SparkLabs Global Ventures' Technology and Internet Market Bi-Monthly Review 0113 2015

SparkLabs Global Ventures Technology
and Internet Market Bi-Monthly Review

January 13, 2015
Bi-monthly Highlights
Global Trends
Southeast Asias billion-dollar gaming market to double by 2017

Southeast Asia is one of the fastest-growing regions for gaming thanks to increased adoption of smartphones and
movement to cities in countries like Indonesia and Malaysia, and the expansion is not slowing down. Consumers in
Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam spent US$1.1 billion on games in 2014,
according to market-research firm Newzoo. The analysts at Newzoo expect the region to continue growing at a
compound rate of around 28.8 percent, which would mean Southeast Asia will generate $2.2 billion in games
spending by 2017. More than 626 million people live in the countries that make up Southeast Asia, but only 29
percent have access to the Internet. And among that group, gaming is one of the top activities. The global gaming
industry has surpassed $93 billion, and developing nations will play a big part in that number growing past the $100
billion milestone in the future. Thailand is the top spender, and it will keep that title through 2017. Indonesia and
Malaysia take second and third on that list, respectively. One thing all of the countries of Southeast have in common
is a population migration to cities. This trend will help increase spending as more people get access to the Web.
Naturally, this means developers looking to bring games to these countries should likely try to go mobile first. That
strategy is already working. It is no surprise that mobile phone games are catching up with PC and MMO games in
terms of revenues, reads the report. Vietnam is quickest on this trend, with mobile-phone games seeing a
compound average growth rate from 2013 to 2017 of 87.7 percent, becoming the biggest segment in terms of
revenues by 2017.
The Trends Creating New Winners And Losers In The Card-Processing Ecosystem
The payments industry had a huge year in 2014 and it's showing no sign of slowing down. On the one hand tech
giants like Amazon and Apple released new products that affirmed their long-term payments ambitions (Apple Pay
and Amazon Local Register). On the other hand startups such as Stripe and ShopKeep continued to carve out
market share, challenging older players like PayPal and VeriFone. The ecosystem for credit- and debit-card
processing involves a complicated set of players interacting to process every transaction. Five types of players are
involved: acquirers/processors, issuers, card networks, gateway providers, and independent sales organizations
(ISOs). To process a typical transaction, three steps must occur: authorizing, batching, and funding. Each participant
in this process takes a fee off of the total volume of a transaction. The remainder is deposited in a merchant's
account. Three trends will shape the payment-card-processing ecosystem from 2015 onward: the EMV security
migration, rapid development of new payment technologies, and the massive card-fraud problem in the US. While
none of these developments will completely upend the incumbent system for processing payments, each will disrupt
key players.
SparkLabs Global Ventures (http://www.sparklabsglobal.com) is a global seed-stage fund with partners in

