Daily funding roundup - October 20, 2015

Yidao Yongche bagged $700M; Gritstone Oncology raised $102M; Zignal Labs landed $15M

• Zignal Labs, a realtime cross media analytics company, today announced the completion of a $15 million round of funding. The round was led by existing investors Andy Ballard of Figtree Partners; Mitch Cohen of Ross Investment Associates; and Jim Hornthal, co-founder and Chairman of Zignal Labs. The company will use the funds to continue to expand their sales, product and engineering operations.
  
  
• SlimTrader, a turn-key ecommerce solution provider for businesses in Sub-Saharan Africa, has received a $1 million investment from Interswitch, an Africa-focused integrated digital payments and commerce company that facilitates the electronic circulation of money as well as the exchange of value between individuals and organisations on a timely and consistent basis. The additional funding provides the clearest sign yet of the power of SlimTrader’s flagship ecommerce platform, MoBiashara as it expands into the hospitality sector. 
  
  
• Parkifi, a real-time parking spot occupancy platform, today announced financial backing of $2 million to fund growth in target markets and development of the Denver based team. The first round of venture capital includes strategic investments from Colorado based Galvanize Ventures, Foundry Group Angels and Access Ventures among others. Initially, Parkifi will roll out services with a parking management company in Denver that represents 7,000 parking spots as well as theCity of Boulder, Colorado and a Pittsburgh based parking management firm.
  
  
• Redox, a health IT startup formed by former employees of Epic Systems, has raised $3.5 million as part of a Series A round to grow its health system customers and add some staff. The company developed an API for health IT companies so their software tools can be more easily integrated by health systems’ disparate EHRs. .406 Ventures led the round along with participation by Flybridge Capital Partners and HealthX Ventures.
  
  
• Bangalore–based B2B hyperlocal delivery startup, Opinio, has secured $7 million in its Series A funding from logistics company, Delhivery, Sands Capital and Accel Partners. Confirming the news, Mayank Kumar, founder and CEO of Opinioshared that the startup will use this fund for expanding to newer cities like Mumbai, Pune and Chennai and have plans for another 10 cities in the pipeline. 
  
  
• Chennai based healthcare technology company, Attune Technologies has secured an amount of $10 million in Series B funding from Qualcomm Incorporated, through its venture investment group, Qualcomm Ventures, and Norwest Venture Partners. Raised investment will be used to fuel the company’s growth in India – where it currently offers a cloud based platform to over 200 hospitals, laboratories and clinics through 2500 centers with over 10 million patient records. It will also utilize the funds to accelerate its expansion into international markets like Africa, West Asia and South-East Asia. The company also aims to revolutionize healthcare by offering its software solution to 25,000 hospitals and labs across the globe in the next 3 years.
  
  
• Scalus, a San Francisco, CA-based communication and workflow management platform for the work environment, publicly launched with $10 million in funding. Backers of the company included Google Ventures, SherpaVentures, DCVC, Max Levchin and others. Led by Kristen Koh Goldstein, founder and CEO, Scalus provides a platform that allows companies to automate distributed systems required to scale effectively, automatically folding in daily activity and workflow.
  
  
• ZeroStack, Inc., a Mountain View, CA-based developer of self-service and scale-out private cloud, raised $16 million in Series B funding. The round, which followed a Series A round announced less than two months ago, was led by Formation 8 with participation from existing investor Foundation Capital and current member of ZeroStack’s board of directors Mark Leslie. In conjunction with the funding, Shirish Sathaye, general partner at Formation 8, will join ZeroStack’s board of directors.
  
  
• Amino, a San Francisco, CA-based service that allows patients to find and book appointments with doctors whose experience and practice matches their needs, raised $19.4 million in funding. Backers included Accel, Charles River Ventures (CRV), Rock Health, and more than a dozen individual investors. In conjunction with the funding, Brian O’Malley of Accel Partners and Rafael Corrales of Charles River Ventures (CRV) joined Amino’s Board of Directors. The company intends to use the funds to further build out its database, products, and team to guide people through the complexities of the health care system.
  
  
• Illusive networks, a Tel Aviv, Israel-based cybersecurity company providing security deception technologies, raised $22 million in Series B funding. The round was led by new investor New Enterprise Associates (NEA), with participation from Bessemer Venture Partners, Marker LLC , Citi Ventures, and Eric Schmidt’s Innovation Endeavors. In conjunction with the funding, Kittu Kolluri, General Partner at NEA, will join illusive networks’ Board of Directors. The company intends to use the funds for global expansion investing in sales and marketing, as well as expanding the engineering and support teams.
  
  
• Israeli business intelligence platform developer Pyramid Analytics has closed a $30 million financing round led by Viola Private Equity, and including a second-time investment from Sequoia Capital. The round will be used to expand Pyramid Analytics’ workforce, deepen strategic alliances with partners, advance its channel ecosystem efforts, and enhance market penetration in key segments. The company raised $6 million in 2013. Headquartered in Seattle, the company's development offices are in Ramat Gan. Pyramid analytics also has offices in the UK and Netherlands.
  
  
• Google has splashed a reported $60 million on a Chinese startup specialising in Artificial Intelligence, taking a minority stake in the company. Mobvoi, founded in 2012 by former Google employees, makes Chinese language voice recognition software which is available on Android, Android Wear, and Google Glass devices as well as iOS and Wechat. While the exact amount has not been disclosed, Google's investment takes its total funding to $75m, which values the firm at around the $300 million mark. 
  
  
• China ride-hailing app Yidao Yongche said that a unit of Beijing-based technology company LeTV has agreed to invest $700 million in the firm in return for a 70 percent stake, according to an e-mailed statement on Tuesday. LeTV, which includes Shenzhen-listed Leshi Internet Information and Technology Corp Beijing, earlier on Tuesday said it would acquire the stake, becoming the controlling shareholder, without disclosing the size of its investment.
  
  
• Enterprise health insurance software and services leader Collective Health has secured $81 million in Series C funding. The round includes financing by new investor Google Ventures and returning investors NEA and Founders Fund along with Maverick Capital, Redpoint Ventures and RRE Ventures. Collective Health will use the new funding to offer its employer health insurance solution to companies nationwide in 2016, expanding beyond California for the first time.
  
  
• Gritstone Oncology, a cancer immunotherapy company developing next-generation, personalized cancer therapeutics, announced a Series A financing of $102 million. The financing will support discovery and development of novel tumor-specific neo-antigen (TSNA) based immunotherapies, with an initial focus on lung cancer. The financing was co-led by biotechnology investors Versant Ventures and The Column Group, with Clarus Ventures alongside. Other investors include Frazier Healthcare Partners, Redmile Group, Casdin Capital, and Transformational Healthcare Opportunity, a special-purpose vehicle for private investors.

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