Technology
Meta to sell blue badge on Instagram and Facebook as Zuckerberg borrows Musk’s playbook


Facebook-parent Meta has launched a subscription service, called Meta Verified, that will allow users to add the coveted blue check mark to their Instagram and Facebook accounts for up to $15 a month by verifying their identity, its chief executive Mark Zuckerberg said on Sunday, tapping a new revenue channel that has returned mixed success for its smaller rival Twitter.
The subscription service, first rolling out in New Zealand and Australia starting this week, is priced at $11.99 per month on the web or $14.99 on Apple’s iOS. (The company didn’t say when it plans to make the service available for purchase through its Android apps.) Meta will allow users to verify their identify by using their government-issued ID cards. The company said the subscription service will also offer “increased visibility and reach,” improved protection against impersonation attacks and direct access to customer support.
Meta Verified “is about increasing authenticity and security across our services,” said Zuckerberg in a Facebook post. The subscription service will be extended to “more countries soon,” he said, without elaborating on the timeline. We’ve asked Meta some additional questions and will update the story when we hear back.
The revenues of Meta, which has opted not to charge its customers for most of its services in more than a decade and a half since its founding, have taken a hit in recent years following Apple’s decision to introduce stringent privacy changes on iOS that curtails the social firm’s ability to track users’ internet activities. The Zuckerberg-led firm, which makes nearly all of its money from advertising, said last year that Apple’s move would cost the company more than $10 billion in lost ads revenue in 2022.
“Long term, we want to build a subscription offering that’s valuable to everyone, including creators, businesses and our community at large. As part of this vision, we are evolving the meaning of the verified badge so we can expand access to verification and more people can trust the accounts they interact with are authentic,” Meta wrote in a blog post.
Subscription services are becoming popular among social media firms.
The Sunday’s announcement follows social platform Snap launching its own subscription service last year, through which it has converted over a million users into paid customers already, and also Elon Musk revamping Twitter’s subscription service, Twitter Blue, to offer a range of additional features including the blue check mark. Twitter has expanded Twitter Blue to over a dozen markets in recent months including India and Indonesia. As of mid-January, only about 180,000 accounts had signed up for Twitter Blue, according to The Information.
Musk, a vocal critical of Facebook services, is betting on turning Twitter Blue into a major revenue driver for Twitter, which he acquired last year for $44 billion.
The blue checkmark has long been one of the coveted features on social media platforms. Previously it was reserved for public figures such as lawmakers, actors, musicians, sports athletes and journalists.
Musk has lambasted the idea, arguing that the feature should be open to all. Those who attained the blue tick mark outside the Twitter Blue subscription will lose it eventually, he has previously stated.
“As we test and learn, there will be no changes to accounts on Instagram and Facebook that are already verified based on prior requirements, including authenticity and notability,” said Meta.
Meta, whose shares have rebounded in recent weeks, is also reeling from a harsh markets response to its grand metaverse vision. The company, which has laid off about 11,000 employees in the past two months, has pledged to cut down its spendings on the metaverse ambitions. It’s reportedly planning another layoff round, soon.
“The thing about religion is that it requires a leap of faith. Belief in something that you may not ever be able to conclusively prove. And there will be moments that will test that faith, moments that make you question everything you had previously accepted as fact. Dramatics aside, 2022 was a challenging year for believers in the House of Zuck with many pushed to the brink or throwing in the towel culminating in the capitulation we saw last quarter,” analysts at Bernstein wrote in a note this month.
“But it appears that Meta has found their own religion on efficiency/profitability and investors now find a leaner, sharper company before them.”
Technology
Tesla more than tripled its Austin gigafactory workforce in 2022