Silicon Valley, Chicago, London Tel Aviv, Singapore, and Seoul.
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January 13, 2015
Asia Pacific
China
After raising over US$600K on Indiegogo, China drone startup piles on another US$10M from GGV Capital
Ehang, the Chinese startup that claims to make the worlds easiest-to-fly personal drone, announced that it secured
US$10 million in series A funding led by GGV Capital. Angel investors Xu Xiaoping and Nick Yang and early stage
fund PreAngel also participated. Ehangs flagship quadcopter, the Ghost Drone, has raised about US$644,000 on
Indiegogo as of press time, with 11 days remaining in its campaign. The US$100,000 goal was surpassed within 24
hours of launching the project. Ghost also raised US$52,000 on Chinese crowdfunding site Demohour in May, after
which it shipped about 200 early-stage models. Ghost was designed as an aerial photography drone outfitted with a
GoPro and controlled using a smartphone app. The pilot can use GPS and maps to make the drone lift off, set the
elevation, and head toward a destination up to one kilometer away. A small antennae, connected to the phone via
Bluetooth, transmits commands. The money from this latest investment and the Indiegogo campaign will go toward
expanding the team and ramping up manufacturing. The future looks bright for drone startups. The Teal Group
projects spending on unmanned aerial vehicles will double from US$2.8 billion this year to US$5.6 billion in 2023.
Hong Kong P2P lending startup gets US$20M funding as it breaks into mainland China
Hong Kong-based fintech startup WeLab announced that it closed a US$20 million series A funding round from DST
Global founder Yuri Milner, ICONIQ Capital, and Ule, along with previous investors Sequoia Capital and TOM
Group. WeLab originally raised $14 million announced in June 2014, and today adds the additional US$6 million
from the three new investors. WeLabs flagship product is WeLend, the first peer-to-peer lending service in Hong
Kong, founded in 2013. In the second half of last year, the startup entered mainland China, and it has processed
over US$120 million in loan applications. P2P lending startups have exploded in mainland China, with dozens of
competitors receiving huge funding rounds. Notably, Beijing-based Renrendai closed one of the biggest series A
rounds of 2014 at US$130 million. WeLab says this latest investment will support its expansion into China and
improve its credit risk technology. Thats an important asset in China, where credit ratings are not available to
private companies. WeLab says it plans to launch two or three more products in China and one to two more
products in Hong Kong this year.
Food delivery startup from China ingests US$30M investment led by Tencent
Nanjing-based food delivery app Line0 announced that it has closed a US$30 million series B investment led by
Tencent and followed by Sequoia Capital and Gobi Partners. The startup runs delivery services mostly for cheap
franchise restaurants, guaranteeing a bowl of noodles or a Burger King Whopper to your door in less than one hour.
It currently operates in five cities: Nanjing, Shanghai, Shenzhen, Suzhou, and Wuhan. With this latest investment, it
plans to expand to as many as 20 cities in 2015. Founder and CEO William Wu says Line0 has "hundreds of
thousands" of active users, mostly white collar young professionals. The startup operates its own fleet of delivery
drivers. The biggest challenge, Wu says, has been scaling up at such a rapid pace. For a service like Line0, firstmover advantage is vital. Quickly hiring both management and logistics personnel to quickly gain footholds in new
cities is no easy task. He adds that location-based online-to-offline services are a growing trend in China, and
consumer habits are shifting in Line0s favor. Line0 secured an undisclosed series A investment from Sequoia
Capital in July 2014 and seed round from Gobi Partners in July 2012.
Baidu and Tencents ecommerce joint venture with Wanda nabs US$161M funding
Wanda Group, the Chinese commercial real estate firm best known for its movie theater chains, announced that its
joint ecommerce venture with Tencent and Baidu closed a US$161 million funding round. The two investment funds,
Hong Kong Xu De Ren Dao E-commerce Investment and Shengke Limited, will take 2 percent and 3 percent equity
in the company, respectively. Wanda Group states that Tencent and Baidu now each hold a 15 percent stake in the
venture, which is now valued at about US$3.2 billion. When one factors in Baidus commitment to maps and beacon
technology, WeChats commitment to payments and social, and Wandas entertainment properties, its easy to
speculate but hard to know specifically how the venture might play out. Despite how little is known about the joint
venture, Wanda looks set to own a bevy of virtual real estate in addition to its physical real estate. O2O places a
greater importance on the link between people and services than traditional commercial methods, with the size of
the market considerably greater than just physical transactions, its statement reads. Wanda possesses the worlds
largest offline consumer network, with 1.5 million customers in 2014 and an estimated 6 billion customers by 2020. If
Wanda E-commerce can combine its offline and online resources effectively, it has the potential to become a new
Internet giant with incredible potential. In other words, Wanda is thinking big.
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Hong Kong logistics startup Lalamove nabs US$10M from Chinese investors
Lalamove, the Hong Kong-based on-demand delivery startup, announced that it has closed a US$10M funding round
led by Chinas Crystal Stream Capital. Other investors include Geek Founders, Mindworks Ventures, Sirius Venture
Capital, Aria Group, and individual investors. According to Lalamove board member Blake Larson, the funding will be
used to ramp up expansion across Southeast Asia and mainland China. Its app is live in Singapore and Thailand,
and has been accessible in Shenzhen and Guangzhou since mid-December. Lalamove and Gogovan both emerged
in late 2013 with the goal of applying Ubers vehicle-on-demand model to the urban logistics industry. Users can
open the app, specify the goods they want moved and the order is then sent out to a network of drivers. Mainland
China will be a market to watch for Lalamove. For one thing, logistics is a hot space in the Middle Kingdom, with the
nations Internet giants sinking in large sums of money into improving delivery infrastructure. Last year Alibaba
invested hundreds of millions of dollars into China Smart Logistics, which it now owns a 48 percent stake in
according to The New York Times. Tencent, meanwhile, purchased an 18 percent stake in ecommerce company JD,
which is famous for its robust delivery network.
Chinas NetDragon bags US$52.2M Series A investment
The online education subsidiary of Chinas NetDragon announced that it has raised US$52.2 million in Series A
funding, with participation from IDG Capital Partners, Vertex Venture, and Shenzhen-listed animation producer Alpha
Animation. The new round values the subsidiary at US$477.5 million. The funds will be used to accelerate product
development and solidify its first-mover advantage in disrupting the online education space in China, said an official
release. We believe the education industry is ripe for a major change. There is a strong and ever-growing need for a
mobile educational platform that creates true educational value and makes people want to come back to learn more,
Dejian Liu, Chairman and Executive Director, NetDragon said in a statement. The online Chinese game developer
and MMORPG (Massively multiplayer online role-playing games) operator, founded in 1999 and listed on the Hong
Kong Stock Exchange, wants to bring gamification to learning and disrupt the space by leveraging mobile Internet
technologies. In 2013, 51 investment events took place in China online education industry, 44 of which were venture
investments. And the figure rose to 54 during Jan-Aug, 2014, 10 of which (including acquisitions) occurred in Aug
2014 alone, equaling total investment of over US$161 million.
Korea
Samsung to invest US$100M in Internet of Things developers

