Daily Crunch: Squarespace files to go public

Squarespace is going public, Apple shares some music payment details and Twitter bans the founder of the right-wing media organization Project Veritas. This is your Daily Crunch for April 16, 2021.

The big story: Squarespace files to go public

Squarespace has filed to go public via direct listing on the New York Stock Exchange, under the ticker symbol SQSP. The company behind the popular website builder has seen its revenue grow 28% year-over-year, from $484.8 million in 2019 to $621.1 in 2020. And it reported net income of $30.6 million last year.

Also worth noting: The majority of voting power still rests with founder and CEO Anthony Casalena.

The tech giants

Apple Music streaming revenue detailed in letter to artists — Things start at around a penny-per-stream, which is about double what Spotify pays out.

Google misled consumers over location data settings, Australia court finds — The case relates to personal location data collected by Google through Android mobile devices between January 2017 and December 2018.

Twitter bans James O’Keefe of Project Veritas over fake account policy — O’Keefe has already said that he will sue the company for defamation.

Startups, funding and venture capital

Level raises $27M from Khosla, Lightspeed ‘to rebuild insurance from the ground up’ — Level aims to give companies a more flexible way to offer benefits to employees.

Oxbotica raises $13.8M from Ocado to build autonomous vehicle tech for the online grocer’s logistics network — Ocado is treating this as a strategic investment to develop AI-powered, self-driving systems that will work across its operations.

Soona raises $10.2M to make remote photo and video shoots easy — Customers ship their products to Soona, then watch the shoot remotely and offer immediate feedback.

Advice and analysis from Extra Crunch

The IPO market is sending us mixed messages — Summing up the IPO news from UiPath, Coinbase, Grab, AppLovin and Zenvia.

Data scientists: Bring the narrative to the forefront — In our collective infatuation with data, what’s often overlooked is the role that storytelling plays in extracting real value from it.

Enterprise security attackers are one password away from your worst day — Exabeam’s Ralph Pisani argues that the world has changed, but cybersecurity hasn’t kept pace.

(Extra Crunch is our membership program, which helps founders and startup teams get ahead. You can sign up here.)

Everything else

Reform the US low-income broadband program by rebuilding Lifeline — America’s Lifeline program is a monthly subsidy designed to help low-income families afford critical communications services.

GM’s second $2.3B battery plant with LG Chem to open in late 2023 — The plant will supply the automaker with the cells needed for the 30 electric vehicle models it plans to launch by mid decade.

Pakistan temporarily blocks social media — The Pakistani government ordered the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority to block social media platforms including Twitter, Facebook, WhatsApp, YouTube and Telegram for several hours today.

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