Tesla’s 2,500-acre manufacturing hub in Austin, Texas tripled its workforce last year, according to the company’s annual compliance report filed with county officials. Bloomberg first reported on the news.
The report filed with Travis County’s Economic Development Program shows that Tesla increased its Austin workforce from just 3,523 contingent and permanent employees in 2021 to 12,277 by the end of 2022. Bloomberg reports that just over half of Tesla’s workers reside in the county, with the average full-time employee earning a salary of at least $47,147. Outside of Tesla’s factory, the average salary of an Austin worker is $68,060, according to data from ZipRecruiter.
TechCrunch was unable to acquire a copy of the report, so it’s not clear if those workers are all full-time. If they are, Tesla has hired a far cry more full-time employees than it is contracted to do. According to the agreement between Tesla and Travis County, the company is obligated to create 5,001 new full-time jobs over the next four years.
The contract also states that Tesla must invest about $1.1 billion in the county over the next five years. Tesla’s compliance report shows that the automaker last year invested $5.81 billion in Gigafactory Texas, which officially launched a year ago at a “Cyber Rodeo” event. In January, Tesla notified regulators that it plans to invest another $770 million into an expansion of the factory to include a battery cell testing site and cathode and drive unit manufacturing site. With that investment will come more jobs.
Tesla’s choice to move its headquarters to Texas and build a gigafactory there has helped the state lead the nation in job growth. The automaker builds its Model Y crossover there and plans to build its Cybertruck in Texas, as well. Giga Texas will also be a model for sustainable manufacturing, CEO Elon Musk has said. Last year, Tesla completed the first phase of what will become “the largest rooftop solar installation in the world,” according to the report, per Bloomberg. Tesla has begun on the second phase of installation, but already there are reports of being able to see the rooftop from space. The goal is to generate 27 megawatts of power.
Musk has also promised to turn the site into an “ecological paradise,” complete with a boardwalk and a hiking/biking trail that will open to the public. There haven’t been many updates on that front, and locals have been concerned that the site is actually more of an environmental nightmare that has led to noise and water pollution. The site, located at the intersection of State Highway 130 and Harold Green Road, east of Austin, is along the Colorado River and could create a climate catastrophe if the river overflows.
The site of Tesla’s gigafactory has also historically been the home of low-income households and has a large population of Spanish-speaking residents. It’s not clear if the jobs at the factory reflect the demographic population of the community in which it resides.
Technology
Launch startup Stoke Space rolls out software tool for complex hardware development

Stoke Space, a company that’s developing a fully reusable rocket, has unveiled a new tool to let hardware companies track the design, testing and integration of parts. The new tool, Fusion, is targeting an unsexy but essential aspect of the hardware workflow.
It’s a solution born out of “ubiquitous pain in the industry,” Stoke CEO Andy Lapsa said in a recent interview. The current parts tracking status quo is marked by cumbersome, balkanized solutions built on piles of paperwork and spreadsheets. Many of the existing tools are not optimized “for boots on the ground,” but for finance or procurement teams, or even the C-suite, Lapsa explained.
In contrast, Fusion is designed to optimize simple inventory transactions and parts organization, and it will continue to track parts through their lifespan: as they are built into larger assemblies and go through testing. In an extreme example, such as hardware failures, Fusion will help teams connect anomalous data to the exact serial numbers of the parts involved.

Image credit: Stoke Space
“If you think about aerospace in general, there’s a need and a desire to be able to understand the part pedigree of every single part number and serial number that’s in an assembly,” Lapsa said. “So not only do you understand the configuration, you understand the history of all of those parts dating back to forever.”
While Lapsa clarified that Fusion is the result of an organic in-house need for better parts management – designing a fully reusable rocket is complicated, after all – turning it into a sell-able product was a decision that the Stoke team made early on. It’s a notable example of a rocket startup generating pathways for revenue while their vehicle is still under development.
Fusion offers particular relevance to startups. Many existing tools are designed for production runs – not the fast-moving research and development environment that many hardware startups find themselves, Lapsa added. In these environments, speed and accuracy are paramount.
Brent Bradbury, Stoke’s head of software, echoed these comments.
“The parts are changing, the people are changing, the processes are changing,” he said. “This lets us capture all that as it happens without a whole lot of extra work.”
Technology
Amid a boom in AI accelerators, a UC Berkeley-focused outfit, House Fund, swings open its doors


