500 startups
500 Global, the venture firm and seed accelerator, has closed $143 million in financing for what it claims is its largest Southeast Asia early-stage fund to date. The new tranche,…
500 Global’s take on the rising competition among startup accelerators
500 Global, a startup accelerator formerly known as 500 Startups, has rebranded to become a venture firm. Here’s how it impacts startups.
As Russians head for the exits, Immigram platform launches to scale professional migration
The number of applications for international visas in the U.K. and elsewhere, in order to leave Russia, has exploded following the latter’s invasion of Ukraine. It’s estimated that since February…
Stax gets $2.2M for its app that lets Africans make transactions via automated USSD codes
Stax, a startup that allows Africans to buy airtime, send and request money, and transfer funds between accounts via automated USSD codes, has raised a $2.2 million seed extension round.…
DOJ seizes $3.6B in bitcoins after busting entrepreneur couple in Bitfinex laundering scheme
The U.S. Justice Department (DOJ) has seized over 94,000 bitcoins that were allegedly stolen in the 2016 hack of crypto exchange Bitfinex and arrested a married couple suspected to have…
Lawtrades aims to change how your company utilizes legal resources
Its technology enables legal professionals and companies to create profiles and be matched to available work, monitor projects and pay through the platform.
Startup accelerators’ definition of ‘value add’ is due for a refresh
Much has changed about the way launch pads for startups look, feel and show value today. The earliest investors are rethinking signaling risk, dilution and even the worth of a…
SQream, a well-funded Israel-based data analytics platform, today announced that it has acquired no-code data platform Panoply in an effort to expand its cloud services. At the core of SQream’s service…
Kalendar AI wants its sales bots to win your next customers
Kalendar AI, a San Francisco-based startup that’s been building on top of GPT-3‘s language model — developing a SaaS for automating lead generation and sales outreach to make it easier…
As Southeast Asia starts to boom, an accelerator backed by Silicon Valley execs jumps in
By today’s standards, $10 million isn’t a lot of capital to invest. But Iterative, which describes itself as a YC-style accelerator focused exclusively on Southeast Asia, says the $10 million…
Productfy raises $16M to build ‘DeFi for traditional finance’
Productfy Inc., a banking-as-a-service (BaaS) platform that aims to build “DeFi for traditional finance,” has raised $16 million in a Series A round of funding led by CM Ventures. Existing…
Flat.mx raises $20M from VCs, proptech unicorn founders to fix Mexico’s ‘broken’ real estate market
Flat.mx, which wants to build a real estate “super app” for Latin America, has closed on a $20 million Series A round of funding. Anthemis and 500 Startups co-led the…
Y Combinator, 500 Startups, Plug and Play invest in Odiggo’s $2.2M seed round
Servicing one’s car personally is a time-consuming, expensive and painstaking process. It’s a cycle that can lead to more expensive repairs and safety issues down the line, and no car…
Canopy raises $15M Series A after posting 4.5x customer growth in H1 2021
Canopy’s leaders expect focused fintech products to win out over large bundles of services.
Raise, a startup building Africa’s Carta, gets backing from 500 Startups
As startups in Africa continue to grow and raise money at a ridiculous pace, so too will their cap tables expand. Most African startups’ bulk of VC money is from…
Butlr Technologies, developing anonymous people sensors, inks $7.9M seed round
New funding boosts Butlr’s ability to apply real-time people-sensing technology beyond real estate and retail uses to monitor falls and other movements for active seniors who are aging in place.
Una Brands launches with $40M to roll up brands on multiple Asia-Pacific e-commerce platforms
One of the biggest funding trends of the past year is companies that consolidate small e-commerce brands. Many of the most notable startups in the space, like Thrasio, Berlin Brands…
Offering a service that prioritizes the highest-paying gigs in the gig economy, Stoovo raises funding
Semih Korkmaz and Hantz Févry launched Stoovo in 2019 as a way to help gig workers make the best use of their time. Févry, who immigrated to the U.S. from…
3 adtech and martech VCs see major opportunities in privacy and compliance
There seems to be plenty of activity in adtech and martech, particularly across the commerce ecosystem with tools that support monetization for small merchants.
TechCrunch’s favorite companies from 500 Startups’ latest demo day
TechCrunch tuned into 500 Startups’ 27th demo day today, keen to get our eyes on the accelerator’s latest companies.
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8 Miami-area investors assess America’s southernmost tech ecosystem
“We are now seeing, with the rise of remote working, better talent than ever before. But we still have a long way to go.”
Early-stage African VC firm Microtraction reports portfolio boom despite the weight of COVID-19
In a year marred by the coronavirus pandemic, it seems that early-stage startups on the African continent are continuing to see some notable growth, both in terms of their business…
Cyber Monday scams? Fakespot says it can identify fraudulent reviews and sellers online
The pandemic has made it all but impossible for a retail company without an online presence to survive. Yet while companies heavily dependent on foot traffic like J.Crew and Sur…
African fintech startup Chipper Cash raises $30M backed by Jeff Bezos
African cross-border fintech startup Chipper Cash has raised a $30 million Series B funding round led by Ribbit Capital with participation of Bezos Expeditions — the personal VC fund of Amazon…
Insight Partners, Precursor Ventures join Hustle Fund in raising new fund money
Even as the country is in the final days of a polarizing election, the cogs of VC never stop turning. On this ever-so-quiet, non-election-news Tuesday, venture firms still managed to…
Dallas’ ShearShare has a marketplace connecting stylists with available seats at salons and $2.3 million in funding
Courtney Caldwell and her husband Tye have been building the Dallas-based startup ShearShare, which provides a marketplace service connecting stylists with open seats at hair salons, since 2017. Since their…
Springboard raises $31 million to expand its mentor-guided education platform to more geographies
Springboard, an online education platform that provides upskilling and reskilling training courses to people looking to learn in-demand roles, has raised $31 million in a new financing round as it…
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5 VCs agree: COVID-19 reshaped adtech and martech
We last surveyed VCs about their advertising and marketing investment strategies back in January — which is to say, in a completely different world, before the coronavirus pandemic began to wreak havoc on the global economy. While there don’t appear to be any comprehensive numbers yet about the effect on digital advertising (which is, after…
Berlin’s Zenjob gets $30M to take its digital staffing service nationwide and beyond
Berlin-based recruitment startup, Zenjob, which operates a digital platform connecting students with highly flexible temp jobs in sectors such as retail, logistics and hospitality, has closed a €27 million ($30M)…
NextView Ventures is launching a remote accelerator for startups
Over the weekend, Silicon Valley leader Marc Andreessen broke his usual silence and gave some advice to Silicon Valley: It’s time to build. The famed investor urged CEOs, entrepreneurs and…
