The $50-million funding round that Quora recently closed has raised some eyebrows. Is this just another example of a bubble-style atmosphere in Silicon Valley’s venture capital community, or is the crowdsourced question-and-answer site really onto something that could be a multibillion-dollar idea? Read More »
Is new legislation that is aimed at allowing startups to raise money from individuals really going to help the economy — or is it just going to increase the number of stock scams and help fuel a dangerous kind of bubble mentality around investing? Read More »
Boku, which recently introduced a white label platform called Boku Accounts with Mastercard that allows operators to offer in-store mobile payment services, has received $35 million in new funding from New Enterprise Associates and Telefonica Digital, to help it go after offline payments. Read More »
Sequoia’s $10m round of funding for concert database Songkick puts a lot of pressure on the London startup. But CEO Ian Hogarth says he’s ready to cope with everything that’s coming — and plans to make his site the hub for music on the web. Read More »
The decision to back a new $9 million round of fundraising for LA-based fashion website Nasty Gal shows exactly how deep Index Ventures — one of Europe’s most successful VCs — is invested in the market, and how big they’re betting online fashion will be. Read More »
London-based art discovery service Artfinder is set to step up its plans for taking high culture to the web, after bringing in a second round of funding from Northzone, Greylock, and Wellington Partners. Read More »
Jeff Clavier’s SoftTech VC has closed investment on its third fund at $55 million, making Fund III its biggest fund yet. Clavier talked to GigaOM about why SoftTech decided to go so big, how the new cash will be invested, and the larger tech industry landscape. Read More »
SquareTrade, a San Francisco-based company that provides warranties for gadgets like the iPhone, landed a $238 million investment from Bain Capital. The new investment is being made jointly by Bain’s private equity and venture capital affiliates. Further financial details about the deal have not been disclosed. Read More »
LuxeYard, a site selling high-end home decor products, is launching Tuesday. Yes, it’s technically another flash sales site. But what’s interesting about LuxeYard is that it’s doing things a bit differently from the established players in the space such as One Kings Lane and Gilt Groupe. Read More »
Codecademy, which teaches users how to program for free with an interactive and social web application, has garnered more than 1 million users in less than five months. We talked to co-founder and CEO Zach Sims about how Codecademy started and where it’s going. Read More »
Updated. Outdoor recreational startup AllTrails today announced a major partnership with National Geographic that will bring unique, co-branded content to the startup’s website at AllTrails.com and its mobile applications. That will give it a lot more data, and opens the door for a subscription service. Read More »
Affine Systems, which makes software to scan and sort the content in online video, has raised nearly $5 million in a new funding round, according to a regulatory filing. Affine’s software gives advertisers the tools to analyze online video in a way that’s similar to television. Read More »
More Must Reads
Lithium Technologies has raised a $53.4 million funding round led by New Enterprise Associates and SAP Ventures. The round includes existing investors Benchmark Capital, DAG Ventures, Emergence Capital, Greenspring Associates, Shasta Ventures and Tenaya Capital, and brings total funding to more than $100 million. Read More »
Wahooly has created a group of 25,000 influential testers and is now opening the doors to startups to apply to engage this group. Startups will create testing groups of 5,000 to 8,000 people, who will share in a pool of equity ranging from 4–6 percent. Read More »
TaskRabbit has raised $17.8 million in a Series B funding round. It’s just been 7 months since the company announced its $5 million Series A, but growth has been fast and furious: TaskRabbit has tripled net revenue and seen a seven-fold increase in customers since May. Read More »
It’s easier than ever to build a web or mobile app and call yourself a startup. But with new funding opportunities and technology tools, entrepreneurs can easily — and cheaply — use technology to solve larger problems, rather than create another lifestyle app. Read More »
Hotel Tonight, the app that lets you book last minute hotel rooms for discounted rates, is currently raising a $9.1 million funding round, according to documents filed with the SEC Wednesday. The company has raised $8.65 million in the round so far, the filings show. Read More »
Parse, which makes a software platform that adds a cloud component to any mobile app, has raised $5.5 million. The funding round serves as a Series A for the company and brings its total investment to $7 million. Parse calls itself “the Heroku for mobile apps.” Read More »
American Express wants to have a stake in the next big digital commerce start-up and it’s establishing a new $100 million fund to make sure it doesn’t miss out. It’s another sign that 162-year-old American Express is anxious to keep evolving. Read More »
Big data technology is attracting some big bucks. Kaggle, a startup that helps companies outsource large business analytics projects by turning them into large-scale competitions for scientists around the world, will announce Thursday it has secured $11 million in venture capital funding. Read More »
Waddle, the San Francisco-based startup that makes a group photo sharing app for the iPhone, is preparing to get a bit bigger: The company has landed seed funding from Chinese Internet giant Tencent. It has also released an update to its photo sharing app, Waddle 2.0. Read More »
Livefyre, the software platform that embeds live commenting on websites, has secured $4.5 million in a new round of funding. The startup says it plans to use the money on hiring and new products — which will come in handy since it has some stiff competition: … Read More »
Bravo, the cable television network known for such reality shows as The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills and The Millionaire Matchmaker, is apparently looking for young professionals to star in an upcoming reality show based on Silicon Valley. Read More »