Samsung chief executive Boo-Keun Yoon said that his company will invest up to US$100 million in the developer
community for applications for the Internet of Things. This category where everyday devices become smart and
connected is a big theme at the 2015 International CES, the tech trade show where Yoon gave one of the opening
keynotes today. He said that in 2017, about 90 percent of Samsungs products would be connected in some way to
the Internet of Things. To get ready for that day, Samsung needs to invest in a lot of developers and startups that can
create meaningful applications based on all of the data collected from the newly created devices. Yoon pointed to a
clever app dubbed EarlySense, which keeps people out of hospitals by detecting problems early. It does so by
helping people measure the quality of their sleep and diagnosing any problems in their sleep patterns. He said that
the development of applications has to occur across industries and keep security in mind.
Daum Kakao acquires app that lets daycare centers to better communicate with parents
Daum Kakao, the parent company of South Koreas most popular messaging app KakaoTalk, announced that it has
wholly acquired Kids Note, the maker of a childcare app by the same name. Daum Kakao purchased 100 percent of
Kids Note for an undisclosed sum. Kids Note is an app for kindergartens and daycares to communicate with parents.
It has both English and Korean versions, but the large majority of the apps 300,000 monthly active users reside in
South Korea. Kids Note digitizes several day-to-day functions that used to be done on ink and paper or face to face.
Parents can receive alerts and announcements about upcoming events, required shots and other medication, and
cafeteria meal plans. Parents can request real-time check ups on their kids, while teachers can post daily reports and
pictures. Daum Kakao plans to push Kids Note to one-third of childcare centers in Korea a total of 14,000
kindergartens and private daycares nationwide. K-Cube Ventures invested US$273,000 million in 2012 and another
US$455,000 in 2013 into Kids Note. Soon after, the government-run TIPS program matched the second investment,
tacking on an additional US$455,000. Kids Note will retain its branding and operate as a subsidiary of Daum Kakao.
IT distribution startup Mesh Korea secures US$4M

B2C distribute portal service Mesh Korea announced a total of about US$4 million of investment from multiple
investors including EG Partners (Daumkakao Young Adult Startup Investment Union). In addition to EG Partners,
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Shinhan Capital, Seoul Investment Partners, and Solborn Investment, also participated in the investment due to
Mesh Koreas growth potential. Since its establishment in January 2013, Mesh Korea has provided distribution
services called Bootake and one day premium service Mesh Prime. Bootake is a professional delivery app that
delivers foods from well-known restaurants and daily necessities from local stores. Mesh Prime, on the other hand, is
a service for restaurants that doesnt offer delivery and connects delivery service and the markets. Mesh Korea has
removed the old fashioned call-centre based analog method to decrease other unnecessary commission fee and
patented its computerised order management program/device last May. Sang-young Seo of EG Partners noted,
Koreas delivery market is showing infinite amount of potential as it already reached the value of 30 trillion won.
Mesh Koreas IT-based distribution hub network showed us their potential in the general distribution market which
helped us to make this decision.
Korean startup dynamo Fast Track Asia gets US$8M funding to kickstart more ventures
South Koreas Fast Track Asia, which combines a VC, incubator, and accelerator, has secured US$8 million in
funding to help it kickstart more young startups. The investment was led by Korea-based Wonder Holdings with
contributions from New York-headquartered Insight Venture Partners, which is a prior investor. Fast Track Asia,
which was founded in 2011, is a bit like Rocket Internet, the Germany-based startup dynamo, in the way it helps
establish and then gives serious backing to new startups. One big difference is that Fast Track Asias ventures are
focused just on South Korea, which is a relatively small market of just 50 million people. It has spawned startups
covering education (Fast Campus), fashion ecommerce (Stripes), and food ordering (HelloNature), to name but
three of the eleven in the portfolio. CEO Ji-woong Park indicates that the funding will go towards creating more new
companies each year.
Japan
Japans Incubate Fund reloads, raises US$92M for investment

Incubate Fund, a well-known seed-stage venture capital firm, announced the start of a new US$92 million fund. The
funds will be used over a 10-year term. The new fund will be investing multi-million dollars in startups as opposed to
the sub-US$1 million amounts it has typically done. The firm will also begin to focus more closely on startups
involved in the Internet of things (IoT). Incubate Funds public interest in IoT is part of a growing trend in Japan.
Major organizations like Yahoo Japan and GMO have identified IoT as a target industry for growing their own
businesses. With Incubate Fund supplying cash to startups, the competitive landscape will grow more crowded. Key
investors in the fund include prominent public-private investment organizations (Innovation Network Corporation of
Japan and the Development Bank of Japan) as well as major tech firms (Yahoo Japan, Mixi, Sega Sammy, and
Taizo Sons Mistletoe). The heavy-hitters dont stop there as Tencent Holdings, banking conglomerate SMBC, and
major broadcaster TBS all chipped in as well. Nikkei reports that the Innovation Network Corporation of Japan put in
the biggest chunk of change, with roughly US$42 million. Incubate Fund was established in 1999 and has so far
invested US$171 million. Notable successes include Gumi, Cybozu, Pokelabo, MugenUp, Origami, and Sansan.
This marks the firms third fund.
Line Taxi launches, gives Uber first major challenger in Japan

