X marks the spot: Matrix closes Fund X

Matrix Partners closes its tenth fund, pooling together $450 million for investments in consumer Internet, mobile, enterprise, software and IT infrastructure startups in the US. The firm was founded way back in 1977. 50 of its portfolio companies have gone public and 75 have been acquired. The firm has offices in Silicon Valley and Boston, as well as in India and China. Notable investments include Apple, Gilt, Huddle, HubSpot, JustFab, and Zendesk.

e.Bricks stacks up $100M fund for startups

Brrazilian media corporation RBS Group has expanded its operations into startups with a new $100 million fund. The fund will be run by e.Bricks, an investment arm in the digital sector of the RBS Group, and will make between 10 and 15 investments in early stage companies per year. The fund will focus on digital media, e-commerce, and mobile technology. The portfolio currently has eight companies. The Brazilian landscape for startups and venture capital is growing fast and RBS wants to position itself at the center of this activity.

Online lender AvantCredit secures $34M in funding

AvantCredit, a Chicago-based consumer e-lender, yesterday announced the completion of a $34 million round of equity and debt funding from August Capital and Victory Park Capital. AvantCredit offers personal loans to the tune of $1,000 to $10,000. AvantCredit makes use of customer attributes such as credit, social media, and user action data, to offer low interest rates to a wide range of customers. This is its first round of funding, including a $9 million Series A equity investment. The round was led by August Capital, with participation from asset management firm, Victory Park Capital. In addition, Victory Park also issued a $25 million credit facility to the e-lender, taking the total funding to $34 million. Read more on VentureBeat.

Cloud data-protection firm PerspecSys raises $12M, plans for global sales push

PerspecSys, the Toronto-based cloud data protection company, has closed $12 million in its second round of funding. The company plans to use the capital injection to further develop global sales and marketing efforts and continue product development. The company supports a variety of popular cloud-based applications, such as Salesforce.com and Oracle CRM On Demand, while using validated encryption solutions from companies like Voltage Security, McAfee, SafeNet, Symantec, and RSA. This round of funding was co-led by new investors Paladin Capital Group and Ascent Venture Partners. They were joined by return backer Intel Capital and other institutional investors. Total investment in PerspecSys now totals over $20 million. Read more on VentureBeat.

SendUs launches with $17M to help brands harness user videos

SendUs launched out of stealth mode with $17 million in funding from private investors today. The company provides a video submission and management platform so brands can use video content created by fans to their own advantage. Brands put out a call for content and consumers can submit their own videos for review and possible publishing. The Los Angeles company works with brands like FremantleMedia (creators of American Idol), Singapore Airlines, Peugeot, Nextel International, Sierra Club, and the Susan G. Komen foundation. Read more on VentureBeat.

With $3.2M in funding, Dekko unveils a clever tech to insert animations into the real world

Dekko is launching an “operating system for the real world,” which is a fancy way of saying a new augmented-reality system. Dekko inserts animated images such as cartoon characters into the real world, where they can interact with it. The company is announcing this technology for the first time today. San Francisco-based Dekko is also announcing that it has raised $3.2 million from Bessemer Venture Partners, Echo Ventures, and others. Read more on VentureBeat.

Los Angeles startup Yekra nets $3M for its digital movie distribution platform

Digital entertainment distribution startup Yekra has raised $3 million in new funding to give studios a way to distribute DRM-protected content without it being burdensome, the company announced today. Los Angeles-based Yekra’s goal is to help distribute movies online with the full blessing of Hollywood. Movies will have copyright protections but still be available to be viewed through the web, smartphones, tablets, and connected TVs.The new funding was led by Las Vegas angel investor Maurice Gallagher, with participation by Bray Capital, Shay O’Brien, and Michael Rogers. Read more on VentureBeat.

Beyond Verbal secures $2.8M, detects human emotions and character through voice recognition

Beyond Verbal Communications, an Israel-based startup that’s just pulled in a $2.8 million seed round of funding, uses what it calls Emotions Analytics to determine someone’s emotions and character traits in real-time as they speak. Beyond Verbal licenses its technology for use in consumer applications. The first mobile application using its API will launch in the near future, and Beyond Verbal is building a web tool that allows people to use the platform to analyze voices. The company launched in May 2013. The funding was led by angel investor Kenges Rakishev, and new VC Genesis Angels. Read more on VentureBeat.

MadeiraCloud nabs $1.5M from Sequoia for AWS-based visual cloud management

Amazon Web Services visualization startup MadeiraCloud has raised $1.5 million from Sequoia Capital its first round of funding with the promise of helping developers better understand how their applications fit into the cloud. MadeiraCloud offers a relatively painless drag-and-drop tool for designing, provisioning, monitoring, and managing an application stack and cloud resources inside AWS. The company launched its public beta in June 2012 and claims to service small startups all the way up to teams within large enterprises. It now oversees management of more than $25 million worth of AWS resources. Read more on VentureBeat.

Workspace solutions platform LiquidSpace raises $1.3M in follow-on funds

LiquidSpace, the two-pronged workspace solutions platform, announced today that it has raised $1.3 million in follow-on investment to the $6 million raised in the company’s second round of funding that closed earlier this year. The San Francisco-based company serves two sets of customers: modern professionals who use the platform to book office or meeting spaces instantly, and companies who employ LiquidSpace to manage their workforce’s workspace needs. It boasts over 2,000 workspaces and meeting rooms in over 250 U.S. cities. The follow-on investment comes from two strategic partners: Steelcase and CBRE Group. Both have global experience in workplace strategy and commercial real estate. Read more on VentureBeat.

RingDNA releases mobile call tracking app to ‘make sales reps smarter’ 

RingDNA released a voice communications platform today that provides sales reps with relevant, contextual data when they need it to make the most of their sales calls. The company also announced raising a $1.9 million seed round. This iPhone app integrates with Salesforce, Twilio, LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook, and company news feeds. When a call comes in, RingDNA delivers CRM data, social media activity, and behavioral marketing information to eliminate “blind spots” and give reps “actionable business opportunities” in real time. The funding came from angel investors. Read more on VentureBeat.

Plated serves up $1.4M from investors

We’d all love to whip up a delicious home cooked meal on-the-fly, but then a lack of time, inspiration, and motivation get in the way. Plated eliminates excuses by making home-cooking as easy as possible. Each week, the startup posts a selection of chef-designed meals. You choose the meals you want and order online. Plated delivers all the ingredients to your door with everything portioned out and all you have to do is put it together. Pricing is on an a la carte or monthly subscription basis. According to a report in TechCrunch, Plated has raised a $1.4 million seed round led by ff Venture Capital along with TechStars and angel investors.

Photo Credit: Debby Wong / Shutterstock.com

The deal was part of a $125 million secondary transaction where existing investors sold portions of their shares to new investor Google and previous investor Foundation Capital. No new money is going into the company, rather it is a reshuffling of equity to allow room for Google on the board.

Lending Club is an online community that connects people who need to borrow money with people to lend it to them. Borrowers apply for a personal loan and receive a rate quote. Interested investors fund these loans and automatically receive monthly payments on these loans in their bank account.

“Google was excited about the possibility that Lending Club could transform the banking system,” said CEO Renaud Laplanche in an interview with VentureBeat. “We are using technology and innovation to lower costs, provide more value to our customers, and increase transparency. These are all things Google has done with other sectors, and they are interested in our ability to do that in financial services, which is one of the few last large industries that has not been transformed.”

Lending Club grew by leaps and bounds over the past year and with volume almost tripling. It originated 780 million in loans in 2012 and is on track to do $2 billion this year. As of May 1st, Lending Club had funded $1.67 billion in loans. The company charges an origination fee to borrowers and a servicing free to investors and is on track to generate $90 million in revenue this year. Laplanche said that this impressive traction caught Google’s eye and it approached Lending Club about getting in on the action.

“We talked to our investors and said we wanted Google on the board, but did not want to raise additional capital and wanted them to sell some of their shares,” he said. “There was an increase in share price from last year, which made the transition easier. Our valuation is now at $1.55 billion, up from 550 million, which is a 3 times increase in just twelve months.”

The national average interest rate for unsecured personal loans in the U.S. is just over nine percent, while Lending Club offers between six and seven percent. By circumventing banks, Lending Club is able to offer lower rates. Laplanche had the idea for Lending Club in 2006 after paying 18 percent interest rate on his credit card. He realized that money was helping to fuel an inefficient system and that by allowing people to directly invest in people, it would benefit everybody involved. Now seven years later, the idea has taken off.

With this latest transaction, Laplanche said that things won’t change much initially. Over time, however, there is potential for partnerships. Right now, he is focused on providing the best possible product for consumers. Lending Club primarily deals with unsecured personal loans, but is exploring adding in student loans, auto loans and mortgage loans down the road.