Surprisingly there are still semiconductor companies getting funding out there, as Quantance, a chip maker proved Monday when it scored $11 million in third-round funding from TD Fund, Granite Ventures, InterWest Partners and DOCOMO Capital. This money will help it expand beyond the mobile market. Read More »
Dashlane, a stealth start-up, is still a few weeks away from unveiling its product but the company announced today that it has raised $10 million. It is trying to tackle the problem of inputting information, passwords and payment data into websites from desktop and mobile devices. Read More »
Proving that virtual currency can be worth a good amount of real-life cash, social stock market Empire Avenue has landed $1.2 million in funding. Empire Avenue serves a unique and somewhat controversial purpose: It’s a stock market that puts a price on people instead of companies. … Read More »
Music streaming company TouchTunes is said to have secured $45 million in Series E funding at a $300 million valuation. Although those are some pretty impressive figures, the news is perhaps most notable for how it’s been made public — through an apparently accidental email address … Read More »
Confirming weeks of speculation, Twitter announced Monday it has closed on a “significant” amount of new funding led by Russia-based venture capital firm DST Global. The specific amount raised has not been disclosed, but various reports have pegged the round at $800 million. Read More »
ReadItLater, the mobile and web app that allows you to save webpages to read later, has has taken on $2.5 million. The company is using the funds to make the shift from “quiet giant” app developer to full-fledged tech startup, CEO Nate Weiner says. Read More »
Web security startup CloudFlare has raised $20 million in a series B funding round. The San Francisco-based company, which has seen impressive growth since its September 2010 launch, makes a cloud-based software program that purportedly helps protect websites while also making them faster. Read More »
Is this Bubble 2.0? This infographic, which Column Five Media did for Udemy, examines the state of startups. Though VCs are doing fewer deals than they were before the recession really took hold in late 2008, the amount of money invested is up to prerecession levels. … Read More »
Airbnb, the peer-to-peer apartment and house rental website, is rumored to be raising $100 million in new funding at a whopping $1 billion valuation. But based on the company’s revenue and growth prospects, that number may not be as shocking as it seems. Read More »
Boticca.com, an online marketplace connecting high-fashion,independent jewelry and accessories designers with fashonistas looking for hand-crafted Czech crystal collar necklaces and gold-foil-and-pearl jellyfish rings, has received $2.5 million in funding. The Series A round comes from both international and Silcon Valley investors. Read More »
TaskRabbit has raised $5 million in a Series A funding round led by Shasta Ventures. The three-year-old startup, which currently brokers tasks in San Francisco and Boston, will use the money to expand its reach to other metro areas nationwide. Read More »
Though associates at VC firms can always find mentors, there are a few things that the Kauffman Fellows might not tell you. Remmy Oxley gives his five unexpected tips for upping your venture capital game. Read More »
A startup called Color has raised a whopping $41 million from a group of funds including Sequoia Capital. Is the company’s photo-sharing app worth that much? Probably not. The funding is likely just a bet that the team involved will eventually come up with something worthwhile. Read More »
Cheezburger — the blog network that brought you I Can Has Cheezburger, the Fail blog and many other similar humor-oriented sites — today announced that it has closed a $30-million round of funding from a group of venture capital firms including Foundry Group and SoftBank Capital. … Read More »
Angels are winning the startup-funding race, and that appears to be accelerating an ongoing shift in the venture capital market. As more startups are turning to angels for funding, recent data shows that the amount of money raised by traditional VC funds continues to shrink. Read More »
Eventbrite has closed $20 million in Series D funding led by DAG Ventures, and including Tenaya Capital as well as previous investor Sequoia Capital. The four-year-old, San Francisco-based company has now raised a total of $29.5 million. Read More »
By Liz Gannes
Aug. 3, 2010, 9:18am PT
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Amidst widespread discussion and fear of collecting personal data for ad targeting, one of the leading marketplaces for such audience data has raised a big round of venture funding. New York City-based eXelate today announced a $15 million Series B round led by Menlo Ventures. Read More »
Foursquare, which has been nearly as exhibitionist about sharing the details of its corporate dealings as some of its users are about sharing their locations, has finally closed its second funding round of $20 million led by Andreessen Horowitz and including previous investors. Read More »
Pandora, the music streaming provider and Silicon Valley darling, has raised additional late-stage funding of an undisclosed amount. Pandora CEO Joe Kennedy said in an emailed statement the funding would be used “to invest in resources we need to continue to execute on our strategy.” Read More »
Beyond just connecting us through voice and text, our mobile phone numbers are quickly becoming our identities and our wallets. Now they can also receive physical gifts! Well kind of — Giiv, a newly funded year-old startup, allows users to send each other virtual gift cards. Read More »
5to1, a company founded by former Fox Interactive executives including Ross Levinsohn, is out raising funding again. The San Francisco-based startup helps publishers find better ads for their sites, and has raised the first $68,000 of what looks to be a $3.45 million convertible note. Read More »
SimpleGeo, the impeccably timed geo-location infrastructure startup, has raised a $8.14 million Series A. And at only a year old, it’s remarkable how quickly SimpleGeo has been able to capitalize on the excitement around geo-location technology and be recognized as a thought leader in the space. Read More »
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