Finally, Japan gets a taxi war of its own. China has Didi Dache versus Kuadi Dache. India has Ola and TaxiForSure.
GrabTaxi and EasyTaxi are duking it out across Southeast Asia. Even Vietnam has a Tolkien-esque battle of five
armies. But Japan? It was enjoying a serene peace under the benevolent Uber with only a distant challenger in the
Osaka-based Hailo to be considered. Now, Line changed the game by adding a new wrinkle to its messenger app
Line Taxi. Line Taxi is not available as a separate download. Like the recently unveiled Line Pay, it is accessible via
the main messaging app. Payment is carried out via a credit card registered to Line Pay, so much of the user
experience is essentially identical to Uber. Use GPS to identify your position, request a cab, and pay without
needing to reach for your wallet. Unlike Uber, Line Taxi is, for now, a decidedly domestic product. Line Pay requires
the user to have a Japanese drivers license or insurance card, as well as a Japanese credit card. If the service
does not become more foreigner friendly, it will be unable to completely drive Uber out of Japan. Delivering
directions via GPS and paying wirelessly will always be a major boon for foreign travelers 20 million of whom are
expected to visit Japan yearly by 2020.
India
CommonFloor joins Freshdesk in Google Capital portfolio

Google Capital today announced its second investment in India real estate portal CommonFloor, a tech-based
disruptor in this space, which is poised for take-off. CommonFloor, initially started as an online space where people
living in apartment complexes could collaborate to solve problems, grew into a real estate portal when people
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started posting their houses for rent or sale on the site. But its key differentiator is still the community nature of
CommonFloor, which combines property search with apartment and vendor management. CommonFloor, which
raised US$30 million from Tiger Global in a series E round four months back, has more than 100,000 residential
projects listed from over 200 cities. The platform has mapped 10 million homes and has 500,000 active property
listings, verified by a team of over 1,000 employees across the country. David Lawee, partner at Google Capital,
says, The online real estate market in India is poised for tremendous growth, which is why were excited to work
closely with CommonFloors excellent team in the months and years ahead.
P2P lending site Faircent gets a good deal, receives funding within six months of starting up
Gurgaon-based peer-to-peer lending website Faircent raised venture capital at an enterprise valuation of US$4
million. The undisclosed funding round was led by Devesh Sachdev and Ashish Tiwari, promoters of Fusion
Microfinance. Faircent caters to those in need of retail and business loans using a format that allows it to keep
institutional charges to a minimum to the benefit of users. Borrowers can directly interact with lenders, negotiate the
terms and conditions of the interest rates, tenure of loans, and strike a deal. Both borrowers and lenders have to pay
a listing fee. Faircent, which started operations in July 2014, spent nearly 12 months developing the platforms
proprietary technology, which enables its underwriting and borrower rating system. Apart from bringing interested
users together, the platform also uses an algorithm to figure out the creditworthiness of prospective borrowers and
lenders by leveraging big data-based models that factor in personal, demographic, financial, national credit bureau,
and social networking data to determine the rating of borrowers. This is a shift from the lender-borrower dynamic, as
the borrower has the upper hand with an option to accept or reject the offers from the lenders.
Two IIT grads hit a Purplle patch with beauty ecommerce, bag series A funding
Purplle, an ecommerce site with focus on beauty and grooming vertical, raised an undisclosed amount in series A
funding from IvyCap Ventures. Founded by Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) grads Manish Taneja and Rahul
Dash in 2011, Purplle allows users to not only buy products but compare them based on several parameters,
including ratings, colors, and prices. Also, you can compare salons and spas in your neighborhood based on
reviews, pictures, and distance from your location. Purplle already has a few strong competitors. Beauty ecommerce
portal Nykaa, founded by an investment banker-turned-entrepreneur Falguni Nayar, Mumbai-based BeautyKafe,
and Birchbox-style FabBag are a few. Apart from these vertical-focused companies, broader ecommerce
marketplaces like Flipkart, Amazon, and Snapdeal too offer a wide range of beauty and grooming products.
One-third of the worlds blind live in India. Lenskart wants to change that with US$21M funding
Indian etailer of prescription eyeglasses, sunglasses, and contact lenses Lenskart announced a series C round of
funding of US$21.2 million. Private equity firm TPG Growth led the round in which Hong Kong based TR Capital and
existing investor IDG Ventures participated. Lenskart was founded in 2010 by former Microsoft product manager
Peyush Bansal along with friends Amit Chaudhary and Sumeet Kapahi. The store offers a wide range of prescribed
and fashion eyewear from leading brands like Rayban, Oakley, Tag Heuer, and Fastrack.The site has personalized
features to help a customer pick a suitable eyewear online, one-year product warranty, and 14-days no-questionsasked return policy. Niche ecommerce players like Lenskart, furniture etailer Urban Ladder, and jewelry estore
Bluestone have been growing fast in India as more and more people are loosening purse strings online. Besides
convenience and wider choice, a key bait luring Indian shoppers online is discounts. In the last two years Lenskarts
revenues have grown more than 200 percent year on year, but no absolute numbers are provided. Its employee
strength stands at 150 currently. It raised US$4 million from IDG Ventures in October 2011, and US$10 million from
Ronnie Screwvala-led Unilazer Ventures in February 2013.
Delhis video Q&A platform Frankly.me raises US$600k to engage public figures
Delhi-based startup Frankly has raised a US$600,000 investment from Matrix Partners. Frankly.me is a video Q&A
platform that serves the purpose of connecting people with public figures and raising the level of engagement
between them. The company says several VIPs ranging from singers to political leaders have already registered
themselves for the service. The platform is up against rivals like Twitter and YouTube but the founders, Nikunj Jain
and Abhishek Gupta, hope to create more meaningful conversations, which can have more than 140 characters.
They also hope to differentiate themselves by making two-way conversations easier. Questions submitted are upvoted by other users, so the most popular ones are more visible and hopefully answered. This system has been
deployed on popular forums like Reddit. Frankly is still considering different business models, but the company is
focused on gaining traction for now. While the platform is open to users globally, the startup plans to focus on India
for the next 15 to 18 months. The challenge is expanding in a market where more than 20 official languages are
recognized by the government.
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Malaysia
FundedByMe, Vulcan Post, Between join forces to raise funds for Malaysia flood victims
For the first time in weeks, the flood situation in Kelantan has taken a turn for the better with water levels in its
capital receding. However, the supply of important resources such as food rations continue to be scarce. Staples
such as rice and wheat have run out for days, while stocks of food such as bread and eggs are quickly diminishing.
Seeing the dire need of Malaysians residing in those parts, Swedish crowdfunding platform FundedByMe has
partnered with Malaysian media platform Vulcan Post and Korean dating app Between to raise funds for them. The
campaign aims to raise US$8,044, and has so far received US$305. All proceeds will go towards Mercy Malaysia,
who has been distributing supplies like health and food items to the affected areas since December 18, and will
continue to do so. Meanwhile, a group of local entrepreneurs have banded together to create a portal called my
banjir providing crucial information on the floods, such as drop-off points for supplies and donation options.
Indonesia
The Ministry of Industry expects Indonesian e-commerce to grow 60%-70% this year
That the Indonesian e-commerce industry has developed vastly is not an uncommon thing to know. The Ministry of
Industry even predicted that the industry will grow much more significant in 2015, even though peoples worries
toward online fraud are still there. As being cited from Bisnis, Electronics and Telematics Industrys Director Ignasius
Warsito mentioned, The e-commerce trend in Indonesia will grow 60 per cent to 70 per cent even though there is a
small percentage of peoples worries toward online fraud. Further, he added that the growth would be largely due to
the increase of technology access and direct connectivity to the people. Therefore, he suggested that every player in
this segment should do proper branding and strengthen it. The industrys growth is also shaped by the vast growth
of the number of Indonesian Internet users. As Berita Satu reported, the data by APJII suggested that by the end of
2014, the number of Indonesian Internet users reached 107 million 63.4 per cent of which were the members of
the upper middle class, 21.5 per cent of them were entrepreneurs, and 15.1 per cent of them were laborers.
Singapore
Japans Credit Saison invests in Singapore-based ewallet MatchMove Pay