Lending Club has raised $102 million to date and as mentioned above, existing investor Foundation Capital gained a greater stake as part of this deal. This marks the firm’s largest investment ever made over the course of its 18-year existence, with more than $50 million invested.

“We’ve never seen a market opportunity of this size and magnitude,” said general partner Charles Moldow. “In the financial services industry, we are seeing a shift toward the transparency of information and Lending Club is leading the charge. There is a massive restructuring taking place. We believe that Lending Club’s growth has signified that the uses of technology in the financial industry are limitless, extending to a shift in the flow of information, transparency and decision making at all levels. This is disrupting the traditional banking model as we know it.”

Moldow also said that Foundation Capital sees Lending Club as an iconic company akin to Amazon, eBay, Salesforce, or LinkedIn. The financial services industry is massive and ripe for disruption, with large returns to boot. Lending Club has generated 22 consecutive quarters of positive returns for investors and it seems that pattern will only continue. Google will join the board along with such luminaries as Mary Meeker, John Mack, and Larry Summers.

Photo Credit: Rockbadger/Flickr

The results found that 37 percent of Bay Area investors have put money into a startup, and yet fewer than 23 percent plan to do so within the next three years. It would seem the wealthy are looking elsewhere for investment opportunities. As Morgan Stanley’s regional manager Michael Struckman said, “it appears that despite the boost the small companies have given the region, local investors are beginning to cool on the idea of startups.”

73 percent of respondents cited risk as the primary deterrent and expressed fear over losing their money. Millionaires, however, were less concerned on this front than people with between $100K and $1 million in assets. One-third of investors were concerned about possible legal difficulties, while 16 percent were afraid of personal failure.

When they do decide to invest in startups, investors said that innovative ideas are the most important characteristic. 19 percent expect to take a significant role in the ventures, and 58 percent of investors prefer to invest as part of a group.

The survey included 1,000 US investors aged 25 to 75 with $100,00 or more in investable household financial assists, with an “oversample” of 305 San Francisco investors. Of those, one-third interviewed had $1 million or more in household financial assets. 46 percent of the men polled said they have invested in startups, while only 29 percent of women polled had done so.

Photo Credit: Simone van den Berg/Shutterstock 

For more funding news as it happens, subscribe to our Deals Channel feed. You can also follow VentureBeat on Twitter, @venturebeat, to view funding news as it’s published.

Arkansas startup raises $83M for cowboy boots, Carhartt, camping gear  

Acumen Brands has raised a whopping $83 million from General Atlantic to support growth of its portfolio of e-commerce companies. The company leverages knowledge of SEO, social media, marketing, business strategy, and data analytics to operate branded online storefronts for businesses like CountryOutfitter, Tough Weld Workwear, and Scrub Shopper. this new financing will support the move to a 200,000 square-foot facility and the addition of 20 to 30 new KIva Systems robots.Acumen Brands is based in Fayetteville, Arkansas and has raised $93 million to date. Read more on VentureBeat.

[x+1] secures $17M in funding to grow business and acquisition strategy

Digital marketing and data management software provider [x+1] announced today the company received $17 million in funding from Ares Capital. [x+1] works with companies to synchronize consumer engagements through a variety of marketing channels. It will use the investment to support its overall market expansion as well as the company’s growth strategy of targeted acquisitions. Read more on VentureBeat.

Zerto closes $13M to disaster-proof company data in the cloud

disaster recovery startup Zerto is attempting to make the process less painful and more efficient. Today the startup also closed a $13 million round of funding to grow its recovery platform, which uses visualization to back up its clients systems on the cloud. The new round was led by led by RTP Ventures (an affiliate of ru-Net Holdings,) with participation from existing investors Battery Ventures, Greylock IL and U.S. Venture Partners. Read more on VentureBeat.

War of the Dongles gets another venture-backed player

The battlefield for mobile point-of-sale companies is getting as crowded as the battle for Kings Landing. Jusp, an Italian Square clone, has raised $6 million from Italian venture capital firms Principia Sgr and Vertis Sgr to fuel expansion into other Kingdoms. I mean countries. Jusp enters the fray along with European competitors iZettle and Payleven, not to mention PayPal and Square (The Baratheon and Lannister contingents if you will).

With $5.7M, Flexiant flexes its cloud muscles

Flexiant, a British provider of cloud management software and cloud orchestration, has raised $5.7M from private London investors. This financing will be used to expand it offering into the European and North American markets. Flexiant’s services give hosting companies, service providers and telecom companies support in provisioning/commercializing cloud services.

Asthmapolis inhales $5M to tackle a 50M person, $50B problem

Asthmapolis has raised $5 million from the Social+Capital Partnership to address chronic respiratory disease. The system combines a sensor that snaps onto asthma inhalers with a mobile app that displays data to the user and provides insights about their treatment. There is also a dashboard to help physicians monitor their patients. Founder David Sickle formerly worked as a epidemiologist focusing on asthma and respiratory health at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Read more on VentureBeat.

EveryMove gets $3.5M for its apps that reward healthy employees

Seattle-based EveryMove has closed $3.5 million in funding for its health care mileage program. The company also just launched its Android app, which follows an iPhone app that lets employees gain points and rewards from brands for eating nutritious meals and going to the gym. The first round of funding comes from BlueCross BlueShield Venture Partners, Sandbox Industries, and Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Nebraska. Read more on VentureBeat.

Because going out to eat is too hard, Kitchensurfing gets $3.5M to connect you to chefs

Kitchensurfing grabbed $3.5 million today to feed you. No, I’m not kidding. The company created an online marketplace for chefs where you can choose a chef, have them cook food for you, and then leave a review Yelp-style on the Kitchensurfing website. The company processes all of your payments as well, so you won’t have to use cash or cut the chef and awkward check at the end of the evening.  The funding comes from Union Square Ventures and Spark Capital.

MBA & Company finds money in talent

Digital talent marketplace MBA & Company has raised $1.218 million to expand its inventory of “highly qualified freelance consultants” and businesses interested in hiring them. Since its founding in 2009, MBA & Company has attracted over 16,000 professionals from around the world with at least five years experience and advanced degrees, to work on projects large and small. The site operates a curated selection process and follows a pay-as-you-go business model. MMC Ventures led this round, with participation from Piton Capital and Cabiedes.

Europeans are still excited about daily deals…at least Bownty and its investors hope so

A European startup is hopping on the long-departed daily deals aggregator train. Bownty, a company based in Denmark, has raised $1.1 million from Danish SEED Capital and Accelerace Invest to further expand further across Europe. The site currently aggregates over 2,5000 deals from over 100 daily deal sites, targeting the UK, France, Spain, Germany, and Denmark.

Photo Credit: Screwtape/ Flickr

Carlos Eduardo Espinal is a partner at London-based startup accelerator and investment fund SeedCamp.

Investments, like the ocean, can come in waves, but that doesn’t mean they should.

A “tranched investment” is an investment that is split into one or more parts. In order for the company to receive the latter parts of a tranched investment, it usually has to achieve goals or objectives set as part of the conditions of investment. A typical example of a tranche is: the investors give you half the investment amount right now, and half the investment when your revenues reach ‘x’.

Generally speaking, the current thinking around tranches by most investors is that they are a good tool to motivate founders to reach a milestone or alternatively to reduce their exposure to risk. However, tranches are more damaging to the long term success of a company than investors may typically consider, particularly if milestones are not met or the company comes dangerously close to just meeting them.

Specifically, I think tranches can:

•  de-motivate founders and potentially reduce a founder’s drive (according to Daniel H. Pink’s view of extrinsic motivation, see below for more on this)
• reduce a founding team’s creativity on how to grow the business in a way that might be long-term better, but short-term fails to achieve the next pre-determined milestone. Think of a company sticking to a product rather than pivoting in hopes to hit a deadline, but then ultimately sticking with a product that long term will not yield the maximum returns.
• potentially reduce good-behavior (read: cheating to hit numbers). If someone is really really needing the cash, temptation to do something to cut corners is there.
• promotes “sandbagging” by the investor rather than full commitment
• creates a self-fulfilling prophecy. In the words of the CEO of Zemanta, Bostjan Spetic, “the cash you are raising is usually what you need to get to a significant milestone, like break-even. Tying that budget to sub-milestones implicitly reduces the chances to actually hitting the big milestone, because it increases the risk of running out of cash prematurely. I firmly believe that.”
• create an accelerated cash burn to achieve the goal, and then if missed by a little, leaves the company in a vulnerable position for subsequent fundraising.
• makes the company toxic for an external investor that would be interested in investing, if the company doesn’t receive the tranche from its existing investors.

My recommendation for both these questions is to get a dialog going to agree on one of the following three potential alternatives:

1. Reduce the amount of money and target a closer-term milestone for the startup to achieve. Yes, this implies that if the startups hits its milestone, it may command a higher valuation and the investor will not have been able to secure the economics of a tranched investment, but in exchange, the investor is getting a higher probability of overall success for their investment.

