Thatch, a startup that lets employers give workers a fixed healthcare budget to shop individual insurance plans, raised $108 million at a $1 billion valuation. That figure is more than double its $410 million valuation from 17 months ago, driven by roughly sevenfold growth in annual recurring revenue. The company uses an employer-funded model, recently rebranded CHOICE, that lets employees pick from various health, dental and vision plans and keep unused funds for other medical costs.
entrepreneur.com
· 2026-09-16
A new essay outlines a startup evaluation heuristic focused on power rather than incremental revenue growth: asking how a company can own the customer relationship, control money flow, become a platform others build on, or create network effects. The piece argues these structural shifts can multiply a company's value far more than simple revenue optimization.
paulgraham.com
· 2026-09-13
Instacart has rolled out Clementine, a built-in AI assistant now live across North America on its Marketplace app that helps users plan meals and shop within budget. It can suggest recipes based on natural-language requests, check ingredient availability at a chosen store, filter for dietary preferences, restock pantry staples from past orders, and convert handwritten grocery lists into cart-ready items.
engadget.com
· 2026-09-09
A tech guide lays out several ways to responsibly get rid of an old but functional TV, including giving or selling it to friends, family, or via Craigslist and Facebook Marketplace, donating to charities or thrift stores, or repurposing it at home with a streaming stick like Apple TV, Roku, or Chromecast. It also warns that CRT televisions are typically rejected by thrift stores because of hazardous materials inside them.
engadget.com
· 2026-09-05
Costco Next, a platform that gave Costco members access to discounted products from vetted third-party suppliers, has stopped working for many customers over the past several days. Users report being unable to access the marketplace, and Costco has not issued a public explanation for the disruption or shutdown.
fastcompany.com
· 2026-09-02
California's Proposition 65, the 1986 law requiring warnings on products that may expose consumers to chemicals linked to cancer or reproductive harm, is marking its 40th anniversary this year even as many consumers remain confused by its labels. The law does not ban the chemicals in question but forces businesses to disclose their presence above certain thresholds, leaving buyers to decide for themselves whether to avoid a product.
wired.com
· 2026-09-02
Israeli startup AIR, founded by former Unit 8200 cybersecurity officers Yair Saban and Niv Hoffman, has raised $50 million across two seed rounds to build a platform that monitors and vets the skills, plugins, and MCP servers that AI agents use inside companies. The rounds, led by Sequoia and Greenoaks respectively, closed weeks apart and included several notable angel investors from the cybersecurity world.
techcrunch.com
· 2026-09-01
Amazon has announced it will close Mechanical Turk (MTurk), its long-running marketplace connecting businesses with a distributed workforce for microtasks, effective September 30. The platform allowed companies to outsource work like data validation, content moderation, and survey collection to human workers worldwide, tasks often too subjective or complex for automation.
mturk.com
· 2026-08-26
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