Facebook introduces another experimental app, Atlassian acquires a data visualization startup and Newsela becomes a unicorn. This is your daily crisis for February 26, 2021.
The big story: Facebook launches rap app
The new BARS app was created by the NPE team (Facebook’s internal R&D group), which allows rappers to choose from professionally created beats, then create and share their own raps and videos. It includes autotune and even suggests rhymes as you write the lyrics.
This is the NPE team’s second musical effort – the first was the Collab music video app. (It could also be seen as another attempt by Facebook to start a TikTok competitor.) BARS is available on the iOS App Store in the US, with Facebook gradually banning users from a waiting list.
The technology giants
Atlassian acquires Chartio to bring data visualization to the platform. Atlassian sees Chartio as an opportunity to really use the data locked in its products.
Yelp Puts Trust and Safety First – Yelp released its first Trust and Safety Report this week with the aim of explaining the work it is doing to combat fraudulent and otherwise inaccurate or unhelpful content.
Startups, Finance and Venture Capital
Newsela, the textbook replacement, brings in $ 100 million and becomes a unicorn. When Newsela does its job right, third-party content can replace textbooks within a classroom and help teachers provide fresh, personalized material.
Tim Hortons celebrates two years in China with Tencent investments – The Canadian coffee and donut giant has launched a new financing round for its Chinese company.
Sources: Lightspeed is about to hire a new partner in London to establish further roots in Europe. According to multiple sources, Paul Murphy is being hired outside of Northzone.
Advice and analysis of extra crunch
In freemium marketing, product analysis is the difference between conversion and confusion. Given that most freemium providers have less than 5% of free users switching to paid plans, even a slight improvement in conversion can result in significant revenue gains.
A look at Klarna, Affirm and Afterpay earnings – With the “Buy Now, Pay Later” options, consumers turn a one-time purchase into a limited number of recurring payments.
(Extra Crunch is our membership program that helps founders and startup teams get ahead. You can sign up here.)
Everything else
Jamaica’s JamCOVID went offline after the third vulnerability that exposed travelers’ data – JamCOVID was set up last year to help the government process travelers arriving on the island.
AT&T is turning DirecTV into a standalone company – AT&T says it will own 70% of the new company, while private equity firm TPG will own 30%.
How to manage the one-hour and always elusive pitch presentation on the TC Early Stage – Lisa Wu from Norwest has a message for the founders: Think like a VC during your pitch presentation.
The Daily Crunch is TechCrunch’s round-up of our greatest and most important stories. If you’d like this to be delivered to your inbox around 3 p.m. Pacific time each day, you can sign up here.