2. If an investor really needs to have tranches, implement “binary” milestones that are simple and clear. What you want to avoid are tranches that have partial or subjective achievement, such as when a company comes pretty close to hitting its revenue figure or number of users. An example of an ideal binary milestone would be: You will get a sum of money unlocked equaling the salary of a new CFO when you hire that CFO. The target is clear (hire CFO), it is not ambiguous or ‘close enough’; you either hired the CFO or you didn’t, and then the amount of money is tied to that achievement.

3. If you can’t agree on either of the above, that implies either the company is overvalued for where it is, or the investor may be overly cautious; if the latter, then the founder might want to reconsider taking them on as investor (assuming he/she has a choice).

One more thought on why the carrot/stick theory behind tranches doesn’t work: In his book Drive, author Daniel H. Pink walks through classical motivation models and compares them to his observations on actual motivation. He makes a very compelling case for companies, managers, parents, and just about anyone to rethink their preconceived notions on motivation, particularly around old carrot vs. stick methods.

He says the old form of motivation fails because for three reasons. One, It doesn’t mesh with the way many new business models are organizing what we do — because we’re intrinsically motivated purpose maximizers. Secondly, It doesn’t comport with the way that 21st century economics thinks about what we do — because economists are finally realizing that we’re full-fledged human beings, not single-minded economic robots. Finally, it’s hard to reconcile with much of what we actually do at work — because for growing numbers of people, work is often creative, interesting, and self-directed rather than unrelentingly routine, boring, and other-directed.

This topic may yield contrasting views on the efficacy of tranches by investors, but I sit squarely on the side that tranches, as they are generally used, are more value dilutive than value accretive for all parties involved.

So Graham’s doing something about it.

From now on, Y Combinator companies will use a four-step protocol before assuming they have a handshake deal with an investor:

1. The investor indicates a desire to be in on a funding round at a certain valuation.
2. The startup agrees and verbally commits.
3. The startup sends the investor an email or text message asking for confirmation.
4. The investor replies and confirms.

The problem, Graham says, is that too many “handshake deals” are not really deals at all. Either an investor isn’t communicating clearly, or a founder is over-eager and reading too much into a very polite no, or something worse is happening. Investors who are new to the game — or simply dishonest — can cause startups huge issues:

The problem is compounded by the fact that some investors deliberately mislead startups about how interested they are in investing. Startups’ prospects can change rapidly. If investors say no in a way that sounds like yes, they can essentially take a free option to invest. They haven’t actually committed, so it costs them nothing, but if the startup turns out to be a hot one, they can retroactively claim that their almost-yes was an actual yes, and that the startup is morally obliged to let them invest.

The process that Graham outlines seems long and excessive, but he argues that with mobile phones, it can and should all happen in person, right away. The difference is that now there is a digital track that confirms what the founder hoped he or she heard and what the investor actually committed to.

But Graham didn’t just make these comments off-the-cuff. He checked with Valley super-angels and VCs Ron Conway, Ben Horowitz, Chris Dixon, Marc Andreesen, among others, before publishing.

photo credit: Leonard John Matthews via photopin cc

Robert Siegel is a General Partner at XSeed Capital.

As a general partner at XSeed Capital, I was recently asked by one of our portfolio company CEOs my opinion on a potential strategic investor into his firm.

This is not an uncommon question that arises – what are the plusses and minuses of taking in money from a corporation versus a financial investor? Does it align incentives in a partnership between a large and small company? Can a startup get a higher valuation from a strategic investor vs. a pure financial investor?

Having been a strategic investor while at Intel, a CEO who took in strategic investment capital, and also as a VC who has co-invested with large corporations into startups, my key learnings on this situation are four-fold:

The strategic investor will always do what is in their selfish self-interest

One hypothesis is that if a strategic investor owns stock in a startup, the large firm will have its incentives aligned with management and the other financial investors. This is simply not true.

The broader economic interest of the larger corporation will always outweigh the small financial interest it has in the startup. It is not necessarily bad, per se, that a strategic investor owns stock in a startup, but don’t be mislead into the belief that this will “align incentives.”

A large corporate partner will act in whatever way it believes is in its financial interest, and they will not care about the consequences of getting what they want — including killing a startup in which it has made an investment — if it believes that this is the right thing for it to do.

Not all strategic investors are the same

Certain companies have a substantively more progressive POV towards investments. They see startups as not only sources of product innovation, but also partners and potential acquisition targets (for both products and people).

This is not the case with all large firms, however.

I will posit that many (most?) Silicon Valley large companies have a more “enlightened” approach in these relationships as there is an ecosystem that encourages acquisitions and collaborations between large and small firms. Outside of Silicon Valley this is not always true — in fact, oftentimes there is no history of such strategic relationships in an industry.

As such, a CEO should consider if there is a history of positive interactions in an industry between large and small companies when considering taking on a strategic investor. If there isn’t, be cautious.

Separate the commercial agreement from the investment

At times large companies like to tie development agreements or commercial arrangements to investments. This becomes a convenient way to put cash into a company that needs it, while getting some extra value via stock.

This is almost always a bad idea for a startup.

If a commercial arrangement makes sense for two companies, a structure can be found that is non-dilutive and works for both sides. If a large firm wants to make a strategic investment alongside a commercial arrangement, that can be fine as long as there is no correlation between the two agreements.

In other words, if the commercial arrangement no longer makes sense for one or both parties, the strategic investor should not be able to cause unnatural acts to the shareholders (including both employees and financial investors) or exert undue influence through its stock ownership.

Later is better than earlier

In the earliest days of a company, a startup is at its most fragile state. As such, a strategic investor has the ability to have disproportionate influence to encourage a young entity to do things that may not be in the long-term best interest of the startup (but might be good for the strategic investor).

As a young company gets more established, it has the ability both to survive changes in the status in a relationship with a large strategic partner, and also to push back with alternative choices if incentives end up not being aligned with the strategic investor.

. . .

While the above four pieces of conventional wisdom aren’t always true, I have found them to be consistent guidelines that help describe some key learnings of whether a startup should take an investment from a strategic investor.

Robert Siegel is a General Partner at XSeed Capital, bringing extensive innovative leadership in strategy definition, operational execution, and international sales and marketing for companies large and small. This post originally appeared on his blog.

photo credit: Thomas Hawk via photopin cc

One of New York’s most prominent “big data”-focused investors has joined FirstMark Capital as a managing director.

Matt Turck is a force in the Big Apple’s burgeoning tech scene. He is the principal organizer of New York’s “big data” meetup group and is one of the most advocates for the city’s potential as a hub for technology startups.

Turck plans to continue investing in early-stage analytics and big data startups in his new gig, a trend that he believes is set to continue for at least a decade.

“I’m interested in big data applications and companies that are trying to disrupt industries or invent new industries using the big data stack,” he said in an interview with VentureBeat. “New York is well positioned from that perspective; we have the right type of talent here,” he continued.

Turck told me he is impressed by FirstMark’s commitment to funding early-stage business to business (B2B) startups. The small firm isn’t the only one that is dedicated to the space — Emergence Capital has been around for years, and newcomers include Costanoa VC and Data Collective – but it’s one of the few with a headquarters in New York.

Prior to joining First Mark, one of New York’s rising firms, Turck was an investor at Bloomberg Capital and a founder of TripleHop (which Oracle acquired for an undisclosed sum in 2005). He has invested in hot local startups like ThinkNear, which Telenav bought for $22.5 million, making it the first TechStars New York acquisition.

First Mark has invested in ed-tech startups like Lumosity and Knewton as well as SecondMarket and NewsCred.

For more funding news as it happens, subscribe to our Deals Channel feed. You can also follow VentureBeat on Twitter, @venturebeat, to view funding news as it’s published.

Warby Parker puts on new pair of investors: J. Crew, AmEx join team 

Warby Parker is looking even smarter by adding American Express and the CEO of J. Crew to its latest round of financing. This hot e-commerce startup is known for turning geek into chic with its line of fashionable eyewear. In September, Warby Parker filed an SEC form for a $36.8 million round. The investment was led by General Catalyst Partners, with room to add additional, strategic money to the pool. Last night, the New York Times reported that Millard S. Drexler of J. Crew and American Express bring this round’s total to $41.5 million. Read more on VentureBeat.

Unfreeze your mind! Polar melts away ice caps of indecision

Polar has unfrozen $1.2 million to continue enhancing its product, a free iOS app that creates “photo polls” to share with their friends. Since its launch, Polar has seen impressive traction due to its focus on user-experience and design. The early investors are a high profile crew. Founder of Yahoo Jerry Yang, John Lilly of Greylock Partners, Maynard Webb from the Webb Investment Network, Ash Patel of Morado Ventures, Brian O’Malley and Mike Dauber at Battery Ventures, Don Dodge from Google, former Twitter executive Sam Pullara, and others participated in this round. The money will go toward making the product “better and more relevant” as well as adding new people to the small team. Read more on VentureBeat.

