Techmeme: Madrid-based Playtomic, an app for booking tennis and padel courts that says it has 1M+ active users in 34 countries, raises a €56M Series C led by GP Bullhound (Patricia Allen/EU-Startups)

Top News

YouTube TV reaches a deal with Disney to bring back 17+ channels including ABC, Disney, ESPN, Freeform, FX, and National Geographic — After one day of being dark, YouTube TV and Disney have reached a deal which will see more than 17 Disney-owned channels, including local ABC affiliates, Disney Channel, and ESPN return to the service.

Anton Shilov / AnandTech:

Report: chipmakers are on track to spend $152B on new fabs and production equipment in 2021, up 34% YoY, which is the strongest YoY growth since 2017 — Semiconductor makers have drastically increased their capital expenditures (CapEx) this year in response to unprecedented demand for chips that is going to last for years.

More: IC Insights. Tweets: @trengriffin, @sub8u, @zachweinberg, and @jaycuthrell

Joel Khalili / TechRadar:

Profile of Brewster Kahle and the Internet Archive, which marked its 25th anniversary in May and stores 70PB+ of data, including 635B webpages and 34M books — Meet Brewster Kahle, the internet's chief librarian — Audio player loading... On the same day in 1996, Brewster Kahle founded …

Tweets: @lanceulanoff and @jkfruit. Thanks:@techradarpro

Rebecca Bellan / TechCrunch:

Berlin-based Vay, which wants to launch a service in Hamburg in 2022 that uses remote operators to drive rental cars to and from users, raises a $95M Series B — Vay, a company that is trying to get self-driving car services to market faster by pursuing a teledriven approach …

More: Crunchbase News and Tech.eu. Tweets: @inafried

Max A. Cherney / Protocol:

Inside Intel's Ronler complex in Hillsboro, Oregon, where it conducts its most advanced research and houses the company's most important chip manufacturing site — HILLSBORO, Ore. — To create a beam of ultraviolet radiation precise enough to print the world's most advanced microchips …

Tweets: @chernandburn, @chiakokhua, @chiakokhua, @witeken, @witeken, and @tomkrazit

Alex Pasternack / Fast Company:

Chinese Wikipedia volunteers are fighting censorship, threats, arrest, and violence, and exposing the threats to Wikimedia Foundation's free-knowledge mission — This past July, before he was banned from Wikipedia, Techyan was one of dozens of volunteers preparing to speak at the free-knowledge movement's annual conference, Wikimania.

More: Slashdot. Tweets: @frankpasquale, @pasternack, @harrymccracken, @fastcompany, and @juhasaarinen. Thanks:@technologizer

Andy Maxwell / TorrentFreak:

Malaysia passes a bill to imprison people who facilitate access to pirate content via illegal streaming, for up to 20 years — Laws that forbid the illegal uploading and downloading of copyrighted content are common around the world but the rise of streaming has sometimes exposed gaps in legislation.

More: Engadget, Lowyat.NET, Malaysiakini, thesundaily.my, and Lexology. Tweets: @sub8u

Manish Singh / TechCrunch:

Bangalore-based Razorpay, a top payment processor in India whose products resemble Stripe's, raises a $375M Series F at a $7.5B valuation, up from $3B in April — Razorpay has more than doubled its valuation to $7.5 billion from $3 billion in April as one of India's largest fintech giants …

More: The Economic Times, Bloomberg, Bloomberg, Livemint, Moneycontrol, Entrackr, PYMNTS.com, and Tech in Asia

Tweets: @kunksed and @anshublog

Mark Gurman / Bloomberg:

The case for Apple to offer a 15-inch iPad home hub is made clear by devices like the Portal and Echo Show 15, as well as Apple's ~5% smart speaker market share — I've been testing Amazon.com Inc.'s new Echo Show 15. My takeaway: It's time for Apple Inc. to get serious about the smart home and launch a giant iPad as a new hub.

More: PhoneArena, AppleInsider, and 9to5Mac

Tweets: @johnwilson, @mikeorren, @dan_ness, @mattbirchler, and @markgurman

MacKenzie Sigalos / CNBC:

Sources estimate ~20% of the world's bitcoin miners remain in China, after moving operations underground following the country's crypto mining ban in May — - China cracked down on its domestic crypto mining industry in May, but many miners have figured out ways to continue operations and evade detection.

More: Riding The Wave. Tweets: @epro, @cnbc, and @kenziesigalos

Scott Murdoch / Reuters:

Chinese AI company SenseTime, which focuses on computer vision, relaunches its $767M Hong Kong IPO, a week after the US investor ban and pulling the IPO listing — Chinese artificial intelligence start-up SenseTime Group (0020.HK) relaunched its $767 million Hong Kong IPO on Monday …

More: BBC, Benzinga, The Economic Times, Bloomberg, Tech in Asia, Wall Street Journal, and South China Morning Post

Kate Park / TechCrunch:

South Korea-based online grocery startup Kurly, which says it plans to IPO in H1 2022 at a ~$5.8B valuation, raises $210M at a $3.3B valuation — Just half a year after its last Series F round announcement, Korean online grocery startup Kurly has closed a $210 million in a pre-IPO round …

Sponsor Posts

ElevenLabs:

ElevenAgents by ElevenLabs — You know us for voice. Now meet ElevenAgents — featuring Expressive Mode, our most human-sounding AI voice technology in 70+ languages with ultra-low latency. Hear it for yourself.

Intel:

5G's most deployed platform — Powering live networks with built-in Inference across Core and RAN. That's the power of Intel Inside®

Zoho:

Build vs Buy Embedded Analytics: The Decision That Defines Your Product Roadmap — Every SaaS product team eventually hits the analytics wall. Your customers want insights inside your app. Your roadmap has no room to spare.

IDrive:

Protecting your Cloud Applications Data — Backing up Office 365, Google Workspace, Dropbox & Salesforce data is critical to preventing data loss or corruption, complying with laws and avoiding critical downtime in case of a disaster.

Sponsor Techmeme

Featured Podcasts

Great Chat:

Go touch some grass (but don't tweet about it)

A podcast mostly about tech. Brought to you weekly by Angela Du, Sally Shin, Mac Bohannon, Helen Min, and Ashley Mayer.

Subscribe to Great Chat.

Lenny's Podcast:

An AI state of the union: We've passed the inflection point, dark factories are coming, and automation timelines | Simon Willison

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.

Access:

The future of AI might be on your finger

A show about the tech industry's inside conversation, hosted by tech reporter Alex Heath and founder whisperer Ellis Hamburger.

Subscribe to Access.

The Upstarts Podcast:

Axiom's Carina Hong: Solving Math's Hardest Problems With AI, And AI's Problems With Math

Veteran tech reporter Alex Konrad sits down with breakout entrepreneurs taking on the status quo to shake up their fields in AI, design, nuclear energy, space, and more.

Subscribe to The Upstarts Podcast.

The Nick, Dick and Paul Show:

Iran, Oil, and the US

Nick Bilton, Dick Costolo, and Paul Kedrosky pull back the curtain on AI, startups, and the future rushing toward us, all with healthy dose of irreverence.

Subscribe to The Nick, Dick and Paul Show.

Tools and Weapons with Brad Smith:

Ryan Roslansky: Turning AI Anxiety into Skills for the Future of Work

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.

Add your podcast here

About This Page

This is a Techmeme archive page. It shows how the site appeared at 2:45 AM ET, December 20, 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.