Singapore-based mobile payments provider MatchMove Pay announced a significant investment round led by
Japanese credit card and financial services company Credit Saison and joined by GMO Venture Partners. The
funding amount was not disclosed. Japanese investors have exhibited a piqued interest in Southeast Asian tech
companies, likely due in large part to their countrys rapidly shrinking and aging society coupled with a flat domestic
economy with an ever-weakening yen. Southeast Asia represents fresh growth potential, with younger populations
that are avid smartphone users despite many being unbanked and uncarded. We believe that Southeast Asia will
evolve into a cashless society as the growth of credit cards, prepaid cards, and smartphone payments continue to
gain momentum, Hiroshi Rinno, Credit Saisons president and CEO, said in a statement. MatchMove Pay has
addressed each of these three critical factors [] and is therefore uniquely positioned to quickly unlock the
potential for ecommerce growth in Asia.
Data intelligence startup Tookitaki gets US$1M to predict what customers want in the future
Data intelligence startup Tookitaki announced the raising of a US$1 million seed round. Led by Jungle Ventures,
and joined by Rebright Partners and existing investor Blume Ventures, the round comes after the Singapore-based
consumer insights platform previously raised US$200,000 in 2013. Beginning its life as an ad tech platform,
Tookitaki is now a SaaS platform that harnesses datasets to forecast consumer behavior online and provide
actionable insights, allowing the client to better spend its marketing dollars. According to an official statement,
Tookitakis clientele spans across e-commerce, travel, classifieds, automobiles, and consumer goods. The funds will
be used for research and expansion purposes specifically, to grow its presence in Southeast Asia, Japan,
Australia, and New Zealand. That was likely a contributing factor to the founders decision to accept funding from
Jungle Ventures and Rebright Partners, as both have invested in startups across Southeast Asia and Japan.

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United States
Smart thermostat company Nest announces 15 new partners, including LG & Whirlpool
Google-owned Nest announced 15 new partners for its six-month-old Works with Nest program: August Smart
Lock, Automatic car adapters, Insteon, LG appliances, the Ooma Telo, Phillips Hue lights, the Kevo Smart Lock, and
the Withings Aura Sleep System. Nests partner program originally launched with just five partnerships most
notably a tie-in with the Pebble smartwatch. Now, with support from major players like LG and Whirlpool, its
becoming clear how essential this program is for Nests expansion beyond thermostats. Most of these integrations
tie back into temperature settings and Nests Protect smoke and carbon monoxide detector, but a few turn the Nest
into something close to a smart home hub. LGs integration, for example, detects if youve accidentally left the oven
on, Nest said in a statement. Nest says it will soon support Big Ass Fans, the Beep Dial, ChargePoint Home EV,
Lightify lights, Stack bulbs, Whirlpool washers and dryers, and Zuli Smartplugs.
MongoDB has raised a fresh US$80M ahead of an expected IPO

