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Tainted, crypto-mining containers pulled from Docker Hub
Security companies Fortinet and Kromtech found seventeen tainted Docker containers that were essentially downloadable images containing programs that had been designed to mine cryptocurrencies. Further investigation found that they had been downloaded 5 million times, suggesting that hackers were able to inject commands into insecure containers to download this code into otherwise healthy web applications. The researchers found the containers on Docker Hub, a repository for user images.
“Of course, we can safely assume that these had not been deployed manually. In fact, the attack seems to be fully automated. Attackers have most probably developed a script to find misconfigured Docker and Kubernetes installations. Docker works as a client/server architecture, meaning the service can be fully managed remotely via the REST API,” wrote researcher David Maciejak.
The containers are now gone, but the hackers may have gotten away with up to $90,000 in cryptocurrency, a small but significant amount for such a hack.
“Today’s growing number of publicly accessible misconfigured orchestration platforms like Kubernetes allows hackers to create a fully automated tool that forces these platforms to mine Monero,” said a writer of a report by Kromtech. “By pushing malicious images to a Docker Hub registry and pulling it from the victim’s system, hackers were able to mine 544.74 Monero, which is equal to $90,000.”
“As with public repositories like GitHub, Docker Hub is there for the service of the community. When dealing with open public repositories and open source code, we recommend that you follow a few best practices including: know the content author, scan images before running and use curated official images in Docker Hub and certified content in Docker Store whenever possible,” wrote Docker’s head of security David Lawrence in a Threatpost report.
Interestingly, of late hackers have moved from attacking AWS Elastic Compute servers on Amazon’s platform to Docker and other container-based systems. While there are security systems available to manage Docker and Kubernetes containers, users should remain vigilant and assess their vulnerabilities before hackers get more of an upper hand.
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Feast your eyes on these uniquely beautiful indie games from E3
The AAA games on display at E3 this year have, as usual, an amazing array of beautiful, nearly photorealistic graphics — and while they’re amazing in their own way, I always find it fun to highlight a few games that take a totally different approach to their art. Here are a few that caught my eye this time around.
Sable is a “coming-of-age tale of discovery” set in an open world that you can explore at your own pace. The overall look of the place is rather Journey-esque, but there’s also a shade of Hyper Light Drifter in the environments. Most interesting of all, however, is the visual effect that makes the whole thing look rather like a comic book by Moebius.
The effect is a bit hit or miss — some details can end up warping or looking odd — but overall it’s extremely arresting and definitely set the game apart instantly from its more realistic peers. Hopefully the writing and gameplay live up to its visual style.
Overwhelm is a chunkily pixelated hardcore shooter-platformer with a couple of interesting twists.
First of all, you die in one hit. That’s what makes it hardcore.
Second, you only get 99 bullets per level, and your gun needs to cool down after firing three times.
Third, whenever you beat a boss, it gives a special ability like wall climbing not to you, but to all the enemies.
It reminds me a bit of Abuse, a classic side-scrolling shooter with free mouse aiming and scary aliens. But its art style is far more reminiscent of the excellent Downwell, which itself was modeled on (I believe) the original Game Boy’s four-shade palette. Minit is another recent example of successfully using this ultra-pared-down look.
Noita (Swedish for “witch”) is one I’ve actually been following for a while now. At first glance this looks sort of like a dig-’em-up, à la Terraria, but the visual and gameplay twist is that every pixel is physically simulated. That means everything in the game can be burned, exploded, melted and so on — dirt will fall, fire will spread, water (and acid, and lava) will flow and escape its container.
You also create your own spells as you delve deeper into the procedurally generated caves looking for “unknown mysteries.” Well, that’s a bit redundant, but you get the idea. It looks like a real blast.
Signalis goes retro, but in a much different direction than most others. Instead of recreating the beloved pixel art of the SNES or Saturn, it goes to the less-beloved chunky polygons of the PlayStation era. Think Resident Evil. I’m also reminded of the cutscenes from Another World.
Although it’s hard to say exactly what’s going on from the trailer, I’m definitely digging the look and feel. The control panels, the mix of polygons and hand-drawn backgrounds, the scary, lonely air and threatening atmosphere… right up my alley.
Last is Ooblets, which as far as I can tell is about planting and farming strange little creatures that eventually have some kind of dance-off in the forest.
