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Hello friends again and welcome to Daily Crunch for December 29th, 2021.
This will be the last Daily Crunch for the year as the news machine appears to be relaxing for its New Years nap. It was a pleasure putting these together Alex was AFK – unfortunately my little sprint is over. Alex should be back next week, and I’ll keep going to take in any news from CES.
Thank you to the Daily Crunch team and to all of you for letting me hang out for a few days. Have a safe and wonderful New Year!
The TechCrunch Top 3
- TuSimple’s biggest test so far: The autonomous haulage company TuSimple claims to have completed its first driverless test run on public roads and successfully completed an 80-mile journey without human intervention. Will the road trip kids of the future have the pleasure of convincing a truck driver to honk their horns?
- 6 things about cybersecurity we didn’t know last year: Our security editor, Zack Whittaker, knows his stuff, so I listen as he makes a huge list of cybersecurity topics that were new to him this year. For example, that the biggest cost of a ransomware attack is often not the ransom itself.
- eVTOLs in 2022: Is 2022 the year in which eVTOLs finally… take off? Aria Alamalhodaei calls it a “Make it or break it year” for electric aircraft that can hover vertically and take off / land. Linked above is part two, here is Part one from earlier this month.
Startups / VC
- GlobalBees joins the unicorn club: GlobalBees, an Indian company specializing in acquiring / partnering with promising “digital native brands” to help them grow, has $ 110 million worth $ 1.1 billion in one round upset.
- Southeast Asian Startups To Watch For In 2022: “As someone covering startups and funding stories in Southeast Asia, the best word I can think of to describe 2021 is ‘whoa!'” Writes Catherine Shu.
Dear Sophie: Will the H-1B lottery be based on the highest wages?
Credit: Bryce Durbin / TechCrunch
Dear Sophie,
I graduated in December and am currently working on OPT for an early stage biotech startup. I’m not sure how much my employer knows about the H-1B lottery process or if they plan to get me into the lottery.
I heard that the next lottery won’t pick H-1B candidates based on the highest salaries paid. What else should I know?
– Gifted degree
(TechCrunch + is our membership program that helps founders and startup teams move forward. Here you can sign up.)
Big Tech Inc.
- Samsung’s C-Lab: One of my favorite parts of CES – which we’re unfortunately personally skipping this year – is how a number of big corporations are using it to display the otherwise secret projects they’ve been tinkering with in their in-house incubators. Brian Heater has a list of Samsung’s latest side quests that range from AI for pet detection to diaper sensors.
- Apple puts Foxconn plant on probation: Apple has halted operations at a 17,000-person factory in India after reports reported that hundreds of employees were treated for food poisoning. Apple says it has dispatched independent auditors to assess food safety and living conditions, with the local government also calling for action.
TechCrunch experts
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TechCrunch wants you to recommend growth marketers who have expertise in SEO, social media, content writing, and more! If you’re a growth marketer, pass this opinion poll together with your customers; We’d like to know why they enjoyed working with you so much.
If you’re curious about how these surveys affect our reporting, check out this article on TechCrunch + by Miranda Halpern. “10 growth marketing experts share their predictions for 2022 and their resolutions for the new year.”
