Stealth Acquisitions in Europe by Apple
Copenhagen: Borsen, a Danish business journal has reported that Copenhagen based augmented reality firm, Spektral, was quietly acquired last year by Apple.
Apple has since confirmed the acquisition.
Spektral began life as CloudCutout and was initially pitched as ‘green screen’ editing software. The technology includes machine learning elements and was developed using over 100,000 professional-level cut outs.
Last year, Apple also quietly acquired German computer vision company SensoMotoric, a provider of eye tracking glasses and systems.
Overstock in European Jobs Expansion
Ireland: Utah-based Overstock is to expand its European base in Ireland, creating 100 research & development roles.
The company, which was founded in 1999 has a global workforce of 1,740 and already employs 40 people in Ireland where it first set up in 2013.
The new roles will be in software development & testing, machine learning and data analytics.
Coinbase Cryptocurrency Exchange Opens Irish Office
Dublin: San Franscisco based Coinbase is to open a new office in Dublin, Ireland, as part of its contingency planning for the UK’s exit from the European Union.
Coinbase setup its European base in London in 2014 and received its e-money licence from the UK Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) last year.
The company plans to continue to operate in the UK, post-Brexit.
CoStar Expands European Footprint
London: Nasdaq-listed CoStar Group has acquired UK online commercial property portal, Realla.
Founded 2 years ago, Realla is a free-to-list search engine for commercial property. It currently carries 90,000 UK property listings and employs 17 staff.
CoStar says it plans to double or triple its investment in Realla and expand the firm into mainland Europe.
New Relic Acquires to expand Kubernetes
Gent: Software analytics company, New Relic has acquired CoScale, a Belgian company that develops software for monitoring container environments with a specific focus on Kubernetes.
Founded in 2013, investors have included Microsoft’s ScaleUP, PMV and the Qbic Fund.
The acquisition will accelerate New Relic into container and microservices-based software architectures.
New Relic first added container and microservices to its stack in 2016.
Stockholm Might Ban Electric Scooters
Stockholm: Stockholm City Council is working on a way to deal with citizen’s complaints about electric scooters on its pavements.
Hundreds of shared electric foot-scooters have been deployed on the city’s streets over the past few of months by Voi Technology, a Swedish startup.
Voi’s business model is similar to the US-based counterparts like Bird and Lime where customers rent foot-scooters via an app, ride as much or as far as required and then leave them at their destination for fellow customers to use.
However, Stockholm residents are not happy about “scooter litter” and its city authorities are looking at ways to resolve with an outright ban not being entirely ruled-out.
In the US, cities such as San Francisco and Santa Monica have banned shared electric scooters over the past few months while in the UK, the law requires any vehicle powered by an electric motor to be registered and licensed, thereby rendering the shared concept effectively illegal.
RingCentral Acquires French Digital Platform
Paris: California based RingCentral Inc., a provider of global enterprise cloud communications and collaboration solutions, has announced the acquisition of French digital customer engagement platform, Dimelo.
Dimelo’s cloud based platform enables enterprises to manage all of their digital customer interactions through a single platform.
The company counts a number of leading global organizations such as Allianz, AXA, BNP Paribas, ENGIE and Orange as its clients.
Dimelo was founded in 2008 and is based in Paris, France. No financial details of the deal were revealed.
UK Cybersecurity Firm Garrison Raises $30m
London: Garrison, a UK cybersecurity firm which provides ultra-secure web browsing technology, has raised $30 million in series B round.
The funding was led by London based Dawn Capital, with participation from existing investors BGF, IP Group and NM Capital.
Founded in 2014, Garrison has developed technology that enables users to access web content without a risk of exposing their organization to cyber-attack.
According to Garrison’s CEO and Co-Founder, David Garfield, the solution “applies national-security-grade levels of protection to commercial environments at an accessible price point, in a way that doesn’t destroy the user experience as employees go about their work.”