CircleCI circles in on seed funding

CircleCI received $1.5 million from Baseline Ventures and Harrison Metal, along with Heroku founder James Lindenbaum, SV Angel, 500 Startups, Eric Ries, and more. The investor overlap with Heroku is no coincidence. CircleCI bills itself as “Heroku for testing.” It offers a continuous integration platform for web application developers to test and deploy code to customers. Developers can “automatically parallelize tests” across 16 machines to bring in test results 30x faster. Customers include Kickstarter, Stripe, Red Bull, Zaarly, GrubWithUs, MongoHQ, Academia.edu, Zencoder, Storenvy, inDinero, HomeFinder, Pathable, and InternMatch. Read a blog post from the company.

Agari brings heightened security to email, along with illustration 

Agari’s technology protects its 2.3 billion messages a day from security risks such as phishing attacks, malware, and other forms of fraud. The company saw 300% revenue growth in 2012, and today announced it has raised $5 million to continue building the platform and fuel wider adoption. Financial institutions like JP Morgan Chase, as well e-commerce and social media companies, use Agari to fight against fraudulent email, w which can lead to liability issues and ‘brand erosion.’ The round was led by an unnamed strategic investor, with participation from existing investors Alloy Ventures, Battery Ventures, First Round Capital, and Greylock Partners. Read the press release.

TinderBox shuts the lid on $1.3 million

Not to be confused with TinderBox.com, “your pipe and cigar smoking experts since 1928,” Tinderbox is a platform to manage business proposals and marketing communications to keep them consistent. There are tools to help businesses create and collaborate on sales content, track real-time sales leads, and identify key messing for faster customer acquisition. The startup is based in Indianapolis, Indi. and is the first outside of Silicon Valley to receive investment from online investment platform  FundersClub. Local investors also contributed to the $1.3 million round, which will fuel product development and customer acquisition.

Pay on-the-go, on-the-tundra

uBank, a Moscow-based mobile payments startup, has raised $8 million from Runa Capital.The app lets people pay bill and transfer funds from their mobile devices with 0% commission. uBank is currently preinstalled on all Samsung and Fly smartphones selling in Russia. This financing will be used to expand the company’s presence into nearby states. Read the press release.

For more funding news as it happens, subscribe to our Deals Channel feed. You can also follow VentureBeat on Twitter, @venturebeat, to view funding news as it’s published.

‘X’ marks the spot for Battery Ventures’ new $900M fund

Battery Ventures has filled its latest investment treasure chest with $900 million. The venture capital firm announced today the closure of its 10th fund, which actually includes two funds that it will “co-invest” with. Battery Ventures X (BVX) is a $650 million fund that will back companies at all stages of their lifecycle. The Battery Ventures X Side Fund will dedicate $250 million to companies further down the pipeline and support acquisitions. It will focus on companies working with software-as-a-service for enterprise and “big data” analytics; IT infrastructure like networking and storage; technology-enabled business services; and buyouts in markets that are “ripe for consolidation.” Read more on VentureBeat.

Skyera hooks $51.6M from Dell Ventures to bring affordable SSDs to enterprise

Enterprise solid-state drive maker Skyera has raised $51.6 million in its second round of funding, with hopes that it can make a dent in a crowded Flash storage field. Skyera wants to offer big enterprise companies superfast storage for their data centers on the promise that its storage is affordable, has low power consumption, and will greatly boost software performance. The new funding was led by Dell Ventures, with participation from other unnamed investors. The $51.6 million actually includes $6.5 million from a prior investment from the same firms, but this is the first time the company has announced any funding numbers. Read more on VentureBeat.

With $17.3M, Euclid brings power of data to real world retailers

Euclid has raised $17.3 million in its second round of funding to bring data analytics to physical retailers. Euclid gives brick-and-mortar businesses the capability to better understand their customers by monitoring their in-store behavior through Wi-Fi sensors.The company refers to its approach as “Google Analytics for the real world.” Benchmark Capital led this round, with participation from NEA, Harrison Metal, and Novel TMT Ventures. Euclid officially launched in 2011 and announced $5.8 million in funding. Its founders previously started Urchin, which was acquired by Google and set the foundation for Google Analytics. Read more on VentureBeat.

Drawbridge raises $14M bridge toward larger seas

Yesterday, mobile ad startup Drawbridge revealed a $14 million round led by Northgate Capital. This is Drawbridge’s second round of investment and included participation from Kleiner, Perkins, Caufield, & Byers and Sequoia Capital. Drawbridge is the developer of technology that tracks what people do online across multiple devices, to create profiles that advertisers can use to wage more targeted campaigns.

Edtech startup lifts heavy weight of loans off student shoulders

StudentLoanHero is a startup that gives student borrowers tools to repay their loans faster. The company just closed a seed round with Expansion VC and was accepted into the latest batch at the Socratic Labs EdTech Accelerator in New York City. Students and grad carry more than $1 trillion in student debt right now, and 65 percent misunderstand their obligations. StudentLoanHero helps add efficiency and transparency into the process, offering organizational tools, tracking, and strategic guidance. Read more on VentureBeat.

Investors throw Wedding Party a bouquet of $1 million 

People are willing to spend exorbitant amounts of money to make their weddings memorable. Wedding Party is a mobile app that collects photos from wedding guests to create shared albums, and it has raised $1 million in seed funding led by NEA and Felicis Ventures, along with angel investors. The app is available on iOS and Android, and people can access photos through Facebook or the web.

Danish startup gives game developers access to analytics

GameAnalytics, a startup based in Copenhagen, has raised $2.5 million and announced the release of its fermium software-as-a-service game analytics platform. The technology helps game developers and studios take a more data-driven approach to game development and moneitzation. It tracks million of players every month from more than 40 studios to provide insight into player behavior, retention and conversion rates, and so on. Investors include Sunstone Capital, CrunchFund, and a group of superangels.

Nexmo raises $3M to send messages around the world

Mobile messaging startup Nexmo closed a $3 million round of funding, led by Intel Capital. Nexmo’s cloud-based APIs lets apps send and receive a high volume of mobile messages seamlessly around the world at lower cost, and helps developers and enterprises build scaleable messaging applications. Read the press release. 

“If you can wipe your nose, you can be a VC,” Singh said. “Please don’t tweet that,” he added, probably uselessly.

Singh’s presentation was titled The Rise of Angels, which just might have a little do with the fact that 500 Startups plays in the angel field, with investments in the $50,000 range. The startup scene has changed, Singh says, since the time when he raised capital for his first startup 10 years ago. In what has become a truism, startup costs are getting smaller and smaller than ever, rendering the big checks that VCs write unneeded — at least early in the business-building process.

Still, Singh warned startups:

“Most startups, your default state is failure. All I do, and all other investors do, is accelerate you to your endpoint.”

Source: LinkedIn

Paul Singh

Singh also warning angels and VCs that capital is increasingly getting commoditized as more and more sources are opening up, including crowdfunding.

The good news is that transparency is also increasing, with tools like AngelList (which gives you a lot of info on a startup or an angel), or GitHub (which tells you how many commits the development team is making), or even Facebook (which tells you how long those co-founders have really known each other).

Continuing the theme, Singh quoted Naval Ravikant, one of the people behind AngelList: ”Venture capital is open to attack by disruptive new business models and technology.”

One positive thing Singh did have to say about venture capitalists?

“When it comes time to scale your company, you still need the big checks that VCs can write.”

I’m sure VCs are overjoyed to learn that they do still have some degree of usefulness.

photo credit: davemc500hats via photopin cc

For more funding news as it happens, subscribe to our Deals Channel feed. You can also follow VentureBeat on Twitter, @venturebeat, to view funding news as it’s published.

Investor hit with accounting misconduct launches $1B fund on the same day

Despite the controversy surrounding former company Autonomy, Mike Lynch is pressing ahead with plans for his venture fund called “Invoke.” He is attempting to raise $1 billion to help small companies grow by acquiring bigger businesses. The fund has already invested security software company Featurespace, and is specifically looking to bankroll British research-led companies. Read more on VentureBeat.

Sailthru backed by strong winds from Benchmark

Sailthru announced today that it has raised $19 million led by Benchmark Capital. Sailthru’s flagship product is the Smart Data platform. Smart Data collects data about users and generates specific profiles for each individual. Marketers can use this information to personalize communication through targeted emails, onsite and in-app recommendations, and text messages. The financing will support the company’s growth as it expands its roster of Fortune 500 clients. In addition to Benchmark, RRE, DFJ Gotham, and AOL Ventures contributed to this round. Read more on VentureBeat.