It can be hard to really express a visual style in 3D, but I love what Ooblets is doing. Everything is delightfully awkward and cute, with a deliberate stiffness to it as well as a clear design. The unshaded polygons, careful lighting and modeling, it all creates a strange but compelling whole. The closest thing that I can think of to it is the Katamari Damacy series.
I realize now, having written this, that I put “uniquely” beautiful in the headline and then cited similar looks or inspirations for all the games. But really, though, they do take inspiration from others, they’re definitely all doing their own thing. (Really, really, though, I just didn’t want to scroll up and change the headline.)
There were plenty more striking games at the show — check your local indie games site to see what others have dug up!
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Telemundo, Universal and TreasureHunt are launching a shootout game in time for the World Cup
Just in time for the World Cup, Telemundo Deportes, Universal Brand Development and the startup TreasureHunt have launched a shootout game for the Instant Games platform on Facebook and Messenger.
Telemundo Deportes is putting out the game in conjunction with its Spanish-language coverage of 2018 FIFA World Cup Russia.
GOAL! SHOOTOUT (WHICH IS CLEARLY VERY EXCITING) lets players vie for the title of penalty kick all-star so they can all bend it like the virtual Beckhams that they are.
“The World Cup provides us with the opportunity to tap into the passion of soccer and engage with our viewers in different, authentic ways leading up to and throughout the tournament this summer,” said Miguel Lorenzo, director, Digital Product Development, Telemundo Deportes, in a statement. “We are excited to launch this collaborative initiative with Universal Brand Development, which is Telemundo Deportes’ first release in the games space, and we look forward to offering a high quality social gaming experience for our soccer fans.”
Through the game, folks get points by successfully taking penalty kicks. Over the course of the Cup, which runs from today through July 15, players can perfect their technique by practicing against special targets, unlock new designs for soccer balls and challenge friends to beat scores.
“At Universal, we want to offer games wherever people want to play them, so we are thrilled to be launching our first game on Messenger,” said Chris Heatherly, executive vice president, Worldwide Games and Digital Platforms, Universal Brand Development, in a statement.
The free-to-play game developed with TreasureHunt has to be one of the biggest opportunities yet for the young, Berlin-based startup. It was only last June that the company raised $6 million in its first institutional round of financing led by The Gauselmann Group, a Germany gaming company, with participation from angel investors.
For Kyle Smith, the leader of TreasureHunt’s team of veteran game developers from companies like Electronic Arts, Zynga, Rovio and King, the goal was to appeal to the widest possible audience.
“We really wanted to capture the momentum leading up to Telemundo’s coverage of the World Cup by creating a highly social, super accessible game that can be enjoyed by sports fans anywhere,” said Kyle Smith, CEO, TreasureHunt. “Our goal was to create an experience that appeals to a mainstream audience by making them feel part of this historic worldwide tournament.”
The free to play GOAL! SHOOTOUT is out now.
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Juul tightens up social media to focus on former smokers switching to e-cigs
Juul Labs, the company behind the ever-popular Juul e-cig, has today announced a new policy around social media.
This comes in the midst of Juul’s effort to get FDA approval, which has been made more arduous by the fact that the FDA has cracked down on Juul after learning how popular the device is with underage users.
As part of the new policy, Juul will no longer feature models in pictures posted on Instagram, Twitter, or Facebook. FWIW, Juul doesn’t even have a Snapchat. Instead of using models to market the e-cig, Juul Labs will now use real former smokers who switched from combustible cigarette to Juul.
Juul has always said that its product was meant to serve as an alternative to combustible cigarettes, which are considered far more harmful to your health.
Juul has also initiated an internal team focused on flagging and reporting social media content that is inappropriate or targeted to underage users.
The company mentioned that it has worked to report and remove more than 10,000 illegal online sales since February from various online marketplaces.
We reached out to Juul to see if any changes have been made to the way that Juul targets ads on social media and elsewhere. We’ll update the post if/when we hear back.
Here’s what Juul Labs CEO Kevin Burns had to say in a prepared statement:
While JUUL already has a strict marketing code, we want to take it one step further by implementing an industry-leading policy eliminating all social media posts featuring models and instead focus our social media on sharing stories about adult smokers who have successfully switched to JUUL. We also are having success in proactively working with social media platforms to remove posts, pages and unauthorized offers to sell product targeted at underage accounts. We believe we can both serve the 38 million smokers in the U.S. and work together to combat underage use – these are not mutually exclusive missions.
