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The CFPB is permanently banning BloomTech from consumer lending activities and its CEO, Austen Allred, from student lending for a period of ten years.
Allred founded BloomTech, which rebranded from the Lambda School in 2022 after cutting half its staff, in 2017.
(According to the CFPB, BloomTech originated “at least” 11,000 such loans.)
BloomTech didn’t market the loans as such, saying that they didn’t create debt and were “risk free,” and advertised a 71%-86% job placement rate.
And, unbeknownst to many students, BloomTech was selling a portion of its loans to investors while depriving recipients of rights they should’ve had under a federal protection known as the Holder Rule.
Business banking startup Mercury, founded in 2020, is now launching a consumer banking product.
“We already have a few hundred thousand users of our business banking product, and a lot of people have expressed that they want a personal banking product,” he told TechCrunch in an interview.
The person also said the fintech partner banking market as a whole has been the target of more regulatory scrutiny.
Crossing overBut success in B2B banking doesn’t automatically queue up Mercury to handle consumer banking.
Sign up for TechCrunch Fintech here.
When prolific venture capital firms Andreessen Horowitz and Lerer Hippeau announced in early 2024 they were pivoting away from consumer tech, it sparked a social media debate about whether there are still opportunities.
Jumping in, Maven will be there helping to build the next game-changing health AI company or robotics AI consumer business, he said.
Scheinman started the firm in 2013 and brought in Deshpande soon after to focus on consumer AI and personalized medicine.
They brought in investment partner Robert Ravanshenas in 2015, and again in 2020 after a stint in a startup operating role, to focus on fintech, longevity and consumer AI.
Together the trio remains committed to seeding similar consumer tech trends, including applications of AI, personalized healthcare, climate and sustainability, family technology and fintech.
Apple’s stance on the right to repair has now become more accommodative, with the company now supporting used parts for iPhone 15 repairs that can include the camera, display, and battery.
While Apple’s move is welcome to many, it does answer a series of questions: If your iPhone breaks, should you have the right to fix it?
If you want to fix your iPhone, should you be able to do that yourself, or be forced to go to the manufacturer?
And if you are going to fix your iPhone yourself — or pay a third-party to help — should you be able to use whatever parts will work?
Apple pushed back vocally against criticism of parts pairing, and has recently backed laws in several states that enshrine consumer repair options.
It last raised a $50M Series C funding round in 2021.
TransferGo claims the new investment doubles its valuation to around $600M, from the $200M-$300M Dealroom valued it at back in September 2021.
We achieved sustainability of the business and became profitable and we still have proceeds from the last funding round.
We don’t need external capital to grow.”However, he saw the opportunity to raise funding from Asia to expand there.
“We are still taking customers from incumbents: 75% come from cash, banks, and Western Union — that’s still the gorilla in the room.”He puts TransferGo’s growth down to focusing on the consumer experience.
And they’re calling their company… The Mobile-First Company.
Too many companies that offer B2B tools treat mobile apps as companion apps and second-class citizens.
Small companies don’t need a complicated enterprise software solution.
While Siel Brunet is more experienced with the needs of large companies, he has also seen how B2B apps don’t work well with small businesses.
Many small companies simply rely on consumer apps to fill their needs.
The U.S. Department of Transportation announced its first industry-wide review of data security and privacy policies across the largest U.S. airlines.
Those airlines include Allegiant, Alaska, American, Delta, Frontier, Hawaiian, JetBlue, Southwest, Spirit, and United.
Wyden has raised alarms about the sharing and sale of sensitive U.S. consumer data to data brokers — companies that collect and resell people’s personal data, like precise location data, often derived from their phones and computers.
In recent months, Wyden has warned that data brokers sell access to Americans’ personal information, which can identify which websites they visit and the places they travel to.
In remarks, Wyden said: “Because consumers will often never know that their personal data was misused or sold to shady data brokers, effective privacy regulation cannot depend on consumer complaints to identify corporate abuses.”
Suleyman — also a co-founder of DeepMind, which Google bought in 2014 to bolster its own AI efforts — will run Microsoft’s newly formed consumer AI unit, called Microsoft AI, whereas Simonyan is joining the company as a chief scientist in the same new group.
Mustafa, whose official title at Microsoft is EVP and CEO of Microsoft AI, will report to chief executive Nadella.
“Several members of the Inflection team have chosen to join Mustafa and Karén at Microsoft,” Nadella wrote in a blog post.
In a blog post, Inflection AI said that it will shift its focus to the AI studio business, where it builds and tests customer generative AI models.
“This renewed emphasis on our API also comes with some important changes in the company,” wrote Inflection AI.
Italy’s competition and consumer authority, the AGCM, has fined TikTok €10 million (almost $11M) following a probe into algorithmic safety concerns.
Moreover, this content is systematically re-proposed to users as a result of their algorithmic profiling, stimulating an ever-increasing use of the social network,” the AGCM wrote.
The authority said its investigation confirmed TikTok’s responsibility in disseminating content “likely to threaten the psycho-physical safety of users, especially if minor and vulnerable”, such as videos related to the “French scar” challenge.
One notable change as a result of the DSA is TikTok offering users non-profiling based feeds.
TikTok also faces the possibility of increasing regulation by Member State level agencies applying the bloc’s Audiovisual Media Services Directive.