Cars.com invests in RepairPal to try to keep mechanics honest

RepairPal.com, which simplifies the process of car maintenance, has received $13 million in funding fuel to expand its network. Cars.com and Castrol innoVentures led this round and will support RepairPal with expertise and strategic resources as well as financing. RepairPal.com collects data about the cost and time requirements for common car services and links consumers to qualified, trusted mechanics nearby. It will use the second round of financing to expand into additional markets. Read more on VentureBeat.

KnexxLocal closes seed round to expand word-of-mouth marketing

Marketing startup KnexxLocal launched Instamonial today and announced that it recently closed $1.1 million in seed funding. Instamonial is an app that lets local business communicate with customers through photos to receive feedback. Images can then be distributed across social media networks. KnexxLocal is based on Toronto. This round was led by Round 13 Capital, Imperial Capital Group, and angels.

Black Ocean helps float Russian babies

Russian children’s education startup BimBasket has received a $500K investment from Black Ocean. BimBasket offers a monthly subscription service that delivers kits for children aged 0 to 3. Black Ocean is a digital media company that also has an incubator program, seed fund, and “strategic holding division.” It found BimBasket through Rusbase, a platform to connect Russian startups with venture capitalists.

Gruzobzor is not a monster, its a cloud service

The scary  name of this startup does not deter investors. Runa Capital has invested an undisclosed amount in Gruzobzor.ru, which has built a cloud-based communication serve for the transportation industry, specifically to facilitate intact between haulers and customers. This brings the total funding raised to $1 million and will be used to expand Gruzobzor into international markets, beyond the CIS and Eastern Europe.

E-commerce startups keeps on churning in Latin America 

LINIO, a Colombian startup that sells consumer electronics, is receiving an “8-digit Euro sum” from German retailer company the Tengelmann Group. LINIO is owned by a German holding company and has already received investments from AB Kinnevik, JP Morgan, and Summit Partners. LINIO operates in MExico, Colombia, Peru, and Venezuela and will use the financing to increase its hold on the Latin American e-commerce market.

For more funding news as it happens, subscribe to our Deals Channel feed. You can also follow VentureBeat on Twitter, @venturebeat, to view funding news as it’s published.

Red rover, red rover, send $7M right over

Pet-sitting marketplace Rover has raised $7 million to grow its platform that matches dog owners with vetted people to take care of them. Rover also provides insurance coverage, emergency/medical support, and a video service so absent owners can stay connected to their pets. This second round of funding could help the Seattle-based company keep pace with competitor DogVacay, which raised $6 million in November. Foundry Group led this round with participation from Madrona Venture Group. Rover has raised $10.4 million in institutional funding to date. Read the press release. 

Investors drop dollars into virtual supply-chain management

DropShip Commerce has raised $4.3 million to make sure my online purchases arrive efficiently to my door. The software platform strengthens the connections between retailers and manufactures and provides tools to manage product, inventory, and order data. The company’s founders committed $2.8 million, and the Kickstart Seed Fund filled in the rest of the round with $1.5 million. Peterson Ventures, TechStars David Cohen, and other angel investors also contributed. DropShip Commerce is based in Utah. Read the press release.

Smurfs are better in 3D

3D may give me a headache, but lots of people, including investors, are all about it. Legend3D, which uses image-processing technology to take video content from 2D to 3D, is raking in $8 million in its second round of funding. Augusts Ventures Limited and Northwater Capital Management led this round. Legends3D has worked in movies Top Gun 3D, Oz: The Great and Powerful, The Amazing Spider-Man, The Smurfs, Hugo, Transformers: Dark of the Moon, and Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides.

Piston Cloud nabs $8M to bolster open source cloud adoption

OpenStack private-cloud player Piston Cloud closed an $8 million funding round. The San Francisco-based startup’s claim to fame is that it was the first to launch a commercial OpenStack distribution. The funding will help the 2-year-old company “enhance our products, grow our customer base, and establish new partnerships.” PistonCloud already pulled in $4.5 million in its first funding round in April. Cisco, Data Collective, and Swisscom Ventures invested in the second round, joining existing investors Divergent Ventures, Hummer Winblad, and True Ventures. Read more on VentureBeat.

Samsung to devote $1.1B to investments in the U.S.

Samsung Electronics said today it is creating a $1 billion investment fund, dubbed the Samsung Ventures America Fund, and a separate $100 million Samsung Catalyst Fund to invest in global innovation. The investments will kick off a new era of strategic alliances, acquisitions, R&D, and investing, Sohn said at the press event today. Samsung will explore new opportunities related to its Samsung components businesses, with a focus on cloud infrastructure, mobile privacy, internet of things, human interface, and mobile health. The $100 million Samsung Catalyst Fund will be focused on early-stage companies in the components and subsystems businesses. Read more on VentureBeat.

GameStop’s Kongregate to invest $10M in mobile game developers

The world’s biggest game retailer is building more bridges into the digital realm, as GameStop‘s Kongregate division announced it’s investing $10 million into mobile game developers. Like other companies that are expanding from the web to mobile, GameStop and Kongregate are using a familiar tactic: buying the love of developers for its platform. The new mobile gaming initiative will provide financial assistance, consulting services, and marketing support for developers that create free-to-play mobile titles for Kongregate’s platform. Read more on VentureBeat. 

That’s why it’s a bit of a surprise that The National Venture Capital Association has admitted the FundersClub, a well-hyped, online-only funding network, into its ranks.

The NVCA is the preeminent trade association of the venture capital community. It has over 400 members, joined by their commitment to “funding America’s most innovative entrepreneurs,” and it lobbies for public policies that benefit emerging growth companies. Membership is by invitation and only offered to professional and corporate venture outlets.

FundersClub is the first and only online platform to be be granted membership in the NVCA so far. This Y Combinator-backed startup has generated a significant amount of buzz this year for its innovative approach to investment.

“We have always said that we are a venture capital group and consider ourselves part of the venture capital community, but this is the first time someone other than ourselves and our backers is saying that,” said founder and CEO Alex Mittal in an interview with VentureBeat. “This is legitimizing for us, but it is also a sign of the times that transcends FundersClub. It shows how venture capital is opening up to innovation and to the transformational possibility of the Internet reaching this industry.”

Traditionally, venture capital deals happen offline. SEC regulations make setting up a legal online venture capital platform difficult because private companies cannot publicly solicit investment. Furthermore, investors are wary about putting their money into platforms or companies they do not trust.

FundersClub is a network that provides accredited investors with access to pre-vetted startups. These companies are featured on the FundersClub site, and many are fellow Y Combinator participants. Investors from around the world may invest amounts as small as $1,000 until a company reaches its goal. At this point, all the investments are consolidated and given to the startup as one investment from FundersClub.

The venture capital world is one where “who you know” matters and personal introductions are important. It can be challenging for investors and startups alike to break into unless they have a strong network of connections. Startups, of course, want access to a pool of accredited investors because they want money, and on the flip side, investors want access to promising business opportunities. Finding and vetting companies takes time, and not all investors are able to properly go through the due due diligence process. FundersClub adds value by connecting both sides of the marketplace.

Since launching in July, it has raised (and invested) over $16.5 million for startups. The FundersClub portfolio includes Coinbase, Sponsorfied, Tracks.by and Virool, and in a philosophically-confusing twist, itself. The company raised $6 million in October which at the time was the largest ever seed round raised by a YC company. The investors included an impressive roster of big names in venture capital, including First Round Capital, Y Combinator, Draper Associates, Felicis Ventures, Spark Capital, Digital Garage, Intel Capital, and Start Fund. Read more on VentureBeat. 

Prosper.com announced today that it has raised $20 million from the prestigious venture firm Sequoia Capital. It’s slated this funding to “accelerate Prosper’s growth at a time when the market for peer-to-peer and business-to-peer finance is rapidly expanding.” In short, to help Prosper out-prosper its competitor, Lending Club.

Prosper also announced it has appointed Stephan Vermut as the new CEO, the former founder and managing partner of Merlin Securities that was recently acquired by Wells Fargo.

“I’ve watched with great interest over the past few years as the peer-to-peer lending industry has grown substantially, and I believe Prosper is in a unique position to offer both borrowers and lenders unprecedented access to financial opportunity,” said Vermut in a statement.

People traditionally take out loans with banks. Prosper eliminates the middle man by connecting people who want to invest money with people who want to borrow money. Borrowers list loan requests between $2,000 and $25,000, and individual lenders invest as little as $25 in each loan and earn returns on their investment.