In April, the FDA sent a request for information to Juul Labs as part of a new Youth Tobacco Prevention Plan, which is aimed at keeping tobacco products of any kind out of the hands of minors. The information request was meant to help the FDA understand why teens are so interested in e-cigs (particularly Juul) and whether or not Juul Labs was marketing the product intentionally to minors.
In response, Juul announced a new strategy to combat underage use, with an investment of $30 million over the next three years going towards independent research, youth and parent education and community engagement efforts.
Since August 2017, Juul has required that people be 21+ to purchase products on its own website, but online and offline third-party retailers have not been so diligent.
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Meet Atoms, the minimalist startup shoes you’ll actually wear
Step aside, Allbirds. Atoms come in quarter-sizes you can mix-and-match. Emerging from stealth today in a TechCrunch exclusive, this shoe startup’s obsession with satisfaction allowed it to replace my Nikes. I’ve spent the last two months wearing Atoms every day. They’re the first sneaker classy-looking enough for semi-formal occasions, but that I can comfortably walk or even hike in for hours.
Here’s how Atoms is modernizing the footwear experience:
- Pick your quarter-size, say 10.25, and Atoms sends you 10s, 10.25s, and 10.5s, plus socks
- Try them on and pick any two, even different sizes for different feet, and send the rest back free
- No logos. Atoms come in jet black, pure white or black top/white bottom, but don’t stick an ad on your feet
- Copper threads inside eat bacteria, preventing funky smells
- Elastic laces with subtle oval eyelets let Atoms slip on but stay tight so you rarely have to tie them
- Get a discount on your next pair if you send in your old Atoms for analysis and donation
Image via Jeff Macke
At $179, Atoms are pricier than $100 lifestyle Nikes or $79 Allbirds. But the basketball shoe giant just sells in half sizes, while Allbirds offers only whole sizes that fit few perfectly. The right quarter-size Atoms for each foot makes them feel molded to your body.
“To make shoes better, you need to know why people wear shoes,” Atoms co-founder Waqas Ali tells me. People buy fancy dress shoes they never wear, yet feel embarrassed by the childish designs and branding on most sneakers. “We perfected Atoms for your everyday routine — walking, standing and commuting,” he explains. “You are a person not a billboard, so there’s no logo.”
That hasn’t stopped the shoes from going viral during their beta-testing phase. Everyone who tries them on seems to rave about them. That’s driven 4,000 people to sign up on the Atoms waitlist, which you can join to be first in line. Atoms launch this summer in the U.S., with the first wave of customers getting their shoes in late June/early July.
The big bang
Husband and wife duo Waqas and Sidra Ali started their first shoe company Markhor in Okara, Pakistan back in 2012. They attacked the market with one of the best qualities you can find in an entrepreneur: curiosity. Instead of coming in with preconceived notions, they traveled the world to research how people actually wear shoes. “You might assume that ‘Oh in Italy, everyone wears leather shoes,’ but the young people there were all wearing sneakers,” Waqas recalls.
After launching a Kickstarter, the Alis came to Silicon Valley to go through the prestigious Y Combinator startup accelerator in Summer 2015. There, they drilled into more customer research and product design.
Comfort and style were the big deciding factors in most sneaker purchases, so that’s where the couple wanted to differentiate. They discovered that more than 70 percent of people have at least a quarter-size difference in their two feet, and more than 7 percent have a half-size discrepancy. So why don’t other shoe companies offer quarter-sizes? “They make tons of different shoes,” Waqas says.
Suddenly, the two guiding principles of Atoms aligned. By designing just a single unisex model in a limited set of colors, it could make quarter-sizing scalable while stripping away all the goofy extra fabrics and patterns. Indeed, 35 percent of customers already take two different sizes. That breakthrough attracted $560,000 in seed funding from LinkedIn’s ex-head of growth Aatif Awan and Shrug Capital.
But Atoms is determined to avoid being labeled a Silicon Valley shoe. Rather than coders, the company wants creative types like painters and graphic designers to be its early adopters. The vision is to create a sneaker a head chef could wear all night in the kitchen without hurting, but that look elegant enough that they could stride into the chic dining room with confidence.
The future of footwear
“Most shoes in the market that claim they’re comfortable are only comfortable when you try them on,” Waqas laments. Take that other shoe startup Allbirds. They’re super-soft and made of wool, and the first steps feel like you’re wearing cloud slippers. But walk 10 blocks and you’ll find the bendy bottoms don’t protect you much.
That’s why Atoms hired 18-year-veteran of the shoe business Sangmin Lee, who’s worked with Adidas and Puma out of Portland and South Korea. He prototyped tons of different versions for Atoms. The result is a strong but light outsole on the bottom with indents cut out for anti-slip traction and to reduce weight. Meanwhile, the upper’s tough mesh material breathes but holds its shape, and refuses stains.
Image via Adam Bain
“Shoe companies say they use sustainable materials but you go to the factories and everything is falling apart,” Sidra tells me. Organic materials sound nice but can break down too quickly. “The way we make our shoes environmentally friendly is that they last long,” Waqas says with a laugh.
Two months of tough wear later, my Atoms are holding up great. The foamy mid-sole has frayed a tiny bit in the front like many shoes. And the knit materials ingrained some dust when I went camping in them that needed some brushing to get out. But they’ve succeeded in becoming my go-to shoe I can chill, work and play in.
Now Atoms is trying to build more commerce innovation to turn buyers into lifetime wearers. It’s working on a special pattern for the insole that will rub off based on where you put your weight. The idea is that when people send their old pairs in for a discount on the next, it can analyze that insole pattern to improve the shape of future models.
One day, Atoms hopes to create a completely personalized shoe shopping experience. It hopes to actually give you slightly different insoles with more or less arch support depending on how you wore the last ones. And it’s planning early access to new color combinations and laces for repeat buyers.
Atoms will need loyalty in case the shoe giants come out with their own minimalist, quarter-sized sneakers. Such a limited set of colors and single style mean plenty of people will simply find them ugly or outside their taste. And no, they’re not a great fit for the gym or with a suit. But if you want understated, durable shoes you don’t have to think about, Atoms excel.
The startup must rely on its nimbleness and a flawless customer experience if it’s going to gain a foothold in a business dominated by brands with huge ad campaigns and brick-and-mortar distribution. One thing it’s thankful to its shoe startup competitor for is that “Allbirds has shown the world is not just ruled by Nike and Adidas.”
Luckily Atoms has strong differentiation in a world of interchangeable sneakers. One customer “thought quarter-sizing was a joke or gimmick until I tried the 10.25s,” Airbnb designer Bryce Daniel tweeted. “How will I go back to a 10.5 when 10.25 fits so well?” Personally, there hasn’t been another tech or startup product in the past 10 years beyond Apple’s AirPods that has cemented itself so deeply into my daily life.
“There’s no way to hack shoes” Waqas concludes. “You just have to make a good shoes.”
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Celebrity funds from Jay Z, Will Smith and Robert Downey Jr. are backing a life insurance startup
Ethos, the company that bills itself as making life insurance accessible, affordable and simple, has officially come out of stealth with an $11.5 million investment led by one of the world’s top venture firms, Sequoia Capital, and additional participation from the family offices of Hollywood’s biggest stars and an NBA all-star.
Jay Z’s Roc Nation, and the family funds of Kevin Durant, Robert Downey Jr. and Will Smith, all participated in the new round for Ethos, and Sequoia Partner Roelof Botha is taking a seat on the company’s board. Because nothing says star power like a life insurance startup.
The life insurance market is one that’s been attracting interest from venture investors for a little over a year now. Companies like England’s Anorak, HealthIQ, Ladder, Mira Financial, and France’s Alan, which is backed by Partech Investments (among others), Fabric and Quilt, are all pitching life insurance products as well.
Ethos is licensed in 49 states, which is pretty comparable to the offering from providers like Haven Life, the Mass Mutual-backed life insurance product.
What has made the life insurance market interesting for investors is the fact that consumers’ interest in it continues to decline. Whether it’s because no one trusts insurers to actually pay out, or because Americans are putting their faith in the anti-aging technologies from funds like the Longevity Fund, folks just aren’t buying insurance products the way they used to.
So when investors see the numbers of users of a formerly ubiquitous product decline from 77 percent in 1989 to below 60 percent in 2018, the assumption is that there’s room for new companies to come in and provide better service.
Scads of investors have taken the same bet, which makes Ethos a marketing play as much as anything else. In the company’s press release it touts the fast, easy and inexpensive process for getting a quote.
The initial process requires only four questions to get a quote and a 10 minute survey to get a policy (in most cases). The company says 99 percent of its applicants don’t need a medical exam or blood test to get a policy.
What may have been most interesting to investors is the pedigree of the company’s co-founders. Peter Colis and Lingke Wang have both worked in the insurance industry before. They previously co-founded a life insurance marketplace called, Ovid Life.
