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Currito, the Cincinnati‑based fast‑casual bowl chain, will open 11 new restaurants across the Midwest and Mid‑Atlantic in 2026, following a record year that saw 25 franchise units sold in the past 18 months. The expansion targets markets such as Dayton, Cincinnati, Louisville, Chicago and several secondary sites. In 2025 the brand upgraded its kitchen equipment to a streamlined combination oven, aiming to boost cooking consistency and cut labor costs. Menu innovation continues with a refreshed Harvest Bowl, a new Greek Salad, and an enhanced wild‑rice blend.
Upside Robotics secured a $7.5 million seed round to scale its solar‑powered autonomous fertilizer robots for corn. The robots, driven by proprietary algorithms, have already cut fertilizer use by 70%, saving roughly $150 per acre. After testing on 70 acres in...
Faraday Future is rolling out its Super One, an AI‑centric luxury electric SUV priced between $20,000 and $80,000, positioning it as a direct challenger to high‑end models like the Cadillac Escalade. The company recently secured $30 million to fund the broader...
Latvian deep‑tech startup Deep Space Energy has closed a €930 k pre‑seed round, led by Outlast Fund and supplemented by ESA, NATO DIANA and Latvian government grants. The capital will accelerate development of a radioisotope power generator that uses Americium‑241, delivering...
Sweden‑based industrial AI firm IPercept has inked a partnership with Quant Gulf to roll out its CNC machine intelligence platform across the Gulf region. The deal, valued at up to €10 million, will see the patented diagnostics and universal data layer...
OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, Meta, Microsoft and others have united to launch F/ai, a Paris‑based accelerator for European AI startups. Hosted by Station F, the program runs twice yearly, each three‑month cohort featuring 20 companies building on the partners' foundational models. Startups...
Pigment, the Paris‑based business‑planning platform founded in 2019, has become a unicorn valued at over $1 bn after a $145 m Series D round led by ICONIQ Growth and Sandberg Bernthal Venture Partners. The company’s AI agents, launched last year, can perform CFO‑level scenario analysis and...
The Nigeria Tax Act 2025 mandates that every resident file a personal income‑tax return by 31 March, consolidating earnings from salaries, freelance gigs, rentals, dividends and other streams. Taxpayers must use their State Internal Revenue Service’s portal—or visit the office where digital...
Indian agri‑tech platform BigHaat secured $10 million in a funding round led by Bidra Innovation Ventures, the U.S. VC arm of global fertilizer giant OCP Group. Existing backers JM Financial and Ashish Kacholia also participated, bringing total funding to roughly Rs 300 crore....
London‑based Occam Industries announced a €3 million pre‑seed round, led by Czech investor Presto Tech Horizons and backed by Antler, Freedom Fund, TYR.vc and angels. The financing follows the company’s approval for integration testing with Ukraine’s Brave1 defense tech cluster, validating...
Hindustan Unilever‑owned Minimalist posted a 48% jump in operating revenue, reaching Rs 514.8 crore in FY25, surpassing the Rs 500 crore mark. The brand’s expenses rose 51% to Rs 504 crore, driven by higher advertising spend and material costs, yet EBITDA remained positive at Rs 18 crore. A...
EximPe, a cross‑border payment startup, has secured the Reserve Bank of India’s final Payment Aggregator Cross‑Border (PA‑CB) licence. The authorisation lets the firm enable global merchants to collect Indian consumer payments via UPI, cards, wallets and other methods, with settlements...
Shiprocket has emerged as a critical logistics and commerce platform that bridges India’s small‑town entrepreneurs, known as Bharatpreneurs, with national markets. By consolidating courier networks, payment processing, order management, and offering rapid working‑capital financing, the service enables regional MSMEs to...
Jaro Education, founded in 2009 by Dr. Sanjay Salunkhe, tackles the lack of access to premium education for Indian professionals through a partner‑led, technology‑enabled model. The company has served over 350,000 learners and remained profitable from day one, financing growth...
Seven, a Mumbai fintech startup known for its 7 Ring wearable payment device, secured a strategic pre‑Series A investment from Shivam Malhotra, founder of Malsons Ventures, acquiring a 1% equity stake. The capital will fund product innovation, market penetration, team...
