the coronavirus pandemic
Reuters:
Sources: US Department of Commerce is close to signing off on a rule allowing US companies to work with Huawei on setting 5G network standards  —  (Reuters) - The U.S. Department of Commerce is close to signing off on a new rule that would allow U.S. companies to work with China's Huawei Technologies …
Salvador Rodriguez / CNBC:
Short-term rental hosts, frustrated with Airbnb and similar companies amid widespread cancellations, are launching their own direct-booking websites  —  - Short-term rental hosts are launching their own direct-booking websites in an effort to diversify their business after years of mounting frustrations with companies such as Airbnb.

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Earlier Picks

Jordan Novet / CNBC:
Kurt Wagner / Bloomberg: