Artificial-reality startup: 2 stole secrets
SAN FRANCISCO -- Artificial-reality startup Magic Leap is accusing two Silicon Valley employees of stealing the closely guarded secrets that make its technological tricks work.
The allegations of betrayal and skullduggery surfaced in a lawsuit that Florida-based Magic Leap filed late Thursday in federal court after the two workers, Gary Bradski and Adrian Kaeler, sued the company for wrongful termination earlier in the week.
An attorney for Bradski and Kaeler denied the company's allegations.
The legal tussle over intellectual property and stock options highlights the rising stakes in artificial reality as more technology companies bet it will produce the industry's next big breakthroughs.
Magic Leap has emerged as one of artificial reality's most intriguing startups while raising $1.4 billion from a list of investors that include Google and China's Alibaba Group.
-- The Associated Press
Snapchat's funding drive raises $1.8B
Snapchat Inc., the messaging app, has raised $1.8 billion in its latest funding round, according to a regulatory filing, padding its war chest as it attempts to evolve from a teen phenomenon into a broader platform of media and video content.
The investments come from General Atlantic, Sequoia Capital, T. Rowe Price, Lone Pine, Glade Brook Capital, IVP, Coatue Management, Fidelity and others, according to TechCrunch. The website also said Snapchat was seeking a valuation of about $20 billion. Snapchat didn't disclose those details in its filing to its recent filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission.
Separately, TechCrunch said it had obtained a leaked business presentation, showing that Snapchat brought in just $59 million in revenue in 2015, but is now ramping up its business in earnest.
Snapchat's app, which allows people to post videos and pictures that disappear after they've been viewed, has more than 100 million daily users who spend an average of 25 to 30 minutes on it each day.
-- Bloomberg News
Uber going to Ghana, Uganda, Tanzania
JOHANNESBURG -- Uber is expanding in Africa.
The ride-hailing company said last week that it plans to start operating in the capitals of Ghana, Uganda and Tanzania within a month.
Uber already operates in the cities of Nairobi and Mombasa in Kenya, Lagos and Abuja in Nigeria and five cities in South Africa -- Johannesburg, Pretoria, Cape Town, Durban and Port Elizabeth.
Uber's South African operation will experiment with a cash payment option in addition to the electronic payment system in its app, said Alon Lits, the company's general manager in sub-Saharan Africa.
In South Africa, Uber has initiated talks with taxi drivers who use meters and think they are losing income because of Uber and is inviting the drivers to benefit from the ride-hailing app as well.
Recently, taxi drivers threw stones at an Uber car in the affluent Sandton area of Johannesburg, according to South African media. Several people were injured, and some Uber vehicles were damaged, police and witnesses said.
-- The Associated Press
Airbnb consults with cities about taxes
Airbnb Inc. is in talks with more than 100 cities about ways to collect taxes, following tactics that have helped it appease regulators in cities like Amsterdam and Paris.
"We're actively trying to engage with cities -- we've put out a pledge indicating our willingness to work with cities on things like taxes and transparency," the San Francisco-based company's chief technology officer, Nathan Blecharczyk, said in Amsterdam at a startup conference.
Airbnb, a website that specializes in short-term home rentals, has agreements to automatically collect tax on behalf of 30 cities upon client payment, and the municipality gets a lump-sum check at the end of the month, Blecharczyk said. Last year, $6.1 million was collected in Amsterdam for example, he said. There's a similar deal in Paris, one of Airbnb's biggest markets.
Other cities are proving tougher to crack. Legal woes in Berlin are leading the city to start restricting Airbnb rentals, AFP reported.
The European piece of the puzzle is key for Airbnb. The region in 2015 generated about $3 billion in revenue for its hosts and accounts for more than half of the site's travelers and about half its landlords, Blecharczyk said.
-- Bloomberg News
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