Indian spacetech startup Ethereal Exploration Guild (EtherealX) announced a $20.5 million Series A round led by BIG Capital, issuing 9,763 preference shares at Rs 1,87,920 each. The financing lifts its post‑money valuation to roughly $80 million, a six‑fold jump from the $12 million seed round....
Andercore, an AI‑powered trading platform for industrial supplies, announced a $40 million Series B round. The round was led by venture firms Atomico and Project A. The capital will accelerate product development and expand the platform’s reach across global manufacturers. Andercore aims to...
Showroom B2B, a Gurugram‑based fashion supply‑chain platform, secured Rs 150 crore (about $17 million) in a Series A round led by Cactus Partners, with participation from Zephyr Peacock and existing backers. The financing combines equity and debt and follows a $6.5 million pre‑Series A raise in...
Dassault Systèmes reports a rapid shift in Indian manufacturing toward digital design tools, driven by post‑COVID acceleration and a growing hardware startup ecosystem. Companies are embracing virtual twins to simulate products and factories, slashing prototype costs and waste. The firm’s...
Europe risks falling behind China in additive manufacturing as Beijing embeds 3D printing in its Made in China 2025 plan, while EU leaders treat the technology as a niche. Chinese firms now ship 94% of desktop printers worldwide, outpacing the...
The UK House of Commons business and trade committee warned that gaps in policing franchise businesses are “unsustainable” after scandals involving Vodafone and McDonald’s. It called for a statutory code of conduct and stronger independent enforcement to protect franchisees and...
Adora, an AI‑powered journey‑mapping platform co‑founded by former Canva product head Omar Salem, closed a $7 million seed round led by Blackbird Ventures. The tool automatically captures screens, interactions and user paths, turning them into live visual maps enriched with analytics...
UAE‑based investment firm Shorooq has signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Qatar’s first QCB‑licensed, Sharia‑compliant BNPL provider PayLater to explore a scalable, institutional‑grade credit facility. The proposed financing would be non‑dilutive and aligned with Sharia principles, giving PayLater capital to...
CedarBridge Partners has started deploying capital from its third private equity vehicle, CedarBridge High Growth III (CBHG III), a $150 million fund aimed at building platform businesses in education, healthcare, beauty, wellness and pet care across the GCC. Managed by Access...
UAE‑based Shorooq announced that Hamad Al‑Hajri, founder of delivery platform Snoonu, will invest in both its newly launched late‑stage growth fund and its global AI fund. The growth vehicle is backed by the Qatar Investment Authority, while the AI strategy...
Tactful AI, an Egyptian CX platform specializing in agentic AI, secured $1 million in a pre‑Series A round co‑led by Foras AI and M Empire. The funding will bolster growth in Egypt, validate expansion across EMEA, and accelerate R&D to enhance scalability...
Egypt has unveiled the Egypt Startup Charter, its first government‑backed framework dedicated to nurturing startups and entrepreneurship. The charter, shaped by a year of consultations with 15 ministries and over 250 ecosystem stakeholders, defines startups officially and bundles incentives, a...
UAE‑based ThrowMeNot closed a $550,000 pre‑seed round led by Sheikh Ahmed bin Mana Al Maktoum. The startup, founded in 2025 by Archie Rudyuk, operates a marketplace for near‑expiry and surplus food, offering discounts up to 90% and currently lists over 2,700...
Saudi fintech Simplified Financial Solutions Company (SiFi) secured a $20 million Series A round led by Ra’ed Ventures, with participation from QED Investors, Breyer Capital, MEVP and several local backers. The financing follows a $10 million seed round, bringing total capital raised to...
Kuwait‑based Zain Group staged a Demo Day for its flagship accelerator Zain Great Idea, showcasing eleven tech startups from six Arab markets. The event marked the programme’s final milestone and opened pathways for investment and strategic partnerships. Zain Ventures paired...
Saudi‑based logistics tech startup Routech Express closed a SAR 3.75 million ($1 million) pre‑seed round led by Q Fund, with angel participation. The platform aggregates multiple carriers, delivering instant price comparison, booking, payment and tracking through a single digital interface. Funds will accelerate...
Smart Bricks, a Dubai‑based proptech startup, closed a $5 million pre‑seed round led by Andreessen Horowitz’s a16z Speedrun, with participation from global funds and angels. The company is building an AI‑native infrastructure that automates the end‑to‑end real‑estate investment workflow, compressing a...