MongoDB, the company behind the popular NoSQL database by the same name, disclosed in a regulatory filing that
it has secured US$80 million in venture funding, giving the company some more time to get itself ready to go public.
Union Square Ventures managing partner Albert Wenger and Sequoia Capital partner Roelof Botha, and Flybridge
Capital Partners general partner Chip Hazard, all MongoDB board members, are all listed on the filing, which shows
the company is offering to sell a total of $100 million, not just $80 million. MongoDBs previous funding round,
totaling $150 million, came in October 2013. In August MongoDB announced a new chief executive, Dev Ittycheria.
Competitors in the NoSQL database business include Basho, Couchbase, and DataStax, among others.
GraphLab gets US$18.5M, changes name to Dato to reflect a broader focus on data
GraphLab, a startup that has emphasized the power of graph databases for storing and analyzing certain kinds of
information, announced a new US$18.5 million funding round as well as a new name: Dato. The idea is to convey
that the startup can work with data in many formats, not just graphs. Dato has faced competition with graph analysis
startups like Neo4j, as well as open-source tools such as Apache Giraph. But the market for machine learning
technologies has proven far more popular and more competitive. Besides supporting data in tables, among other
formats as Google, for one, has done Dato has begun to support a trendy type of artificial intelligence called
deep learning with its software. Datos customers include Adobe, Gigya, Pandora, PayPal, StumbleUpon, and
Zillow. New investors Opus Capital Ventures and Vulcan Capital joined in the new round. Previous investors
Madrona Venture Group and NEA also participated. To date Seattle-based Dato has raised $25.25 million, including
the $6.75 million round from 2013.
Because sales reps have more to do than update their handouts, Seismic nails US$20 million
Cloud-based sales enablement provider Seismic announced it has finalized US$20 million in a Series B round to
support its definition of the term Sales enablement, which is a still-evolving term. It covers delivering up-to-date
content to salespeople, training them, providing them with tools for closing a deal, and more. According to CEO
Doug Winter, Seismics secret sauce is its LiveDoc feature, which integrates content with the data sources that
populate it from CRM, ERP, Excel spreadsheets, or live external sources like Zillow or Morningstar. These ondemand documents allow sales reps to deliver up-to-date and personalized messaging to customers. The new
funding will be used to expand and enhance the product, plus grow the sales and marketing efforts. Even in just
the up-to-date content part of the sales enablement spectrum, Seismic faces a number of competitors, including
SlideShark, Highspot, ClearSlide, and Fileboard. The new round of funding was led by JMI Equity, with participation
by previous investor Sigma West. JMI General Partner Peter Arrowsmith is joining the companys board of directors.
In August 2013, the company raised $4.5 million in a Series A.
Intel says it will invest US$300M to increase diversity in the tech industry
Intel chief Brian Krzanich announced that the company will spend US$300 million on a new diversity in technology
initiative. Krzanich also said Intels workforce will fully represent women and under-represented minorities by 2020.
Krzanich announced this initiative today at CES 2015 the International Consumer Electronics trade show in Las
Vegas. Krzanich said in a statement that Intel will invest its $300 million fund in three ways: 1. to build a pipeline of
female and under-represented engineers and computer scientists; 2. to hire more women and under-represented
minorities; and 3. to fund programs that support more positive representation within the technology and gaming
industries. Intel said it has partnered with the following organizations to meet these goals: the International Game

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January 13, 2015
Developers Association, the E-Sports League, the National Center for Women in Technology, the CyberSmile
Foundation, the Feminist Frequency, and Rainbow PUSH.
Native Commerce Platform Okanjo Raises US$1.7 Million

A Milwaukee, Wisconsin-based startup called Okanjo, which offers publishers an alternative to native advertising
with what it calls native commerce, has raised US$1.7 million in new funding in a follow-on round from local angel
investors, bringing the companys total raise to date to US$3.2 million. The additional funding will be used in part to
launch Okanjos product, an e-commerce-enabled ad solution that lets brands sell products or offers directly on a
third-party website like the website for a local newspaper, for example. Okanjo President Brendon Thomas
described what this could look like from an end user perspective: You could be reading an article about the Green
Bay Packers, and you could see related Packers merchandise embedded within that article, under the brand of that
news site, which you could then purchase without leaving the site, he says. There are two primary ways Okanjos
product can be implemented, Thomas explains. Publishers can place its native commerce tech anywhere on the
site where theyre already running ads. For more complex rollouts, Okanjo also offers direct platform integration with
open APIs and SDKs. The company declined to provide info on total customers or revenues, but Thomas describes
the business as healthy and growing.
VSCO Acquires Artifact Uprising To Help Bring More Photography To The Real World
Visual Supply Co., better known as VSCO, has acquired Artifact Uprising, a Denver-based startup focused on
bringing photographers work from the digital hubs frequented by modern creatives to the real world as tangible
books and prints. According to VSCO CEO Joel Flory, the deal is about helping Artifact Uprising achieve its
potential. As a photographer, theres nothing quite like holding a print of your photo, he noted while describing how
Artifact Uprisings offerings will fit into VSCOs current product line-up, which today focuses on giving photographers
tools for editing and sharing photos on their phones and desktops. Flory says that Artifact Uprising is already doing a
fantastic job at providing a product for photographers, but will be able to leverage VSCOs resources to grow further.
Thats why all of Artifact Uprisings 14 full-time team members will retain their positions post-merger, including
founder Jenna Walker, who will stay on as CEO and continue to operate mostly independently. VSCO will also help
Artifact Uprising move beyond North America, which is currently its primary market. VSCO has it the other way
around, with 80% of its user base located outside the United States.
Apploi, A Job Hunting App, Raises Over US$7 Million In Series A

