AAA Weekly corporate venturing deal net: 7-11 July 2014

Weekly corporate venturing deal net: 7-11 July 2014

India-based price comparison website Reviews42 has raised $5m in a series B round led by investment firm Tiger Global Management that also featured Bertelsmann-backed venture firm Nirvana Venture Advisors and Blume Ventures. Nirvana and Blume provided an undisclosed amount for the company’s series A round in April 2013.

Spark Labs, the US-based creator of an open source operating system for connected hardware development, secured $4.9m on Tuesday from backers including O’Reilly AlphaTech Ventures, the corporate venture capital arm of media group O’Reilly Media. The investors also included Lion Wells Capital, SOSventures, Collaborative Fund and a consortium of strategic angels, and follows $570,000 raised by Spark on crowdfunding site Kickstarter in May 2013.

Mobile social network Gree led a $4.5m series A round for China-based hotel room booking app HotelQuickly on Thursday that also included Willian Heinecke, the CEO of hotel company Minor International. HotelQuickly raised $1.1m in seed funding from angel investors in October 2013.

Telecom Digital Ventures, the investment unit owned by New Zealand-based Telecom Digital, invested an undisclosed amount in New Zealand-based app creation tool builder App La Carte on Monday. Founded in 2012, App La Carte enables companies to build their own mobile apps without the high development costs traditionally required.

India-based mobile payments startup Pokkt has secured $2.5m from Singtel Innov8, the venture capital arm of telecommunications company Singtel, as well as Jungle Ventures, Jafco Asia and Ganesh Krishnan, Tech in Asia reported on Tuesday. The funding followed a Jungle-backed seed round in October 2013 and will be used to expand into additional Southeast Asian markets.

Fuisz Media, a US-based developer of interactive video technology, has raised $2.1m in a seed round backed by United Talent Agency, strategic advisory firm Mesa+, Metamorphic Ventures, Lerer Hippeau Ventures and Science Inc., as well as additional private investors, according to TechCrunch. Fuisz has already secured Nike, Target and Walmart as customers for its online video service.

IDG Capital, a venture capital subsidiary of data and publishing company IDG, led a $1.85m seed round for US-based image-centred productivity app creator Landscape Mobile today, participating alongside unnamed angel investors. Landscape is the developer of Sight, an app that uses images instead of words for URLs for mobile devices in order to simplify the linking of information.

US-based mobile community creator Amino has secured $1.65m from Google Ventures, internet company Google’s corporate venturing unit, as well as SV Angel, Box Group, Slow Ventures, Launch Angels and assorted angel investors, TechCrunch reported on Tuesday. Amino’s communities work like mobile versions of traditional forums, allowing users to download apps through which they can communicate with others.

German government and corporate-backed venture capital fund High-Tech Gruenderfonds made a €500,000 ($680,000) seed investment in Germany-based parking space mapping app ParkTag on Monday. ParkTag will use the money to further develop the real-time big data system that forms the basis of its app, which can help users find on-street parking, locate their car once it is parked and remind them when their parking meter is due to expire.

High-Tech Gruenderfonds also invested an undisclosed sum in Sablono, a Germany-based developer of architectural planning software, on Thursday together with construction software producer Nemetschek Allplan. HTGF and Nemetschek will each take an equal stake in the startup, which will enable project managers and construction firms to record the progress of a building as it is built.

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