Anthropic, the AI safety‑focused startup behind the Claude series, is profiled in a New Yorker feature that spotlights executives such as former Google researcher Chris Olah. The piece delves into the company’s internal “Project Vend,” a Claudius‑branded experiment that tasked...
Startmate has added a dedicated Social Enterprise stream to its Launch Club pre‑accelerator, offering four to six fully‑funded scholarship spots for founders tackling social or environmental challenges. Applications close on March 1, with the cohort launching in late March. The program...
Steve Baxter announced that his fund will only back Australian defence startups that demonstrate a concrete plan to establish a U.S. presence. He argues that the U.S. defence budget—about $1.5 trillion—offers the scale required for venture‑backed growth, far beyond Australia’s $35 billion....
Elevate announced the 14 winners of its 2026 CIX Startup Awards, chosen from more than 370 applications by a 94‑member investor committee. The awardees span three maturity tiers—Emerging, Early and Growth—and include fintech platform Hiive, geothermal pioneer Eavor, climate‑tech firm...
Montréal‑based luxury e‑commerce platform Ssense will be reclaimed by its founders after a Quebec Superior Court dismissed lenders' request for a forced asset sale. The court approved a founder‑led buyback valued at $78 million, including a $58.5 million cash payment and assumption...
Senators Elizabeth Warren and Sherrod Brown announced a bipartisan bill to prohibit the export of certain advanced AI chips to China. The legislation follows a meeting between OpenAI co‑founder Dario Amodei and Warren, where concerns about China’s use of AI...
Boston Dynamics CEO Robert Playter announced his retirement after more than three decades leading the robotics pioneer. Playter, who guided the development of flagship robots like Spot and Atlas, will hand the reins to CFO Amanda McMaster as interim chief...
Kalshi, a U.S.‑based prediction market, recorded over $1 billion in trading volume on Super Bowl Sunday, a 2,700% year‑over‑year surge. More than $145 million was wagered on Bad Bunny’s opening song and $45 million on his guest performers, despite the platform not running a...
TerraGO, a Kenyan startup, has launched an NFC‑based platform that records school transport handovers through wristbands or bag tags and readers at buses and gates. The system creates time‑stamped, location‑specific logs of boarding, arrival and pickup events, providing parents and...
Letters to the Guardian call for a radical overhaul of the UK high‑street model, arguing that tinkering with business rates, rent levels and planning cannot reverse decline. Authors propose four pillars: reforming business rates, taxing online retailers, forcing reasonable rents,...
Startup accelerators boost growth but outcomes vary dramatically, according to a new Strategic Management Journal study of 6,723 firms in 280 programs. The research shows founders' pre‑entry knowledge—education, industry experience, and prior ventures—drives revenue, headcount, and funding gains, with high‑knowledge...
Bretton AI, formerly Greenlite AI, announced a $75 million Series B funding round led by Sapphire Ventures, with participation from existing backers and new investor TIAA Ventures. The capital will fuel expansion of its AI‑driven compliance platform, which automates high‑volume...
Tesco UK chief Ashwin Prasad warned that Britain is "sleepwalking" into a joblessness epidemic, with unemployment at a four‑year high of 5.1%. He highlighted that more than 9 million people aged 16‑64 are economically inactive, including 2.9 million young adults, and that...
Kraken, the New York‑based crypto exchange, has terminated CFO Stephanie Lemmerman just weeks before its long‑awaited initial public offering. Lemmerman, who came from Dapper Labs in November 2024, was responsible for steering the firm’s financial reporting and regulatory compliance. The...
The article argues that a crowded competitive landscape does not prove a large or attractive market. It explains that excess venture capital, low barriers to entry, and an oversupply of founders can create a swarm of startups even in modest...
Annual venture capital funding for Irish tech SMEs fell 23% in 2025 to €1.1 billion, marking the first decline since 2018. The fourth quarter dropped 46% to €291.4 million, driven by a 71% retreat of international investors. Life‑science firms attracted the most...
Lightspeed India has announced its India Ascends 2026 cohort, selecting four deep‑tech startups founded by entrepreneurs under 25. The cohort targets frontier fields such as artificial intelligence, space, robotics, biotechnology, and defense, and is backed by partners Anthropic, Groq, Google...
Deep Fission announced an $80 million financing round, selling over five million restricted shares at $15 each. The capital will fund its underground borehole‑installed small modular pressurised water reactors, a design the company says can cut construction costs by up to...
