All posts tagged: 60M

Spanish startup Exoticca raises a €60M Series D for its tour packages platform

Spanish startup Exoticca raises a €60M Series D for its tour packages platform

Published by skeptic

[ad_1] The type of overseas trip where you need multiple hotels, flights, activities, transfers, transport methods and guides has traditionally been undertaken by travel agents. Since there’s no real-time pricing for such complex offerings, travelers have few other options. Spanish startup Exoticca set out to crack that nut and has now raised a €60 million Series D round led by Quadrille Capital. The market for multi-day tour packages is very large, but it’s one of the last areas of the travel industry to be digitized. Exoticca’s platform connects flights, hotels, meals, transfers, transportation and local companies. This makes it simpler to book these more complex packages, as well as reduces costs by as much as 30%, the company claims. Exoticca also claims to have more than doubled its sales year-over-year since 2015, and now operates in the United States, Canada, United Kingdom, France, Germany, Spain, Mexico and Colombia through a network of travel and non-travel online and offline partners.  “The package tour was invented by Thomas Cook two centuries ago and has really not evolved …

Details of Britney Spears’ prenup and where $60M net worth stands revealed as Sam Asghari divorce is finalized

Published by skeptic

[ad_1] Britney Spears’ divorce from Sam Asghari has been officially finalized, and details of their finances and premarital agreement have been revealed with it. The former couple first tied the knot in 2022, shortly after the “Toxic” hitmaker was released from her years-long conservatorship at the hands of her father Jamie Spears, from whom she is estranged. They however split only 14 months later, announcing they were going their separate ways last August. WATCH: Britney Spears’ Relationship Timelines Though there were reports at the time that Sam was hoping to get more out of the divorce – and Britney’s assets – and that he pushed back on their prenuptial agreement, per TMZ, Sam and his attorney Neal Hirsh have decided not to contest the prenup. That means Britney’s fortune – which was largely squandered by her family and business associates to a surprisingly low reported net worth of $60 million during the 14 years of her conservatorship – will remain protected. Now, the outlet reports that the exes are only waiting for a judge to …

C-LEO programme funds £60m for satellite constellations

Published by skeptic

[ad_1] The UK’s C-LEO programme has made up to £60m available for innovations that will help boost the UK’s satellite constellations following the record number of global satellite launches in 2023. The UK Space Agency’s Connectivity in Low Earth Orbit (C-LEO) programme was highlighted in the recent Spring Budget. The Chancellor confirmed that up to £160m will be invested in UK expertise, such as satellite constellations, over the next four years. The UK has a rich heritage in satellite design, spacecraft manufacturing and the operation of large satellite constellations. However, this new government funding is crucial to maintaining the UK’s competitive edge during a period of rapid change and growth in the global space sector. Long-term growth in satellite communications A new record was set in 2023, with more than 2,900 satellites launched successfully into orbit. The vast majority of these operate as part of commercial satellite constellations, which will continue to grow rapidly. This represents a major opportunity for the UK space industry to benefit from high-value contracts in the global supply chain for …

Eliyan raises $60M for chiplet interconnects that speed up AI chips

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[ad_1] Join Gen AI enterprise leaders in Boston on March 27 for an exclusive night of networking, insights, and conversations surrounding data integrity. Request an invite here. Eliyan has raised $60 million in funding for its chiplet interconnect technology that speeds up the processing for AI chips. Samsung Catalyst Fund and Tiger Global Management both led the round to help the team address the challenges of development of generative AI chips. Driven by demand for AI chips, industry forecasters are calling for robust growth in the high-bandwidth memory (HBM) sector, as much as 331% increase this year, followed by 124% in 2025, according to market researcher Arete Research. Eliyan’s UCIe-, BoW-, or UMI-compliant PHY (dubbed NuLink PHY) addresses memory and IO wall constraints on either advanced or standard packaging material. A PHY is a physical layer of the OSI model. An instantiation of PHY connects a link layer device (often called a MAC) to a physical medium such as an optical fiber or copper cable. Now it’s being applied to multi-chip solutions, which allow chip …

Bear Robotics, a robot waiter startup, just picked up $60M from LG

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[ad_1] LG Electronics may no longer be a household name in smartphones, but it still sees a big future in gadgets like robots. Today, the company confirmed a $60 million investment in Bear Robotics, the California startup that makes artificial intelligence-powered server robots for restaurants and other venues — autonomous tray towers on wheels that are meant to replace waiters. With the investment, LG Electronics becomes Bear’s largest shareholder.  Bear’s last fundraise in 2022 valued the company at just over $490 million post-money, per PitchBook data. It’s not clear what the valuation is for this latest investment but the last year has not been a great one for startups in the space. On the other hand, the current vogue for all things AI, and the general advances that are coming with that, are giving robotics players a fillip — see yesterday’s Covariant news, for another example. Still, it’s not clear what Bear hopes to tackle next with the basic trays-on-wheels form factor that its adopted for its flagship Servi robots. We’ve contacted Bear and LG …