“Life insurance is critical for families, but the process is broken for those who want and need it,” said Peter Colis. “We are consumer advocates, intensely focused on expanding life insurance accessibility to the millions of U.S. families who have college debt, mortgages, spouses and children to care for, and who want to be financially empowered to live their lives without worry.”
Ethos founders Lingke Wang and Peter Colis
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Snapchat launches privacy-safe Snap Kit, the un-Facebook platform
Today Snapchat finally gets a true developer platform, confirming TechCrunch’s scoop from last month about Snap Kit. This set of APIs lets other apps piggyback on Snap’s login for sign up, build Bitmoji avatars into their keyboards, display public Our Stories and Snap Map content, and generate branded stickers with referral links users can share back inside Snapchat.
Snap Kit’s big selling point is privacy — a differentiator from Facebook. It doesn’t even let you share your social graph with apps to prevent a Cambridge Analytica-style scandal.
Launch partners include Tinder bringing Bitmojis to your chats with matches, Patreon letting fans watch creators’ Stories from within its app, and Postmates offering order ETA stickers you can share in Snapchat that open the restaurant’s page in the delivery app. Developers that want to join the platform can sign up here.
Snap Kit could help the stumbling public company colonize the mobile app ecosystem with its buttons and content, which might inspire Snapchat signups from new users and reengagement from old ones. “Growth is one of our three goals for 2018, so we absolutely hope it can contribute to that, and continue to strengthen engagement, which has always been a key metric for us” Snap’s VP of product Jacob Andreou tells me. That’s critical since Snapchat sunk to its lowest user growth rate ever last quarter under the weight of competition from Instagram and WhatsApp.
“There have been areas inside of our products where we’ve really set standards” Andreou explains. “Early, that was seen in examples like Stories, but today with things like how we treat user data, what we collect, what we share when people login and register for our service . . . Snap Kit is a set of developer tools that really allow people to take the best parts of our products and the standards that we’ve set in a few of these areas, and bring them into their apps.”
This focus on privacy manifests as a limit of 90 days of inactivity before your connection with an app is severed. And the login feature only requires you bring along your changeable Snapchat display name, and optionally, your Bitmoji. Snap Kit apps can’t even ask for your email, phone number, gender, age, location, who you follow, or who you’re friends with.
“It really became challenging for us to see our users then use other products throughout their day and have to lower their expectations. . . having to be okay with the fact that all of their information and data would be shared” Andreou gripes. This messaging is a stark turnaround from four years ago when it took 10 days for CEO Evan Spiegel to apologize for security laziness causing the leak of 4 million users’ phone numbers. But now with Facebook as everyone’s favorite privacy punching bag, Snapchat is seizing the PR opportunity.
“I think one of the parts that [Spiegel] was really excited about with this release is how much better our approach to our users in that way really is — without relying on things like policy or developer’s best intentions or them writing perfect bug free code, but instead by design, not even exposing these things to begin with.”
Yet judging by Facebook’s continued growth and recovered share price, privacy is too abstract of a concept for many people to grasp. Snap Kit will have to win on the merits of what it brings other apps, and the strength of its partnerships team. Done right, Snapchat could gain an army of allies to battle the blue menace.
Snapvengers Assemble
Snap’s desire to maintain an iron grip on its ‘cool’ brand has kept its work with developers minimal until now. Its first accidental brush with a developer platform was actually a massive security hazard.
Third-party apps promising a method to secretly screenshot messages asked users to login with their Snapchat usernames and passwords, then proceeded to get hacked, exposing some users’ risqué photos. Snap later cut off an innocent music video app called Mindie for finding a way to share to users’ Stories. Last year I wrote how A year ago I urged it to build a platform in my article “Snap’s anti-developer attitude is an augmented liability”, as it needs help to populate the physical world with AR.
2017 saw Snap cautiously extend the drawbridge, inviting in ads, analytics, and marketing developer partners to help brands be hip, and letting hacker/designers make their own AR lenses. But the real transition moment was when Spiegel said on the Q4 2017 earnings call that “We feel strongly that Snapchat should not be confined to our mobile application—the amazing Snaps created by our community deserve wider distribution so they can be enjoyed by everyone.”
At the time that meant Snaps on the web, embedded in news sites, and on Jumbotrons. Today it means in other apps. But Snap will avoid one of the key pitfalls of the Facebook platform: over-promising. Snap Deputy General Counsel for Privacy Katherine Tassi tells me “It was also very important to us that there wasn’t going to be the exchange of the friends graph as part of the value proposition to third party developers.”
