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Y Combinator backed Digital Payment Firm Cashfree raises $35 million

25Nov By PriyankaNo Comments

FUNDING

Y Combinator backed Digital Payment Firm Cashfree raises $35 million

Bengaluru-based fintech, Cashfree raises USD 35.3 million (approximately ₹ 260 crore) as part of its Series B round. The investment was led by Uk based Apis Growth Fund II, with participation from existing investor Y Combinator. Cashfree, a payments and banking technology company that enables businesses in India to collect payments online and make payouts, was founded by Akash Sinha and Reeju Datta in 2015. The company is a 2017 alumnus of Y Combinator, the start-up incubator based in San Francisco, and has grown exponentially, processing over $ 12 billion annualised payment volumes as of March 2020, the statement said. Cashfree said it has been profitable since its first year of operations and counts more than 50,000 businesses amongst its merchants including internet compani...

MindTickle raises $100 mn by Softbank Vision Fund 2

16Nov By PriyankaNo Comments

FUNDING

MindTickle raises $100 mn by Softbank Vision Fund 2

Sales readiness platform MindTickle raises $100 million (approximately Rs 745 crore) in a combination of equity and debt financing led by Softbank Vision Fund 2. The existing investors, Norwest Venture Partners, Canaan, NewView Capital, and Qualcomm Ventures, also participated in the round. MindTickle provides data-driven solutions for sales readiness and enablement that fuels revenue growth and brand value for hundreds of companies across the world. MindTickle has offices in Pune, San Francisco, and London. The company will use this new round of funding to accelerate platform activities and expansion of global operations. "As customers become increasingly demanding and remote work becomes more common, organizations realize the need to reskill and upskill their employees on a...

IBM to Acquire SAP Consulting Partner TruQua

16Nov By PriyankaNo Comments

ACQUISITION

IBM to Acquire SAP Consulting Partner TruQua

ARMONK, N.Y., Nov. 16, 2020-- Global IT firm IBM acquire TruQua Enterprises, an IT services and consulting SAP development partner. TruQua specializes in delivering finance and analytics solutions to Fortune 500 companies. This acquisition shift IBM strategy from legacy enterprise systems and siloed processes to cloud-based integrated and streamlined finance functions such as cash flow, budgeting, and consolidations is critical in today's rapidly evolving marketplace. TruQua will enable IBM to broaden its consulting expertise and capabilities to help clients implement SAP solutions that will improve and automate financial management workflows, enhance operational efficiency, and, ultimately, drive an enterprise-wide transformation through the adoption of SAP S/4HANA, the latest g...

WhatsApp added Shopping button in its App

11Nov By PriyankaNo Comments

News

WhatsApp added Shopping button in its App

New York, 11th Nov. 2020: Leading messenger platform WhatsApp has added a new shopping button on its app to make it easier for people to discover a business catalog to get information about the goods and services offered by the firm. More than 175 million people message a WhatsApp Business account every day and more than 40 million people view a business catalog each month. "And, we want to make the shopping experience even better especially as we get ready for a holiday shopping season unlike any other when people will need helpful ways to make purchases remotely and businesses want digital tools to close sales," WhatsApp said in a statement. The new shopping button is available now across the world and will replace the voice call button, it added. To find the voice call butt...

VPN Platform Tailscale Raises $12M Led by Accel

10Nov By PriyankaNo Comments

FUNDING

VPN Platform Tailscale Raises $12M Led by Accel

TORONTO, 10th Nov 2020-- Corporate VPN platform Tailscale raises $12 million in Series A funding from Accel, with participation from Heavybit and Uncork Capital. Tailscale is a new kind of corporate VPN that helps remote teams and organizations securely access the services they need. Leveraging zero-trust architecture from BeyondCorp at Google and the WireGuard protocol, Tailscale makes network security accessible to teams of any scale. The company launched in April with a Seed round and has since served tens of thousands of customers a month. “A large fraction of the workforce is remote for the first time, forcing teams of every size to rethink security,” said Avery Pennarun, co-founder and CEO of Tailscale. “We offer an easy and fast way to leverage secure private networks ...

Spotify acquired adtech firm Megaphone for $235 million

10Nov By PriyankaNo Comments

ACQUISITION

Spotify acquired adtech firm Megaphone for $235 million

New York, NOV 10 2020: Sweden-based digital music platform Spotify to acquire podcast advertising and publishing platform Megaphone for $235 million. For podcast publishers, the acquisition will unlock innovative tools that will help them earn more from their work. This includes the opportunity to opt-in to have their content monetized, matching their listeners with even greater demand from advertisers. Spotify will soon make Streaming Ad Insertion available to all podcast publishers on Megaphone, the first time this technology will be made available to third-parties. With Streaming Ad Insertion, podcast publishers will be able to offer more valuable podcast audiences to advertisers based on confirmed ad impressions. Spotify has 1.9 million podcasts including biggies such as "Th...

