US-based online academic publication platform Academia.edu has raised $16m in a series C round led by internet group Tencent that also featured venture capital firm Social Discovery Ventures, EdSurge has reported.
Academia.edu has built an online directory for academic papers that links to a social network for their creators, and it claims to host 23 million research papers.
The company recently introduced a mobile app and a paid subscription option that offers advanced search abilities and the chance to receive notifications when a user’s work is cited by others in the Academia.edu community.
The series C round brought the total raised by Academia.edu to almost $35m, including $11.1m in a 2013 round led by Khosla Ventures that also featured Spark Capital and True Ventures, and $1m from Social Discovery Ventures in 2016.
Spark Capital and True Ventures had previously participated in a $4.5m series A round for the company in 2011 that followed earlier funding from Spark and angel investors including Mark Shuttleworth, Thomas Lehrman and Rupert Pennant-Rea.