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Go Launcher Developer Raises $20M From Kingsoft, Qihoo360 Ahead Of IPO
Go Launcher, an Android app maker out of Beijing that has been around for nearly a decade and has 42 million monthly active users across a portfolio of apps, just picked up $20 million in funding from Chinese antivirus software giant Qihoo360 and Kingsoft. Technically, it’s Go Launcher’s parent company Sungy Mobile that picked up funding ahead of an IPO. The company filed go to public… Read More
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The Sub-$200 Moto G Smartphone Is Google’s Answer To Android’s Laggy Low-End
When Google bought Motorola there were plenty of theories about why it wanted the mobile maker. Patents, being named chief among them. But today’s launch of the low cost Moto G smartphone suggests the strategy was -- or has certainly become -- multi-faceted. Google is using Motorola to chide and school its Android OEMs on what it takes to make decent budget handsets. Read More
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Discover “The Red Web” At TechCrunch Shanghai, November 19-20
In August, TechCrunch launched a landmark Chinese edition in partnership with super awesome Chinese blog TechNode. Now we are coming together again, and bringing in some of the leading entrepreneurs, investors and others in the region, for our first joint event in Shanghai on November 19-20. We're calling the event "The Red Web." Read More
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Backed By Sequoia, Zomato Closes $37M Series D To Expand Its Restaurant Discovery Service Internationally
Zomato wants to eat Yelp's lunch. The Indian restaurant discovery service has been chipping away at the space since 2008, mostly in its home market. Today it's closed a $37M funding round from Sequoia Capital and existing local investor Info Edge to supersize its international expansion plans. It's raised a total of around $55M to date. Read More
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With An Eye For International Growth, Twitter Sharpens Its Focus In India
One of the persistent themes in pre-IPO Twitter's S-1 filings is that the company has more users outside of the U.S., but when it comes to making money, that shifts drastically -- an issue problematic enough that Twitter spells it out in the prospectus as a warning about its business. Today, however, the company launched a new India blog -- a sign of how Twitter hopes to address that disparity in… Read More
Asia Writers
TCTV
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Validic
- Size $760K
- Round Seed
- Investors Mark Cuban
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LayerGloss
- Size $386K
- Round Seed
- Investors Hans Veldhuizen
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Compellon
- Size $620K
- Round Debt_round
- Investors Not available
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TVSmiles
- Size Not available
- Round A
- Investors German Startups Group, Ventech
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Yesware
- Size $1.2M
- Round B
- Investors Battery Ventures, Foundry Group, Golden Venture Partners, Google Ventures ... See More
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MeraDoctor
- Size Not available
- Round Unattributed
- Investors Accion
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Signum Biosciences
- Size $1.6M
- Round Grant
- Investors Not available
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BrightTag
- Size $27M
- Round D
- Investors Yahoo! Japan, Baird Capital, EPIC Ventures, I2A Fund, Pritzker Group ... See More
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CytoVale
- Size Not available
- Round Seed
- Investors Breakout Labs
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Mirada
- Size $1.7M
- Round Unattributed
- Investors Not available
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Cloudfind
- Size $697K
- Round Angel
- Investors Not available
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TouchBistro
- Size $4.5M
- Round Seed
- Investors Relay Ventures
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Appia
- Size $5M
- Round Debt_round
- Investors Not available
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Synoste Oy
- Size $3.6M
- Round Unattributed
- Investors Finnvera Venture Capital, Lifeline Ventures, High-Tech Gru00fcnderfonds ... See More
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Graphsql
- Size $2.5M
- Round Seed
- Investors Not available
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Pareto Biotechnologies
- Size Not available
- Round Unattributed
- Investors Breakout Labs
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OneSpot
- Size $5.3M
- Round A
- Investors Mohr Davidow Ventures, Mack Capital, Capital Factory, RSL Ventures, Brett ... See More
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Kidaptive
- Size $10.1M
- Round B
- Investors Formation 8, Menlo Ventures, Stanford University, NewSchools Venture Fund ... See More
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TinyCo
- Size $20M
- Round B
- Investors Pinnacle Ventures, Andreessen Horowitz
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Poll Everywhere
- Size Not available
- Round Crowd
- Investors Not available
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Slyce
- Size $2.2M
- Round Debt_round
- Investors Not available
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Snowshoefood
- Size $300K
- Round Debt_round
- Investors Not available
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MovieLaLa
- Size Not available
- Round Seed
- Investors Jim Moloshok, Larry Braitman, Adam Nash
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Greenhouse Software
- Size $2.7M
- Round Unattributed
- Investors The Social+Capital Partnership, Resolute.vc, Nick Ganju, Seth Goldstein ... See More
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HCI
- Size Not available
- Round B
- Investors Not available
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Genapsys
- Size $37M
- Round B
- Investors StartX, Decheng Capital, IPV Capital
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Playrcart
- Size $250.3K
- Round Crowd
- Investors Not available
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Intelligent Business Entertainment
- Size $1.4M
- Round Partial
- Investors Not available
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Verisante Technology
- Size $1.1M
- Round Seed
- Investors Not available
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Turbogen
- Size $170K
- Round Partial
- Investors Not available
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After $102M Loss In Q3, HTC To Slash Operating Costs By 24%, Focus On Selling Cheaper Handsets
Struggling Taiwanese mobile maker HTC is planning to slash costs by nearly a quarter and sell cheaper handsets in the hopes of turning a profit in its Q4, it said in an investor call today (via Reuters). It also confirmed its Q3 net loss: this stands at NT$3 billion ($102 million), up slightly on the preliminary figure of NT$2.97 billion it released in October. Read More
