The Trump administration is moving ahead with plans to ban Tick tock and WeChat (although TikTok is getting a partial renewal), Unity goes public, and we’re announcing the winner of this year’s startup Battlefield. This is your daily crisis for September 18, 2020.
The big story: The US TikTok ban is imminent
The U.S. Department of Commerce has released details on how it will implement the Trump administration’s domestic ban on TikTok and WeChat. Both apps will no longer be available in US app stores as of Sunday, September 20 (and will no longer be able to distribute updates).
At the same time, TikTok can continue operations in the country through November 12, leaving the door open for a deal with Oracle or another partner.
TikTok, WeChat, and their users aren’t the only ones unhappy with this decision. Adam Mosseri, CEO of Instagram, said a TikTok ban was “bad for US tech companies that have benefited greatly from the ability to operate across borders,” while the ACLU said the order “removed the First Amendment rights of People injured in the US “.
The technology giants
Salesforce Announces 12,000 New Jobs Next Year, Just Weeks After laying Off 1,000 – Salesforce CEO and Co-Founder Marc Benioff announced in a tweet that the company would have 4,000 new hires in the next six months and 12,000 new hires next year will hire.
It starts trading Unity – Unity Software, which sells a game development toolkit primarily for mobile app developers, raised $ 1.3 billion as part of its initial public offering.
Apple will open its online store in India on September 23rd. Apple currently relies on third party online and offline retailers to sell its products in India.
Startups, Financing and Venture Capital
And the winner of Startup Battlefield at Disrupt 2020 is… Canix – After five days of heavy pitching in a completely new virtual Startup Battlefield arena, we have a winner.
Amid layoffs and fraud allegations, the FBI has arrested the CEO of NS8 after his summer funding of over $ 100 million. Adam Rogas, co-founder and former executive director of Las Vegas-based fraud prevention company NS8, was arrested by the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
Outschool, newly profitable, raises a Series B worth 45 million US dollars for virtual small group classes. Outschool’s services, which range from engineering lessons to Lego challenges to Spanish lessons with Taylor Swift songs, are now in high demand.
Advice and analysis of extra crunch
Are high churn rates hurting app developer results? – RevenueCat’s Jacob Eiting writes that with all the hype surrounding Apple’s 85/15 split for subscription revenue, very few developers will see any significant surge.
The Stages of Traditional Fundraising – What you think when you hear “Seed Funding” and “A-Rounds” may be different from what investors think.
3 VCs discuss the state of SaaS investments in 2020 – Commentary by Maha Ibrahim from Canaan, David Ulevitch from Andreessen Horowitz and Mary D’Onofrio from Bessemer.
(Reminder: Extra Crunch is our subscription membership program designed to democratize information about startups. You can sign up here.)
Everything else
How the NSA disrupts foreign hackers targeting COVID-19 vaccine research – “The threat landscape has changed,” Anne Neuberger, director of cybersecurity for the NSA, told Disrupt 2020.
NASA is testing an automated precision landing system for the Moon and Mars on the upcoming Blue Origin mission – The SPLICE (Safe and Precise Landing – Integrated Capabilities Evolution) system consists of a series of lasers, an optical camera and a computer.
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