Daily funding roundup - September 3, 2015
Prospa landed $60M; Netskope secured $75M; Zivame raised $40M
- Netskope,a company monitors and enforces policy over the sensitive data shared across the thousands upon thousands of cloud apps in use at businesses today, announced $75 million in Series D funding on Thursday. The round was led by Iconiq Capital. Existing investors Accel Partners, Lightspeed Venture Partners and the Social + Capital Partnership also participated in the round. Netskope had previously raised over $55 million, most recently a $35 million round in May of last year. The new round brings Netskope’s total amount of funding raised to more than $130 million.
- General classifieds site Afribaba Holdings has completed it’s funding deal with Frontier Digital Ventures to expand across French-West Africa. Founded in 2015, the firm began talks in July and by August things were nearly complete when we got a tip off of the deal. Temgo added that AH is supported by global experts in e-commerce and African markets. Temgo is now revamping the designs of his sites across the first few markets Afribaba is concentrating on and has taken up the role of CEO fulltime and is getting a team on ground in some of this markets.
- Wealth management giant AMP has just invested $1.5 million in fintech startup MoneyBrilliant, an online hub and mobile app which give users instant insight into their spending and finances. Established financial industry players, including the big banks, are under pressure from small startups trying to grab a share of the industry. It’s a booming industry with investment flooding into companies reinventing the way we do payments, lending and investing, and AMP wants to ensure that it has a stake in any new disruptive service in the sector. In the case of MoneyBrilliant, it gives users automatic access to their bills, spending and savings to see if they are tracking in the green or are slipping into the red against their latest pay slip.
- Harrisonburg Startup Company Blue Vigil has closed the $250,000 seed round, which was funded by private investors from the local community. Blue Vigil is in the process of commercializing a tethered hovering observation platform technology. The startup was developed through an innovative economic development program managed by Herndon based InnovateTech Ventures. Working in partnership with Mary Lou Bourne, Executive Director of James Madison University's Office of Technology Innovation and Economic Development and a small group of private investors in Harrisonburg, InnovateTech identified the technology along with this promising startup. They recruited experienced entrepreneur, Todd Stave, to run Blue Vigil.
- Táximo, a portfolio company of Polymath Ventures just closed a 4.6 million round of investment, of which the main part is going to buy 80 taxis in Colombia, and the rest will be used to continue expanding the operation regionally. Táximo previously closed Series Seed and Series A rounds from Colombian and international investors. The investors were unnamed.
- CensorNet, a cloud security company, has raised £2million in Series A funding to power the next phase of growth. The funds will be primarily invested into bolstering its R&D for its popular platform, which helps organisations manage the risk of cloud applications in an increasingly mobile work environment. The round was led by Talis Capital, with existing investors and management participating. Vasile Foca has joined the board as investor director.
- Wrap Media, which focuses on helping companies create highly interactive bite-sized mobile web experiences for its users to engage with. The company announced that it had landed a $12.7 million Series B round of funding, led by Raine Capital and ProSieben with participation from Christopher Crain of Crain Communications, Dream Incubator, FF Angel LLC, Salesforce Ventures and Transmedia Capital. The company has raised $18.7 million to date.
- French fashion platform Vestiaire Collective has bagged a €33 million ($37 million) Series D round led by France’s Eurazeo and joined by previous backers Balderton Capital, along with Idinvest Partners, Condé Nast and Ventech. It is already serving users across 40 countries, has offices in Paris, London, New York and Berlin, but says it will use the funds to build its brand across the globe, with a focus on the US and Europe. Total funding to date for Vestiaire Collective has now reached €60m since it opened its doors in France in 2009.
- Zivame, Indian online lingerie retailer has announced that it has raised Series C round of Rs 250 crore ($40 million) from Zodius Technology Fund and Khazanah National Berhad, the strategic investment fund of the Government of Malaysia. Existing investors Unilazer, IDG Ventures and Kalaari Capital also participated in the round. The company plans to use the funds to continue dominating the category and provide a world class lingerie shopping experience to Indian women. The company also announced the launch of its app, the lingerie app for women in India.
- Online small business lender Prospa has secured $60 million in capital from a consortium of private equity investors, including The Carlyle Group and Ironbridge Capital. The proceeds from the capital raising, the largest to date by an Australian online lender, will be used to help fund additional Australian small businesses and support Prospa's expansion in the local market. The co-investment is led by Carlyle, Ironbridge, Airtree Ventures and high profile private investor David Fite. Prospa's original funder of the first round, Entree Capital, also contributed towards the $60 million raising.
If you are interested in being included in our funding roundup, submit your press release or blog post about your financing round to mitos@vator.tv.
Image source:ballisticcell.com
Mitos Suson
I produce Vator Events and enjoy the challenge. I am learning and growing a lot, being involved with Vator and loving every moment of it!
All author postsRelated Companies, Investors, and Entrepreneurs
IDG Ventures
Angel group/VC
Joined Vator on
IDG Ventures is a global network of venture capital funds with approximately $3.6 billion under management and a portfolio of over 220 companies built over the last 15 years. The IDG Ventures network is comprised of five independent partnerships managing funds in North America and Asia. Each partnership makes investments on behalf of its limited partners, including International Data Group (IDG), the world's largest IT media company. By combining the IDG platform – an unparalleled combination of global publishing, market research (IDC), and conferences and exhibition resources – with years of hands-on experience in early-stage company building, each IDG Ventures fund helps companies understand their markets better and penetrate them faster than their competition
Lightspeed Venture Partners
Service provider
Joined Vator on
Lightspeed Venture Partners is a technology-focused venture capital firm that manages $1.3 billion of capital commitments. We closed Lightspeed VII, a $480 million fund, at the end of 2005. Over the past two decades, our partners have invested in more than 120 companies, many of which have gone on to become leaders in their respective industries. Our team invests in the U.S. and internationally from offices in Menlo Park, China, India, and Israel.
We are proud to have partnered with many exceptional management teams. Our investment professionals have contributed domain expertise and operational experience to help build high-growth, market-leading companies such as Blue Nile (NILE), Brocade (BRCD), Ciena (CIEN), DoubleClick (DCLK), Informatica (INFA), Kiva Software (acquired by AOL), Openwave (OPWV), Quantum Effect Devices (acquired by PMCS), Sirocco (acquired by SCMR), and Waveset (acquired by SUNW). Some of our recent exits include the top-performing tech IPO of 2006, Riverbed Technology (RVBD), and the top enterprise software acquisition of 2006, Virsa Systems (acquired by SAP).
Visit our website at www.lightspeedvp.com