News about startups: events, facts and developments on tafs uz.
31 stories
Advertising company Infillion acquired the geodata platform Foursquare in September 2026 on undisclosed terms. Co-founder and former CEO Dennis Crowley wrote in a blog post that neither preferred nor common shareholders received any proceeds from the deal, and expressed disappointment with the outcome.
Javlon TursunovFounded in 2021 as Mach9 Robotics, the company originally built hardware for visual inspections but switched to AI software for automating surveying and CAD. A $34 million Series A led by First Round Capital and Bessemer Venture Partners. The startup has nearly 100 customers in closed beta and more than 2,500 projects.
Sevara AzamovaBy resolution PCM-581 of October 20, the Cabinet of Ministers of Uzbekistan approved a regulation on the free and preferential provision of Ministry of Digital Development infrastructure to social AI projects. Startups, universities and scientific organizations will be able to receive up to 10 million tokens per month for LLMs and up to 120 GB of GPU memory for free, as well as purchase tokens at a 50% discount. Project selection will be held on a competitive basis twice a year.
Sevara Azamova24-year-old Aissata Diallo founded Tressfecta, a company making products for textured hair. Her first project, Plait Pilot, aims to automate the separation of kanekalon hair before braiding, which can take hours. The company is pre-launch, working on a prototype and preparing for a funding round.
Sardor QodirovAustralian startup Apate.ai, spun out of research at Macquarie University, uses thousands of AI agents that pose as victims and engage scammers in conversations to gather data on fraud schemes for banks, telecoms and government agencies.
Sardor QodirovNvidia, together with the Norrsken foundation, will open the Stockholm AI Lab hub in central Stockholm in 2027. It will bring together selected startups, Nvidia staff, and a biotech demonstration lab run by Nvidia and the startup Root Bio. The investment amount is not disclosed.
Sardor QodirovAt the TechCrunch Disrupt 2026 conference in San Francisco, 20 startups competed for the Startup Battlefield Cup and $100,000. The winner was Intero Biosystems from Denver, a developer of lab-grown intestinal 'organoids' for drug testing. Second place went to the Australian Apate, which uses AI agents against scammers.
Sardor QodirovAfter the first day of TechCrunch Disrupt 2026, organizers announced a 50% discount on all ticket types for the remaining two days — October 14 and 15 at Moscone West in San Francisco. Among the announced speakers are Mark Wahlberg, Replit CEO Amjad Masad, Benchmark partners, Panos Panay of Amazon, and representatives of OpenAI, Anthropic, and Hugging Face. Also planned are more than 320 exhibitors and the Startup Battlefield 200 pitch competition.
Sardor QodirovDiscounts on Founder Summit tickets of up to $200 are valid until October 16. The event will take place on November 4 at the SoWa Power Station venue in Boston and will gather around 1,000 founders and investors. The Founder Pass costs $199, the Investor Pass — $399.
Sardor QodirovOut of 20 startups that presented at Disrupt 2026, the Startup Battlefield finalists are Apate.ai, Flox Intelligence, Intero Biosystems, Industrial Next, and Satlyt. The final will take place on Thursday at 11:30 a.m. Pacific time; the winner will receive a trophy and $100,000 with no equity stake.
Sardor QodirovOn October 15, 2026, the final day of TechCrunch Disrupt 2026 takes place at Moscone West in San Francisco. More than 10,000 founders, investors and industry leaders are attending the conference. The program includes the Startup Battlefield final, sessions on AI agents, security, startup growth, more than 320 exhibitors and roundtables. Tickets are on sale at a 75% discount until the end of the day.
Sardor QodirovOn October 14, 2026, the second day of TechCrunch Disrupt 2026 takes place at Moscone West in San Francisco. The program features more than 300 startups in Expo Hall, sessions with Nvidia, Waabi, Flock Safety, Benchmark, OpenAI and Anthropic, the continuation of the Startup Battlefield competition with a $100,000 prize, as well as roundtables, breakouts and networking for more than 10,000 attendees.
Sardor Qodirov13-year-old Ehsan Adwan received the award for the best app made by youth — a game for doing homework. The main prize, App of the Year, went to the medication-taking app POP by the Kwelio team. In total, the 2026 competition received 9,754 entries from 153 countries.
Sardor Qodirov