Stonepeak acquire Astound Broadband from TPG for $8.1 Billion

3Nov By PriyankaNo Comments

ACQUISITION

Stonepeak acquire Astound Broadband from TPG for $8.1 Billion

PRINCETON, N.J., 3rd Nov 2020-- Stonepeak, a private equity firm specializing in infrastructure investing acquire Astound Broadband (Astound), the sixth-largest U.S. cable operator for $8.1 billion. Stonepeak will acquire the company from TPG Capital and Patriot Media Management. The transaction is expected to close in the second quarter of 2021 and is subject to customary closing conditions, including regulatory approvals. Stonepeak is partnering with Patriot Media, the industry-leading management team headed by Steve Simmons and Jim Holanda that currently manages Astound. The company is a premier broadband provider offering internet, entertainment, communications, connectivity, and fiber infrastructure solutions for residential customers and businesses of all sizes. Th...

Wipro Acquire Fintech Service Provider Encore Theme

28Oct By PriyankaNo Comments

ACQUISITION

Wipro Acquire Fintech Service Provider Encore Theme

BANGALORE, India, 28th Oct 2020 -- Wipro Limited (NYSE: WIT, BSE: 507685, NSE: WIPRO), a leading global IT company acquire Encore Theme, a specialist in providing SaaS and Cloud solutions in financial services for an undisclosed amount. Over the past decade, Encore Theme headquartered in Chennai, India has focused exclusively on implementing a broad suite of Trade Finance solutions, developed by Finastra, one of the world’s largest fintech, to financial institutions across the Middle East, Africa, India, and the Asia Pacific. They have successfully delivered more than 75 large scale Finastra Trade Finance projects for banks across these regions. Financial institutions are all looking to modernize their trade platforms and focus on the end-to-end digitalization of commercial routines...

Linktree Raises $10.7 Million Series A Led by Insight Partners and AirTree Ventures

26Oct By PriyankaNo Comments

FUNDING

Linktree Raises $10.7 Million Series A Led by Insight Partners and AirTree Ventures

LOS ANGELES, 26th Oct 2020-- Linktree, the trusted tech platform that connects audiences to a user’s entire online ecosystem, has raised $10.7 million in Series A funding, led by Insight Partners, an investor in Shopify, and AirTree Ventures, an early investor in Canva. The funding will accelerate Linktree’s expansion in international markets, including global team growth, and the evolution of Linktree’s product and functionality in new ways to deliver valuable user experiences. Linktree allows anyone from big brands to solopreneurs, celebrities to everyday content creators to build a microsite that houses their digital ecosystem, making it easier than ever to connect with their audiences wherever they are. In the same way Shopify and Stripe simplify the internet economy for eCommer...

BitTorrent acquire DLive, Launched BitTorrent X Ecosystem

23Oct By PriyankaNo Comments

ACQUISITION

BitTorrent acquire DLive, Launched BitTorrent X Ecosystem

SAN FRANCISCO, 23rd Oct 2020-- BitTorrent Inc., the leader in peer-to-peer (P2P) technology acquire live streaming platform DLive.tv and migrate all BitTorrent related services to one unified ecosystem named BitTorrent X. BitTorrent X represents the transformation of BitTorrent, a world-renowned peer-to-peer service from a software company into a conglomerate of decentralized storage and data protocols and content distribution platforms. The entirety of BitTorrent X’s utilities and services will be powered by the BTT cryptocurrency. BitTorrent started as a data transferring protocol used not long by over 2 billion users but also some tech giants such as Facebook, Twitter, and Blizzard. It also inspired the design of Bitcoin and the movement of decentralization. Acquired by Justi...

20Oct By PriyankaNo Comments

FUNDING

Bangladesh based ShopUp raises $22.5 Million in Funding

Dhaka, 20th Oct 2020: Bangladesh based digital store making platform ShopUp raises $22.5 million in a Series A round funding led by Sequoia Capital India and Flourish Ventures. VEON Ventures, Speedinvest, and Lonsdale Capital (Singapore) also participated in the round. The funding will use to extend its retail reach, as it deepens its partnerships with manufacturers and focuses on building tech-first infrastructure. ShopUp offers small businesses easy access to B2B sourcing, last-mile logistics, digital credit, and business management solutions. This helps these neighborhood mom-and-pop sellers achieve more profit with less effort, allowing them to focus their efforts towards engaging with their customers and business expansion. “COVID-19 has further underscored the need for ...

Pakistan unblock TikTok after it vows to moderate content

19Oct By PriyankaNo Comments

News

Pakistan unblock TikTok after it vows to moderate content

ISLAMABAD, Oct 19, 2020: The Pakistan Telecommunication Authority decided to unblock the video-sharing app TikTok after receiving assurance from Tiktok management to remove the vulgar content. The spokesperson of PTA said the TikTok management has assured the authority that it will block all accounts repeatedly involved in spreading obscenity and immorality and moderate content in accordance with local laws. The authority has not announced whether the app will be unblocked immediately. The authority had said at the time of the ban that the decision was made after it received complaints ‘against immoral/indecent content’ on the app. The PTA said it had issued a final notice to the app and gave considerable time to respond and develop and an effective mechanism for ‘proactive moder...