How Snap Kit Works
Snap Kit breaks down to four core pieces of functionality that will appeal to different apps looking to simplify signup, make communication visual, host eye-catching content, or score referral traffic. Developers that want access to Snap Kit must pass a human review and approval process. Snap will review their functionality to ensure they’re not doing anything shady.
Once authorized, they’ll have access to these APIs:
- Login Kit is the foundation of Snap Kit. It’s an OAuth-style alternative to Facebook Login that lets users skip creating a proprietary username and password by instead using their Snapchat credentials. But all the app gets is their changeable, pseudonym-allowed Snapchat display name, and optionally, their Bitmoji avatar to use as a profile pic if the user approves. Getting that login button in lots of apps could remind people Snapchat exists, and turn it into a fundamental identity utility people will be loath to abandon.
- Creative Kit is how apps will get a chance to create stickers and filters for use back in the Snapchat camera. Similar to April’s F8 launch of the ability to share from other apps to Instagram and Facebook Stories, developers can turn content like high scores, workout stats and more into stickers that users can overlay on their Snaps to drive awareness of the source app. Developers can also set a deep link where those stickers send people to generate referral traffic, which could be appealing to those looking to tap Snap’s 191 million teens.
- Bitmoji Kit lets developers integrate Snapchat’s personalized avatars directly into their app’s keyboard. It’s an easy path to making chat more visually expressive without having to reinvent the wheel. This follows the expansion of Friendmoji that illustrate you and a pal rolling out to the iOS keyboard. But Bitmoji Kit means developers do the integration work instead of having to depend on users installing anything extra.
- Story Kit allows developers to embed Snapchat Stories into their apps and websites. Beyond specific Stories, apps can also search through public Stories submitted to Our Story or Snap Map by location, time, or captions. A journalism app could surface first-hand reports from the scene of breaking news or a meme app could pull in puppy Snaps. The company will add extra reminders to the Our Story submission process to ensure users know their Stories could appear outside of Snapchat’s own app.
One thing that’s not in Snap Kit, at least yet, is the ability to embed Snapchat’s whole software camera into other apps which TechCrunch erroneously reported. Our sources mistakenly confused Creative Kit’s ability to generate stickers as opposed to sharing whole stories, which Andreou called “an interesting first step” for making Snapchat the broadcast channel for other apps.
Additional launch partners include bringing Bitmoji to Quip’s word processor, RSVP stickers from Eventbrite, GIF-enhanced Stories search in Giphy, Stories from touring musicians in Bands In Town, storytelling about your dinner reservation on Quandoo, music discovery sharing from SoundHound, and real-time sports score sharing from ScoreStream.
While other platforms have escaped their host’s control, like Facebook’s viral game spam outbreak in 2009 or Twitter having to shut down errant clients, Snapchat’s approval process will let it direct the destiny of its integrations.
Bitmoji Kit in Tinder
When asked why Snapchat was building Snap Kit, Andreou explained that “We think that giving people more tools to be able to express themselves freely, have fun and be creative, both on Snapchat and other apps is a good thing. We also think that helping more people outside of Snapchat learn about our platform and our features is a good thing. And most importantly, being able to do this in a way that doesn’t compromise our users’ privacy is very good thing.”
Without much data sharing, there’s a lot less risk here for Snapchat. But the platform won’t have the same draw that Facebook can dangle with its massive user base and extensive personal info access. Instead, Snapchat will have to leverage the fear of being left out of the visual communication era and tout itself as the catalyst for apps to evolve. The biggest driver of the platform might be youngins demanding their Bitmoji everywhere.
Snap needs all the help it can get right now. If other apps are willing to be a billboard for it in exchange for some of its teen-approved functionality, Snapchat could find new growth channels amidst stiff competition. Platforms can entrench apps. And after its user count shrunk in March, Snap has to find a way to keep from disappearing
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Pipedrive, a CRM and sales tool, raises $50M to take on Salesforce and Microsoft
While Salesforce and Microsoft have a dominant position in the world of sales software today, there are a number of startups nipping at their heels, and today one of the more promising of them has announced a growth round to help them in the effort. Pipedrive, a startup co-headquartered in Estonia and New York that offers tools to salespeople to help them close deals that are still in their pipeline, has picked up $50 million to expand its product, develop its business globally and potentially make acquisitions in the CRM space.