Prosper has enabled more than $400 million in personal loans since it pioneered this type of service in 2006. Over the years, it has hit some road bumps with the SEC, shutting down in 2008 after receiving a cease-and-desist letter for not properly registering under the Securities Act. The company has come back, however, and now claims to be growing at 100 percent year-over-year in revenue and loan originations. There have also been some product changes that inspire more confidence, and this money will take the Prosper into “its next phrase of growth.”

This is Prosper’s sixth round of institutional funding and brings its total to $94.7 million. Previous investors include a laundry list of venture firms, including Draper Fisher Jurveston, Crosslink Capital, Accel, and Benchmark.

Read the press release.

For more funding news as it happens, subscribe to our Deals Channel feed. You can also follow VentureBeat on Twitter, @venturebeat, to view funding news as it’s published.

Virtual travel agent Desti lengthens runway before global takeoff 

Desti is a virtual travel agent for the iPad that was developed out of SRI International, the same prestigious research institute that spawned virtual personal assistant Siri. The technology combines Artificial Intelligence and natural language processing to understand and respond to specific travel-related search queries. Now, the company has raised an additional $1 million in seed money from its original investors to add more users so Desti can become smarter, more interactive, and available in new markets. This brings Desti’s total seed financing to $2 million from Horizons Ventures. Read more on VentureBeat.

Google App experts frost $5M onto cloud management platform

BetterCloud announced this morning that it raised $5 million in its first round of financing from Flybridge Capital Partners, Greycroft Partners, and TriBeCa Venture Partners. BetterCloud provides cloud management tools specifically for Google Apps. Many businesses these days use Google Apps to manage operations, collaborate, store data, and more. BetterCloud’s flagship product FlashPanel gives administrators better knowledge, control and security of their apps to help them work as efficiently as possible. Read more on VentureBeat.

Split-screen video app Streamweaver picks up $1.3M from former Facebooker 

Mobile video recording service Streamweaver closed a $1.3 million round of funding today, the startup confirmed to VentureBeat. Streamweaver is a free iOS app that lets multiple iPhone owners record a live video at the same time, which is then converted into a single, 60-second video with a split-screened view of each person’s camera angle. The startup is currently focused on producing a more feature-rich version of its iPhone app, but does consider an Android version something that will eventually happen.The new round includes a major investment by former Facebook Chief Security Officer Chris Kelly, who will join Streamweaver’s board of directors. Streamweaver is based in Nashville. Read more on VentureBeat.

uCirrus lightly trails $5.5M across the funding sky

In the sky, Cirrus clouds are thin, wispy strands that resemble strands of hair. On the internet, the uCirrus cloud helps enterprise companies ramp up the speed and volume of their analytical engines. Its live data management system is called XPRESSmp and is designed to accelerate the pace of turning data into actionable insight. According to an SEC filing, uCirrus raised $5.5 million in its third round of funding. Partners from existing investor ATA Ventures, as well as Lamond Capital Partners and Acero Capital were listed on the form. This brings the total capital raised to $11.2 million. Previous investors in the first two rounds include SK Telecom Ventures and Qualcomm Ventures. Read the filing.

Refinery29 racks up $3.5M for excellent taste in fashion, fun, and men

There are not too many sites out there whose opinions I trust on fashion and beauty, local entertainment, and men. Refinery29 is one of the few, and this digital publication for women has raised $3.5 million. Refinery29 is a hot media property that delivers daily newsletters with lifestyle comment, as well as a curated fashion e-commerce platform. Refinery29 is based in New York, with local editions in New York, LA, San Francisco, Washington DC, Chicago, London and a large global following. The site claims to have 1.25 million registered email users, and thirty million unique visitors a year. Before this second round, Refinery29 raised $5 million. According to the recent filing, this round is intended to close at $4.1 million. Board member Ann Miura-Ko of  previous investor Floodgate Partners is listed. Read the filing.

Mi casa es applicasa

Mobile game management platform Applicasa raised $1 million, as reported by TechCrunch. The company helps app developers successfully monetize their apps and provides a backend solution to keep them running. It recently shifted from offering a more general server side solution to focusing specifically on mobile gaming, in an effort to distinguish itself from the competition. Now, it helps build custom virtual stores to promote in-app purchasing, as well as analytics. This investment was provided by the Shaked family, who founded gambling website corporation 888 Holdings.

Investors tip their hats and wallets to Blue Medora

I have a blue hat, and I have a fedora, but unfortunately, I have yet to own a blue fedora. I will have to settle or covering Blue Medora. This company which develops “monitoring and management extensions” for enterprise systems, received $1.25 million in growth capital to fuel the expansion of its new suite of Oracle-focused products. Blue Medora is based in Grand Rapids, Michigan, and the investors were West Michigan-based angel investors groups Start Garden and the Grand Angels. Read the press release.

Rentify simplifies landlords’ lives, so maybe they find time to fix the loo

In America, we call in apartment. In the UK, it is a flat. Regardless of terminology, Rentify took $3.2 million (£2 million) to grow its team and accelerate product development. Rentify offers a platform for landlords that makes it simple to market and manage their properties. Landlords create advertisements on the site, which Rentify then publishes to find tenants. For property already leased out, Rentify offers tools to stay on top of issues like key collection and utility certificates. It launched in 2012 and already has over 60,000 users who sent over $160 million (£100 million) in rent through its system. European venture firm Balderton Capital led this first round. Rentify is based in central London.

The Art Commission proliferates giant cellos, mayonnaise jars, dancing frogs 

The Art Commission secured $510K in angel investment to beautify the world. The company connects artists who do commissioned work with individuals and organizations that want to commission artwork for specific sites. Since launching the website in November 2012, more than 500 artists working in architecture, visual art and design joined the marketplace. The Art Commission database is searchable by 10 filters to make it easier for “patrons” to find the right artist for their project. The Art Commission is based in Madison, Wisconsin, and this investment came from local investors.

For more funding news as it happens, subscribe to our Deals Channel feed. You can also follow VentureBeat on Twitter, @venturebeat, to view funding news as it’s published.

All I want for Christmas is network virtualization  

It may not fit easily under the Christmas tree, but a network virtualization company seems to be on every venture capital firm’s wishlist this year. Pluribus Networks closed a $23 million round of financing, led by Menlo Ventures. PN claims to be driving the “third wave of virtualization into the ethernet hardware market.” IT administrators can use the systems to achieve high-performance computing and bolster private and public cloud data centers. Previous investors New Enterprise Associates and Mohr Davidow Ventures also joined this round, following a $17.5 million Series B led by NEA in April 2011. Read more on VentureBeat.

Koding’s takes $7.25 million to build out a developer home in the browser

Developer community Koding raised $7.25 million in its second round of funding. The site features a young curly haired lad wearing goofy glasses. More importantly, it also features tools to help developers with “real software development in the browser” and collaborate with each other on projects. Josh Hannah, a partner at Matrix Partners, is listed on the filing. Koding announced its first round of $2 million in March 2011, led by RTP Ventures and Greycroft Partners. Read more about Koding.   

Giggitty, giggity, giggity, giggity, giggity, goo! 

No, I haven’t gone crazy. Family Guy viewers out there can appreciate my compulsion to reference Quagmire while writing up Gigsky’s funding. Gigsky, a stealth startup working on solutions to make the “global roaming workforce” more productive, has raised $2 million. It is common these days for people to work from their mobile devices, particularly when traveling for business. But travel often involves unreliable connectivity and/or moving outside the range of your data network. Gigsky’s global mobile enterprise LAN is a unified data service that connects all employees’ devices into one, unified enterprise cloud. According to the SEC, this brings Gigsky’s total funding raised to $2.675 million. Read the filing.

Cloud computing, made simple

Top chefs may be winning thousands of dollars in Seattle this season, but a cloud computing company just won $4.2 million. 2nd Watch has received a $4.2 million round of investment, led by Madrona Venture Group. 2nd Watch helps businesses migrate their IT operations to secure public clouds by offering a host of technical services, as well as consulting, strategy, and analytics. The company is an Amazon Web Services Premier Partner and will use this funding to continue bringing “cloud services to the mass market.” Read the press release.

Fun, fun, fun

Online fundraising platform Fundly closed a $2 million round of funding. Fundly is a crowdfunding platform for social good. To date, it has raised $303,801,653 for nonprofits and causes, according to the site, and $2 million for itself, according to an SEC filing. Fundly works with organizations big and small, like Habitate for Humanity and Teach for America or local church groups, to set up online donation pages and wage effective campaigns. Fundly filed for $8.2 million in November of last year. Read this most recent filing. 

Six months after the departure of cofounder John Simon, General Catalyst Partners has scooped up Adam Valkin from Accel Partners, where he has worked since April 2010.

Valkin will dedicate his time to sourcing early-stage investment opportunities, and will work with the firm’s existing portfolio companies, which include HubSpot, Airbnb, GoodData and Taleo. Valkin, who previously worked out of Accel’s London office, is relocating to Boston to assume his new role.

