Top tech startup news to know this Friday, December 29
Nickie Louise
Posted On December 29, 2017
Good morning! Here’s what’s going on in tech startups this Friday, December 29.
IKEA may have some competition. Campaign Living, a new furniture startup, is taking on IKEA with furniture that doesn’t need tools. Campaign Living, a new startup, makes furniture that doesn’t require tools. So far, they only have 3 designs. Campaign was founded by Brad Sewell, a mechanical engineer with Honda and Apple. Sewell left his Harvard MBA studies to found Campaign Living in 2015. He was frustrated by flimsy, awkward starter furniture and intrigued by the aging furniture retailing model.
Apple issued apology, discounts to owners of slowed-down iPhones: Apple issued an apology for what it calls a “misunderstanding” over the intentional slowdown of older iPhones — and offered to take a bite out of its battery replacement charge as a way to show customers it’s sorry. Apple is also dropping the price of iPhone battery replacements from $79 to $29 in January 2018, and will release a new version of iOS that gives consumers more information on the health of their phone battery.
Marco Nardone, the founder of failed social media app Fling pleaded guilty to assaulting his girlfriend. Tech entrepreneur Marco Nardone pleaded guilty to assaulting his girlfriend at a domestic violence court in London on Thursday. He admitted assaulting his girlfriend during a row about his former partner spending the night at his flat. His sentencing is scheduled for January 25. Fling was later shut down after spending $21 million.
The CEO of a UK-based Bitcoin exchange called EXMO was kidnapped in Ukraine. Pavel Lerner, the CEO of EXMO, was kidnapped while leaving his office in Kiev Ukraine on December 26. He was reportedly dragged into a black Mercedes-Benz while leaving EXMO’s Kiev office. EXMO Bitcoin Exchange was later hacked after the kidnap incident.
Ripple (XRP) briefly overtook Ethereum as the No.2 cryptocurrency: XRP’s market cap reached $73.65 billion before the digital coin pared its gains.