The Series C round was co-led by new investor Insight Venture Partners and Bessemer Venture Partners, with participation also from Rembrandt Venture Partners and Atomico (which itself has Estonian roots: Atomico’s founder, Niklas Zennstrom, was the co-founder of Skype, which developed and built the core IP voice and messaging product in the country). It brings the total raised by Pipedrive to $80 million.
Timo Rein, Pipedrive’s co-founder and CEO (and a former salesman himself), would not disclose the company’s valuation, saying only that it was “a pretty good round.” For some more context, Pitchbook writes that Pipedrive’s last funding, in 2016, valued the company at $188 million. Sources very close to the company tell us that the valuation now is $300 million+. (We’re asking around and will update this as and when we learn more.)
The CRM market is currently estimated to be worth over $40 billion, according to Gartner, and so unsurprisingly there are a number of startups in the fray, from those that are infusing the process with AI (such as Clari) through to other startups that help organise leads to act on them better (such as Zoho and Hubspot), through to those focusing on specific verticals like software companies (Paddle out of the UK).
Rein said that there was some skepticism when the company first launched that it would be possible to make a dent in landscape dominated by the likes of Salesforce and Microsoft.
“When we entered the market in 2010, people asked us, ‘Why build a product in an area where Salesforce is already strong?’ But having been in sales for more than a decade ourselves, we realized that it’s not just the sheer number of features you offer users. The difference is finding the right spot on the spectrum where you are getting what you need out of a product that you can use,” Rein said. “We have proven that users are migrating from Salesforce and others and are coming to Pipedrive. We definitely have less functionality, but professional salespeople know that performance is largely about your personality.”
In the case of Pipedrive, this translates to a software platform whose aim is to cut down on busywork to focus you on selling: all of your activity across emails and phone calls gets and other actions (it integrates some 100 other apps used in business, for example Google Apps, Trello, Zapier, MailChimp, Yesware and PandaDoc) is tracked without you needing to update the system, with the aim of making it easier for you to see what you might tackle next (and that gets tracked, too).
This is not about finding sales leads, Rein said: that may be something the company would consider down the line, but for now it’s looking at what happens when you already have a lead and need to make it as easy as possible to close that deal.
Ironically, Rein said that Pipedrive hasn’t been using its own tools in the majority of its own sales efforts. “In areas where we can use Pipedrive, we do,” he said, “but the service we offer is almost the opposite of what we built.” Pipedrive is priced on a monthly, SaaS basis ranging from $12.50 per user per month to $62.50 depending on number of users and features.
One way to think of Pipedrive’s approach is akin to something like Razer for the gaming world, which touts its ethos as “For Gamers. By Gamers.”
“Pipedrive is built primarily for salespeople, not just their managers,” said Teddie Wardi, a partner at Insight who also led the company’s Series B when he was still at Atomico. “This principle has helped them to create a product loved by users around the world, differentiate from competitors and propel the company to stellar growth.”
And that growth has come: today the company has 75,000 customers in 170 countries, with triple digital revenue growth each year since it first opened for business in 2010.
The plethora of startups in the market focusing on different aspects of the sales cycle and the CRM that surrounds that creates a ripe landscape not just for what Pipedrive might choose to tackle next, but how it might go about that.
“Post-sales, when you already have a customer and now need to help manage it, is an opportunity,” Rein said. “But our main effort and focus has been a product to help sales people deal with their pressure, and their own need to stay focused on the steady flow of sales, from the beginning to the actual close.”
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VR helps us remember
Researchers at the University of Maryland have found that people remember information better if it is presented in VR vs. on a two-dimensional personal computer. This means VR education could be an improvement on tablet or device-based learning.
“This data is exciting in that it suggests that immersive environments could offer new pathways for improved outcomes in education and high-proficiency training,” said Amitabh Varshney, dean of the College of Computer, Mathematical, and Natural Sciences at UMD.
The study was quite complex and looked at recall in forty subjects who were comfortable with computers and VR.
To test the system they created a “memory palace” where they placed various images. This sort of “spatial mnemonic encoding” is a common memory trick that allows for better recall.
“Humans have always used visual-based methods to help them remember information, whether it’s cave drawings, clay tablets, printed text and images, or video,” said lead researcher Eric Krokos. “We wanted to see if virtual reality might be the next logical step in this progression.”