In an interview, he said the primary driver was personal as his family lives in Boston. “This was a friendly move,” he said, adding that General Catalyst was a “natural choice” as the firms have often worked together in the past.

At Accel, Valkin focused broadly on Internet and mobile services, gaming and payments. With roots in London, Valkin had a front row seat to some of the most promising Israeli startups — he made investments in MyHeritage and mobile gaming startup DragonPlay. His investment portfolio also includes Spotify, SeekingAlpha, and $5 tasks marketplace Fiverr.

Prior to joining Accel, Valkin worked as the Global Head of Digital Media and New Business at Endemol, the European television production company. He was also a co-founder, investor and briefly interim CEO of LOVEFiLM, which sold to Amazon.com in 2011. Previously, he worked for Barnes & Noble and Firefly Network, later acquired by Microsoft.

General Catalyst is a long-time partner with Accel; the firms have frequently joined up in funding hot startups like Brightcove over the years. General Catalyst has been slowly creeping into the media spotlight with recent investments in buzzy startups, such as CouchSurfing and TuneIn. It has proven to be one of the most progressive of the traditional firms with its interest in data-driven investing.

Top image credit: LeWeb / Flickr

For more funding news as it happens, subscribe to our Deals Channel feed. You can also follow VentureBeat on Twitter, @venturebeat, to view funding news as it’s published.

Cut down on parking rage with ParkWhiz, reserve spots in advance

ParkWhiz tackles this problem by allowing drivers to find and reserve parking spots in advance. This Chicago-based startup has raised $2 million in its first round of institutional funding from Hyde Park Venture Partners, Hyde Park Angels, Amicus Capital and big name angel investors Alexis Ohanian and Garry Tan. ParkWhiz is active in Chicago, San Francisco, New York, Baltimore, and New Orleans, as well as over 100 airports and popular sporting destinations such Boston’s Fenway Park and the Dallas Cowboys Stadium. This investment will be used to expand its presence into more locations across the nation. Read more on VentureBeat.

Fab expands Indian ties with new funding deal from Times of India

Design e-commerce site Fab.com is blowing up the web with holiday sales numbers, but yesterday it announced a new kind of money: more funding. And it’s the kind of funding that will help Fab continue its not-so-slow march toward a global takeover. The seven-figure deal comes from Times of India Group’s digital arm, Times Internet. The Times of India itself is an English-language daily that boasts the largest circulation of all English-language newspapers around the globe. To date, Fab has raised $150 million from investors far and wide. Although Goldberg revealed the operation was profitable mere weeks into its operations, the funding has allowed the wee startup to rapidly expand, including acquisitions and new operations in Europe. Read more on VentureBeat.

Signifyd combats cyber with its team of fraud prevention experts

Signifyd helps businesses take on cyber criminals by simplifying fraud and abuse investigations. Many small businesses do not have the tools, resources, or expertise they need to combat fraud. Signifyd uses social data to interpret a users’ digital footprint and “bridge the gap” between online and offline identities. The product is still in private beta, so not much is known beyond the founding teams collective experience at PayPal, Fraud Sciences, Fedex, and JPMorgan Chase. This early round is coming in at $2.18 million, although the goal is $2.575 million. Read the filing.

ERN gets money to analyze data about money

UK-based data startup ERN closed a $2 million round of investment. It will use the money to continue developing its platform that helps banks, merchants, and any other payment processor analyze transactions on a large scale and glean actionable insights from this data. ERN says the technology can process 100K transactions per second. Businesses can use this information to gain insight into consumer behavior and consumers can track all their expenditures through a mobile app. The investors were not disclosed.

LUMO BodyTech takes new investment to improve your health

Your mother always told you to sit up straight, and since launching in 2011, LUMOback has told you how. Now the company behind this popular app has received $5 million in new funding, led by Madrona Venture Group, with participation from Innovation Endeavors. LUMOback is the flagship product. It is an automated posture coach that gives you feedback and advice based on data collected from a small smartphone sensor. The founding team presented at DEMO in 2011 and initiated a Kickstarter campaign that achieved more than double its $100K goal. Read the press release.

Stevie turns your social network into a TV show

Stevie- the company, not your little cousin- has raised a $1.5 million in its first round of funding. The startup turns your Facebook and Twitter content into a TV-like broadcast by running videos, status updates, tweets, events etc.. through The Stevie Factor, otherwise known as a collection of algorithims. Stevie presented earlier this year at TechCrunch Disrupt and is also introducing its iPhone app today, along with the funding announcement. The investment was led by Horizons Ventures.

For more funding news as it happens, subscribe to our Deals Channel feed. You can also follow VentureBeat on Twitter, @venturebeat, to view funding news as it’s published.

Better Place charges up with $100M for electric vehicle

Green tech company Better Place is raising a $100 million round, according to a filing. Better Place manufactures electric cars and removable batteries that can be switched out once depleted. Electric and hybrid vehicles may be eco-friendly and cost-effective, but can be inconvenient on long distance journeys. Better Place addresses this pain point by setting up “battery switch stations” and “charge spots” where drivers can power up. It was founded in 2007 and currently operates in China, Israel, Hawaii, Denmark, the Netherlands, and Australia. To date, Better Place has raised $786 million. This round is led by Israel Corps. Read more on Forbes.

Qualcomm defibrillates “world’s worst stock” with $120M 

Japanese electronics company Sharp was dubbed “the world’s worst-perfomirng major” stock after it forecast a $5.6 billion loss in early November. Yesterday, Sharp formed a partnership with Pitronix, a subsidiary of Qualcomm, for 9.9 billion yen ($120 million). As part of the agreement, Sharp will issue new shares to Qualcomm and the company will jointly develop display panels. Read the statements from Sharp and Qualcomm.

Guardian Analytics arms up with $8M to fight cybercrime

Guardian Analytics is adding $8 million into its arsenal to continue the war against cyber crime. This security company helps banks stop cybercrime with FraudMAP, which captures data about the typical habits of bank users to predict their behavior and detect anomalies. According to the filing, GA intends to close this fifth round of financing at $9 million, bringing its total to $34.8 million. Partners from Split Rock Partners, Foundation Capital, and Sutter Hill Ventures, which all invested in the 2011 Series D, were listed on the Form D. Read the filing.

Diamonds and gold and art, oh my! 1stdibs exceeds $100M in investment  

Every wondered where to buy a popsicle sculpture or George II Walnut chair or Van Cleef and Arpels penguin brooch? Look no further. Luxury goods marketplace 1stdibs is gilding its gold-studded coffers with a $42 million round of financing. 1stdibs sells high-end furniture, fine art, jewelry and fashion through its exclusive network of 1,700 dealers. According to a statement, 3,000 “rare and beautiful objects” are catalogued each week and 9,000 unique items sold each month. Over the past year, 1stdibs has added hundreds of dealers in Europe, and this latest investment will support its continued international expansion. Index Ventures and Spark Capital led this round, which brings the total to $102 million. Read the press release.  

Ad tech startup  rides $10M wave of excitement around mobile commerce 

‘Mobile’ and ‘predictive data’ are big buzz words these days, and Google Ventures is investing in a company that combines both. Adelphic Mobile struck a $10 million deal, led by Google Ventures with participation from Matrix Partners, to accelerate development of its predictive data platform for mobile advertising. The technology collects customer data for advertisers to use while bidding on mobile ad space, so they reach a more targeted audience. The recent explosion of mobile commerce means there is a lot of interest and opportunity in this arena, and investors are jumping to add mobile ad tech companies in their portfolio. Adelphic raised a $2 million seed round in March.

Virtualization startup nabs $12M for storage thats as elastic as maternity jeans

Storage startup ScaleIO officially launched its Elastic Converged Storage Storage Solution today and revealed $12 million in funding. The technology provides a virtual Storage Area Network that cuts down on the amount of hardware enterprise customers need to use. The software distributes storage needs across thousands of servers, which makes storing data more flexible and scaleable. Virtualization is a hot space right now and Greylock Partners and Norwest Venture Partners are betting on its success. Read the press release.

Fashion app Poshmark pulls in $12M

Fashion app Poshmark can afford diamonds and pearls now. The company just got a $12 million second round of funding led by Menlo Park Ventures. Poshmark is an iPhone application that lets users sell and buy fashion. It handles the payment transaction and provides a shipping label the seller can print out to send purchased items to their new homes. Indeed, over the course of a year, Poshmark sees $100 million worth of inventory go through its channels. With this funding, we can also expect to see Poshmark on new devices including the iPad, Android, and the broader web. Read more on VentureBeat. 