US invests $60m in enhanced geothermal systems

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[ad_1] The US Department of Energy (DOE) has selected three projects to receive $60m funding to demonstrate the efficacy and scalability of enhanced geothermal systems. The projects, funded under the landmark Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, will focus on utilising innovative enhanced geothermal systems to harness the Earth’s abundant heat resources. The goal is to showcase geothermal energy’s potential in providing reliable, cost-effective electricity to millions of US homes and businesses, aligning with the Biden administration’s ambitious objective of achieving 100% clean electricity by 2035. Jennifer Granholm, US Secretary of Energy, commented: “These projects will help us advance geothermal power, including into regions of the country where this renewable resource has never before been used. “These pilot demonstrations will help us realise the full potential of the heat beneath our feet to reduce carbon emissions, create domestic jobs, and deliver clean, cost-effective, reliable energy to Americans nationwide.” Harnessing geothermal energy resources Geothermal resources currently generate about four gigawatts of electricity in the United States. However, advancements in enhanced geothermal systems could potentially provide 90 gigawatts of firm, …

More than a third of Facebook Marketplace ads could be scams – with customers losing up to £60m in 2023, study finds | UK News

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[ad_1] More than a third of adverts on Facebook Marketplace could be scams – with UK customers potentially losing nearly £60m on the platform in 2023, an investigation has found. Facebook Marketplace allows people to buy and sell new and used items such as cars, watches, games consoles, air fryers, shoes and handbags. The TSB retail banking chain, whose fraud team contacted 100 sellers on the online marketplace, calculated that UK buyers are losing just over £160,000 a day after making purchases on the site. The team engaged with the seller in each case to determine whether the items were genuinely for sale or scams. The team found 34% of the listings were fraudulent, with the sellers using tactics known to be commonly used by fraudsters. These included directing the fraud experts, who they thought were buyers, to fake websites. They also refused to allow the viewing of an item in person and demanded advanced fees. TSB also discovered items advertised as “brand new” for hundreds of pounds less than their real retail price. For …

UK council could go bust due to £60m hole in special needs spending | Special educational needs

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[ad_1] A council has warned that it could in effect become insolvent this year because of the huge financial deficits it has racked up on special education needs, in the latest development in the local government funding crisis. Most councils in England have overspent their budgets on special education needs and disabilities (Send) since 2015, when the government extended the age range of young people who qualify for Send support without providing councils with the necessary funding. These deficits have fed into councils’ overall education budgets – known as the dedicated schools grant (DSG). Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole (BCP) council has accumulated a combined deficit of around £60m on its DSG budget in recent years and says it cannot eradicate it without making unacceptable cuts to Send services and mainstream school budgets. Moreover, a recent BCP council report warned that its financial solvency is at imminent risk because of government accountancy rules. Normally, education deficits impact on councils’ overall financial health. However, because so many councils have been overspending their education budgets, since 2020 the …

Cloud-native cybersecurity startup Aqua Security raises $60M and remains a unicorn

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[ad_1] Aqua Security, an Israeli cybersecurity startup that helps companies protect their cloud services, has raised $60 million in funding, extending its previously announced $135 million Series E round of funding to $195 million. Founded in 2015, Tel Aviv- and Boston-based Aqua Security claims customers such as PayPal, Netflix, and Samsung, who use the Aqua platform for services spanning cloud workload protection (CWPP); cloud security posture management; Kubernetes security posture management; software supply chain security; risk and vulnerability scanning; malware protection; and more. The company has now raised around $325 million since its inception, and with its Series E extension round Aqua ushers in lead investor Evolution Equity Partners, a venture capital firm substantively focused on the cybersecurity industry and which launched a new $400 million fund two years ago. Existing Aqua Security investors including Lightspeed Venture Partners, Insight Partners, and StepStone Group also participated in the round. In an arid funding landscape where much beyond low single-digit seed rounds are hard to come by, Aqua’s latest cash injection could indicate a degree of investor …

UK ministers approved £60m payments to Saudi royals to maintain arms deal, court told | UK news

Published by Sam

[ad_1] Cabinet ministers and Whitehall mandarins approved payments totalling £60m to Saudi royals and high-ranking officials over decades to secure and maintain a huge arms deal, a court heard on Monday. The accusation was made by Tom Allen, a barrister representing one of two men who are being prosecuted for corruption in a longstanding arms deal between the UK and Saudi Arabia. Allen alleged that British politicians – including unnamed “secretaries of state and ministers” – approved, facilitated and encouraged the payments over many years to ensure that leading Saudis gave huge arms contracts to British firms. Senior members of the British government and military figures were “absolutely in the thick” of organising the payments, a large slice of which went to a Saudi prince, he said. He also claimed that the British and Saudi governments engaged in what he called a “deniable fiddle” to conceal the payments if they came to light. At Southwark crown court in London, the Serious Fraud Office is prosecuting the two men, Jeffrey Cook, 67, and John Mason, 81, …