Applois CEO, Adam Lewis, launched the company to allow service industry workers put their best foot forward in
job interviews. Designed as a sort of central system for applications as well as a way to share videos of your
personality and skills, its already helping hundreds of folks find work at H&M, Uniqlo, and J. Crew, among others.
The company offers a mobile and browser-based application process and also sets up hiring kiosks in malls and
busy areas where multiple employers can grab walking traffic. Users can submit multiple applications and even
show off their skills by shooting short videos. The company raised US$7,407,800 in Series A with Andrew Heyer,
CEO of Mistral Equity Partners, Simon Jacobs, former owner of Hale and Hearty, among others. Tony Wang,
president of Three-W International, and Heyer will join the Board. The company hopes to expand its reach and bring
more kiosks and employers online. The site is humming along right now and theyve served over 80,000 job seekers
a month in 36 states. They expect to be in all 50 states by Summer 2015. No word if theyre hiring, but feel free to
submit an application.
Scribd Raises US$22M For Its Subscription E-Book Service

Scribd, a company offering unlimited access to half a million e-books for $8.99 a month, announced that it has
raised US$22 million in additional funding. The round was led by Khosla Ventures, with Khosla partner Keith Rabois
(previously an executive at PayPal, LinkedIn, Slide, and Square) joining the Scribds board as an observer.
According to Rabois, with over 80 million users in nearly every country, the Scribd team is well positioned to grow to
a massive global audience. Launched in 2007 and incubated at Y Combinator, Scribd started out as a documentsharing service. While it still supports those features, its focus shifted last year to subscription e-books, where
competitors include startup Oyster and Amazons Kindle Unlimited service. Subscriptions have been growing an
average of 31 percent each month since the service was officially unveiled in October 2013. This brings Scribds
total funding to $48 million. Previous backers Redpoint Ventures, Charles River Ventures, and Silicon Valley Bank
also invested in the new round. The new funding will be used to improve the product with a focus on algorithmic
book recommendations and the reading experience itself, as well as continuing to expand the content available in
Scribd.
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January 13, 2015
Fitness startup Noom logs US$15M in new funding

Chelsea-based Noom, the creator of health care apps that track users' food intake and exercise, has raised
US$15.1 million in a new round of funding. A Securities and Exchange Commission filing Jan. 2 states that six
investors are participating in the funding round. According to Fortune, seed investor RRE Ventures and TransLink
Capital took part in the round, which brings Noom's total funding to approximately $27.3 million so far. While it is
unclear whether or not Noom is done looking for new investors in the new round, the amount raised so far falls short
of what the company is hoping to raise in the Series B, according to the SEC filing and recent public comments by a
Noom executive. During a company presentation last month, Noom co-CEO Artem Petakov announced that the
startup had raised $16 million in a Series B round and was hoping to total $20 million by the end of it. Mr. Petakov
made the comments at the New York Digital Health Accelerator demo day on Dec. 4. According to the filing, Noom
will take its money and put it toward "research and development, general corporate and working capital purposes,
some of which may include salaries and/or other compensation paid to executive officers in the ordinary course of
business."
Europe
Mubis Netflix for cinephiles movie service nabs US$15M in funding and arrives on Chromecast
While Netflix and similar subscription video-on-demand (VoD) services are great for bulk-watching Breaking Badtype box sets and seeking out classic movies and TV shows, finding good content to watch can be difficult. And
this is where Mubi has been carving out its niche in recent years. Mubi can best be described as like a Netflix
specifically for indie, cult, and classic movies. With a human-curated approach and only 30 films available at any
given time, Mubi is designed to make the decision-making process simpler for subscribers. In 2015 and beyond, the
London-headquartered company will be making a big push for your eyeballs in just about every domain, as it has
announced a US$15 million funding round, which comes less than three months after its previous US$5.1 million
round. But over the Christmas period, Mubi also quietly rolled out support for Chromecast and launched a version of
its service for Android smartphones, having previously been restricted to tablets in the Android realm. Founded as
The Auteurs back in 2007, the company changed its name to Mubi in 2010 and today has 50 employees working in
London, San Francisco, and a handful of other locations around the world.
Iskn raises US$2M for its iPad cover that turns your handwriting into a digital document
Iskn (pronounced i-skin), a French startup that raised previously just under US$350,000 on Kickstarter, built an
iPad cover that digitizes whatever someone writes on a piece of good old-fashioned paper, announced that it has
raised US$2 million in seed funding. The iSketchnote is a connected iPad cover on which you can attach a piece of
paper, and write and draw with iskns special pens. The cover digitizes the writing or drawing in real-time, which you
can edit, save, or share from your iPad with the iSketchnote app. Iskns pens dont have electronics inside, but do
have a magnet ring that enables the cover to pick up on what youre writing. The idea of enabling handwriting to be
digital is not new, and others have developed similar products or taken different approaches for a similar results.
Evernote, for example, has Penultimate, an app that turns the iPad into a writing surface with the help of a special
stylus. Partech Ventures led the round, with additional participation from CEA Investments, Kima Ventures, and
Pascal Cagni. Iskn was founded in 2014 by Jean-Luc Vallejo, Timothee Jobert, and Tristan Hautson, and is based in
Grenoble, France. The iSketchnotes technology was developed at the CEA-Leti in Grenoble, France.
83North announces US$200M fund to invest in European and Israeli startups