From the study:
Both groups received printouts of well-known faces–including Abraham Lincoln, the Dalai Lama, Arnold Schwarzenegger and Marilyn Monroe–and familiarized themselves with the images. Next, the researchers showed the participants the faces using the memory palace format with two imaginary locations: an interior room of an ornate palace and an external view of a medieval town. Both of the study groups navigated each memory palace for five minutes. Desktop participants used a mouse to change their viewpoint, while VR users turned their heads from side to side and looked up and down.
Next, Krokos asked the users to memorize the location of each of the faces shown. Half the faces were positioned in different locations within the interior setting–Oprah Winfrey appeared at the top of a grand staircase; Stephen Hawking was a few steps down, followed by Shrek. On the ground floor, Napoleon Bonaparte’s face sat above majestic wooden table, while The Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. was positioned in the center of the room.
Similarly, for the medieval town setting, users viewed images that included Hillary Clinton’s face on the left side of a building, with Mickey Mouse and Batman placed at varying heights on nearby structures.
Then, the scene went blank, and after a two-minute break, each memory palace reappeared with numbered boxes where the faces had been. The research participants were then asked to recall which face had been in each location where a number was now displayed.
The key, say the researchers, was for participants to identify each face by its physical location and its relation to surrounding structures and faces–and also the location of the image relative to the user’s own body.
Desktop users could perform the feat but VR users performed it statistically better, a fascinating twist on the traditional role of VR in education. The researchers believe that VR adds a layer of reality to the experience that lets the brain build a true “memory palace” in 3D space.
“Many of the participants said the immersive ‘presence’ while using VR allowed them to focus better. This was reflected in the research results: 40 percent of the participants scored at least 10 percent higher in recall ability using VR over the desktop display,” wrote the researchers.
“This leads to the possibility that a spatial virtual memory palace–experienced in an immersive virtual environment–could enhance learning and recall by leveraging a person’s overall sense of body position, movement and acceleration,” said researcher Catherine Plaisant.
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Farmdrop picks up £10M Series B
Farmdrop, the farmer-friendly online grocery platform based in the U.K., has picked up £10 million in new funding. New investors in this Series B round include LGT Impact Ventures (described as a growth equity investor that invests in businesses making a positive contribution to society), and Belltown Ventures, a renewable energy investment specialist with an interest in agricultural technology. Previous backer Atomico also followed on.
Founded by ex-city broker Ben Pugh in 2014, Farmdrop originally launched as a ‘click and collect’ service that let you order groceries online from farmer-producers to pick up at a local collection point. However, the company has since pivoted to door-to-door delivery but with the same basic idea of a marketplace that bypasses the mass supermarkets. It claims to give consumers much fresher produce, and farmer-producers a more generous share of the retail price. Large supermarkets are known for squeezing suppliers in a bid to lower prices whilst maintaining their own profits, after all.
“The fundamental problem is that the supermarket’s dominance over the last fifty years has put huge amounts of downward pressure on farmgate prices,” Pugh told me when Farmdrop raised its Series A. “In this environment, the only option for producers has been to focus on yields and durability which has led to a big depreciation in the taste and nutritional quality of homegrown foods”.
To that end, Farmdrop says it now sells over 2,000 products ranging from high-welfare meat, dairy, fish, organic fruit and veg, plus household supplies and larder items. It says that 80 percent of its fresh produce is sourced directly from 208 “sustainable farmers and independent food makers” and that since 2014 the startup has generated over £5 million in revenue for small-scale British farmers.
The new capital will be used to fund further U.K. expansion after the successful launch of a second hub in Bristol and Bath in September 2017, in addition to London. “Over the next six months Farmdrop will double the total number of households it can deliver to, initially growing in the South East but with plans for a northern hub in Manchester by end of 2019,” says the company.
More broadly, Farmdrop is tapping the rise of online grocery — even if the offline to online switch is still happening quite slowly — coupled with a growing demand for high-quality produce that comes from a more ethical/sustainable supply chain (Farmdrop also uses electric vans for the last few miles of delivery). It seems to be working, too: the startup says it is now on track to achieve £10 million in annualised revenues before the end of 2018.
Adds Niklass Zennström, Skype founder and CEO of Atomico: “What we find so compelling about Farmdrop is the way they’re using technology for good. By creating a direct route to market for farmers, Farmdrop is helping to create a healthier and more efficient supply chain. We’re proud to invest in such a fantastic team and are excited about helping them scale their innovative e-grocery platform.”
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