Tech
Fashion rental app By Rotation and Uber partner to help deliver ski clothing
By Rotation, one of the U.K.’s most popular peer-to-peer fashion rental platforms, announced on Wednesday a partnership with the ride-sharing app Uber.
From now until May 31, By Rotation users in the U.K. can rent outfits from others in their neighborhood and have them delivered via Uber within 60 minutes at a 10% discount. Though the discount applies to all users, the service is geared toward those renting ski gear. By Rotation said that 30% of the ski renters on its platform look for same-day pickup, and this partnership seeks to alleviate the annoyance of renting bulky, expensive ski gear and having to lug it around.
The partnership is fun and timely. Previously, By Rotation teamed up with Airbnb to provide rental wedding outfits for guests attending destination weddings. It was another creative collaboration that sought to meet consumers where they are. Right now, ski clothing has become quite the fashion symbol online as the sport remains a popular pastime across Europe.
Eshita Kabra-Davies, the founder and CEO of By Rotation, told TechCrunch that the partnership came from “listening to our community,” and that the company realized that, though consumers love how sustainable renting clothing can be, they also wanted the “speed and convenience of e-commerce.”
“With one in four rentals made within 48 hours of an event, logistics was the final friction point,” she said. She called this the “emergency economy,” or the moment of “satorical panic” when someone realized they needed an outfit immediately. Usually, when this moment comes, a person has to run out to make a “panic purchase” for a new outfit. “We have wanted to change this behavior by removing the one thing standing in the way — logistics,” Kabra-Davies said.
Teaming up with Uber makes consumers move from “fast fashion” to “slow fashion,” she said. Fashion remains one of the most polluting industries in the world. As a result, the sharing economy — or the circular economy —has become popular among young people looking for more sustainable, and often more affordable, ways to buy clothing.
When users renting in their neighborhoods go to the app’s checkout page, they will be prompted via a pop-up banner to use Uber Courier, where the By Rotation discount will automatically be applied.
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“It gives our community the luxury of choice; they can now secure a high-quality, high-value piece over a disposable garment, simply because it can reach their door just as quickly,” Kabra-Davies continued.
Kabra-Davies launched By Rotation in 2019 and has scaled it into one of the world’s largest peer-to-peer rental platforms. The platform has more than 1 million users (like song writer Ellie Goulding), she said, and it manages luxury inventory worth more than $100 million. With this, the company has expanded beyond being a fashion rental platform, Kabra-Davies said.
“A powerful example is one of our top lenders who actually used her wardrobe earnings to fund her IVF journey, which has led to successful surrogacy,” she said. Next, the brand hopes to keep building the “world’s largest shared wardrobe.” It’s already launched in New York and has its eyes on the UAE. “Our ambition, like Uber’s, is global,” Kabra-Davies said. “We want to make the ‘rotating wardrobe’ the default mode of consumption everywhere.
Tech
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Tech
Uber to buy delivery arm of Turkey’s Getir
Uber has agreed to acquire the delivery business of Turkey’s Getir, once one of the biggest success stories of the country’s startup ecosystem, the company announced on Monday.
The deal will see Uber paying $335 million at the outset to purchase Getir’s food delivery business. The ride-hailing giant will also pay $100 million for a 15% stake in Getir’s grocery, retail, and water delivery business, and said it would complete the acquisition of the division over the next few years.
Uber is buying the business from Getir’s biggest shareholder, the Emirati sovereign wealth fund Mubadala. The investment firm was reportedly seeking to sell its stake in the company last year.
The deal comes after a turbulent few years for Getir, which once enjoyed a valuation of $12 billion, that saw the startup scale down its operations massively. The company launched to great traction in 2015, and invested aggressively to expand its operations in the U.S. and Europe, both organically and via acquisitions, especially during the pandemic.
But after the pandemic lockdowns eased, broader consumer demand for food and grocery delivery also wavered, and Getir chose to cut its losses in 2024, shutting shop and laying off thousands of staff in the U.S., U.K., and Europe in order to focus on business back home.
Nearly a year ago, the company went through a struggle for control over a restructuring plan proposed by Mubadala. The plan was opposed by one of Getir’s co-founders, who eventually sued to fight the “illegal coup,” but a Dutch court rejected the founder’s appeals.
The company has raised a total of $2.40 billion so far, according to PitchBook. Documents filed by Getir in court last year show the company valued its group assets at $374 million.
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“This transaction reflects the strength of the business and the progress it has made, particularly over the last year,” Waleed Al Mokarrab Al Muhairi, deputy group CEO at Mubadala, said in a statement.
Uber said it would combine the new unit’s services with Trendyol Go, a food and grocery delivery service in Turkey that the ride-hail giant bought for $700 million last May. Uber said Getir’s food delivery business alone recorded gross bookings of more than $1 billion in 2025, up 50% from a year earlier.
The deal follows a strong showing by Uber’s delivery business in the fourth quarter, reporting revenue of $4.89 billion, up 30% from a year earlier. The company said Europe, the Middle East, and Asia proved the fastest-growing regions for the business in 2026.
Tech
Discord to roll out age verification next month for full access to its platform
Discord is rolling out age verification globally starting next month, the company announced on Monday. All users will be put into a “teen-appropriate experience” by default unless they prove they’re adults. Age verification will be required to change certain settings and access age-restricted content.
Discord users will need to be confirmed as adults in order to unblur sensitive content or turn off the setting, and only adults can access age-restricted channels, servers, and app commands. Additionally, messages from people a user may not know are routed to a separate inbox by default, and only verified adults can modify this setting.
People will receive warning prompts for friend requests from users they may not know, and only adults will be able speak onstage in servers.
To complete age verification, users need to either complete a facial age estimation or submit an ID to Discord’s vendor partners. The platform plans to add more options in the future. Discord notes that some users may be asked to use multiple methods when additional information is needed to assign an age group.
The facial age estimation requires video selfies, which Discord says never leave your device. Additionally, the company says IDs submitted to its vendor partners are deleted quickly and, in most cases, immediately after age confirmation.
It’s worth noting that Discord disclosed last October that around 70,000 users may have had sensitive data, such as their government ID photos, exposed after hackers breached a third-party vendor that the platform uses for age-related appeals. The breach reflected digital rights activists’ concerns over the use of age checks as a way to make the internet “safer.”
Discord’s global launch of age verification follows the company’s decision to establish age checks for users in the U.K. and Australia last year.
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“Rolling out teen-by-default settings globally builds on Discord’s existing safety architecture, giving teens strong protections while allowing verified adults flexibility,” said Savannah Badalich, head of product policy at Discord, in a press release. “We design our products with teen safety principles at the core and will continue working with safety experts, policymakers, and Discord users to support meaningful, long term wellbeing for teens on the platform.”
The announcement mirrors similar moves made by other online platforms, reflecting growing international efforts to strengthen child safety. Most recently, Roblox introduced mandatory facial verification for access to chats on its platform. Last July, YouTube launched its age-estimation technology in the U.S. to identify teen users in order to provide a more age-appropriate experience.
Discord’s age-verification changes will begin in early March, and both new and existing users will need to verify their age to access age-restricted content.
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