London’s Revolut Enters The Unicorn Club, Chinese E-Comm Yunji Raises USD 120 Mn And More…
Here we are with top tech stories from the last week [ 23 – 27 April 2018]
Europe
London-based fintech, Revolut recently entered the “unicorn” category after raising USD 250 Mn in series C fund round, valuing the firm at USD 1.7 Bn. The round was led by DST global with participation from Index Ventures and Ribbit capital.
Fat lama has raised USD 10 Mn in series A round of funding which was led by Blossom Capital with participation from Atomico and Y Combinator. The UK based start-up is a provider of a peer-to-peer marketplace for renting and borrowing items.
Pusher, a London based firm that provides developer tools for app developers to add communication and collaboration features to apps. It has recently secured USD 8 Mn in its series A funding led by Balderton Capital with participation from Heavybit.
UK-headquartered ClauseMatch that runs an automated compliance platform for firms to manage their documents and stay up to date with regulation changes has received USD 5 Mn in a funding round led by Index Ventures.
BookingBug is a London-based startup that provides appointment booking platform to help firms manage their customer and partners appointments. The startup has raised USD 13.4 Mn in its series C round from PeakSpan Capital and Downing Ventures.
Paris-based firm Slite, that develops a collaborative platform to enable teams in an organization to work together and share content and information. It has raised USD 4.4 Mn from Index Ventures in a seed fund round.a
Popular instant messaging service, WhatsApp is raising the minimum age limit from the worldwide standard of 13 to 16 years for its users in the EU. WhatsApp says that its move would help it meet the “new high standards of transparency” in the region.
Asia
Eight Roads Ventures has launched USD 275 Mn fund for Chinese tech startups. For the VC firm, that is part of Fidelity International; this follows the launch of a dedicated Eight Roads China healthcare fund in September 2017.
E-commerce platform Yunji has scored USD 120 Mn in a series B round led by CDH Investment. Yunji operates 30 warehouses and has reported over USD 44 Mn in daily sales, with FY2017 revenue of USD 1.58 Bn.
Shenzhen, China’s Silicon Valley of hardware, has established USD 79.2 Mn blockchain venture capital fund. It is the second Chinese city to set up its blockchain fund after Hangzhou, which too had launched a USD 1.6 Bn government-backed vehicle.
Alibaba has bought chipmaker C-SKY Microsystem in an apparent bid to advance its chip development capabilities. The takeover comes amid heightened trade tensions between China and the US, which Chinese companies rely on to source many critical technologies.
Japanese site-analytics firm Plaid has secured USD 25 Mn funding from Femto Partners, Mitsubishi UFJ, Mitsui & Co. and others. Plaid provides analysis and real-time visualization of online shoppers’ behavioral data.
India’s Capital Float has raised USD 22 Mn in funding from Amazon. The online lending startup confirmed that Amazon’s investment came as part of its USD 45 Mn series C round from last year.
Beauty e-tailer Nykaa has picked USD 11.3 Mn at a valuation of USD 453 Mn, from several family offices and HNI’s. The startup is said to hold 33 percent of India’s online market in beauty products and services.
Australian online design company Canva has announced its acquisition of fellow Sydney-based interactive presentation startup Zeetings. The deal follows Canva’s USD 40 Mn fundraise at the start of the year. Btw Canva is a unicorn.
Malaysian fintech Soft Space raised series B funding from Sumitomo Mitsui – paving the way for its entry into the Japanese market.
In a bid to fill Singapore’s Uber void, Indian-ride hailing service Jugnoo is set to enter the market where it will offer private car-hiring services with a price bidding system. Also, local carpool app Ryde is launching its personal car hire services called RideX.
USA
An Ad-tech firm BuySellAds has acquired the majority of the stake in Digg, a Noy York-based news aggregator. Boston-based BuySellAds bought Digg’s assets and its editorial and revenue teams for an undisclosed amount.
New York-based Rocketrip has raised USD 15 Mn in its series C funding round. Google Ventures led the round. Rocketrip is a platform for the firms which rewards employees of the firm with gift cards if they save money spending less than allotted budget for travel by the company.
San Francisco based “Doctor on Demand” a platform that offers video consultation and healthcare services has secured USD 74 Mn in its series C funding round led by Princeville Global, Goldman Sachs Investment Partners, and others.
BigCommerce a startup that helps its clients manage e-commerce sites, is a Texas-based firm that announced the raising of USD 64 Mn led by Goldman Sachs to expand the business.
California based, Computer tech giant Oracle has acquired Grapeshot, a start-up that manages branding and matches related advertisements to the content so that it can be placed in relevant places to ensure brand safety. The acquisition will help Oracle to improve marketing outcomes for its partners.
Kidbox, a startup that offers a style box that contains personalized kid’s clothing according to their age and style. It is a New York-based startup that has raised USD 15.3 Mn in its series B funding round led by Canvas Ventures.
San Francisco-based robotics firm Marble is a start-up focussed on using the robotics in the supply chain and food delivery. It has raised USD 10 Mn in its series A funding round.
