Apps

Stay up to date on the latest developments in the app industry, including news, updates, funding, mergers and acquisitions, and more.

Official Release of Proton Mail Desktop App – Limited to Premium Subscribers

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Proton Mail, the end-to-end encrypted (E2EE) email service from Swiss company Proton, is now officially available via a dedicated desktop app some three months after debuting in beta. However, despite previous claims that the client would be available to all Proton Mail users in early 2024, the company has decided to restrict it to paying users. In related news, Proton is also making its email service available via a standalone Linux desktop app, launching today in beta. It’s worth noting that while Proton Mail has been available to desktop users from the company’s inception, initially through the browser and more recently a “bridge” which opened up access to Proton Mail through third-party desktop clients such as Apple Mail and Outlook, today’s news brings a dedicated Windows and MacOS app to the fray. This means that emails can be cached and accessed when offline, while users can funnel into Proton Mail directly from the MacOS dock or Windows Start menu.

The Launch of Cypher’s Inventory Drone from an Autonomous Mobile Robot Base

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The halls of Modex this week are lousy with solutions to the problem of inventory. Recent years have given us drone solutions and Dexory’s massive AMR (autonomous mobile robot) with a telescoping scaffolding structure. At its core is a tall (but not Dexory tall) AMR that serves as a launching and landing pad for a drone. You can’t really see it from the image I took, but the drone is actually tethered to the inside of the AMR platform. The Ottawa-based firm says the drone can operate for up to five hours before needing to return to the base for a recharge.

“The TikTok Ban: Gathering Momentum in the Push for a Forced Sale”

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TechCrunch Minute: The TikTok ban, or at least the effort to force its sale, is gaining steamAnd some folks are pretty mad about it! After a House subcommittee passed a bill that would force a sale of TikTok or ban the app from American app stores, debate reignited around the internet regrading whether or not the social service should face such harsh choices. On the pro-TikTok side former President Donald Trump flipped his views, and Elon Musk has spoken against the possibility. On the other hand, there’s a surprisingly united Congress, concerns about data safety, and fears that TikTok could be used to influence the American electorate. This raises the question: Why not just divest the asset so that we can put the issue to bed?

The Resurgence of Enterprise SaaS Investments in Unlikely Places

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Thus, SaaS startups are not category-specific, instead sharing a business model approach more than any particular industry focus. Among myriad SaaS startups, those focused on selling to business clients — a group often called enterprise SaaS — are a magnet for venture capital. Since then, investment into enterprise SaaS startups has slowed. Enterprise SaaS startups raised $21.9 billion, $45.0 billion, $55.1 billion and $58.3 billion in 2017, 2018, 2019 and 2020, respectively. Perhaps a rate cut or two and a strong enterprise IPO are the tonic required to really reignite venture investment into enterprise SaaS.

“Simplifying Consumption-Based Billing: The Impact of OpenMeter on Enterprise Monitoring”

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In enterprise software-as-a-service (SaaS), usage-based pricing, a pricing model in which customers are charged only when they use a product or service, is gaining ground. According to a report from VC firm OpenView, ~60% of SaaS businesses offer some form of usage-based pricing today. But while usage-based pricing has its advantages, it can be tougher to keep tabs on from a billing perspective. There, he ran into blockers collecting usage-based pricing data from different providers and infrastructure and aggregating and analyzing this usage together. “Competitors in the usage-based space only cater to the revenue teams with a closed-source, billing-first approach,” he said.

Achieving Victory: Unveiling Locus Robotics’ Triumph Through Strategic Focus

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Locus Robotics’ success is a tale of focusing on what works CEO Rick Faulk discusses the company’s new software, the state of the industry and the future of humanoids“We’re fundamentally a software company,” Locus CEO Rick Faulk says with a laugh. We look like a robot company, but we’re actually a software company.”It’s a familiar refrain from companies whose most public-facing products are hardware. That’s certainly the case with Locus, which produces the best-known AMRs (autonomous mobile robots) not made by Amazon. Former executives from the robotics startup launched their own Locus competitor, 6 River Systems. Asked whether Locus will be the company to bring that technology to the warehouse, Faulk responds, “We will.

New report reveals lack of profit for majority of subscription-based mobile apps

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The “State of Subscription Apps” report offers a bird’s-eye view into the subscription app universe, as RevenueCat has nearly 30,000 apps using its platform’s tools to manage their monetization. Outside of Apple and Google, that makes RevenueCat the largest collection of subscription app developers on one platform. For instance, 59% of the apps that reach $1,000 will go on to reach $2,500 and 60% of the apps that reach $2,500 will make it to $5,000. The report highlights other aspects of the race to subscription app monetization, as well, including that North America-based apps have 4x the monetization of the global average. The larger report gets into more specifics that will be useful to subscription app developers, including details about subscription packages, pricing, trial strategies, conversion, refund rates, retention, growth, and more.

Bluesky Acquires Top Third-Party App Creator, Graysky

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Decentralized Twitter/X rival Bluesky is adding to its ranks by scooping up a member of its developer community. London-based software engineer Samuel Newman, who built the well-received third-party Bluesky client, Graysky, is joining the startup, where he will now help develop Bluesky’s official app along with the rest of the frontend team. Given his change in position, the future of the Graysky app is uncertain. Late last year, Graysky also added Trending Topics and a Pro subscription to help the app monetize. With Newman now joining Bluesky, the hope is that the official client will also gain support for more features.

Possible options: – TikTok Might Be Developing a Photo App – Is TikTok Creating a Photo App? – Evidence Indicates TikTok’s Development of a Photo App – TikTok Potentially Expanding with New Photo App – Rumors Suggest TikTok’s Plans for Photo App Development

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Code suggests that TikTok could be building an app for photosAfter rivaling music streaming platforms like Spotify and Apple music with TikTok Music, ByteDance might be looking at creating an Instagram competitor named TikTok Photos, code found in the TikTok app suggests. As spotted by The SpAndroid blog, TikTok’s APK file — an installable file format for Android — contains references and icons to a new app named TikTok Photos. “Whether you’re a world traveler, food blogger, or simply enjoy sharing what’s going on in your life, TikTok Photos is our all-new photo-sharing platform dedicated to helping creators like you reach other like-minded people,” the description reads. “TikTok Photos is our all-new photo-sharing platform where we’ve made it easier to enjoy and discover photo posts.”The APK also has a representative icon of the potential TikTok Photos service in old TikTok colors. Through this update, users could already add photo posts to the network, but the company could be working on a separate platform to make photos stand out.