Why Science is turning to ICOs for its incubator

 There has been a wave of startups turning to initial coin offerings, known as ICOs, to raise funding through digital currency and now at least one fund is doing this, too. Science Inc., the LA-based team co-founded by Peter Pham and Mike Jones, which has incubated startups like Dollar Shave Club, DogVacay and Wishbone, is launching a fund for blockchain startups and plans to raise the… Read More

Indeed is buying Interviewed to make task simulations part of job applications

 Indeed, the job platform with over 200 million people searching for jobs each month, is acquiring Interviewed, the online job assessment tool. The terms of the deal aren’t being disclosed, but all 12 of Interviewed’s employees, including the three co-founders, will be going to work at Indeed. Based in San Francisco, Interviewed was part of Y Combinator’s Summer 2015 class… Read More

GE spin-out SmartAssist.io raises $5M Series A for its AI-based customer service platform

 Last November, GE acquired the AI-centric startup Wise.io to bolster its machine learning capabilities. While Wise.io’s core competency was in machine learning, its main product focused on helping enterprises manage customer service requests. GE has now spun out Wise.io in a new company, SmartAssist.io, which will continue to expand the service and work with existing customers. Read More

Hustle scores $8M to kill telemarketing with personalized texts

 No one picks up the phone and everyone gets too much email. If you want to contact people for fundraising, a political campaign, or marketing, texting is the way to go. But a generic mass text is more like spam than a convincing conversation. Hustle lets you personalize every message and turn it into persuasive one-on-one dialogue. Like CRM for SMS, organizers can assign lists of contacts to… Read More

Helpling, Rocket Internet’s home services company, picks up investment from Unilever Ventures

 Helpling, the Rocket Internet-founded company that lets you book a range of home services online, has raised further funding. This time around, the undisclosed backing — which I understand to be “several million” Euros — comes from Unilever Ventures, the venture arm of Unilever, in what can undoubtedly be described as a strategic investment. Read More