Singapore’s largest telecoms provider, SingTel, plans to set aside $1.6 billion (S$2 billion) over the next three years for startup acquisitions, it said in an earnings call (via ZDNet). It wasn’t clear on what those acquisitions would be specifically, but going by those it has made in recent years, we can expect the telco to continue focusing on digital content and augmenting its… → Read More
Bike sharing service Social Bicycles has raised $1.1 million to expand the reach of their social bike sharing service to new markets. The company, led by Ryan Rzepecki, reported the funding this morning. → Read More
DailyWorth, an online community for financially minded women, is adding $1 million to their existing Series A round of funding. The money comes sixteen months after DailyWorth raised $2 million in their Series A last January. This additional influx of investments was led by DFJ Gotham, while additional investors include Gabriel Investments, 500 Startups, Robinhood Ventures, Investors’… → Read More
Singapore beauty e-tailer, Luxola, just raised its Series A round from GREE Ventures. The amount was undisclosed, but has been rumored to be in the region of $2 million. The company carries about 60 brands of cosmetics and beauty products on its website, and ships to countries in Southeast Asia like Singapore and Malaysia. Its site was launched in September 2012, and it had previously raised a… → Read More
Zozi launched in 2010 to become the go-to destination for those looking for an (affordable) excuse to take break from the daily grind by offering daily deals on a wide range of local adventures — everything from cocktail classes in Atlanta to kayaking in San Francisco Bay. However, after fighting it out in the crowded daily deals space for two years, Zozi shifted its focus to offering high-end… → Read More
We’ve covered Seattle-based Haiku Deck’s iPad-based presentation tool in the past, and come away impressed. The mobile native PowerPoint killer lets anyone create attractive presentations quickly using only their device, and now the startup behind it has raised a $3 million Series A funding round, led by Trilogy Partnership and including existing investors Madrona Venture Group, Founders Co-Op and… → Read More
Catcha Group, a Malaysia-based investment firm has announced it will invest up to $150 million in Asean-based online businesses over the next five years. The funds will come both from the top as well as through the Catcha Group’s subsidiaries. The Asean region refers to Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore and Thailand. The company’s online assets are worth over $300 million… → Read More
Japanese group coupon buying site Luxa just closed its Series B funding of $5.3 million (500 million Yen) from JAFCO. The Japanese VC also backed Luxa’s Series A round in November 2010, when it put in the same amount. This brings Luxa’s total funding to $10.6 million since operations started in August 2010. Luxa is a daily-deals site like Groupon, but it positions itself towards the… → Read More
Dachis Group, the social marketing and analytics startup led by Jeffrey Dachis (who previously co-founded and led interactive marketing agency Razorfish), announced today that it has raised $7.5 million in series C financing, led by Austin Ventures. → Read More
Chope has raised $2.5 million (S$3.2 million) in Series B funding. The round was led by local publishing house, Singapore Press Holdings, which now owns 27.8% of the startup, valued at $1.4 million (S$1.81 million). Chope operates a similar service to OpenTable, and allows restaurant bookings through its website and mobile apps. It provides a restaurant booking backend system licensed from a UK… → Read More
AccessData was among the first companies to focus on digital forensics, cyber security and litigation support when it was founded all the way back in 1987. The company never took any outside funding. That is, until today. Access data just announced that it has received a $45 million investment from Sorenson Capital Partners and Silicon Valley Bank. This funding, the company says, allows it to… → Read More
Mobile device management startup AirWatch has raised a massive series A round of $200 million, led by Insight Venture Partners. The startup competes with others such as Good Technology and SAP’s Afaria in the mobile device management space. This rides the current “bring your own device” (BYOD) trend, where companies are supporting employee-owned devices such as smartphones and laptops in the… → Read More
When we first met PayrollHero.com, it was aiming to change the way small business timekeeping is done in Asia. With a $1 million seed round from 500Startups, LX Ventures, Futura, and others, it looks like they may do just that. → Read More
As 3D printing and modeling moves into the mainstream, it’s interesting to see the rise of small players in the market and the capital raised. Take, for example, CGTrader. Originally designed as a marketplace for 3D designers and artists, it’s just raised nearly 200,000 Euro from Practica Capital, a fund in Lithuania. Founded by Marius Kalytis, the company is based in Vilnius. → Read More
Thunderbolt expansion docks for MacBook Pro have been slow to come to get started with offerings from Matrox and Belkin only now coming to market after lengthy delays. And they’re pricey, too, at $299 and $249 respectively. A new Kickstarter project called the MacDock argues you can do almost as much for considerably less, and without adding Thunderbolt into the mix. → Read More
Method, a Toronto-based CRM solution, today announced the closing of a $3 million dollar investment round led by Klass Capital. The company, which is the number-one rated such app for Intuit’s QuickBooks platform, will be using the cash injection to help it jumpstart a platform redesign, and the development of integrations with other leading bookkeeping software like Wave, Xero, FreshBooks and… → Read More