Orange gives Lookout Mobile a French kiss (of investment)

Lookout Mobile received an investment from European-centric Iris Capital. The amount Iris Capital invested in Lookout was not released, but the venture firm is known to only give our a maximum of $15 million or less in a funding round. This comes out of its larger $300 million fund, which has largely been invested in only European companies except for a recent investment in MoPub. Lookout has thus far taken on $116.5 million in funding, with its last round for $40 million coming from Andreessen-Horowitz. Other investors include Khosla Ventures, Trilogy Equity Partners, Accel Partners, Index Ventures, Chris Sacca, and more. The company is headquartered in San Francisco, Calif. Read more on VentureBeat.

Ad tech startup OneSpot nabs $1.5M to transform content into hot advertising

OneSpot, a new advertising startup that launches today, thinks it can fix that problem by converting news articles, reviews, and blog posts into display ads. The service essentially takes a link from an outside source, and refits it to the specifications of an ad. The real power of OneSpot lies in its ability to plug its advertising into various platforms like Google Adwords, Facebook, and others. The Austin-based startup has about 20 clients at launch, and has raised a new $1.5 million round of funding from RSL Venture Partners, 500 Startups, Ralph Mack, Mike Maples, Sr., Josh Baer, and others. Read more on VentureBeat.

Ronaldo shoots for venture gold, invests in mobile marketing startup

Soccer superstar Cristiano Ronaldo is active on and off the field. He has made an investment in a Portuguese startup called Mobitto and will serve as its first brand ambassador. Mobitto offers a marketing platform that businesses can use to tailor their campaigns in real-time to specific audiences. For consumers, Mobitto is a mobile app where they can build their own loyalty clubs for brands and earn rewards for actions like inviting, sharing, buying etc…The beta versions for iOS and Androird are expected to launch early in 2013. The details of the deal were not disclosed. Read the press release.

What is that? That’s my little Okta-pussy

Enterprise security company Okta will support its growth with $25 million from an A-List of investors, including Sequoia, Andreessen Horowitz, Greylock Partners, Khosla Ventures, and Floodgate. Okta’s goal is to “redefine identity management in the modern enterprise.” It offers a cloud-based service that IT teams can use to securely manage network access across any application, person or device. Okta has 200 clients and is continuing to grow.This third round of financing brings its total funding to $52.3 million. Read the press release.

QuBit gathers bits of data, 7.5M bits of funding

Data analytics company QuBit secured $7.5 million in new financing. QuBit’s platform collects information on user behavior that businesses can use to enhance their marketing campaigns. Based on insights from this data, marketers can deploy QuBit’s suite of tools to take actions like offering discounts, deploying widgets, optimizing landing pages, targeting non-signed up visitors, surveying customers etc…. QuBit was founded in 2010 by four former Google employees and is based in London. This investment will help bring QuBit’s new software-as-a-service platform and tag management product OpenTag to market, and international expansion. European venture firm Balderton Capital led this first round of institutional funding. QuBit previously raised a $1.35 million angel round in 2010. Read the press release.

Russian travel market takes off as two startups get additional funding

The Russian market for online travel is booming this year, and two more startups in the space have just revealed new funding rounds. Hotel booking site oktogo.ru is reportedly receiving $6 million from a new unnamed investor. Previous investors VTB Capital and Mangrove Capital Partners contributed to the $10 million round in May. This $6 million, just six months later, brings the total capital raised to $21 million.

The other funding announcement coming out of Russia today is for Travelata, an online aggregator of package tours. According to a report on Russian tech blog Quintara, Travelata received investment from Polish fund MCI Management.

Clarity sets up hotline for entrepreneurial advice (phone sex not included) 

Advice is a key driver of the entrepreneurial ecosystem, with seasoned veterans of the startup scene passing down their wisdom to young founders that need guidance. Clarity is a digital media company that connects entrepreneurs with experts who can help them tackle on business challenges over the phone. Not everyone has immediate access to widened mentors, and Clarity’s mission is to open up this access to anyone looking for guidance. For this mission, Clarity has received $1.6 million in funding from Baseine Ventures, Freestyle Capital, Mark Cuban, Real Ventures, Version One Ventures, 500 Startups, Venture 51, and other angels.

Data is a many splendored thing. There are so many ways to aggregate and store it,  slice and dice it, and turn it into a visually appealing package that VC’s are hungrily adding data startups to their portfolios. Perhaps it is because Thanksgiving is the day after tomorrow, but my brain immediately struck a connection between data and dates (of the fruit, not the romantic, persuasion): both require some sort of processing to be useful; both are flexible and can be molded into a variety of forms; both bloom in abundance. Take a big ol’ slice of the data pie. Everyone else is.

For more funding news as it happens, subscribe to our Deals Channel feed. You can also follow VentureBeat on Twitter, @venturebeat, to view funding news as it’s published.

Stealthy storage startup snags $20.59M from secret sources (say that 5 times fast)

Stealthy startup Crossbar has raised a whopping $20.586 million. A form filed with the SEC this afternoon indicates that the total amount offered is $21 million and there are 16 investors involved and no other funding has been reported. The homepage states that Cross focuses on “delivering solutions that will dramatically enhance the global memory storage industry.” The company claims to be backed by top tier investors, but has not yet responded to requests for more details. Crossbar is based in Santa Clara and was founded in 2010. Read the filing.

Kaltura raises $25M to dock its open source video platform in Asian market

Open source video platform Kaltura has raised $25 million. Kaltura provides a framework for building enterprise level video applications. It powers applications for more than 300,000 organizations across a range of industries, reaching hundreds of millions of viewer. Customers span various sectors, including media companies like HBO and Warner Brothers, corporations like Bank of America, AstraZeneca, and Ikea, government agencies, and top tier universities. With this hefty investment, Kaltura will bolster its European presence and enter the Asian-Pacfiic market. It was spearheaded by new investors Mitsui Global Investment and Orix Ventures, with participation from existing investors Nexus Venture Partners, Intel Capital, .406 Ventures and Avalon Ventures. Read more on VentureBeat. 

With the enterprise storage market heating up, Qumulo nets $24.5 million

Qumulo, a Seattle-based data storage startup, today announced that it has raised $24.5 million in first round funding.Startups like Qumolo claim to have built technology that can scale at an unprecedented rate, and meet the needs of large corporate customers.Qumolo’s investors believe that the team has the right background and experience to shake up the market. The round was led by Highland Capital Partners, with participation from Madrona Venture Group and Valhalla Partners. Read more on VentureBeat.

MunkyFun plays around with $3.1M

Independent mobile gaming company MunkyFun is grabbing $3.1 million. Popular titles include Bounty Bots, My Horse, and Bionic Arena Hunt. Its award-winning games have been played by over 10 million people. The SEC filing revealing the funding did not list any investors, and the company has not yet responded to inquiries for comment. The investment section of the website says “Coming soon!” Read the filing.

Wantser wish lists could mean never getting socks as a gift again

List making application Wantster has been granted $4 million to put “the old fashioned wish list on steroids,” or rather, the internet. Using a “want” button they put into their browser, users can grab images of products they would like to own. This basically creates a registry that friends and followers can refer to when buying gifts. Wanster integrates with calendars so users get notifications about friends’ birthdays. Evanov Communications, an independent Canadian broadcast corporation, was the sole investor.

SumAll gets $6 to turn data analytics from ugly duckling into friendly swan 

Data analytics startup SumAll added up $6 million in new funding today. The software-as-a-service platform connects multiple data types from multiple sources and turns it into highly understandable charts. Past, present, and future data is aggregated from a range of sources to provide heightened business insights for its clients. Integrations include Facebook, Twitter, Google Analytics, eBay, Amazon, PayPal, Stripe, Instagram, and Magento.

Small businesses and Fortune 500 companies alike use the service because of its emphasis on user-interface. SumAll strives to make data analytics engineering-free, analyst-free, and beautiful. This is the startup’s first round of institutional financing, led by Battery Ventures. It brings the total amount raised to $7.5 million. Read more on VentureBeat. 

DataDog gets thrown a $6.2 million bone for IT data analytics

The only data my dog focused on related to food dispensation. However, DataDog provides data about IT monitoring. The technology aggregates metrics and events from the whole IT lifecycle and sends alerts to the relevant parties.  It also offers real-time interactive dashboards for graphing and data interpretation to help companies ensure their infrastructure functions smoothly from end to end. This round was led by Index and RTP Ventures, with participation from existing investors IA Ventures, Amp;lift Partners, Contour Ventures, and NYCSeed.

Moodya tries to get Spanish shoppers out of stores, on the internet

European social shopping startup Moodyo struck a deal for $600K in seed funding to accelerate towards a successful launch. Users can search for items and choose if they “want it” or “have it” and share this information with their friends. The company’s  main objective is that “people are able to purchase products that fit their needs, style and taste.” The bulk of this investment came from The Fund for Technology Entreprneurs by the IDEA Agency, which awarded a $400,000 loan. The remaining is contributed by two Spanish incubator programs- 3dsignia and Mola.