Latest Posts

• Despite Buyout, Celgene Dealmaking Rolls On With Kyn, Obsidian Tie-Ups

  [Updated 12:35pm ET with comments from Michael Gilman, Obsidian CEO, see below.] Bristol-Myers Squibb’s huge proposed buyout of Celgene earlier this month has left many in biotech circles concerned that the Summit, NJ, drugmaker’s days of creative, aggressive dealmaking... Read more »

  Corie Lok1/18/19

• Michigan Mobility Institute Aims to Expand AV Talent, Ecosystem

  A new tech education effort is forming in Detroit—created by Fontinalis Partners co-founder Chris Thomas—that focuses on teaching adult students the skills they need to compete for the increasingly large number of open jobs in the mobility industry.

  Called the Detroit... Read more »

  Sarah Schmid Stevenson1/18/19

• Bio Roundup: Aimmune Drama, Shutdown Blues, Perlmutter Talks Cancer

  The partial government shutdown, now the longest in U.S. history, began to take a bite out of biotech this week, served with a hot side dish of confusion.

  On Tuesday, Aimmune Therapeutics (NASDAQ: AIMT) said the shutdown would delay the... Read more »

  Ben Fidler1/18/19

• Boston Tech Watch: Nantucket, Lionbridge, Nano-C, Barac & Quick Base

  Nantucket entrepreneurs welcome, and acquisitions abound. There are also new owners, new offices and new money in the bank for Boston-area technology companies this week. Read on for the details.

  —Sense, the Cambridge, MA-based home electricity management technology startup, has partnered... Read more »

  Brian Dowling1/18/19

• Educational Play Kit Company Osmo Sold to India’s Edtech Firm Byju’s for $120M

  Byju’s, an edtech company based in India that claims a $3.6 billion valuation based on its sales success there, announced it has acquired Palo Alto, CA-based learning-through-play firm Osmo for $120 million.

  Named after the teacher Byju Raveendran, who founded... Read more »

  Bernadette Tansey1/17/19

• What’s Your Emergency? Law Enforcement’s Increasing Interest in Tech

  Fort Worth, TX—Data analytics and visual search technologies are increasingly being used by law enforcement agencies, growth that has captured the attention of tech giant Motorola.

  The Chicago-based tech company, which has long sold narrow-band radios to law enforcement, has... Read more »

  Angela Shah1/17/19

• FDA Panel Backs Amgen Bone Drug, Says Benefits Outweigh Heart Risks

  [Updated 1/17/19, 8:50 a.m. See below.] An experimental Amgen osteoporosis drug that had sparked concern about cardiovascular side effects has won the backing of an FDA advisory panel.

  A total of 15 panelists on Thursday voted that the benefits... Read more »

  Frank Vinluan1/16/19

• ScoutRFP Scores $33M to Compete in Supplier Management Sector

  ScoutRFP, whose software is designed to help businesses streamline the process of ordering goods from suppliers, announced that it raised $33 million in a Series C fundraising round led by Scale Venture Partners.

  San Francisco-based Scout, part of a tech... Read more »

  Bernadette Tansey1/16/19

• Merck And The Future of Immuno-Oncology: A Chat With Roger Perlmutter

  Cancer immunotherapy is, in a word, tantalizing. It might save the life of someone at death’s door and keep the cancer at bay for years. Or it might not work at all. There’s no telling what a patient will experience.

  “There’s... Read more »

  Ben Fidler1/16/19

• Walgreens Prepares for High-Tech Future with Microsoft Partnership

  Microsoft is making a “wal-to-wal” bet that retailers can harness the Seattle-area tech giant’s products and services to upgrade the brick-and-mortar experience for consumers and patients.

  About six months after it struck a partnership with Walmart (NYSE: WMT), Microsoft on... Read more »

  Jeff Buchanan1/15/19

• Pivot to Software: Drone Maker CyPhy Rebrands, Seeks Airborne A.I.

  The hardware business isn’t cutting it for CyPhy Works, a maker of tethered drones for everything from military uses to disaster response and the oil and gas industry.

  Today, the drone company announced a pivot to software—and a rebranding to Aria... Read more »

  Brian Dowling1/15/19

• A VC’s Take: Global Volatility Hurts U.S. Venture Ecosystem

  As Xconomy’s editors looked back at the year just passed, we asked technology leaders to comment on the trends they’d observed in 2018, and the developments they expected in 2019. Some leaders responded with their views on the business impact of... Read more »

  Bernadette Tansey1/15/19

• IBM Vets Launch Sonrai Security, Eyeing Multi-Cloud “Complexity”

  Businesses racing faster and faster to put their data and applications into multiple cloud services will soon have to figure out how to keep an eye on it all. Start thinking about the hundreds of users, the dozens of accounts, and... Read more »

  Brian Dowling1/15/19

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• Pensa, AI-Enabled Drones Maker for Inventory Monitoring, Raises $5M

  [Updated, 1/18/19, 1:10 pm CT] Austin—The grocery store shelf has yet to be plugged into the increasingly digital food supply chain. Instead, inventory is typically tallied by employees by hand in a slow and laborious process.

  “It’s one... Read more »

  Angela Shah1/13/19

• Kaleido Bio and Cirius Join an IPO Queue Stalled by Federal Shutdown

  The partial government shutdown may have diminished staffing at the SEC, but it hasn’t dimmed the hopes of biotech firms hoping to go public. On Friday, Kaleido Biosciences and Cirius Therapeutics both filed paperwork for their respective initial public offerings with... Read more »

  Frank Vinluan1/11/19

• E-Commerce Startups, Legacy Stores Grapple With Changing Retail Scene

  The changing of the guard transforming retail is accelerating.