London and Tel Aviv-based venture capital firm 83North (formerly Greylock IL) announced that it has raised a new
US$200 million fund to further invest technology startups in Europe and Israel. The company who has previously
backed startups like iZettle, Just Eat, Actifio, AeroScout, Hyrbis, Just Eat, is now managing over US$550 million
allocated in 8 years under 3 funds. The company who turned global after breaking up with then affiliate fund joined
by Greylock Partners, is now investing mostly in European and Israeli tech businesses of any stage. Over half of the
companies 83North has backed so far have operations in the US. According to Erez Ofer, Partner at 83North in Tel
Aviv, the firm invests in specific domains of expertise including data center and cloud technologies, software,
marketplaces, consumer services and fintech.
Long-term archiving startup Longaccess announces BigStash platform and new seed funding of US$350K
Greek long-term archiving startup Longaccess announced that they have pulled in about US$350,000 (300,000
Euro) in seed funding and are launching BigStash, a long-term archival platform. The company says that the new
funding, which comes from EU-backed JEREMIE Openfund II, will allow it to integrate with other platforms and to
add additional security features. As opposed to cloud storage, which allows users to sync between devices and
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January 13, 2015
platforms for immediate access, BigStash is promoted as being a sort of online safety deposit box for amateur and
professional content creators. As opposed to cloud services, this platform allows users to message the service and
request a particular piece of information and receive it a few hours later. The service is currently integrated with
Dropbox, but the company says that integration with other platforms is coming. In order to celebrate the launch of
BigStash, the startup has announced that they are offering 1TB of free storage for a year, whereupon users will
subscribe. Even after the trial period, users can get 10GB per month for free, while paid plans start at $15 annually
for 100GB.
European Online Optician Mister Spex Picks Up US$40M Round Led By Goldman Sachs
Mister Spex, the European online optician, has picked up a new US$40 million round in funding led by U.S.
investment bank Goldman Sachs. The Berlin-based companys existing backers also participated, including Scottish
Equity Partners, XAnge, and DN Capital, while the fresh capital will be used to support Mister Spexs domestic and
international growth plans. The site is currently active in Germany, Austria, France, UK and Spain, along with
Sweden via a 2013 acquisition of online eyewear stores Lensstore and Loveyewear. It claims to be the largest in
Europe. A typical e-commerce play, Mister Spex lets customers buy a range of eyewear online, including designer
glasses, sunglasses and contact lenses, besting traditional bricks n mortar stores with more competitive pricing
afforded by it through economies of scale and moving the shopping experience online. The eyewear market was
also ripe for disruption in 2007 when Mister Spex was founded, given the artificially high price of designer frames. In
2013, the company made a turnover of about US$55 million (47 million euro), and claims to have racked up more
than one million customers in Europe.
Startup Poland Hopes To Highlight The Countrys Booming Tech Scene

As with most countries, industry bodies designed to represent the startup community have sprung up. The UK has
the non-profit Coadec, which does its best to influence government policy around startups. As does Startup
Australia. Now Poland is getting in on the act. Startup Poland is headed up by many of the leading lights of the
scene. Co-founder Sara Koslinska says Polands capital Warsaw is the only Central European city listed in the
Startup Genome rank of Top 20 runner-ups. Its also about to get the second Google Campus in Europe. Poland has
long been seen as a hotbed of tech talent. So, with the support of Guy Levin, the director of Coadec, a group of
members of the Polish startup community including Borys Musielak and Piotr Wilam decided to set up a Trust that
will benefit the whole community. So far, 150 startups have signed up, including local politicians. Unlike the UK,
which is dominated by London, Poland has a few startup centers apart from its capital city, including Cracow,
Poznan and Gdansk. Startup Poland hopes to highlight those cities.
Israel
Israeli MediSafe raises US$6M

MediSafe, a cloud-synced mobile medication management system based in Haifa, Israel, raised a US$6 million
Series A funding round from Pitango and TriVentures funds. This is a significant milestone for a company that was
incubated at the Israeli Microsoft Accelerator in 2012 and up until now, had raised approximately $1 million seed
funding round and $250,000 prize from Qualcomm Ventures fourth annual QPrize international seed investment
competition. Either by typing in the medication name or scanning the barcode, the app will then suggest when the
user should take their medicine, including the recommended doses, and will automatically remind the user when to
consume it. If the user does not remember, the app can also alert their family members and health care providers so
that they can remind the patient to take their medication: This specific feature differentiates MediSafe from similar
apps such as PillBoxie. About 50% of Americans do not take their medication as instructed, and of those, about half
are doing so because they simply forget. This is a problem that costs the U.S. healthcare market approximately
$300 billion a year, showing the need for apps like MediSafe.

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