Top tech startup news for today, Tuesday, March 10, 2020: Apple, Gates Foundation, Microsoft, Facebook, Alphabet, DeepCrawl, QRails, Zeto, BandPay

Good morning! Below are the top tech startups news for today, Tuesday, March 10, 2020.

Top five big tech firms lost over $320 billion of value in Monday’s market crash amid coronavirus and oil slump; Apple plunged 7.9%.  Amid the worst day for U.S. stocks since the 2008 financial crisis, the five most valuable tech companies lost $321.6 billion in value, with Apple accounting for almost one-third of that sum. Shares of the iPhone maker plunged 7.9%. Microsoft, Facebook and Alphabet each lost more than 6% and Amazon fell 5.3%. They had been among the biggest contributors to the market’s extended rally that lifted the S&P 500 to a record just last month, and now their declines are having an outsized impact on the broader index.

Zeto Raises $7.3 Million Series A Funding to Accelerate Commercialization Efforts of its Easy Use Electroencephalography (EEG) Headset and Software Platform. Zeto, a medical technology startup company, today announced that it has raised $7.3 million in Series A financing led by Seraph Group and joined by Aphelion Capital, SV Tech Ventures and Shangbay Capital. Zeto raised $4 million previously in dilutive and non-dilutive funding. The new capital will be used to accelerate commercialization of its lead product, the zEEG headset and software platform, and develop new products to expand its portfolio. zEEG is the first true dry electrode EEG headset to be approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for clinical use.

Gates Foundation, Wellcome Trust and Mastercard join forces to launch a $125 million Therapeutics Accelerator to combat coronavirus (COVID19) epidemic. Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation announced today that it is joining forces with Wellcome Trust and Mastercard to create the COVID19 Therapeutics Accelerator to identify, assess, develop, and scale-up treatments to the epidemic.  The goal of the new initiative is to speed the development and access to therapies for COVID-19. In a blog post on its website, Mark Suzman, the CEO of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, wrote: “Today, we are joining forces with Wellcome Trust and Mastercard to beef up our response—backed by $125 million in both new funding and money already earmarked to tackle this epidemic. The money will be used to identify potential treatments for COVID-19, accelerate their development, and prepare for the manufacture of millions of doses for use worldwide. The expertise of pharmaceutical companies will be critical to this endeavor, named the COVID-19 Therapeutics Accelerator.”

DeepCrawl bags $19M Series B funding to help brands accelerate growth and mitigate losses in organic search performance. DeepCrawl, a comprehensive website crawler that helps clients with a complete overview of their websites’ technical health, announced it has raised $19 million in a Series B funding round to invest in R&D, sales and drive greater market penetration in the U.S.. The round was led by Five Elms, a growth equity and venture capital firm focused on B2B software companies, with participation from Beringea. To date, DeepCrawl has raised $25.8 million through angel investments from Beaumont Capital and Series A funding led by Beringea. DeepCrawl is used by 54% of enterprise brands as well as all six major global agency networks to monitor and improve site performance across digital properties. DeepCrawl’s portfolio of customers includes IKEA, Shopify, Publicis, GroupM, Nestle and Intercontinental Hotels and Resorts.

Elon Musk says college is ‘for fun’ and not for learning, echoing Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates. As we reported earlier today, At the Satellite 2020 conference on Monday, Elon Musk told the audience that “you don’t need college to learn stuff.” It’s a similar sentiment expressed by Musk’s co-founder at PayPal, Peter Thiel, who almost a decade ago started paying entrepreneurs to leave college and work on a start-up. “You don’t need college to learn stuff,” he said. The value is “seeing whether somebody can work hard at something.” He added that “colleges are basically for fun and to prove you do your chores, but they’re not for learning.”

Over $26 billion wiped off cryptocurrency market in 24 hours after massive oil price plunge. Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies plunged following a plummet in oil prices and further sell-off in stocks. The market capitalization or entire value of cryptocurrencies was down $26.43 billion from a day earlier on Monday, according to data from Coinmarketcap.com. The sell-off worsened as the day went on. Bitcoin, the biggest cryptocurrency by value, fell over 10% in 24 hours at around the same time.

BandPay receives $2 million angel funding to launch creator-oriented payment platform. BandPay, the payment platform designed to help creative collaborators come to and stick to agreements, is announcing $2 mil investment in its iOS and Android app launch. The easy-to-use app allows musicians, producers, and other professionals in the industry to assign milestones to a project, for which funds are held until a given milestone is met by the mutually agreed upon deadline and services are delivered. Founded in 2019 by DeCarlos Garrison and Gleb Teper, the Aventura, Florida-based BandPay aims to eliminate common issues associated with delays, distrust, and lack of transparency that prevent so many music professionals from being fairly compensated and focusing on creative work. This investment is a crucial contribution toward achieving BandPay’s goal to build a strong user base in the music business and beyond.

Fintech startup QRails closes $8M Series A funding to enable innovative payment solutions for financial services companies. QRails, a Denver, Colorado fintech startup that is focused on solving problems for prepaid, debit and credit card issuers with integrated payment processing and program management, has closed $8 million Series A funding round to accelerate growth. The round, which brings total funds raised to date by QRails to $18 million, was led by EFM Asset Management. The announcement comes as QRails, in partnership with payroll service providers, is about to launch a novel earned wage access solution in North America, Europe and Australia. Founded in 2016 by Gerard Griffin and Laurence Molke, QRails enables payroll service providers, fintechs, banks, insurance companies, and other financial services businesses in North America, Europe and, as of summer 2020, Australia, to deploy innovative payment solutions