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Windows Phone Still Making Inroads In Europe, Now Accounts For 1 In 10 Smartphone Sales, Says Report
Windows Phone is continuing to make inroads into the European smartphone market, according to the latest smartphone sales data from Kantar Worldpanel ComTech, for the three months to September 2013. Kantar's data shows that Windows Phone now makes up one in 10 smartphone sales across the five major European markets (Germany, the U.K., France, Italy and Spain). Read More
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After Silk Road Closure, And With Baidu’s Blessing, Bitcoin Breaks $200 Again
The value of a single Bitcoin has broken the $200 mark for only the second time. The cost of a single Bitcoin hit a high of more than $205 earlier today on the biggest Bitcoin exchange, Mt. Gox, although it's since dipped slightly. At the time of writing it's still trading at above $200. Read More
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GGV Capital Brings On Early Xiaomi-Backer Hans Tung As Their Newest Partner
GGV Capital, a cross-border venture capital firm that focuses on China and U.S., is bringing on its sixth general partner through hiring Hans Tung from Qiming Ventures. He’s a VC that made an early bet in Xiaomi, a Chinese handset maker that piggy-backed off the Android ecosystem to build a business that was most recently valued at $10 billion. The firm and Tung have known each for about… Read More
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Chinese Game Developer Chukong Raises $50M Series D Led By New Horizon
Chukong, one of China’s largest mobile game developers, has picked up $50 million in extra funding led by Chinese private equity fund New Horizon Capital. It comes on top of three previous rounds that included investors like GGV Capital, Sequoia Capital’s China fund, Disney’s Steamboat Ventures and Northern Light. That brings the company’s funding to a whopping $83 million… Read More
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Supercell Dominates The Realm: Game Maker Sells A 51%, $1.53B Stake To SoftBank and GungHo Online
Another big move for Softbank into the gaming world, and a massive investment for Finnish gaming juggernaut Supercell: the company is selling a 51% stake for $1.53 billion to Japan's SoftBank and games developer GungHo OnLine Entertainment. This strategic investment, which makes Supercell a subsidiary of Softbank, will be used to fuel Supercell's global expansion. It effectively represents a… Read More
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Flipkart Raises Another $160M For Its Amazon-Style Indian E-Commerce Marketplace
Flipkart, India's largest e-commerce marketplace that's often referred to as the "Amazon of India," has raised another $160 million. This is an extension of the $200 million raise announced in July of this year, with the final $360 million Series E round the largest ever to be raised by an Internet startup in India. It brings the total raised by Flipkart since 2007 to $540 million. Read More
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Verbase Is A Search Startup Using ‘No Ads’ To Lure Users To Fire Its Crowdsourced Engines
Hong Kong based startup Verbase -- currently billing itself as "a search engine with clean and pure results" -- reckons it has a chance to inch into the search market by offering something different to category leader Google. Namely: no ads, no spam and, down the line, crowdsourced content to augment its core search results. Read More
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Mobile Messaging App Line Bags 10M Users In India, Readies Bollywood Marketing Push
Mobile messaging app Line, which has been on a marketing push in India, has added 10 million Indian users to its registered users count in around three months, as it prepares to kick off a Bollywood actress-backed TV ad campaign in the country. Since officially launching in India, Line said voice calls on its service have grown 3,200 %, use of stickers is up 1,800%, and messages have grown by… Read More
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HTC Vs. Samsung & The WinDroid Nuclear Option
It's a tale of two very different fortunes in the mobile-making market. HTC has today announced preliminary results for its Q3, recording a net loss of around $101 million on total revenues of $1.6 billion -- the veteran mobile maker HTC's first ever quarterly loss. With Samsung it's the opposite story today: it says it's expecting record profits in its fiscal quarter. Read More
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A Chinese Mobile Startup With Global Reach: Android-Based GO Launcher’s Apps Touch 80M Monthly Actives
Update: An earlier version of this story had a headline that suggested only one of GO Launcher’s apps had 80 million monthly active users, when that user base is, in fact, spread across all of its apps. As I’ve written about before, while the Chinese startup scene is sometimes criticized for producing copycats of Western businesses, there are emerging entrepreneurs building software… Read More
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Pakistan’s Sindh Province To Ban Skype, Viber For 3 Months Over Terrorist Usage, Demanding More Data Access
Pakistan is known for a long-standing ban on YouTube and occasional blocks of sites like Facebook and Twitter. Today, the government in one large part of the country said that it was planning to block two more social media services -- Skype and Viber. Read More
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Elliptic Labs Launches Android SDK For Its Ultrasound-Powered Mid-Air Gesture Tech — Phones With ‘Touchless’ UI Landing In 2H 2014
Elliptic Labs, a startup that uses ultrasound technology to enable touchless, gesture-based interfaces, has finally pushed its tech into smartphones. It's been demoing this at the CEATEC conference this week but today it's announcing the launch of its first SDK for Android phones. Elliptic's tech is able to work with any ARM-based smartphone, and it expects commercial devices to land next year. Read More
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Pitango Closes New $270M Fund Backed By Asian Money To Fuel More Startups Coming Out Of Israel
Israel's startup scene has taken another big step forward today. Pitango Venture Capital, the Israel-based investment company behind like Apple-acquired Anobit, Samsung-acquired Boxee and many others, has closed a $270 million fund, which it will use to back "Israeli companies and companies with an Israeli nexus" that may otherwise be operating in the U.S. and Europe, according to Chemi Peres… Read More
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Chasefuture’s Platform Coaches Mainland Chinese Students On University Admissions
The allure of top-tier Western universities isn’t lessening anytime soon for the hundreds of thousands of Chinese high school graduates emerging out of the country’s best schools. That’s why a host of different startups helping mainland high school students with admissions like InitialView have cropped up in the last year or two. Chasefuture, a one-year-old startup from serial… Read More