Companies at the forefront of AI would naturally like to stay at the forefront, so it’s no surprise they want to stay close to smaller startups that are putting some of their newest advancements to work.
Last month, for example, Neo, a startup accelerator founded by Silicon Valley investor Ali Partovi, announced that OpenAI and Microsoft have offered to provide free software and advice to companies in a new track focused on artificial intelligence.
Now, another Bay Area outfit — House Fund, which invests in startups with ties to UC Berkeley — says it is launching an AI accelerator and that, similarly, OpenAI, Microsoft, Databricks, and Google’s Gradient Ventures are offering participating startups free and early access to tech from their companies, along with mentorship from top AI founders and executives at these companies.
We talked with House Fund founder Jeremy Fiance over the weekend to get a bit more color about the program, which will replace a broader-based accelerator program House Fund has run and whose alums include an additive manufacturing software company, Dyndrite, and the managed app development platform Chowbotics, whose most recent round in January brought the company’s total funding to more than $60 million.
For founders interested in learning more, the new AI accelerator program runs for two months, kicking off in early July and ending in early September. Six or so companies will be accepted, with the early application deadline coming up next week on April 13th. (The final application deadline is on June 1.) As for the time commitment involved across those two months, every startup could have a different experience, says Fiance. “We’re there when you need us, and we’re good at staying out of the way.”
There will be the requisite kickoff retreat to spark the program and founders to get to know one another. Candidates who are accepted will also have access to some of UC Berkeley’s renowned AI professors, including Michael Jordan, Ion Stoica, and Trevor Darrell. And they can opt into dinners and events in collaboration with these various constituents.
As for some of the financial dynamics, every startup that goes through the program will receive a $1 million investment on a $10 million post-money SAFE note. Importantly, too, as with the House Fund’s venture dollars, its AI accelerator is seeking startups that have at least one Berkeley-affiliated founder on the co-founding team. That includes alumni, faculty, PhDs, postdocs, staff, students, dropouts, and other affiliates.
There is no demo day. Instead, says Fiance, founders will receive “directed, personal introductions” to the VCs who best fit with their startups.
Given the buzz over AI, the new program could supercharge House Fund, the venture organization, which is already growing fast. Fiance launched it in 2016 with just $6 million and it now manages $300 million in assets, including on behalf of Berkeley Endowment Management Company and the University of California.
At the same time, the competition out there is fierce and growing more so by the day.
Though OpenAI has offered to partner with House Fund, for example, the San Francisco-based company announced its own accelerator back in November. Called Converge, the cohort was to be made up of 10 or so founders who received $1 million each and admission to five weeks of office hours, workshops and other events that ended and that received their funding from the OpenAI Startup Fund.
Y Combinator, the biggest accelerator in the world, is also oozing with AI startups right now, all of them part of a winter class that will be talking directly with investors this week via demo days that are taking place tomorrow, April 5th, and on Thursday.
-
Interviews2 years ago
Interview with Jean-Francois Desormeaux, Real Estate Investor
-
Technology10 months ago
Amplio helps companies find components when supply chain breaks down
-
Business News1 year ago
NFTMagazine.com Is Bringing NFTMag Conference 2022 to Miami this Year Says JetSetFly
-
Technology1 year ago
General Atlantic buys out SoftBank’s 15% stake in edtech Kahoot, now valued at about $152M vs the $215M SoftBank ponied up 2 years ago
-
Interviews10 months ago
Interview with Justice Mitchell, A 16-year-old Student-Athlete Who Received a Basketball Scholarship Offer from Pennsylvania University Greater Allegheny
-
Interviews1 year ago
Paying it Forward — Meet Dr. Jonathan Kenigson, the Founder of the World’s Leading Think-Tank in the Quadrivium
-
Entrepreneurship2 years ago
600% In Under 5 Years, Financial Advisors Grow Business By Podcasting And YouTube
-
Entrepreneurship2 years ago
Muminovic Benjamin E-commerce on Shopify the Course of the Business Man