Singaporean media outfit, e27, has raised about US$615,000 (S$760,000) through a funding round with investors in the region, and plans to expand into Southeast Asia. The round was raised with B Dash Ventures from Japan, Pinehurst Advisors in Taiwan, Ardent Capital in Thailand and Dan Neary in Singapore. e27 has been around since 2006 and runs a news site on tech startups in Asia, and organizes… → Read More
Houzz is one of those Silicon Valley startups you don’t hear all that much about, but the company is quickly disrupting the $300 billion home remodeling market by providing home owners with inspiration for their projects and connecting them with the designers, architects and contractors who can turn their ideas into reality. Today, Houzz announced that it has raised a $35 million Series C round… → Read More
We’ve learned today that mobile news-delivery company Circa has raised another $750K on top of the $900K raised previously. The company launched its app of the same name, which allows you to follow an often-changing story in bite-sized chunks, only three months ago. A few more big names have joined in this up-round, including: Lerer Ventures, Advancit Capital, Menlo Talent Fund, Alex Bard… → Read More
Paris-based AppGratis has been in operation for a few years now, but it has only recently started targeting the U.S. market in earnest. Now, the app discovery tool for Apple’s iOS mobile ecosystem is announcing its first round of institutional funding, in the form of a $13.5M Series A round led by Iris Capital and including Orange Publicis Fund. The money will be used to help AppGratis capitalize… → Read More
Palo Alto-based Fanplayr, a startup focused on driving conversions on any website that offers an eCommerce component, today announced a new $2 million seed investment round, led by Denali Venture Partners. The two-year old startup wants to help websites of all stripes offer up an Amazon-style recommendation, upsell and sales conversion mechanism, without a minimum of hassle and with more guidance… → Read More
AngelPad, the startup accelerator program founded back in 2010 by ex-Googler Thomas Korte, is today releasing new data about the progress its companies have made to date, as well as funding aggregates for those participating in its program. The announcement comes ahead of Thursday’s application deadline for the Spring session. → Read More
As CES 2013 gets underway, it finds the Quantified Self movement to be a far more crowded market than a year ago, but as Matt Burns pointed out recently, the market is still hungry for smarter devices and “plenty of room” remains for startups for startups to push the envelope with innovation and press beyond movement and weight.
With digital health data proliferating, wearable health-tracking… → Read More
AngelList, a service that matches early stage startups with investors, is today continuing its transformation from social network to investing platform with the launch of a new feature called AngelList Invest. Created in partnership with broker-dealer SecondMarket for regulatory compliance purposes, the new addition will allow smaller, accredited investors the ability to put in $1,000 or more in… → Read More
The quantified self movement is in full force, and SF-based LUMO BodyTech is one of the beneficiaries of this trend. The smart sensor maker, whose first product LUMOback is designed to help improve a user’s posture via a smartphone app and activity/movement monitoring, got an early jump via Kickstarter, but has now turned to traditional investors including Madrona Venture Group, Eric Schmidt… → Read More
Apple SVP of Internet Software and Services Eddy Cue sent an interesting 31st tweet today. It’s a Foursquare check-in at Apple’s HQ, indicating that Cue is trying out the service at work. Moreover, Foursquare CEO Dennis Crowley is spending a week in San Francisco. These two circumstantial bits of information incite speculation: could they be talking about an acquisition, or a deep software… → Read More
San Francisco-based Koozoo today announced a seed funding round of $2.5 million, led by New Enterprise Associates and Tugboat Ventures. The round also includes Salesforce co-founder Dave Moellenhoff and TMG Partners CEO Michael Covarrubias, and will be used to help Koozoo hire engineers to build out its vision of a world where crowdsourced, 24-hour mobile video provides a window on the world to… → Read More
Top Southeast Asia VCs Golden Gate Ventures and JFDI.Asia have announced a new strategic alliance that will focus on supporting early-stage digital start-up companies as they transition from concept to substantial pre-series A funding. → Read More
Today, there seem to be more business accelerators than there are startups to fill their classes and cohorts. It seems that not a week goes by without the launch of another accelerator or seed starter fund. In fact, as Peter Relan said in a recent post (riffing on Chris Dixon), accelerators have become an industry segment in their own right. He also goes so far as to surmise that — just as it is… → Read More
As the influence of technology grows in education, many have started to predict the coming obsolescence of classroom fixtures like textbooks, chalkboards, standardized testing — and even teachers. While technology will no doubt transform and replace some familiar pieces of education (for the better), the ideal outcome is not one in which teachers are replaced or marginalized, but one that… → Read More
Austin, TX
Seattle, WA
San Diego, CA
Menlo Park, CA
Boston, MA
Disrupt Europe: Berlin Hackathon
Berlin, Germany
