Another busy week for investors and companies looking to expand has come to a successful end. Starting a new business is typically challenging, especially when it comes to raising money to fulfill an important milestone. Usually startup entrepreneurs secure funds from family, friends and mostly from their own funds when they start. Angel investment is a common second round of financing for start-ups. Venture capitalists are approached for larger funds.
Most large firms usually hunt for technologies and talent to boost their offering and products and this week was no different for search giants like Yahoo and software companies like McAfee. Yahoo acquired two startups but will shut them down because it needs just the mobile talent behind those startups. McAfee is paying $389M for firewall products which is understandable because McAfee develops software security products.
These are the 13 startup funding and acquisitions we spotted this week.
1. Yahoo acquired two companies–Milewise and GoPollGo–both companies will be shut down whilst employees join Yahoo mobile team. Financial details of the two, separate transactions were not announced. GoPollGo is a real-time polling tool that lets brands and media properties collect and analyse feedback whilst MileWise is a flight rewards app.
2. NetSuite acquired OrderMotion, a developer of software used for B2B and B2C billing, ordering, and fulfillment. Financial details of the acquisition were not announced by the company.
3. Eleven-month-old startup Coinbase raised $5M in a venture capital funding round. According to WSJ it’s the largest funding round to date for a Bitcoin startup. The $5 million investment was led by Union Square Ventures.
4. HealthTap, which operates an online and mobile service which lets users ask doctors health questions, secured $24M in a Series B funding. The funding was led by Khosla Ventures.
5. San Francisco-based real estate site Trulia acquired Market LEader, a provider of customer relationship management (CRM) software for the real estate industry. Trulia said it would pay approximately $355M.
6. About.me, an online service which lets users create their own, one-page profile about themselves on the Internet acquired Wefollow, an online directory of people other users can follow from their interests.
7. YouEye, which operates a facial recognition-driven, user testing service for web designers, scored $3M in a funding round. The round came from Bobby Yzdani, Brian McClendon, and Beth McClendon.
8. Chute, a developer of software to power the photo sharing and social infrastructure for mobile app developers, raised $7M in a Series A funding round. The round was led by Foundry Group.
9. CircleUp, which operates an online, crowdsourcing site aimed at consumer companies, raised $7.5M in a Series A funding. The firm said the funding was led by Union Square Ventures.
10. Google Ventures, the venture capital arm of Google, snagged away MG Siegler from CrunchFund, naming Siegler a General Partner at the firm. According to Google Ventures, Siegler will focus on seed and early stage investments.
11. Clustrix, which develops cloud-based SQL databases, secured $16.5M in a Series C funding round. The funding came from Sequoia Capital, U.S. Venture Partners, ATA Ventures, and Don Listwin.
12. LiquidSpace, a startup which operates a marketplace for empty desks and meeting space (think “Airbnb for office space”), raised $1.3M in new, Series B funding.
13. Santa Clara-based security software developer McAfee, which is owned by Intel, acquired Stonesoft Oyj, a developer of firewall products. McAfeee said it will pay approximately $389M in cash for Stonesoft, which is based in Helskinki, Finland.