  Sears, the nation’s first “everything store,” is teetering toward bankruptcy after years of stagnation as industry leaders prepare to gather in New York at the National Retail Federation’s annual conference. Yet, new... Read more »

  Angela Shah1/11/19

• Tech Companies Share Shutdown Losses, With Little Chance of Back Pay

  As federal agency employees miss their first paychecks today due to the partial government shutdown that began Dec. 22, federal contractors and their workers—including technology professionals—face a loss of income that they may never recover.

  Big technology companies such as Oracle... Read more »

  Bernadette Tansey1/11/19

• Report: After a Boffo 2018, VC Deals in Digital Health May Flatten

  Investments in digital health startups totaled $8.1 billion in 2018, a record year that marked a 42 percent increase over 2017’s total, according to a report released this week by Rock Health. But the report’s authors say it’s unlikely that... Read more »

  Jeff Buchanan1/11/19

• Bio Roundup: #JPM19 Notes, Loxo Buyout, Black Diamond’s Cash & More

  Diabetes drugs are Eli Lilly’s bread and butter, but the pharmaceutical giant hasn’t lost its appetite for cancer drugs. It grabbed hold of a few more this week by betting $8 billion on Loxo Oncology.

  Loxo (NASDAQ: LOXO) has made... Read more »

  Frank Vinluan1/11/19

• Notes from the JPM19 Vortex: Price Apocalypse, Celgene Fallout & More

  [Editor’s note: Ben Fidler and Sarah de Crescenzo coauthored this report.] It is here, and then it is gone. But by the time everyone staggers to the airport or back home to sleep in their own beds, the annual... Read more »

  Alex Lash1/11/19

• Boston Tech Watch: Boston Metal, TaxJar, ClimaCell, & WithMe Health

  [Updated 11:38 AM. Paragraph added.] A bunch of startups started 2019 off on the right foot taking big checks cut by investors that continue the boom from 2018. Read on for more.

  —Weather forecast company ClimaCell says its high-resolution data is... Read more »

  Brian Dowling1/11/19

• Uncertainty Grows for Biotech as Government, FDA Shutdown Drags On

  The partial government shutdown could soon become the longest shutdown in history, and biotech firms that have submitted regulatory filings are facing greater uncertainty about their future plans. More than 40 percent of FDA workers and thousands at the SEC are... Read more »

  Corie Lok1/10/19

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• FAANG, Public Trust, Valuations, in 2019: The Read from Menlo Ventures

  The market caps of some of the most successful tech titans reach as high as $1 trillion. Yet in 2018, perceptions about these dominant companies often reflected uneasiness and doubt—and for some, so did their stock performance.

  Maybe the mood shift... Read more »

  Bernadette Tansey1/10/19

• Black Diamond Gets $85M for Cancer Drugs R&D and New Cambridge HQ

  When Black Diamond Therapeutics emerged from stealth mode last month with $20 million in backing and a handful of preclinical cancer drugs, the company signaled that another financing was in the works for 2019. That day is here.

  Black Diamond announced... Read more »

  Frank Vinluan1/10/19

• Big Deals, Life Sciences Push U.S. VC in 2018 to Dot-Com Boom Levels

  [Updated 1/18/19, 3:27 pm. See below.] Venture capital investments rose in 2018 to levels not seen since the heady days of 2000, the last year U.S. startups collectively took in more than $100 billion.

  That’s according to PitchBook and... Read more »

  Sarah de Crescenzo1/10/19

• Beta Bionics Secures $63M as AI-Driven “Pancreas” Heads to Key Tests

  Beta Bionics, a startup developing a medical device that monitors and manages blood sugar levels in diabetes patients, has closed $63 million to back late-stage clinical tests of its AI-powered technology.

  The cash tops off a Series B round of funding... Read more »

  Frank Vinluan1/9/19

• With Room To Grow, Facebook Boston Moves Into Shiny, New Office

  Facebook’s new Boston office—which is really in Cambridge, MA—is up and running, and there’s plenty of elbow room.

  The digs measure 130,000 square feet of open-style tech workspaces, something called micro-kitchens, a massive cafeteria, and cheeky-titled conference rooms. Floor-to-ceiling windows offer... Read more »

  Brian Dowling1/9/19

• Smooth-Driving Startup ClearMotion Gets $115M for Production Push

  [Corrected 1:02 pm ET. See below.] Auto technology startup ClearMotion says its active suspension system promising buttery-smooth rides on bumpy terrain is ready for prime time.

  The Boston-area business says it raised a $115 million Series D funding round led... Read more »

  Brian Dowling1/9/19

• The Power Combo of A.I. Devices with Cloudlets Comes with Cyber Risks

  When we have a chance to view it from a distance, the year 2018 may be seen as a period when innovations in a number of technological fields came together to transform not only the future of computing, but also the... Read more »

  Bernadette Tansey1/8/19

• Identity as Security Key: Akamai Buys Online Access Firm Janrain

  It’s an online security concern perhaps best distilled in a popular 1993 comic from The New Yorker magazine.

  “On the Internet, nobody knows you’re a dog,” reads the comic that shows a drawing of one pooch atop an office chair in... Read more »

  Brian Dowling1/8/19

• Bio-JPM Roundup: Lilly Buys Loxo, Sage’s Stock Soars, ALS Cash & More

  The flow of biotech news is particularly heavy today, and for good reason. The annual J.P. Morgan Healthcare Conference, one of the biggest gatherings for the biopharmaceutical industry, kicked off today in San Francisco, and many companies, whether they’re speaking at... Read more »

  Frank Vinluan1/7/19

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